Interesting speculation on whether CIA and others 'buckled' to Administration pressure to get the WMD analyses it wanted. Given the crudeness of most hard-charging politicians, it wouldn't surprise me in the slightest. Before the war, I thought that if no WMD were present in Iraq (whether they had been destroyed long before or never existed in the first place), and Saddam Hussein was too proud or stupid to announce the fact to the world community, and the U.S. invaded anyway, it would be the greatest joke in the history of the world. It looks alarmingly like this scenario has come to pass. The simple absence of reliable information prior to the start of the war always seemed the biggest hindrance to getting any kind of international consensus, and the predisposition of the Bushies to conceal and spin just makes things worse. We are lucky this time, because the war itself has done a lot of good, but it's a sign of great dangers to come. Together with Bush's tax-cutting obsession, and Saudi-cuddling inclination, it's just another reason to want to bid these guys goodbye. The Democrats are so lame, however, that we may be seriously stuck for another four years - when the first Boomers start to retire and the real chaos in government starts.
Friday, June 06, 2003
Tuesday, May 20, 2003
My Trip To New Mexico, And Back
My preparations for the trip started slowly, during the week of May 5th, by catching up on some Davis Musical Theater Company (DMTC) money matters (where I'm treasurer), by catching up on sleep after DMTC ended its run of "Grease" (where I played Eugene the Nerd), and by doing some housecleaning. I left Persia Nelson (Katherine Arthur's daughter) in charge of the house, with the task of redecorating, rearranging the furniture, cleaning the place further, and otherwise making it a better place to live.
After Pam Lourentzos' ballet class on Sunday May 11th, I dragged my suitcase and a big painting by the artist Joe Ray to the airport. I bought the painting a year ago, on the Internet, with the assistance of Deborah McMillion-Nering, from MARS Artspace in Phoenix, for my sister Michelle's birthday, or for Christmas, but since I hadn't gone to N.M. lately, I still had the painting. There was only one place on the plane where the painting would fit (behind the very last seats, opposite their dedicated space for art portfolios), but at least there was a space: 32" x 39" is the largest size painting you ever want to take on one of Southwest's 737's. I lugged the painting through the Las Vegas airport, where we changed planes, but succeeded in getting it to Albuquerque intact, where I rented a car, and drove to my Dad's mobile home in the North Valley.
Arising late on Monday morning May 12th, I prepared to leave for Santa Fe to do genealogical research at the N.M. State Archives. I idly read the front-page story of the Albuquerque Journal:
SANTA FE - President Bush will get back to work today by pushing his tax cut and job creation plans at a Bernalillo business after spending a relaxing golf weekend in Santa Fe.
Bush will travel to Bernalillo to give a speech on his tax cut and economic growth plans at MCT Industries Inc. around 9:30 a.m., said Tucker Eskew, a White House spokesman.
I looked at the clock on the wall - it was 9:28 a.m. "Holey Moley, I'm late", I shouted! I quickly drove over to Bernalillo, N.M. (where my grandmother once lived, where numerous cousins live, and where I lived briefly when I was 3 years old), towards Santa Fe, 10 miles north of the Albuquerque city limits, exiting I-25 at the southern exit to Bernalillo around 10 a.m. Immediately, I noticed several Sandia Pueblo police cars blocking off what appeared to be a freeway frontage road, but I drove past, assuming that MCT Industries would be on the south side of town. When I couldn't find the place, I drove back to where the police cars clustered, and hesitated. I was confused, not only by the speech's location, but the unexpected appearance of a new-looking Mormon church where the road to my grandmother's old house should have been located, and by the abrupt appearance of a roadrunner racing across the street. Why did the roadrunner cross the street? Because Acme Industries was on the other side?
Anyway, I got back on the freeway, and went to Bernalillo's north exit from I-25, passing what was obviously MCT Industries, with its big American flag, and throngs of guests. Nevertheless, the formidable appearance of policemen, a few troops, lots of traffic, and a few protesters dissuaded me from turning on the frontage road towards the speech's location. Frustrated, I drove around back to the south side of town, established that the Mormon church had, in fact, not displaced the road to my grandmother's old house, and sneaked up close to MCT Industries, reaching the frontage road where it intersected Richardson Drive, south of the speech's location. I parked, and stood with a few locals from the mobile home park across the street, as well as policemen from Santa Ana Pueblo (every policeman in 20 miles must have been nearby). I guessed that, since Bush was traveling from the north, from Santa Fe, probably towards Albuquerque, to the south, he would have to pass this location. And we waited.
People entertained themselves. A man picked up his close-cropped 3-year-old son by placing his palms on either side of the kid's head and lifting him straight up, dangling the kid's body from the kid's head. Never would work with me! Several police motorcycles raced by in formation: first, a group of two cycles, and then a group of four. One woman smiled and said, "they're going to get a ticket!" I spoiled the joke slightly by stating the obvious: "I don't think so!" One African-American man, a local apparently well-known to the mobile-home-park folks, wandered down the middle of the frontage road, and a motorcycle cop stopped and ordered him off the road. Actually, I was surprised to see any local African-Americans - Bernalillo historically has had very few, but times must be changing.
Then, many cycles approached in formation, bracketing four vehicles - Bush's motorcade! As they drove past, I had trouble figuring out which vehicle was his (apparently the second, in front of the antenna-laden communications SUV). I couldn't see well through the tinted glass, and I was standing too far to the left to clearly see Bush himself, seated, as one should have expected, on the far right. The excited mobile-home folks saw Bush wave at them, though. I was very impressed. Imagine, Bernalillo, N.M., federal-aid-dependent capital of north-central N.M., hosting the President of the U.S.! Won't happen again in a hundred years! I figured he must have owed Senator Pete Domenici a favor, or something. After Bush passed, kids posed for photos with the Santa Ana policemen. Everyone seemed happy. So now, I've come close to seeing a sitting President three times, but not quite succeeded - I shook hands with Jimmy Carter, on October 4th, 1976, in Denver, CO, just before his election, saw a speech by Ronald Reagan at Arizona State University's Sun Devil basketball arena, in July, 1989, shortly after he had left office, and now almost saw George W. Bush.
A few national commentators took note of Bush's speech, which surprised me, given Bernalillo's obscurity. Michael Kinsley, at Slate, had an especially acidic take on MCT Industries. There was also an article concerning press manipulation that made reference to the Bernalillo speech, by Elisabeth Bumiller of the New York Times, reported in the Sacramento Bee on May 18th:
"And on Monday, for remarks the president made promoting his tax cut plan near Albuquerque, N.M., the White House unfurled a backdrop that proclaimed its message of the day, 'Helping Small Business,' over and over. The lettering was too small to be read by most in the audience, but just the right size for television viewers at home."
Afterwards, I drove around Bernalillo, taking note of the many changes that have accumulated over the years. I was surprised by the appearance of a "MTV Lane" in a mobile-home park near my grandmother's old house: just a coincidence, or some sort of honor for the music network?
On Monday and Tuesday, I drove to Santa Fe to do genealogical research at the N.M. State Archives, and on Wednesday I stayed in Albuquerque, at the old Public Library, where genealogical information is also available. By plowing through the data, I discovered that one ancestor, who moved from Mexico to N.M. in 1852, was a candymaker by trade. How strange is that? I now have a million questions about how that would have worked, especially in the very rural Old West. Did he pick the trade up in Mexico as a young man, or did he learn it in Santa Fe? Why did he move to very-rural Los Lunas, south of Albuquerque - it couldn't have been to practice his craft, could it? Was it a family tradition? But there is no one to ask - he's long gone! I also had some success in pushing back my Sena line of ancestors back to around 1800, but I don't know whether that is sufficient to connect my ancestry with that of the prominent Sena family of Santa Fe (that clan is so large anyway), but I hope so.
On a very windy and dusty Thursday May 15th, I travelled with my sister Michelle, to Madrid and Galisteo, N.M., on the high plateaus between Albuquerque and Santa Fe. I bought lots of stuff in the Madrid shops - Guatamalan wear, pretty paper constructions, a kaleidoscope, etc. After passing felons collecting roadside litter (from the nearby N.M. State Penitentiary?), we stopped at the cemetery in Galisteo, looking for Valdezes, but found none. Apparently we were near where Shirley MacClaine and her friends have their various estates, because we passed places like the Nizhoni School for Global Consciousness.
Upon our return, the entire family went to dinner, but afterwards we went to my sister Marra's house when we learned in a frantic call from her husband Ken that the winds had knocked a tree down on their house. The damage was minimal, fortunately.
I travelled again with my sister Michelle, to Santa Fe, on a calm and clear Friday, May 16th. We also stopped in Bernalillo, to see our grandparents' graves, located in the Our Lady of Sorrows Cemetery near the successful, obviously well-connected, and (to my alarm) ever-expanding MCT Industries. In Santa Fe, we visited the Veteran's Memorial Cemetery, where our mom, uncle, and aunt are buried. Drought-ridden Santa Fe water restrictions are making it hard for the Cemetery to keep the grass green, especially near where my mom is buried. We also shopped (I bought a pretty emerald-green aventurine jewelry box), and drove around aimlessly in the pretty hills, with all the beautiful houses.
Friday evening, after eating Mexican food that had apparently begun to go bad, I bid Albuquerque farewell and made a quick trip via a nausea-inducing Southwest 737 to Las Vegas, NV. The Las Vegas weekend was a hectic time, visiting the family of a college friend in the remote northern suburbs, my cousin's family in the somewhat-less-remote eastern suburbs, and with various gambling and discotheque forays on the Strip, which ended up mostly OK.
My first hosts were my UNM (University of New Mexico) college friend, Ira Gershin, and his family, consisting of wife Marci, and daughters Rachel and Beth (ages 11 and 9, respectively), son Daniel (age 7), and German Shepherd dog Midnight (nine months?). Ira and Marci greeted me at the airport, and helped me rent a car, which proved good for the flexible travel I had in mind that weekend. I stayed with them Friday night, even though that meant my paid-for hotel room at the Excalibur hotel on the Strip remained unoccupied that night (room reservations secured through Vegas.com, while reasonable, unfortunately can't be changed much less than a week in advance). Friday night, Ira and I went to the nearby (only five miles away) new Sun Coast casino, to play blackjack, where Ira lost, but I won ($547.50 - $200.00 = $347.50). It was a pleasant escapade for me, even though the Mexican dinner and I had to part company during the evening. After retiring at 3 a.m., I awoke to the early-rising children (around 7 a.m.) They were very curious about me, remembering a previous visit in January 2000, when I brought my dog Sparky, when Rachel still had allergies to dogs, and couldn't play with him as much as she wanted.
Ira and family were fun. Rachel tends toward intellectual pursuits, and she is a little anxious about making the transition to 6th grade. She is going to be having her bat mitzvah on Martin Luther King weekend in 2004. Beth, with her curious but attractive lisping speech, is showing signs of fulfilling a potential for beauty that I noticed as long ago as 2000. Daniel, age 7, is one very active kid. As Ira and Marci painted Beth's bedroom on Saturday morning, Daniel buttonholed me for hours with his Pokemon cards and Donkey Kong on the Nintendo 64.
After visiting Ira and family, I drove back to the Excalibur hotel, showered, and ended up playing blackjack at the neighboring Luxor casino for several hours Saturday afternoon. I won a lot of money ($1093.50 - $140.00 = $953.50, plus the previous $347.50 = $1301.00 total winnings). I left the Luxor at 5 p.m., to make my 6 p.m. dinner appointment with my (now elderly) cousins, Joyce Anton Krebs (also a descendant of the Sena clan) and her husband Ralph, who live on the east side of Las Vegas, way out on Tropicana Blvd., way past Liberace's museum (which, unfortunately, I didn't have time to visit).
I have noticed, in previous blackjack gambling, that prolonged time at the tables kills. Even if the odds are slightly in your favor (which they aren't, they are slightly in the casino's favor), the back-and-forth, win-and-lose nature of gambling will eventually cause you to lose your entire bankroll. The long-time winner is always the party with the biggest bankroll, namely, the casino. But if duration at the tables is limited by hard deadlines (e.g., by Ira's need to return home, or by my dinner appointment with the Krebs), it is still possible to come out ahead, or at least not lose badly, since deadlines impose some badly-needed discipline on the effort. According to the book named 24/7 (Living It Up and Doubling Down in the New Las Vegas), by Andres Martinez, published in 1999, which I was reading during this trip, the fiendish gambler and writer extraordinaire Fyodor Dostoevsky posed the need for detachment and discipline thus in a letter to his wife:
If one is prudent, that is, if one is as though made of marble, cold, and inhumanely cautious, then definitely without any doubt, one can win as much as much as one wishes.
I hadn't seen the Krebs in about five years. I arrived at their new home in a gated community and regaled them with stories of my good luck, plus my determination to buy everyone as big a dinner as they could handle - $1000 worth of pizza if they wanted. Even though Joyce had just worked a 12-hour shift as a security guard, she seemed happy and alert, and gratified to hear something else than a sad story about the casinos. Their son Christopher was also there. Christopher is apparently a refugee of the dot.com collapse in Silicon Valley, and who now commutes often between Las Vegas and Santa Clara, CA, for various property maintenance jobs. I bought them all a sumptuous all-you-can-eat dinner at Sam's Town casino buffet, although I tried to be careful, since memory of the Mexican dinner lingered. Ralph endeavored to help me with the genealogy work - he gave me a copy of his own Krebs masterwork. We also went on what seemed like a fool's errand, looking for an open Kinko's copying place at 9 p.m. on a Saturday night, in order to copy some Sena-related material. But I need not have worried: Las Vegas is THE 24/7 city. After getting lost, and suffering through a traffic jam near the UNLV stadium, where a heavy-metal concert was getting out, we were successful in getting the few pages I needed copied. It was a very pleasant visit!
By now I was anxious. I had a lot of money, and unless I spent it on goods, I was likely to lose it in the casinos. I decided to try, in a rather ineffectual way, to spend a portion of the winnings on goods. Racing back past Liberace's museum (now closed for the evening), I stopped at the Tropicana Blvd. Wal-Mart and went hunting for a new suitcase to carry my loot. I could have bought more items there, like a digital camera, but I was indecisive and not inclined to do product research at the instant. I returned to the Excalibur Hotel with just the suitcase, and went shopping there instead.
There is a Hat Shop at the Excalibur, where I started buying caps, wands, hats, etc. There was a very well-spoken 26-year old Filipino immigrant manning the counter, named Jose Melancio (Jomel) Clarito. He buttonholed me for about an hour in a cabbages-and-kings kind of discussion. He described the travails of being Filipino in these post-September 11th days, when many Filipino immigrants have lost employment because they are not native-born, for example, from the various airport security jobs that used to provide an good entry-level living. Plus casinos have the habit of dismissing entire boatloads of people, immigrants included, like all the pirates just dismissed en masse over at Treasure Island Casino. Jomel reminded me of what my friend Gabe MacAuliffe might have been like if he had been a Filipino immigrant growing up in gang-ridden Covina in the 80's rather than a native-born Californian growing up in Sacramento in the 70's. In any event, it was a pleasant discussion (I notice, in vapid and transient Las Vegas, a real yearning for people to make and hold human connections).
Afterwards, I wanted to see if the Studio 54 discotheque (named after the original New York club) at the MGM Grand Hotel, across the intersection of Tropicana Blvd. and the Las Vegas Strip from the Excalibur, was quite as exotic as I remembered it from my March, 2002 visit. On that night a year ago, I arrived on a Tuesday night, which is EDEN (Exotic Dancers and Entertainers Night), when these strange but beautiful working people can get in without paying cover. What an amazing spectacle! Acres of splendor! Hanging with the supermodels! So, passing by the New York, New York Hotel's loop-da-loop roller coaster (which I badly wanted to ride, but there was no freakin' time), I made my over to the MGM Grand.
Discotheques are a form of theater - personal theater. Live out your bacchanalian fantasies, exposed in perfect anonymity. As expected, there was no way to get in Studio 54 around midnight - it was still too early, and crowded, but there appeared to be a big party in the cavernous lobby outside Studio 54. From a tall platform, about eight women, dressed in platinum-blonde wigs, go-go-boots, and various mini-skirts and thin blouses, sang the 80's hit "I Want Candy" and did exactly the same hand-jive routine we had just done for "Grease" at DMTC (apparently it's been standardized):
I know a girl who's soft and sweet
She's so fine, she can't be beat
Got everything that I desire
Sets the summer sun on fire
I want candy
I want candy
Ought to see her with her hair hung down
Ain't no finer girl in town
Candy's just what the doctor ordered
She's so sweet she makes my mouth water
I want candy
I want candy
Candy on the beach, there's nothing better
But I like candy in slack's and a sweater
Some day soon I'll make you mine
Then I'll have candy all the time
I want candy
I want candy
Hmmm….. The beautiful crowd seemed to be too soused, and too inclined to preen, to give these women their full attention. So, I went off and played more blackjack, but lost this time (maybe because there was no hard deadline: $820.00, plus the previous $1301.00 wins = $481.00 total winnings for the entire trip, a modest overall win). At around 2:30 a.m., I finally entered the packed Studio 54 and danced with the very strange and exotic crowd there. Several go-go dancers, looking much like the platinum blondes outside (maybe they were some of the same ladies, since a DJ had now replaced the ladies outside), elevated themselves above the writhing crowd. They had similar go-go boots to the ladies outside, but wore strange mesh-like leotards, and those ever-popular thongs, of course. They pointed single ostrich feathers at the dancers with a sense of hauteur and command. A bare-chested man with painter pants and great abs, who looked liked he fell right out of a Kylie Minogue video, danced provocatively on another riser. Hordes of people shook and twisted in the dark on metal-mesh platforms suspended over the dance floor. Theatrical lights whipped to and fro in the cacophonous musical din, in a computer-driven frenzy.
I'm sure I stood out in this crowd like a baboon in a flock of birds, being much older and certainly funnier-looking, but I presumed upon their beneficent sense of tolerance, and just flailed around with the best of them. A few people seemed friendly, but it was hard to tell in the noise.
The dancing was not as energetic as I remembered a year ago. Rap/hip-hop music ruled for about 45 minutes, then 30 minutes of high-energy house, then back to rap/hip-hop. Two songs stand out in my memory. First there was Notorious B.I.G.'s enormous hit (featuring rapper Sean Combs, formerly known as Puff Daddy, who has now adopted the nickname Notorious B.I.G. preferred all along, P. Diddy), Going Back To Cali. Not only is the hook line mesmerizing in its chant-like way, but for once, my life, and Notorious B.I.G.'s (who was murdered in 1996), were moving along parallel directions: the early-morning wake-up call for a plane trip to California:
*phone number being dialed*
*phone rings three times*
[Biggie] Yo!
[P. Dad] Yo Big wake up wake up baby
[Biggie] Mmm, yo...
[P. Dad] Yo Big wake yo' ass up c'mon
[Biggie] I'm up! I'm up. *mumbling* I'm up I'm up
[P. Dad] Big, wake up!
[Biggie] I'm up diddy, what the fuck, man? What's up?
[P. Dad] C'mon now it's a quarter to six we got the 7:30 flight
[Biggie] Mmm, *mumbling* yeah
[P. Dad] Yo Big Big, Big
[Biggie] Yeah I hear you dogg, I hear you, alright, 7:30
[P. Dad] Yo take down this information
[Biggie] Ain't no pen
[P. Dad] Tell your girl then to remember it or somethin
[Biggie] Aight honey, yeah write this down
[P. Dad] Aight, ummm, flight five-oh-four
[Biggie] Five-oh-four
[P. Dad] Leaving Kennedy
[Biggie] *mumbling* Kennedy
[P. Dad] On the L-A-X
[Biggie] Oh! Cali??
[P. Dad] No doubt baby, you know we gotta get this paper
[Biggie] Ahh, no doubt, aight
[P. Dad] You aight?
[Biggie] I'm up, I'm up
[P. Dad] Yo Big
[Biggie] I'm UP man
[P. Dad] Flight five-oh-four
[Biggie] Alright 7:30 I'ma meet you at the airport
[P. Dad] California
[Biggie] Yeh
*phone clicks*
etc.
Chorus:
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
etc.
(Lyrics available here, or here).
Then there was also the huge summer 2002 House hit by Who Da Funk (featuring Jessica Eve), called Shiny Disco Balls. This song was very popular, especially in U.K. dance clubs, and is practically THE Las Vegas anthem among Clubbers the world over. It gave me the greatest pleasure to hear the tune, at last, in its proper environment, a Las Vegas discotheque….
Drugs...
rock 'n' roll...
bad-ass vegas whores...
late-night booty calls...
shiny disco balls...
I danced till about 4:30 a.m. or so, retired back to the Excalibur, and restlessly twitched in bed until the 6 a.m. wake-up call from the Excalibur automatic attendant:
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
I'm going going, back back, to Cali Cali
I'm going going, back back, to Sacramento
Upon returning to Sacramento, sleepy and barely awake, I was amazed at the progress Persia Nelson had made in improving the house. The room previously known as the pinko-stinko room, partly because of the pink carpet (even before the bunny's litter box was housed there) is now the sharpest room in the house. Vast improvements and Persia's discerning eye at work everywhere! I was even able to make Pam Lourentzos' Sunday ballet class at 11:30 a.m. Then afterwards, a nap, and back to the DMTC routine, with "Show Boat" rehearsal that evening.
End of trip!
Tuesday, May 13, 2003
Quick Note
On Monday George W. Bush gave a speech at a factory in Bernalillo, NM. I learned about it in the morning paper and raced out there, and I got to see his motorcade rumble past. A fun tale I will expand upon later.
Later, this weekend, a quick trip to Vegas. Should be fun!
Saturday, May 10, 2003
Upcoming Trip To NM
No Condemnations For The Excess
The revelation regarding Bill Bennett's excesses, and the failure of conservatives to roundly condemn the sin (if not the sinner), are just another sign that conservatives are sliding comfortably into more and more seats of entitlement, from which they will exercise power without conscience or limit. The excesses for which conservatives once pillioried liberals now bear a right-wing label. Deficit spending is now a conservative privilege, as are foreign adventures. Perhaps it's just part of the cycle of American politics, whereby the Democrats and Republicans covet the other's position, and completely switch positions over time (have you noticed the Red-Blue states of the 2000 election are nearly the mirror image of the 1900 election?) In any event, conservative ascendancy is looking like it's going to be pretty toxic for everyone who doesn't fit into a privileged elite of one stripe or another.
Regarding Bennett, much of the damage he's done is within his own family. Excess wreaths itself in lies, which start in response to very basic questions: "I miss you, everyone's been looking for you, where have you been?"; "where has our money gone?", etc. The damage continues with denials of a problem, assertions that no material harm has been done to the family, and bogus promises to stop gambling, with the entire family acting as accomplices. His excess, evasions, and outright lies form a poor basis from which to expound conservative virtues of sobriety, reserve, and honesty, yet he still has many defenders on the right! Family values indeed!
Here's an interesting link regarding Bill Bennett's problem.
Tuesday, May 06, 2003
Monday, May 05, 2003
We Finished "Grease" This Weekend
On the last Saturday, we had a strange audience that seemed overly reserved, unusual for a Saturday, but I was surprised by a wave of sympathy that rippled through the audience when Eugene gets pushed around at the dance just before the contest, when Miss Lynch, who officiates, says all couples should be boy-girl, and Roger says "Too bad, Eugene!" I had never felt that wave of sympathy before that last Saturday. There was a point in the show every night after the contest, when I ad libbed a line that was not in the script, to comic effect. The moment came when awards are given after the Dance Contest at the High School Hop. When Danny and Cha-Cha are presented with a trophy prepared by "Mrs. Schneider's art class", I shouted a line, sometimes, "Home Room!", or "4th Period!", or something to that effect. My ad lib line that night was "And Special Ed!" After the show, I learned that the audience had a significant number of kids with Down's Syndrome, which simultaneously explains the audience's reserve, and their sympathy for the underdog. Strange moments come when doing theater!
In my show biography, I told the story of Bob Chaney, a good friend from junior high school, high school, and early college years, but a consummate nerd - the best I ever met. Here is the story I related, in a caption below my picture, which was posted along with the rest of the cast's pictures in the lobby of the Varsity Theater in Davis:
I would like to dedicate my performance as Eugene the Nerd to my old junior high/college friend, Bob Chaney, the Prince of Nerds. Bob had all the requisite Nerd gear - checked shirt with pocket protector, thick glasses with tape on the temple, slumped shoulders. But Bob had the attitude down cold - a real inspiration, and what I try to capture with Eugene.
When Bob entered college, his grades fell sharply. Bob wouldn't write essays the way the English teachers wanted - his dream was to come up with the world's best manual for automobile repair, and so he would write - manuals. Confronted with essay demands in History class, he tried a "Comprehensive History of Automobile Repair Manuals since World War II". Bob already knew something the rest of us would learn only with the dot-com boom: there are a lot of really badly-written manuals in the world.
In our freshman year in college (New Mexico Tech - Socorro, NM - 1974), Bob had a dorm room at the east end of West Hall, which was unfortunate, because that was where the Hoovers (guess why they are called that), under the leadership of the infamous Wedge, held drunken air guitar parties all weekend long. Wedge and the Hoovers started calling Bob "Plebney", and began harassing him. Poor Bob slept in his closet, so as to avoid partiers spying through his window. One Saturday night, 'One Drunk Chick' pounded on his door shouting "I want to sleep with Plebney!" Bob opened the door, jabbed her with a pencil, and slammed the door. The Hoovers were angry, and wanting revenge, when someone realized that they themselves were ultimately at fault. Who better than Bob, they reasoned, really represented the Hoover spirit? And so Bob became, after a fashion - the Hoover's mascot! And all lived happily ever after!
The moral of this story is: Each of us has the Hoover spirit deep inside, we just express it in different ways.
In any event, here are some pictures from DMTC's recent version of "Grease" (all photos by James Stark).
"Beauty School Dropout" - Megan O'Laughlin, Lauren Miller, and Stacia Truesdale
"All Choked Up" - Amber Jean Moore (Sandy) foreground; Lauren Miller, Dena Lozano, Lauren deMitchell, and Megan Garcia (The Pink Ladies); background Danette Bell-Vassar, Megan Garcia, Rebekah Shepard, Stacia Truesdale.
"Summer Nights" - Marc Valdez (Eugene), Tommy Callahan (Sonny), Richard Kuykendall (Kenickie), David 'Turtle' Akona (Doody), James Blumer (Roger), Josue Aceves, Brian Turner (Teen Angel)
"High School Hop" - foreground: David Holmes (Danny Zuko) and Claire Lawrence (Cha-Cha deGregorio); background: Mary Young (Miss Lynch) and Arthur Vassar (Vince Fontaine).
William Bennet's Hypocrisy
Thursday, May 01, 2003
Bush The Bully
Santorum's Arrogance Towards Gays
Job Loss Worry
Robust Occupation Recommendations
Thursday, April 17, 2003
Pontification And Rhetoric On The War
Marc (speaking to Walt):
I like much of what you have to say, with a few comments and caveats. I think I'll put the whole discussion on my blog, because it is so interesting. Here are my comments:
Many more civilian lives will be saved by deposing Hussein now, rather than letting his regime continue in power. After all, we accepted with equanimity the degradation of Iraq's health services that sanctions brought in the 90's, and the many (but barely noticed) civilian deaths that that degradation assuredly caused, because we thought it would be more humane than war. Not the least bit true, as it is turning out. All we did was perpetuate the agony.
Many people have not fully accepted that 9/11 was a deliberate murderous act, and that something like it can assuredly happen again - and again - and again. It's an inexcusable failure of imagination. I wrote elsewhere of the contempt I felt for the writers at The Nation, for their failure to grasp what happened even within their own city of New York. Much of that failure is rooted in simple, smug callousness, of the sort liberals used to flay conservatives about, before many liberals stopped paying close attention to what was happening in the world, and tried to force the world into their little Vietnam preconception box.
I've felt that there were good reasons to oppose war with Iraq, but purely of the tactical sort that people rarely mentioned in the months leading up to the war. I was always more worried about nuclear weapons in Iraq than many of the neocons were, and so I was hesitant to go charging in unless we had better information regarding disposition of the weaponry. I also thought the Bush Administration did a terrible job at educating the public and explaining its position. But the general advisability of getting Saddam out of power as soon as possible? How could a sensitive person not support that? And what can one only think of a person who would oppose that?
As you say, UN approval has never been required to go to war. Indeed, the UN has been directly involved in allowing war crimes to proceed (e.g. Srbenica, the Hutu refugee camps of Rwanda, etc.).
I did disagree with your full list of the "what ifs" that never transpired. NATO was vital to resisting the Soviet empire, but SEATO never played that important a role, since it did not oppose the totalitarian might of the Soviet Union directly, but rather the ambitions of restless satellite states, and indirectly at best. And I do not believe that Reagan and Thatcher's rearmament ventures had much importance in bringing down the Soviet Empire. Far more important to that collapse was Gorbachev's efforts to reform and deterrorize the Soviet Union. Gorbachev upended the careful balancing of subnational and ethnic interests in the Communist government by relying almost exclusively on Russians to run the show, which provoked ethnic anger among many in power in the provinces. In addition, power in the Soviet Union was BASED on terror - deterrorize in any meaningful way, and you lose all control of events. Once reform started, all the West had to do was persist long enough with its 45-year-old containment policy, and the Soviet Union would come unglued all on its own. Rearmament efforts, while helpful to modernize the U.S. military, were, in a major way, redundant and pointless.
Groups like Al Qaeda take a while to put together, and cost a lot to maintain - that's why we won't see 100 bin Ladens. Once formed, however, these organizations are hard to destroy. That's one reason why we must become more proactive.
We had good reason to believe Hussein wished us harm, but as long as he struggled under effective sanctions, he had trouble executing his plans. The decay of sanctions and the option he now had of using third parties like Al Qaeda ended our idyll. Best to take action sooner than later.Most protestors are not "anti-American", but they do seriously misunderstand the situation. I'm more worried about new efforts in conservative circles to limit the range of free thought, however. My brother-in-law, for example, believes Jimmy Carter committed treason by publicly announcing his opposition to the war, and should be punished accordingly. I say Carter should be able to say what he pleases. I guess that means I'm a traitor too, since I support Carter's right to air his opinion in public.
Attacking Iraq is not the best way to attack Arab terrorism, because we are targeting less-dangerous terror players, but the Baathists are evil in their own unique and special way, and we are doing the world a considerable service nonetheless by forcing them from power.
The news media has shown a profound ignorance of the international situation, as they almost always do regarding any big story, but especially so now, since the situation is so complex and full of nuance. It's hard not to get mad at the media's easy compliance with defeatism. I particularly remember Judy Woodruff on CNN, on the first Monday of the war, the day when the news was sinking in about the capture of the 12 American soldiers from Ft. Bliss, TX. Woodruff announced that it was a very bad day for Coalition forces, when, in fact, the forces were in great shape, racing almost unopposed for Baghdad. What planet was she on? Planet CNN, I guess. In a separate orbit from jingo-mad Planet Fox.
The U.S. should abandon the UN: having such a large irresponsible body beholden to no particular authority is causing many difficulties in the world.
Walt:
Marc: I wrote this in response to a liberal friend of mine who opposes the war. It may be somewhat strong on rhetoric, but I guess thats my style. I'm forwarding it to you for your entertainment.
Pete, Pete, Pete.
On April 7, in response to some humorous commentary which I sent, you responded:
Do you really think that because our news media never presents any details about civilian casualities that there haven't been any? Or that the number is small? Smaller than the number of people killed in the World Trade Center? Are you that naive? Out of curiosity, what do raging conservatives consider an acceptable number of civilian deaths in a war that is not prompted by overt hostility from the host country?
I gather that my razor sharp humor has cut a little too close! I'll lay off the humor for awhile, and speak seriously about my views on the war. My essay below has turned out to be longer than originally intended. Events are moving so fast that my views might look silly, stupid, or wrong next year. But I will risk being proved wrong by history, and record for posterity the Iraqi War, as I see it on April 13, 2003.
First, the civilian casualties. Of course there are many; hundreds dead and several thousand wounded by coalition forces. Add to that an unknown number of civilians killed or wounded since March 19 by the Baath regime. If food or water shortages worsen, it could get worse. I don't believe Americans are under any illusions about the civilian costs of this battle. Anyone who remembers that photo of the firefighter carrying the dead baby in Oklahoma City knows what happens in war.
Now about your question "what do raging conservatives consider an acceptable number of civilian deaths?" My first answer is that I don't know, because I'm not currently acquainted with any raging conservatives. But at a deeper level, this is an unfair question --trying to force someone to define or endorse an acceptable adverse outcome rate--questions like this are commonly used as insincere objections to all sorts of things. Its not just you; thousands of people use this rhetorical device every day to impeach problem-solving advances. I have heard it employed several times in my own company.
Manager: "We had 10 hand or finger losses in the factory last year. By installing guard covers on fan belts, we can reduce the injury rate by 70%".
Smartass 1: "Do you mean to say that 3 amputated hands or fingers per year is acceptable to this company?"Car Manufacturer: "Next year, we will introduce a reinforced frame which will increase survivability of high speed rollovers by 50%."
Smartass 2: "Does that mean you don't care about the other 50% who will die in your vehicles?"Military Spokesman: "The bomb explodes at depth, sending blast energy upward and not outward, thereby reducing civilian casualties."
Smartass 3: "Since it only reduces civilian casualties but does not eliminate them, you really don't care about civilians."So anyway, Pete, I won't say that fan belt covers are a good idea if they reduce injuries 90%, but a bad idea if they reduce injuries by only 70%. I won't say that 1,000 casualties are acceptable, but 10,000 aren't. I will say that I am impressed with the efforts the US is making to reduce or avoid civilian deaths, and proud of the US for doing it. I have never heard of anything similar in any other war, anywhere in the world, in the last 100 years. It is also obvious that we care more about the safety of Iraqis than the Iraqi government does. Finally, I am ready to accept civilian deaths which do occur, because I (and everyone I know who supports the war) believe that, over the next 10 or 20 years, fewer innocent people will die if we remove Saddam, but more innocent people will die if we don't. If I did not think so, I would not support the war. I respect the opinions of reasonable people who believe the opposite, but I do not agree with them. About 70% or 75% of the US agrees with me on this.
Please don't think that I am willing to accept civilian deaths only because they are not Americans. We all know that because of this war, American civilians at home may be killed, perhaps even in comparable numbers to Iraqi civilians. I work at a nuclear defense facility which stores and processes plutonium. Some of my coworkers are Muslims. I know that my workplace may be attacked, and it is not impossible that a truck bomb might blow up next to the building where I work. Furthermore, there is an operating nuclear reactor about 20 miles from my home, and 6 miles from my workplace. It is upwind.
Now I will explain why I (and the other 200,000,000 Americans) support the war.
The first task of any thinking person is to understand his own culture and time; anyone who cannot do that is truly lost. For our culture at the present time, the defining moment is September 11, 2001. Previous defining moments, like December 7, 1941, the 60's protest era, our Vietnam defeat, Watergate, fall of the Berlin wall, etc., are now history; but 9/11 rules the present. On September 11, we realized, finally, that some people want to kill us by the thousands, and by the millions, and they are learning how to do it. When the scales fell from our eyes, we saw, finally, the pattern of the last 35 years. This pattern consists of Islamic militants, wishing to do us harm, becoming increasingly bold, inceasingly murderous, and increasingly successful. We didn't notice before, not really, because previous successful attacks have mostly been in Europe or the middle east. But now the war has come home. We are 35 years into a religious crusade against our civilization (jihad is the Islamic term). The medieval crusades lasted 200 years. The religious wars of the Reformation lasted 140 years. I don't think there is any hope of this one ending within 20 years, no matter what we do. We can turn the other cheek, or we can fight. I vote to fight.
By attacking the Taliban and Al Qaeda, we are responding directly to the attackers of 9/11. However, Saddam has not publicly threatened harm to the US directly. So why attack him? We are fighting a pre-emptive war of self defense. Its been done before; the Third Punic War was fought for the same reason. The UK's declaration of war against Germany in 1939 could also be construed that way. A pre-emptive strike makes a lot of people uncomfortable; I too was uneasy about this initially. We have been subtly conditioned over the years to think that we are supposed to let the bad guy have first shot. Think of every John Wayne movie, Clint Eastwood movie, Steven Seagal, Schwarzenegger, Stallone movie; think of High Noon and every movie or TV show you've ever seen which shows a gun duel between a good guy and a bad guy. The good guy ALWAYS lets the bad guy draw first, and beats him because the good guy is faster. Its a comforting way to think; one never has to make a hard decision. The only problem is that its a fantasy. In real life, the guy who shoots first kills the other guy.
So why is Saddam is a danger to us? Just because he has not publicly announced an intent to attack our interests, does not mean that he is not our enemy. Not all bad guys give their victims fair warning. We think he is a danger because he is a sadistic, cruel, megalomaniac head of state with a personality akin to Stalin or Hitler. He has dreams of conquest. He is developing the same weapons that Al Qaeda wants to have in order to use against us. Recently, he has been using the same militant Islamic rhetoric that Al Qaeda uses. He has already used WMD on his own people, and on his neighbors. He was not deterred by repeated military defeat. He was not deterred by UN sanctions. He was not deterred by threats of military force from a superior power. I believe that he, like Hitler, would bring war to the world if he could. He has been working on the means to do that. Finally, if we did nothing, and he died of natural causes before doing anything, the WMD would still be there for use by other jihadist Muslims who have access to it, or who can buy it. That is why I and two hundred million others agree with President Bush; in this case we're willing to draw and fire before the bad guy does, despite the moral teaching of Clint Eastwood movies.
Having said that, I can respect someone who refuses to draw first, someone whose sense of morality and goodness won't allow him to shoot back until he's already been shot himself. It truly is a morally justifiable position. My only problem with that is, it is also a suicidal position. What about my own position: can I accept the (small) possibility that I'm wrong about Saddam? That he is not really a cruel megalomaniac trying to obtain the power to kill millions? Sure.
ALLOWING INNOCENT DEATHS
By supporting the war, I am willing to see US forces kill thousands of innocent people, unintentionally. It is a sobering thought; but I am not alone in being willing to let innocent strangers die in order to preserve something important to me. You are the same way, Pete. Lets do some thought experiments:
1. HIV STATUS. Suppose that back around 1985, when reliable blood tests for AIDS were introduced, that someone proposed to require everyone in the US to be tested regularly, and wear their HIV status on a non-removable hospital-style bracelet. Nobody goes to jail, but everybody knows who's infected. The results of such a proposal are obvious. HIV positive people would be fired from their jobs, they'd lose their friends, they'd become wards of the state, and nobody would have sex with them. The AIDS epidemic would have come to a virtual standstill, in 1985. This would have saved 50,000 to 100,000 lives in the US alone. Where would you have stood on this one Pete? Which do you value more: 100,000 innocent lives, or the right to privacy?
2. L.A. GANG SHOOTINGS. Last week the news said that 30 or 40% of homicides in Los Angeles are gang-related; its been that way for 10 or 20 years. Current due-process rules cannot stop the killing; I guess about 200 per year. How about letting cops detain suspected gang members without due process, and imprison them indefinitely, or relocate them to small towns in Kansas. Which is more important to Pete: 200 innocent lives per year, or the right to due process?
3. HIGHWAY SPEED LIMITS. I remember when you opposed raising the highway speed limit above 55 mph, partly because more people would die in accidents. However, if we wanted to save lives, we could have lowered the speed limit to, say, 25 mph. Almost nobody gets killed at that speed. I'll bet if we all drove 25 mph, the number of traffic fatalities would drop by 75%, or 30,000 lives saved per year! What do you think, Pete? Which is more important to you -- 30,000 innocent lives per year, or short commuting times?
Shall I turn your question around and ask how many AIDS deaths are acceptable to a "raging liberal" before allowing prospective sexual partners of carriers know who they are sleeping with? I will not--my point is not to imply that you have callous disregard for innocent life, but rather to show that everyone is willing, to some extent, to balance human lives against some concept or practice, with acceptance of a nonzero fatality rate -- which may actually be very high, as shown in the AIDS example and the speed limit example. You and I both are willing to see innocents die, and so is everyone else.
Now that I've explained why I support the war, let me talk of goals and conduct of the war.
NECESSITY FOR UN APPROVAL OF WAR
It is not necessary. There have been wars and revolutions in the world constantly since the UN was created. If anything definite can be said about the UN, it is that its track record in preventing war is little or no better than the League of Nations. It is not usual for belligerents to seek UN approval to make war. Furthermore, there is no US tradition, law or constitutional rule requiring international consent for US involvement in military conflict.
But should we, in the interests of peace and humanity, use the UN as a binding arbiter in matters of war, even if we don't have to? Should the US lead by example? I might consent, if I thought that the UN had the security and safety of the US as an objective. But I am convinced that the nations which opposed the US attack on Iraq did not do so because they felt it was in our best interest to sit still. Rather, I think that France's, Germany's, and Russia's positions were based on their own interests, not on ours. I see no reason to allow them to make our foreign policy if they do not have our best interests at heart.
"THE COALITION": FACT OR FANCY?
We get mixed signals on this--government officials claim that 40+ nations are part of the coalition, while opponents of the war make it out to be the US, UK, and nobody else. Whats the truth? First of all, I know from the news that at least 7 nations have sent troops: US, UK, Australia, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Poland, and Kuwait. The last four are not widely known, but I have heard references to their troops on CNN, Fox, and USA Today. I speculate that there may be a few more countries which I missed because I can't watch the news all the time.
Furthermore, it is obvious that about 6 to 8 Muslim States are helping us quietly by allowing us use of their land, air space, or the Suez Canal. Of course, some claim political cover by saying that the US can use their territory only for transportation of food and humanitarian supplies. But considering that armies can't function without food, and prompt humanitarian relief is our objective, it is clear that these countries are making our work easier.
Although much is made of protests in various parts of the world, we can learn something by where the protests are not occurring. I have not heard of any protests in a former Soviet Republic (except Muslim Uzbekistan, and Russia itself), nor in any "Iron Curtain" nations. You may remember the famous Chirac remark that eastern European nations "missed a good opportunity to be quiet" when they expressed support for the US. We're probably talking about nearly 20 European nations who know what totalitarianism is, and who support us. Spain, Portugal, and to some extent Italy, gave us valuable UN support during the diplomatic phase. Israel of course would gladly throw some nukes if we'd only let them.
Some other things that are conspicuously missing are: (1) an OPEC oil embargo against us, (2) a General Assembly resolution against us, (3) bombings or takeovers of US embassies, (4) violent denunciations from the Arab League . Why is none of this stuff happening?
WHAT IF WE FIND NO WMD?
I support the war because I feel that Saddam is an evil man with dreams of conquest, and that he has at least some WMD, and is trying to obtain more. I don't think anyone believes that Saddam does not possess poison gas. I don't think anyone believes that Saddam does not plan or dream about conquering other nations. Given this belief, my desire is to destroy his regime, and find and destroy as much WMD as possible. However, we do not need to find WMD to justify the war. If we know that Jesse James robbed a bank, we do not have to find the hidden loot in order to justify punishing him. Of course, finding WMD would give Bush and Blair valuable political cover; but we are not fighting the war for Bush and Blair.
It is possible that we may not find WMD soon or at all: it may be well hidden, underground, perhaps beneath a paved highway or parking lot, and those who know its location are either dead or otherwise beyond our reach. One image I have is of Hans Blix showing up at a factory, and peering underneath toilet lids, while his Iraqi escorts are laughing because his SUV is parked on top of the VX canisters. Another image is Saddam having a work gang pave over the WMD, and then killing the workers. Of course, some officials would need to know the location -- people who might have been killed in combat, or are out of the country, or disguised as ordinary civilians. Another scenario might have Saddam transporting WMD to a neighboring country, either before or during the war. Still another would have him subcontracting out the development or storage of WMD to another nation, perhaps even France, Germany, or Russia.
THE OTHER JUSTIFICATION FOR THE WAR
Although we are attacking Iraq as a pre-emptive self-defensive measure, for our own protection, we also happen to be liberating 24,000,000 people from a totalitarian regime which has kept itself in power for 30 years through internal terrorism and murder. Anyone who has watched TV footage of Iraqi crowds welcoming American troops to Iraqi cities knows this in their hearts. The war is justified on this ground alone.
JUSTIFICATION FOR THE WAR: A BROADER HISTORICAL VIEW
I owe this concept to a co-worker, a Brit who was born in England after the end of WW2. In February 2003, he was opposed to the upcoming war with Saddam, but not for the same reasons as Martin Sheen. He felt that we should have deposed him in 1991 (Saddam, not Sheen), and that he needed deposing, but it was too late now, because the 2003 war would be too big. In his view, the 1991 and 2003 wars against Iraq are analogous to WW1 and WW2 against Germany -- in both cases, the first war was not prosecuted sufficiently enough to convince the aggressors that they couldn't win, and the second war, though morally justified, was too costly (British interpret the cost of WW2 differently than we). This co-worker changed his mind about the 2003 war in early April. He now supports the war.
Historically, the 2003 war can be viewed not merely as a continuation of Bush senior's foreign policy, but also as a continuation of Wilson's, Roosvelt's, Truman's, Kennedy's, and Reagan's foreign policy. This is not the first time that the US and Britain have worked together to destroy a regime that oppressed its own people at home, and built a military machine for conquest abroad -- it is the fourth time we have done so! We destroyed Nazi Germany, Japan's dictatorship, the Soviet Union, and now Baathist Iraq.
Imagine what the world would be like if we did not supply Britain and the USSR in WW2. What if we never sent troops to Europe? What if we signed a treaty with Japan after Pearl Harbor, promising neutrality with any Japanese actions against China and Australia? What if we did not form NATO and SEATO to oppose Soviet expansionism? What if Reagan and Thatcher did not re-arm in the 1980s? What if we did not defend Kuwait in 1991, but rather declared neutrality with respect to possible Iraqi attacks against Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Qatar, UAE, or Oman? What would the world be like if our Presidents over the past 90 years adopted a Swiss style neutrality in all conflicts, or adopted one former President's policy of deterring totalitarianism by boycotting sporting events?
In this model, which I subscribe to, the international role of the US in the past 90 years has been to prevent Hitler, Stalin, and other dictators from over-running the planet and making George Orwell's "1984" come true. The war against Iraq is justifiable in the short term as self-defense against militant Islam, but also fits into this larger historical picture.
OPPOSITION TO THE WAR: "ONE HUNDRED BIN LADENS WILL RISE UP"
This remark by Mubarak is no bombast; it is a legitimate argument for not attacking Iraq. A reasonable person, having US interests at heart, could oppose the war on this basis, and many do. I respect that opinion; I do not consider such people traitors or "raging liberals". It is hard to make big decisions, because outcomes are difficult to predict. All I can do is tell you the way I read the situation.
The real danger to this country is not individual terrorists willing to die to blow up a plane or a McDonalds. The death rate due to such attacks is not great, considering that 280,000,000 people live here, and its been happening for 35 years. The danger lies in organizations or governments which have the technical resources and funds to develop or buy WMD. Bush knows this, so he has shifted the emphasis from forensic investigations and legal prosecution of individuals, to locating and attacking large organizations who wish to hurt us.
I don't think that 100 Bin Ladens will rise up. A thousand or ten thousand guys may pick up a grenade, but an organization like Al Qaeda or the Baath Party does not grow up overnight, and is not invisible when it does. We'll deal with the organizations as they come up. This is not to say that America will not be attacked on our own soil by individuals or small cells; of course we will. But each attack that kills 10 or 100 or 1000 people will merely hasten the day when the US will be ready to implement the one truly effective homeland defense: exclusion of all foreign Muslims from the US. This will probably occur after the next WTC-scale attack, or at the latest, the one after that.
OPPOSITION TO THE WAR: "NO BLOOD FOR OIL"
What should we think about all these protesters? They certainly do not represent mainstream American public opinion. The polls have been quite clear -- approval for the war since March 19 has held steady between 70 & 78%. There have been no protests in South Carolina, so I haven't met any protesters personally. I imagine they are the usual suspects -- college kids, leftists, ex-hippies. I did listen to one interview of a protester on NPR. This guy organized "A Day of Poetry Against the War". He was encouraging people to write poems protesting the Iraqi war, and he would post them on his Internet site. He read on the air his own personal contribution to this project-- a poem he wrote in 1975, protesting the Vietnam War. One thing is clear -- the most visible protest leaders are Hollywood bigwigs, folks who agitate for more fuel-efficient cars while they fly private jets for weekends in Aspen.
Are their reasons sound? As I said, there are legitimate reasons to oppose the war:
1. "Shooting first is morally wrong, even in self defense": I can respect this position, even though it is a death-wish when WMD is involved.
2. "We'll make more enemies than we remove": This position may have real merit, although to me, its an acceptable risk.
A third morally justifiable argument is "We have no proof Saddam means us harm". This is an extension of American criminal justice theory, which uses a "beyond reasonable doubt" test to justify use of force. I understand why reasonable people might apply that paradigm. I don't think you have to be crazy or anti-American to hold this position. Like "let the other guy shoot first", this idea has been subtly inculcated into all of us by countless courtroom dramas on TV and in the movies. However, the "beyond reasonable doubt" test is not the only possible legal rule, even within the American system. Civil courts use a "preponderance of evidence" test, as do other nations in their criminal justice systems. Furthermore, even in the US, a police officer is not bound by the "beyond reasonable doubt" test when deciding to use deadly force. Cops are authorized to use deadly force simply if they believe that their life, or the life of another, is in danger. This is the rule we are applying to Saddam.
Although there are good reasons for opposing the war, there are also bad ones. The one seen most often on TV is "NO BLOOD FOR OIL!" These people are the ones who do not understand their own culture, or their own time. Anybody old enough to remember 9/11/2001 knows why we are attacking Iraq. Trying to interpret the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, the actions of John Ashcroft, and the overwhelming public support for it all, without acknowledging the role of 9/11, is like trying to understand FDR's New Deal without knowing acknowledging the Great Depression. Another bad reason was given recently by Michael Moore: Bush brought this on to distract us from the real problem, the poor economy! I'd agree if I thought Bush engineered the WTC attack, but I don't think he did. The American people are not children, and Bush is not a hypnotist. We are facing an economic problem, and also a security problem. Everybody knows about both, and we showed clearly which was first priority last November, when one party emphasized one problem, and the other party emphasized the other. The "no blood for oil" people and the "Svengali" theorists do not understand their own people or their own time.
Another bad reason is endorsed by one of my co-workers. He thinks that George Bush has a personal ambition to fight a war, so he can be a "macho man", like Theodore Roosevelt. I don't think my co-worker's point of view is widely held.
Are the protesters "anti-American" or "traitors"? I would not want to publicly call them so at the present time. So far, their actions that I've seen on TV are within the bounds of what I consider acceptable public dissent. However, on a personal level, I have no doubt that many are in fact anti-American. I say this because I am half sure that several mutual acquaintances of ours are protesting the war. I would guess that George, Suzanne, the other Suzanne, Gretchen, and John F. (not the professor) might be in this group, if they hold the same views they did in the 80s. These people, when I knew them, felt that mainstream values of American society are on the wrong side of history. Two of them, both American citizens, visited communist countries during crisis periods, when war was not impossible, explicitly in order to show support for those communist governments, both of which were military dictatorships. If these people were not anti-American at that time, then nobody is anti-American, and the word has no meaning.
Significantly, none of the prominent war protesters have yet done anything close to what Jane Fonda did. Sean Penn, Susan Sarandon, Martin Sheen, Michael Moore, Natalie Mainz, Peter Arnett, etc., while clearly against the war, have not approached the behavior of "Hanoi Jane". To my knowledge, none have burned the flag, none have renounced their citizenship, none have symbolically killed US soldiers, none have offered material aid to Saddam's government. It could be that these folks, deep down, suspect that they themselves might possibly be on the wrong side of history. Or maybe they just don't want to risk losing a movie deal and be forced to sell their private jet.
IS ATTACKING IRAQ THE BEST WAY TO DETER ARAB TERRORISM?
I honestly don't know. If Congress, or ex-presidents, or Nobel Peace Prize winners, or professors, or Michael Moore, or Natalie Mainz, had any concrete suggestions, I'd certainly listen. However, I don't think the "Law and Order" approach will work: sentencing people to jail who are already willing to die will not deter anyone. I'm not optimistic about the "fix the economy and hope terrorists go away" approach, either. Until somebody comes up with a better idea, I'll support any president who fights back.
MILITARY CONDUCT OF THE WAR
Although I can't predict the ultimate political fate of Iraq, the military phase of this war has been perhaps the most successful in history. We conquered an aggressive military power of 24 million people, with a strong government, after warning them and giving them several months to prepare. When Bush gave Saddam 48 hours to leave, we implicitly told him the day and time that we intended to strike. We conquered them in 3 weeks, with about 130 Coalition deaths. The only comparable invasion I know of (in terms of military success, not justification) would be the German & Russian attacks on Poland in 1939 -- the Polish Government lasted 5 weeks. The analogy is not complete, however, because the attack was a surprise, it was not announced beforehand, Poland was not a military dictatorship, and the attackers did not try to save civilian lives.
What impresses me more than the military success, is the unprecedented manner in which we are respecting human life. Rather than employing "carpet bombing" in order to induce panic and chaos in the enemy's capital, a practice for which there is much precedent, we attack with expensive cruise missiles and smart bombs, in order to destroy government facilities without hitting residential neighborhoods. Missile attacks on government buildings take place at night, when buildings are empty. Rather than attack power plants -- legitimate military targets -- we leave them so civilians may enjoy electricity. We design bombs with upward blast patterns, to save lives. When the Iraqi army mixes with civilians, we don't shoot. When they store weapons in schools, we don't bomb. When 150 armed Fedayeen make a stand in a Mosque, we don't attack! But for two occasions which lasted minutes, we have not even raised the American Flag over there. Of all wars of the last century, I am not aware of a conflict in which civilians have been treated with such care.
The US did not invent war -- wars have been fought for thousands of years, and it is likely that wars will continue for thousands of years to come. But the humane way in which the US chooses to fight its wars makes me proud.
NETWORK TV COVERAGE
This war is a historical turning point; it has captured my full attention. I've been watching the news 2 hours a day since March 19. I've seen many press conferences, and much expert analysis. I have been amazed by the defeatist, know-it-all, and profoundly hostile attitudes shown by some of the press in the first two weeks of the war.
In the days before March 19, the US made numerous statements -- "shock and awe", "unlike anything seen before", "negotiating secretly with the Republican Guard". When Rumsfeld talked like this, I interpreted it at the time as "talking trash" or "psy-ops" stuff, aimed at putting fear and doubt into the hearts of our enemies. I didn't take it all as Biblical truth, and I thought that this kind of propaganda should certainly be used -- reducing enemy morale is a good thing at the start of a war. However, at news conferences around Days 5, 6, and 7, it seemed that half of the press corps wanted to dissect every Pentagon pronouncement ever made about the war, with the goal of trying to force either Rumsfeld or Franks into admitting that we were losing. We all know Peter Arnett's take on the campaign: "It is clear that the American war plan has failed". Is it really true that intelligent and experienced journalists at CBS, ABC, and NBC believed we were losing the war? Or did they want the American public to think so? When they pulled the statue down in Baghdad, I tuned into CBS evening news. Dan Rather described it, in a funeral director's voice, saying "Today in Baghdad, there was shock and awe, and fear, despair, and death". Those were the exact words he used to describe the liberation of a city from totalitarian rule, while people were dancing in the streets, welcoming the Americans! What is going through the minds of these network journalists?
I remember a vivid episode of the old Outer Limits show. A young couple took a wrong turn and ended up at a house where a 60-ish woman lived alone. On her wedding night back in the 1920's, her bridegroom suddenly disappeared from the party, never to be seen again. Ever since that night, she kept everything unchanged in that house, playing 1920's music, wearing 1920's clothes, still dressed up in makeup and lipstick, an elderly flapper, grotesque in the 1960s, waiting for her bridegroom to return. I think something like that might be happening with network news. Dan, Tom, and Peter are all about 60 years old, as are their network presidents and vice presidents. Perhaps they remember those heady years of the late 60s and early 70s, when they protested the government and brought down a president. But since then, time has not stood still. America has moved on. But these guys don't get it -- they think every war is Vietnam, every government screw-up is Watergate. They are losing their audience to a new crowd at CNN and Fox. During this war, the largest news event in a quarter century, everybody is watchng TV, but CBS News' ratings actually went down 15%! Nobody wants to see a 60-year-old flapper.
IRAQ'S POLITICAL FUTURE
Many conservatives want out of the UN. Although I understand that feeling, I do not share it. The UN, despite its inability to stop war, poverty, or injustice, is still a useful organization, and has its place. It has been successful as a public health organization, and patrolling war zones after belligerents stop shooting. This is how they should be used in Iraq. In this matter, I may be disagreeing with Bush.
Although the military war against Iraq has been quite successful, Iraq's political future may not be so rosy. There may be a civil war, it may fall to pieces like Yugoslavia did, it may become a fundamentalist Islamic state, it may even wind up being run by another warlord not much different from Saddam. I don't think the US necessarily has the will, patience, or even the wisdom to bring about a happy ending. Therefore, I recommend a strong UN involvement in Iraq's rebuilding. This way, costs and risks will be shared, the French and Russians can still have some feeling of power, and might even provide a needed perspective on things. Besides, we can always veto any proposal we don't like.
CONCLUSION
The key to minimize political risk is to allow the UN a substantive reconstructive role; that will co-opt international critics, making it difficult for them to undercut us. Osama Bin Laden once said that "When people see a strong horse, and a weak horse, they naturally prefer the strong horse". By showing in Afghanistan and Iraq that we are willing and able to destroy organizations which mean us harm, even in the face of French and Russian disapproval, any nation or organization which plans to harm us will know that nobody will protect them. This has to translate into a stronger negotiating position with Iran, Syria, and North Korea.
I understand that in the near term, existing terrorist infrastructures will redouble their efforts to do us harm. But in the long run, I think the way to prevail against terrorism is to show strength, rather than weakness.
Wednesday, April 16, 2003
"Grease" Review
Tales from Sacramento's Streets At Night
TALES FROM SACRAMENTO'S STREETS AT NIGHT
Last June, on a particularly dark street, at 2 a.m. in a residential neighborhood, I encountered an 50-ish long-haired guy who wanted to know if he was getting any closer to Sutter Hospital. "I've been walking for miles: man, I feel really sick," he said. I told him he was going the right way, but he still had at least two miles to go before he got to the hospital. So he went off into the night, probably needing a ride to the emergency room, but on foot instead. I hope he's all right.
Last July, I had a strange encounter while walking Sparky (without a leash as always) at 2:00 a.m. on a Saturday morning. We were walking past the south side of Sierra 2, a former elementary school converted into a neighborhood arts center, when we passed a car that had several people inside. When I looked back after Sparky, who was trailing behind at that point, I was surprised to see a gangly guy who had apparently been in the car we just past, creeping after Sparky. I called Sparky closer, but the guy kept coming. Finally I decided to confront the guy. The fellow was young (white, about 20), wearing sportswear, and a big ridiculous-looking necklace (apparently he had come from some nightclub or other). He asked me if Sparky would bite, and he pretended to be afraid of the dog. He tentatively petted Sparky, carefully eyeing me as I gripped the pooper scooper: Sparky, of course, was pleased to be getting well-deserved attention. The guy quickly trotted away to rejoin his friends, who by that time had pulled closer in their car. I suspect he and his friends wanted to do a thrill dognapping, but abandoned the idea because I would have had made him pay a painful price. Alternatively, he might have just wanted to pet Sparky - drunk people sometimes do strange things - but it was sort of strange nevertheless.
Also last summer, I was walking Sparky past the local adult bookstore on Broadway (I think it's called something like L'Shoppe Amour), about midnight, wondering whether I should tether Sparky to a post and go inside, when two beautiful and well-dressed women patrons climbed out of their late-model parked car. The driver looked at Sparky and said "Oh, he is so cute!" and started doting on him. Sparky of course sat at attention, winning even more admiration from the beauties. After a surprisingly long time, and after much amiable conversation, the women finally entered the store through the open door, and Sparky (of course) followed after them. Embarrassed, I had to retrieve the ever-sociable dog from the aisles of the store, and continue our walk down the dark streets.
Once, several years ago, while walking Sparky at night, I heard several gun shots being fired at a nearby traffic light. To get a clear look at who was firing the shots, all I had to do was walk around from behind a rose bush hedge. I decided, instead, that I really appreciated the scent of the roses, and I never got to see who was firing the gun, and at what.
There have been some close calls. Three years ago, Sparky and I missed the Kimi Anderson shooting by about and hour and a half, but did get to see all the police cars. Kimi Anderson, a 13-year-old girl who lives two blocks east of me, was shot by another neighbor who lives three blocks south of me, as her parents called police from the parking lot of Cafe Melange, a local coffee shop near Sierra 2. Kimi's parents had flashed their headlights at a driver who had menaced them on the road: the driver went beserk, chased them around in his car, then went home, got his arsenal, came back, located the vehicle and shot into it, striking Kimi in the spine, and paralyzed her for life. According to her aunt (whom I recently met), Kimi now lives at a specialty hospital in Indianapolis, IN, and has endured several surgeries in the last few months. The so-called "Road Rage Shooter", probably the least-popular man in Sacramento, now spends time in prison.
And then, of course, there was the infamous episode in 1995 when I got held up while walking Sparky. But that's for another time.....
Monday, April 07, 2003
The Authoritarian Impulse
Yet, as the following E-Mail exchange with my brother-in-law Ken Newman illustrates, there is an impulse for harsh measures in our society at this time. I lament the authoritarian impulse he showed regarding the right of former Presidents to speak their minds regarding the war. Maybe some of the histrionic history professors weren't so far off the mark after all...
(in usual reverse order)
From: Marc Valdez, Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2003 2:14 PM, To: 'Newman, Ken', Subject: RE: Asia Minor Quagmire
Yes, but WHICH speaking engagements? What EXACTLY did Clinton and Carter SAY? I need names, dates, cities, countries, venues, guests, audience size, etc. Do you have links to news articles? I can hardly say much if I don't have the info., and I can hardly compare what they said to the French position.
Remember, Carter is responsible for what HE says, and the Iraqis are responsible for what THEY do. Dissent has a long and glorious tradition in democracies, and if the Iraqis somehow take heart from Carter's statements, a man who has not held office in 22 years, when faced with several hundred thousand apparently implacable troops at their door, that's an indictment of THEIR judgement, not Carter's. 'Giving encouragement' is too broad a term and can be construed in myriad ways. So if a tax cheat inflates his deductions, is he 'giving encouragement' to Hussein, because he deprives the U.S. government, and hence the military, of sustenance? Where do you draw the line?
There is little indication that Hussein would have reconsidered his options in response to world opinion, whether led by Carter, or anyone else. That's what's fun about being an absolute dictator - you don't have to listen to anyone's opinion. Iraqi state media have used demonstrations in the West to try to boost Iraqi morale, much as we use whatever support we get in Iraq (thus the inflated reports of a revolt in Basra when the war was just starting) to boost our morale, but much of that falls way short of 'giving encouragement' to the enemy - it certainly wouldn't pass a legal test. Do Carter or Clinton advocate people to take up arms against the U.S. government? If prominent Democrats or others miscalculate their opposition, and go too far, public opinion will finish off their influence - the virtue of a democracy.
The cartoon was of conservative bent, because it portrays the media as whiny, irresponsible children harassing a responsible adult (Rumsfeld). I can't imagine how you see it as having a liberal bent.
Most of the media I see these days are on Fox or MSNBC, and they don't seem to have the same bent as "peace" protesters. Conservative media, not liberal media.
In my understanding, most of the teach-in at Columbia was interesting and informative, but Professor de Genova had crossed the line. He will be rebuked or disciplined.
I thought it was Berthold who had decided to resign, not that he had been fired by UNM......
From: Newman, Ken [mailto:KNewman@pnm.com], Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2003 1:41 PM, To: Marc Valdez, Subject: RE: Asia Minor Quagmire
In their speaking engagements overseas they have taken to task the administration's position on the war. In other words, carter and klinton are french. This gave encouragement to those like the french and those like the iraqis.
No, that cartoon was of liberal bent. And, I'm glad you explained it because I didn't understand it. So, you admit that the media feels the same as the "peace" activists. I thought it was the "peace" protesters shouting at President Bush about his Vietnam war to be. Come to find out from you that you think it's the media shouting at President Bush about his Vietnam war to be. So the media and the "peace" protesters are one and the same.
You are a smart guy. I don't have to explain to you about the behavior of some very prominent democrats to those overseas who also condemn the Bush administration? Let's say Saddam would have reconsidered in the face of world opinion against him. However, here are carter and klinton telling Saddam that the world is for him to encourage him to think the world's condemnation of Bush will stop the destruction of Saddam's regime. So, how many lives did that cost?:
Next can o' worms. The "teach-in" at columbia university. What do you know about it? Here is a hint -- Professor Berthold, UNM, was fired, but not for his hate speech concerning the deaths at the Pentagon. Will the professors at columbia be fired or even rebuked for their advocating murdering of US citizens who happen to be in the armed forces.
From: Marc Valdez [mailto:MValdez@sierraresearch.com], Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2003 1:58 PM, To: Newman, Ken and others, Subject: RE: Asia Minor Quagmire
Gee, Ken, it's a joke! I thought you'd like the cartoon because of its conservative slant!
Sorry about labelling it "Asia Minor Quagmire." I had something in mind like 'A minor Quagmire in Asia' or 'a quagmire in Asia Minor' (except of course Iraq is not precisely IN Asia Minor, just next to it, just - never mind!) The quagmire being, of course, NOT the war in Iraq, but Rumsfeld's daily press briefings. But, you see, if you have to EXPLAIN humor, it ceases being funny!
You condemn Carter and Clinton on the war, but I haven't seen any quotes from them in the press, although I understand (from somewhere) that Carter is against the war. What, precisely, are you condemning? If Carter wants to be against the war, let him express his opinion - it's his right as an American citizen, whether or not Bush or anyone else 'appreciates' it, and it certainly ain't treason! It certainly costs no lives.
From: Newman, Ken [mailto:KNewman@pnm.com], Sent: Thursday, April 03, 2003 12:40 PM, To: Marc Valdez and others, Subject: RE: Asia Minor Quagmire
Don't see the humor. Maybe because it's an old joke. I suspect that the answer is "No". We will know by the time of the 2004 election whether the "Asia Minor Quagmire" is another Vietnam. We know that the un-peaceful "peace" activists would just love this to become George Bush's Vietnam and are willing, in their wild imaginations, to sacrifice our troops to that effort.
However, the cartoon does show that the media are out of step. Doubt that you changed any minds with the use of this stupid cartoon. Nope. We saw enough of this in the streets of ABQ.
I'd recommend fox news network.
It is at best a moral for former presidents to verbally attack and undermine a sitting president in the international forum during a time of war. This amounts to aiding enemies of our country. Iraqi leaders could actually think the war could be won on the streets of America. You can call it freedom of speech, but how many lives did it cost? I'm sure that carter would not have appreciated ford condemning carter during carter's efforts to free the hostages. No? But, I digress. We won't know until November of '04 whether carter and klinton were successful in their efforts. I hope the liberal establishment is unwinding. Imagine that. It happened to the Soviets. Could it happen to American liberals? Naw, that's my wild imagination.
Gerard, Vicki, Zane: Marc is my usually nutty brother-in-law. Lately, he has not been very funny.
From: Marc Valdez, Sent: Wednesday, April 02, 2003 11:55 AM, To: 'Newman, Ken' and others; Subject: Asia Minor Quagmire
Cartoon link: Date 03/28/03
A Discussion About Michael Moore
Marc (speaking to Walt):
I agree with you regarding the Saudi relations problem affecting the entire U.S. government, both parties, and for many years now. I also agree that it is very much an over-simplification to talk about Prince Bandar being cozy with Bush (although it should be noted that an invitation to Crawford Ranch is given only to the world's most important guests - a prime perk). But these problems are not going to be addressed unless someone takes the political initiative, unless someone puts the Administration (of whatever party it happens to be at the time) in a very tight, uncomfortable corner, and that's where a very articulate party hack comes in handy. Michael Moore might be intellectually dishonest (I was impressed with the mental cartoon he rendered of the Lockheed Martin facility just outside Littleton, CO, where I was once employed), much as Rush Limbaugh has been similarly dishonest on different issues, but the arguments of both hacks charm through their simplicity and directness. It's a useful skill, leaving enough out of an argument to make it direct and easily digested. After "Bowling for Columbine", no one can look at Charlton Heston quite the same way again. Bye Moses, hello heartless creep.....Walt:It's Moore's primo chance. I hope he doesn't blow it with narcissistic blarney.
Which reminds me - The Atlantic magazine just arrived, with the cover story: The Fall of the House of Saud, by Robert Baer. Looks like an interesting article!
Walt:After sending this, I thought about it some more:
Michael Moore is basically a very articulate party hack, in the same way that Vladimir Posner was in the 1980s, or that Rush Limbaugh is today. However, the question of how should the US deal with the Saudis is an important one, which does need to be addressed, very soon.
Marc:I think your assessment of the Saudis is right on target. They are truly playing both sides, and I am sure that many Saudi individuals who make pleasant conversation with Americans at dinner parties support militant Islam quietly at the same time. However, this problem with the Saudis is a problem that the ENTIRE US Government is failing to face, together with previous US administrations, and governments of our allies. I suspect that our presidents, senators, congressmen, and their advisers don't really know what to do about it, because, after all, the Saudis are selling us oil, and cooperating in some of our endeavors against other problematic Arabs. They're even cooperating with us now. The OPEC embargoes of the 70s are not being repeated, even though we are conquering an Arab country!
To reduce this very difficult problem to the level of "Bush is cozy with the Saudi ambassador -- he invited him to his ranch" or even "Bush is soft on Saudi because he owns stock in Saudi companies" is an unworthy oversimplification; exactly what I would expect from Michael Moore. If Moore's thesis was even halfway true, then Bush's policy toward Saudi Arabia would be in stark contrast from the position of the Democratic Party, it would be different from what most of the Republican party would advise, it would be different from Clinton's and Gore's approaches, as well as the policies of the other coalition members. But what I actually sense is that everyone in both parties of the US government, Canadian government, British government, etc, all our ex-presidents, presidential hopefuls, etc, as well as President Bush, are uncertain of what to do about it.
Michael Moore is intelligent and entertaining, but he is intellectually dishonest. His work reduces complex problems to "Vote Democratic" bumper stickers. If Al Gore were President today, would US policy towards Saudi Arabia be different? I think not. Would Michael Moore make a documentary criticizing it? I think not.
Walt:As evil as the Iraqi regime is, it is probably only the second or third most dangerous threat to the USA at present. Al Qaeda is first on my list, not just because of its ruthlessness and skill, but because it gets plenty of support from official circles in Saudi Arabia. For example, the New Republic has been reporting for several years now the consequences of an apparent deal between Al Qaeda and the Saudi government in the mid 90's - no attacks by Al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia that target Saudis, in exchange for surreptitious material support for Al Qaeda's foreign adventures. Two of the Sept. 11th hijackers took refuge at a safe house in San Diego, operated at a cost of several hundred thousand dollars a year, using "charity" money provided by the sister of the Saudi ambassador to the U.S., Prince Bandar bin Sultan. Thus, money funneled directly from Saudi government circles was used to help destroy the World Trade Center. It would be extremely naive to believe that officials in Saudi Arabia didn't know exactly what they were doing with their charitable contributions.
Prince Bandar bin Sultan has been the Saudi ambassador to the U.S. for 20+ years, and is arguably one of the most powerful people in the world. His influence is everywhere - I'm extremely interested in his recent important role in getting Richard Perle - one of the most influential people in the U.S. - removed as chairman of the Defense Advisory Council. Using carefully calculated innuendo, he can easily deflect the growing impatience within the U.S. government with Saudi policies.
President Bush is very cozy with Bandar bin Sultan - the Saudi ambassador is probably the only person in the diplomatic corp assigned to the U.S. ever invited as a guest to Bush's Crawford Ranch. Bush has invited only about three heads of state to the ranch (Mexico, China, Russia) - I don't think Bush ever bothered inviting Tony Blair to the ranch. The Prince clearly is more important than even Blair!
The bin Laden family is quite important in Saudi Arabia, and the clan is so large that it would be hard to believe that many in the clan knew much about Al Qaeda, yet some family members probably did have useful information, and it is suspicious that those family members in the U.S. on Sept. 11th were spirited out of the country before the FBI could interview them.
No, the basic problem with Bush/Saudi connections seems to be that the Administration is helping shield our direct enemies from our wrath. Out of ignorance or naivete, Bush, Cheney, et al. feel they have great influence with the Saudis, even feeling friendship towards them, but the Saudis are playing a double game, and they are definitely NOT our friends in any meaningful way. Not precisely our enemies, since the pact with Al Qaeda will be dispensed with by the terrorists at the most convenient time, opening the Saudi monarchy to attack, but definitely not our friends. I heard of some recent public opinion poll from Saudi Arabia stating that 90+% of the people there strongly oppose our venture into Iraq: even the monarchs can't ignore such a lop-sided margin. The monarchs likely feel they must surreptitiously attack the U.S., as dangerous as that is, just in order to maintain their own power base in a youthful (average age in the population is about 20), idle (high unemployment rate), incensed (particularly by the Israeli/Palestinian conflict), increasingly radicalized society.
How will all this get the full public expose it deserves? Well, after the success of "Bowling for Columbine", Michael Moore is fishing around for something to do, and his acid attack may be just what is needed. Bush/Saudi connections are Bush's greatest weakness - a great political opportunity for any Bush opponent. Moore may blow his chance - he's a bit of blowhard after all - but all I can say is that I envy Moore's opportunity!
I guess its no secret that the US Government and Bin Laden had a common enemy in the USSR during its invasion of Afghanistan, and therefore we helped him fight the Soviets. Its also no secret that Bin Laden comes from a family which runs a large legitimate business connected with the oil industry. Although I have not heard the details of that company's ties with US business interests, it wouldn't surprise me if some US oil interests did business with that company. And since it is common knowledge that the Bush family has been in the oil business for 50 years, I guess its possible that Bush senior is/was involved with a US company that is/was involved Bin Laden's father's company.
What I'm not clear on is what all this means to Michael Moore, and why I should be outraged by it. Does Michael Moore think that Osama Bin Laden is not really a terrorist, but rather a legitimate businessman? Or does Michael Moore think that Bush Jr. secretly supports Osama Bin Laden? Is Michael Moore advising us to leave Bin Laden alone? Does Bush think that by bombing Bin Laden, he can get in good with Bin Laden's family? Was the WTC bombing a Bush/Bin Laden plot to make money for George W. Bush??
Actually, I think the Trilateral Commision and the Masons were behind the whole thing.