The New York Times today has a highly-disturbing article on the murder of two detainees at Baghram Air Base in Afghanistan in 2002. It is based on a 2000-page investigation done by the Army itself into the incidents, which was given to the Times.
I have two questions: One, why doesn’t the Times make this report available in its entirety to its readers to judge for themselves? It could do so easily enough on its website where a video now appears that could be described as highly-editorial in support of the article. Two, has there been another military force in the history of warfare that so completely investigates the activities of its own personnel for purposes of reviewing their actions morally and legally and improving them?
I would like to add that, as a novelist, I found the opening paragraphs of this story particularly badly written, as if taken from the pages of pulp fiction. I’m not quite sure why the Times feels it has to hype its investigation this way. Perhaps because the news is already more than two years old.
UPDATE: Austin Bay and I will be on Hugh Hewitt’s Show at 4:30PM Pacific to discuss this article, Newsweek and related matters. Also, there may be a revelation regarding Austin and Pajamas Media. [That again?-ed.]
MEANWHILE: This report from La Shawn Barber is worth a look.
AND: Audio of Hewitt Show here. Another discussion of
Pajamas Media by the estimable Pejman Yousefzadeh here.
Can someone explain to me why a three-year-old story with no signs of a cover-up is news?
As someone pointed out to Instapundit, why didn’t we hear as much about Michael Spann as we do about these guys? And I’ll add Matt Maupin to that — why isn’t the press beating the drums to get the “insurgents” to release him or let us know where he’s buried?
They along with the New York Post’s
“Saddam in Tighty Whiteys Fuel the Flame Story” are bored.
They are manufacturing or recycling the compost heap of what they deem is news…
Trash. The media has declared war on the military subclass.
This should be nipped in the bud before they can stir up trouble for our men and women in uniform. Front page, huge. They really have become the enemy, the liberal press are full of Walter Duranty’s. It might be time to start writing to their advertisers and tell them what is thought of newspapers the have become the mouthpiece of our enemies, these people haven’t a clue to what is happening with the Islamic Fascist. For what it is worth, I wrote and told them what a bunch of traitorous rats I thought them to be.
To put this in perspective, the United Nations and its band of merry cut throats and enablers of genocide’s, rapes and the greatest theft of all time have never gotten this type of coverage. It should be noted just who they are apparently working for and it isn’t their country in time of war. Lets see some beheadings on the front page and lets see those planes hit the buildings again, let see those poor people who had to jump. The rats at the Time’s make me furious.
“Suppose that American media were really funded and supported by the Muslim Brotherhood, and openly opposed to the United States. How would the coverage differ?
Answer: not at all”.—Charles at LGF
Can’t improve on that analysis,so I just posted it intact.
Frankly the media is infested with a death-wish contempt for the society that sustains them.They need to GO !!
ìI’m not quite sure why the Times feels it has to hype its investigation this way.î
The New York Times despises President Bush far more than it does the Islamic nihilists. Thatís all there is to it. Am I possibly exaggerating? Nope, not even slightly. The Timesí publisher and editors on a subconscious level perceive George W. Bush and the Republican Party as greater threats than Osama bin Ladin. They will angrily deny that this is the case—but you merely need to listen to them carefully.
“One, why doesn’t the Times make this report available in its entirety to its readers to judge for themselves?”
It would limit the damaging effect of the anti-American proganda effort. Good anti-American propagandists can never present the entire story – if the did they would be journalists.
“Two, has there been another military force in the history of warfare that so completely investigates the activities of its own personnel for purposes of reviewing their actions morally and legally and improving them?”
Not in the recorded history of this planet. I can’t speak for planets in other galaxies or the alternative universe where the NYT recruits its propagandists.
Typical Times’ garbage. Note this bit, from page 2:
“Built by the Soviets as an aircraft machine shop for the operations base they established after their intervention in the country in 1979…”
Intervention? Sheesh, the Times is still taking their talking points from the Communists!
Dougf,
“Suppose that American media were really funded and supported by the Muslim Brotherhood, and openly opposed to the United States. How would the coverage differ?
I’ve begun to wonder if this isn’t true. Maybe not the Muslim Brotherhood, but certainly Islamofascist petrodollars. They are far too dedicated, single-minded, and relentless to be motivated by some simple-minded elitist worldview. These bastards behave as if they have fat paychecks to lose.
Roger, the NYT has lost any moral authority (assuming it ever had any) to speak to me on such issues. They have proven repeatedly that they are as viciously anti-military as they are ignorant about it. I won’t be reading their 6,000 word article on supposed abuse (the end result of the last 3+ years of smears is to cause people like me to distrust ANY stories of abuse by our military – a dangerous consequence but predictable). I’ll wait to read the respected, considered opinions and analysis of same by bloggers I trust, including you. I’m also very interested in reading the milbloggers’ take on this.
There is very little MSM I read anymore that is not first filtered through the blogs I trust.
Rick:
How I envy the historians of the future, uncovering the many hidden Durantys of the period from World War II until the dethronement of Eason Jordan. Think of the possibilities.
I’m probably going to get hammered for demanding so little of our military and holding my fellow Americans to something less that the stratospheric standards necessary to wage war with a bunch of 15th century whackjobs, but if two prisoners dead and the preposterous nonsense at AG are all the “prisoner abuse” our troops have dished out these past 3 years, I’m amazed at their control and professionalism. We did nearly that much damage to ourselves everytime we held escape and evasion training back when I served.
Roger,
Let’s put the “disturbing” aside for a moment. Because right after 9/11 I saw American Patriotism take hold, across the board. Both in the cleanup that occurred when ordinary citizens showed up en masse to clean up Ground Zero. And, in all the flags that were waving from cars, and home windows.
How did Bush blow that away?
Why are we fighting, now, with half of America feeling cheated? FDR wasn’t a bit better at pulling this country together for the war efforts in WW2?
And, say what you will about the Civil War, doesn’t a lot of credit go to Abraham Lincoln? What about Lincoln’s 2nd Inaugural. Spoken in 1865, a few weeks before his assassination.
…”AND, MALICE TOWARDS NONE.
Bush, it seems, didn’t do this at all. Man’s got his agenda. And, it’s not magnanimous. More than that, stuff that works for bullies rarely works on Americans’ hearts and minds. Yup. My opinion.
And, the chat room mentality that appears here? Go gang up. It’s the right’s way of trying to detour opinions into their right wing camp. And, it won’t work. Not on me. Not on many.
Skookumchuk,
We’re gonna have to recapture a number of history department chairs from the Zinnfandizers and Bellesile buffoons first. There aren’t many places where a dissertation proposal on the interlocking threads of lefty affinity groups within the propaganda machine that masquerades as a “free press” would be well received.
If someone made such a proposal today in many of our “great” institutions, the dissertation committees would note that the next step would be to try and discover how the universities became indoctrination centers.
I saw this one coming:
http://shortfinal.blogspot.com/2005/05/media-vs-military.html
…Baghram Air Base in Afghanistan in 2002.
The date was the first thing I noticed in the article. Long ago, investigated, and dealt with. This “scoop” interests me not at all except for the timing and the sense I get that the MSM has officially declared war on me. So be it.
Carol-
easy for you to sit back and pontificate you are so far removed from the military you cannot even comprend.
The difference between this and WW II-maybe it was a little more obvious we had enemies plus maybe some of ‘yours’ were drafted. a little easier to comprehend.
You’ve aligned yourself with the neo-axis…
So as a military dependent the word I’m thinking you might understand for what your party is up to is-
dolchstoss
You and your brethren the media are particpating in psychological warfare against the military AND their families who you all conveniently at best patronize or luxuriously forget.
Don’t worry the active-duty military are a little pre-occupied but at least they get to hear Rumsfeld -when he is over there in theater- tell the media what they can do with their ignorance.
For us back home-we are going to have a hell of a time telling these guys and gals all of the shenanigans the Democrats and their enablers such as war hero McCain was up to.
You’ll win.
Bush didn’t “blow away” the unity and common, shared goals post-9/11, the media did. Their constant sniping, deliberate disregard for our country’s accomplishments, and automatic gainsaying of every single positive initiative undertaken by the Bush administration is what blew away our national resolve, at least for those that were just jumping on the bandwagon because it was the latest fad.
iirc, the incident made so much of in the nyt this morning is ‘old news’ – and quite settled, to boot … in exactly the fashion & manner proscribed by military law.
the miscreants (six or seven) promptly faced general courts martial and were found guilty (mostly) and punished in varying degrees.
if the nytims left that series of facts out of the article, i’m sure the omission was ‘inadvertant’.
Rick:
Yes, but the important thing is that someday it will be done. There is the making of one or more “great institutions” in doing so.
Carol,
A perspective from abroad. Right after 9/11 I was shown images of American’s blaming America. The people I saw interviewed were Chomsky and Moore. I was shown protests against Bush, not for going into Iraq, but for going into Afghanistan. The bookshelves in my bookstore were filled with anti-American diatribes, translated into a foreign language at record speed, and published by divisions of the LAT and a host of other American media giants. Now perhaps from your perspective those voices were hidden, but since 9/12 it has been a slow creep, a singular process as more and more on the Left edged over to that kind of view. The 2002 and 2004 election cycles speed it all up. Every night I was shown Democratic candidates calling Bush a “gangster” and a “traitor” and, well you get the picture. “How did Bush blow that away?” you ask. Perhaps, there is very little there in your “that.” As for World War 2 I will leave to someone else. But as for the Civil War, have you ever read the abuse of Lincoln in the press? The Northern press that is.
Much of your post was two feet firm in the realm of mythmaking. As for feeling cheated, therapy? Grow up?
sped
Hey, Pinch. This Kipper’s for you:
We aren’t no thin red ‘eroes, nor we aren’t no blackguards too,
But single men in barricks, most remarkable like you;
An’ if sometimes our conduck isn’t all your fancy paints,
Why, single men in barricks don’t grow into plaster saints;
While it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Tommy, fall be’ind,”
But it’s “Please to walk in front sir,” when there’s trouble in the wind–
There’s trouble in the wind, my boys, there’s trouble in the wind,
O it’s “Please to walk in front, sir,” when there’s trouble in the wind.
You talk o’ better food for us, an’ schools, an’ fires, an’ all:
We’ll wait for extry rations if you treat us rational.
Don’t mess about the cook-room slops, but prove it to our face
The Widow’s Uniform is not the soldier-man’s disgrace.
For it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ “Chuck him out, the brute!”
But it’s “Savior of ‘is country” when the guns begin to shoot;
An’ it’s Tommy this an’ Tommy that, an’ anything you please;
An’ Tommy ain’t a bloomin’ fool–you bet that Tommy sees!
And the rest of us do too, of that you can make no mistake.
I’m perhaps the last one on these boards to get wrought up about the PissKoran story, be it the ur-truth, a minor truth, a lie or an outright hallucination, but this latest stunt by the NYT is outrageous.
This gussied-up corporate statement on behalf of Newsweek is so transparent as to be laughable. To me it signifies a wish to revive the paranoid, give-’em-both-barrels NYT world of Howell Raines: another version of All Augusta National, All the Time.
And they’re only bringing it on themselves. Are they really that paranoid on 43rd street?
Does anyone else sense the beginning of a death spiral here?
How did Bush do all that damage to you, Carol? Promise you a rose garden, did he? How exactly did he fail to miraculously convert you? How shall he lead the deliberately unleadable?
I’m afraid Madawaskan is right. GWB and the US military are hostage to this certain mindset due to its intermingling citizenship among those who understand–and thus appreciate–the national effort. Thus the administration and the miltary are continually casting pearls before swine who then inflate with the self-importance of being courted and/or appealed to, when the truth is, they get the valuables tossed into their troughs for free, simply because they’re always there there.
Yama–
My hometown, Springfield, Ill., has just opened the new Lincoln Museum. There is a hall over twenty feet long filled with cartoons viciously mocking Lincoln. As you walk through the hall, loudspeakers play some of the choicer insults hurled at what many consider our greatest president ever.
Fresh Air,
Bush is in good company. Facing a similar bunch. The more things change….
Unanimity of opinion about any American war is very rare. All have been wracked by dissention, usually much worse than what we see today. World War II was the great exception and I’ve taken to wondering why this is so.
It may be that the greatest immediate benefit in our aiding Stalin against an attacking Hitler was that by doing so we got our own media onside in the struggle. Otherwise the war could easily have been portrayed by the Durantys as a battle between rival visions of capitalism and empire, or even (had Joe and Adolph remained pals) a battle between good and evil, with us as the evil ones. Not that hard to imagine. I wonder if Roosevelt considered this.
Great wondering Skookumchuk. Never thought about that. I wonder how things were portrayed in America up to the point of the Soviets entering the fray, and then thereafter?
Skookumchuk – excellent insight. Prior to Barbarossa in June 1941, both the far left and the far right viewed support for Churchill as support for the (take your pick) limey or UK capitalist empire.
Note the postwar left-lib literature (Vonnegut, Heller etc) that posited characters suggesting an equivalence between US officers and fascist ones, and US and Nazi war acts. Not hard to imagine how the Times would’ve covered Patton had he not been supporting the Red Army on what the Russians called the “second front.”
From the previous thread.
Carol herman has unconsciously hit upon the nub of the matter when she says,
“If this were a chess match, instead of what’s gonna be up ahead in the senate; I’d say the DEMOCRATS have REGAINED the MIDDLE GROUND.”
To the MSM the WoT is utterly unimportant, other than being a useful stick with which to beat the administration ,all that concerns them is which party rules.
It a form of insular decadence, which in the current climate is suicidal.
As for the NYT,only one question needs to be asked,”Why now?”
I wonder how things were portrayed in America up to the point of the Soviets entering the fray, and then thereafter?
Great idea. Methinks the blogosphere has a research project. Wonder if there’s any way to scan old issues of the Times from 1939-June 1941 and get them online? Maybe divvy up the research by month and give a month of NYT issues to each of ~30 leading pajamasmedia bloggers and their following?
Peter, “schwerepunkt”.
Actually, the prevailing coverage without the SU fighting the Nazis probably would have been closer to Joe Kennedy Sr’s line when he was Ambassador to the Court of St James: Not our problem and besides, Britain’s finished (“licked”, in Joe’s charming phrase). Anyway, nice to see Germany back on its feet, Stalin doesn’t object and most of the French have no problem with German occupation, so why should we bother taking sides?
Thibaud, there’s an extensive photolayout somewhere on the net–I’ll try to re-find it later–showing just that event to which you earlier referred, some SS prisoners with their hands in the air, who were thought by their combat-fatigued captors to be on the verge of rushing them, and so shot ‘em down–with a nearby correspondent’s camera clicking away. Wasn’t Italy, tho–Patton was on ice during the Italian Campaign, in England, organizing the phantom Pas de Calais invasion force.
Carol,
Just to continue the chat room mentality gang up, although your post was chalk full of its own special chat room mentality all by its lonesome– “not magnanimous,” “bully,” his “agenda”: just when did you drop that flag you were waving and begin to feel cheated? Was it after the Iraqis voted? After Syria left Lebanon? After Karzai was elected? No WMD? Patriot Act? Patriot Act as interpreted by Democrats who overwhelmingly passed said act? Before the 2002 election cycle? 20004? The “axis of evil” speech? Some other time. Just curious. Given the constant onslaught by the press, and the Dems, and the Fahrenheit 9/11 type propagandists, I am always surprised how well America has and is holding up. And though the elites use so-called world opinion to disingenously make points that present little more than a gross stereotype of world opinion, the truth is, the world also is doing much better than I expected it would at seeing this job through. I know in my small part of the world, even though the usual suspects will still hold a protest now and then, and all the cameras show up and film them, still, the crowds walking by and shaking there heads are by far larger, and it isn’t Bush or Howard or Koizumi or Blair or the leadership in Poland or Italy and most of the other countries standing by America who are doing poorly, yes you’ll always have Spain, but Chirac and Schroeder, and Canada, not to mention Kerry, who are in trouble or simply irrelevant.
The Times is just cleaning out its closet. I wonder how many more of these little gems they’ve got tucked away for a rainy day…
Dems regaining the middle ground? Umm, no. Sorry, thanks for playing.
yama-arashi, thibaud:
We have had several discussions here on this topic many months ago. One poster gave specifics of how little support there was for Churchill within the American left prior to Barbarossa. I wish I knew which thread that was. Anyway, the interesting thing is if Roosevelt considered ways of bringing the media onboard – if he had a developed strategy.
It may be a book waiting to be written.
And, it won’t work. Not on me. Not on many.—Carol Herman
You appear to be operating under the delusion that anyone thinks you can be persuaded to either grow-up, or alternatively just do the right thing and stop trying to undermine the defense efort.
Speaking just for me I gave up that thought in 2003 when I saw how things were going.I really don’t care whether it works on you. NOTHING will work on you.Nothing.
Time will tell. There’s an interesting column up over at Huffington’s Post, that says America’s losing it’s clout in terms of “soft” power. Maybe, ya need to be Chinese, to understand that there are times being too strong can make you weak?
Dunno.
But I see that, here, the “right wing news” brigade does it’s job sweeping up behind the GOP’s elephant; as it walks the parade grounds. That’s politics. And, that’s life.
Not too sure, by the way, when I saw the seams fracturing. What happened? Was it Hughie, Dewey, Louis, and Hewitt’s “big stick” operation, whereby Dr. Frist was supposed to get a new spine?
Gee. That one reminded me more of a Gay Rights Marriage Issue Agenda; with zealot males picking their male “bride,” than it did anything that belonged in the senate.
Not that Rush hasn’t made a career out of inflaming his own zealot-ditto-heads. But wasn’t Talk Radio losing steam?
And, meanwhile, like in all brutal boxing punching matches; this new operation in the senate suddenly looked like the democrats, in the minority, and having suffered for looking extreme … Are, surprise. Surprise. Suddenly rising IN THE MIDDLE. It’s the GOP tent that’s intolerant.
Why such a “primary fight, now?” Sure. Dr. Frist wants to be the GOP nominee. But if the primary (which grows best in the 11 Southern States), can trap 78 senators … then that’s the operation that’s in play, now. Or, so it seems to me to be in play. How do the senators vote? Dunno. How to poker players throw out cards and make bets? Well? I’d guess there’s a lot of bluffing going on.
Can John Ashcroft replace Rehquist in a few weeks? Stay tuned. The serial, similar to the Perils of Pauline, continues.
Chat rooms, by the way, are subject, eventually, to Godwin’s Law.
PeterUK,
O.T.
Apologies for that island crack. I don’t have much wit, and I shouldn’t try to spend it until I save it up for a decade or two. As one who lives on an island remarkable similar to yours, I took a liberty, in the feeling of brotherhood, which maybe I shouldn’t have. Of course I never meant to imply anything negative about the part of that island which you and those like you reside in, but rather only about the small area of real estate that that man so disagreeable to us both currently represents. Cheers.
I’ve heard anecdotes that the US press really rallied behind Finland, against USSR, in the immediately pre-WWII Russo/Finnish war. I think even the Duranty’d press was appalled at the giant bear eating up the Reindeer People.
The story … emerge[s] from a nearly 2,000-page confidential file of the Army’s criminal investigation into the case, a copy of which was obtained by The New York Times…. The Times obtained a copy of the file from a person involved in the investigation who was critical of the methods used at Bagram and the military’s response to the deaths.
Q’s for the Times:
- When exactly did the investigation conclude?
- When and how did the Times “obtain” this file? Did they seek it out from their source immediately after the uproar over Newsweek’s PissKoran article? Or has it been on the shelf, and if so, for how long?
- What exactly is the “news” in this story? If the angle is that violent abuse of detainees in Afghanistan was “routine” or systematic, then why the focus on these two deaths? Where’s the evidence of routine and systematic abuse?
Hey, Yama, don’t ‘save up’ that wit–it’s GREAT! You and Peter both…must be something in all that water.
Carol, right, the place is a mess. Hey, I know what! Let’s don’t clean it up!
The question that pops into my head when I hear these types of gotcha stories is: yeah, and now what? What are we supposed to conclude? What’s the unspoken agenda here? That we pull our troops back out of Vietnam and it will all go away?
Seriously, what if there are 15 Abu Ghraibs–or 150–out there, and what if in every one of them they are flushing Korans down the drain 24/7 in every cell, and what if they are beating thugs to death on a daily basis, then: What of it? The world isn’t nearly as nice as the NYT wants it to be. So what? This isn’t an adolescent game, folks. These are real mass-murderers. They’re killing us and we’re killing them. Real death. So, what’s the plan? Shut down the military? Pull all US troops out of everywhere and wait for the next al Qaeda attack? Cover ourselves in ash and wait for the beheaders to show up? Inquiring minds want to know.
Carol,
Nice reply.
I guess for you everything has become local. Nary, nay, not one word about things abroad. Oops, I stand corrected, something about losing soft power and yin and yang. As someone who reads Chinese considerably better than I write English, you’re barking up the wrong tree if you think the classical philosophers of that great tradition wouldn’t be absolutely amazed at the shallowness and disingeniousness of the “but wherefore America’s soft power” and the like liberal crowd. Though I am sure there are a hundred scholars of Chinese things in the U.S., most who can’t read a lick, who make any text they stumble across dance to the tune of their choosing. Derridadada. Hegelalala. Foucault, Foucault, Foucalululooooo.
OT
I tried but couldn’t make Heideggar do a little dance. Arrogant, pathetic bastard.
The answer to that WichitaBoy, is, we re-do The Clinton Years! Hey, no 911! Hey, no AQ! Hey, no NoKo/Iran nukes! Dontcha remember, everybody was holding hands and buying each other a coke? Nothing was happening behind the scenes under the radar, because the NYTimes didn’t say so!
Michael McCanles said…
Some historical notes relevant here:
Making newspaper sales out of in-depth fact reporting didn’t exist to any serious degree in the U. S. until the American Civil War. “News” papers were in fact extensions of the old Englih 18th-century “journals” which mixed gossip, some real news, and a lot of essays. The latter–what correspond to what we call editorials today–were normal on the front page.
During the American Civil War it was quickly recognized by senior civilian and military officials in the North that extensive military reporting in the context of a relatively small war theatre geographically speaking–roughly the southeastern quadrant of what is now the lower 48 states–constituted a serious form of military intelligence and planning leakage. The result were various attempts to close down access of reporters of particularly the New York papers–which tended to be Democratic (i.e., crypto-Confederates)–to the Union armies.
William T. Sherman would have gleefully contributed to Belmont on this subject were he alive. He called reporters essentially “spies,” and wanted them tried and executed as such. He in fact put a reporter on trial by a military court martial, but didn’t get the conviction he wanted. I believe that General Lee had his staff troll regularly for Union newspapers. I stumbled on a Union naval admiral involved in the “inland war” on the Mississippi, who telegraphed the Union War department asking for a news release as to where his ships were going in the following 24 hours. He said in his message that doing so would get that news to the Confederate command in beleaguered Vicksburg by night-fall. I suspect that he was at least 3/4ths serious.
(2) The re-election of Lincoln in 1864 hung in the balance on the basis of the slow march of Grant’s and Sherman’s armies toward military victory. For the first time in American history, major political support for a major war was held hostage to the information that the newspapers produced. As one of the most significant theorists of the American Civil War, Archer Jones, points out, military victory or defeat was no longer simply a matter of forcing an enemy army physically to retreat or failure to do so. By 1863, the information flow across the country as to what the armies did–relevant to both sides–was as important or more so in determining whether or not the will to prevail rose or flagged.
Finally, Sherman’s march through Georgia was essentially a “news” event, since its purpose was not military conquest, but a show, as he put it to Grant, that he could march an army through the heart of the deep south and no one could stop him. It was, in short, “military theatre.” The target? Not people’s plantation houses–the great monstrous fact of the anti-Sherman people both south and north–but people’s willingness to continue allegiance to the Richmond government and the “CSA.” If the Richmond government could not protect them, then the “lost cause” was already a fact.
IOW, a typical Sherman move: if he couldn’t kill the reporters, he could make use of them for his own purposes. Here, the reporters were retreating southern papers, which traveled by wagon just in front of Sherman’s army. They set up shop for 24 hours, put out the papers locally, and then loaded up again. It was these southern newspapers that were the main source of news about Sherman’s advance as far as Northern readers were concerned.
6:38 PM
. 6:38 PM___LINK
At 1:36 PM CaliStandardTime, Yama fell over into his bowl of saki. No, really, LOL x 2 !
yama-arashi:
Foucalululooooo
That’s out by you someplace, near the Northern Marianas, right? Discovered by the Portuguese on their way to Old Nippon I think.
Let’s put the “disturbing” aside for a moment. Because right after 9/11 I saw American Patriotism take hold, across the board. Both in the cleanup that occurred when ordinary citizens showed up en masse to clean up Ground Zero. And, in all the flags that were waving from cars, and home windows.
How did Bush blow that away?
Carol, in the timeless words of Priscilla Alden, “why don’t you speak for yourself”?
Look at some of the recent polls, or if you like look at the recent election results, where in the face of Evan Thomas’ famous 15 percent, Bush won the election rather handily, and the Democrats lost it rather handily, with the Senate Minority Leader turned out of office, and what looks like a dramatic and rather durable reversal of the old status quo.
I don’t think the difference is as great as you suggest (sure isn’t in my neighborhood) and the polls seem to indicate that patriotism and optimism are pretty widespread.
So, if you feel Bush has lost all of that, I think the question has to be “why is it you lost your patriotic fervor?”
Pat Curley said,
“
Typical Times’ garbage. Note this bit, from page 2:
“Built by the Soviets as an aircraft machine shop for the operations base they established after their intervention in the country in 1979…”
Intervention? Sheesh, the Times is still taking their talking points from the Communists!”
—
Pat Curley:
You know as well as the rest of us that that beleaguered land was sorely in need of machine shops.
…still is, despite all the so-called good intentions of the Chimp in Chief.
Skookumchuk,
Coming at Roosevelt–Franklin that is not Teddy (if it had only been Teddy in the thirties but I digress)–from the Pacific Ocean side of things, it seems Franklin himself, or at least many advising him, were themselves very much on board (wink, wink, nudge, nudge), and it was less a matter of bringing the press on board, and more like riding the wave together once the Soviets, with a lot of help from Japan, provided the wave(s).
Yama–
You da man! All your bases are belong to us!
Thibaud–
This is a classic “on-the-shelf” story. There is no proximate reason for its release. Just like the push-polling the Slimes does when the Pravda teletype’s running a little slow and it needs another bash-Bush story.
Yama-Arashi,
Not at all.It is just that we don’t like to be regarded as “off” the coast of Europe,lowers the tone of things,rather Europe is a land mass off the coast of Britain.
Foucalululooooo? Actually the South Korean’s are claiming it as theirs these days. With absolutely no protest from Japan. And the tyrant in North Korea couldn’t be happier.
I tried but couldn’t make Heideggar do a little dance. Arrogant, pathetic bastard.
Heng hao!
My guess is the Times is doing this story now bdcause American casualty numbers are down and they want to get some more people killed.
Carol:
I know old men who fought in WW2 that were convicnced McArthur was a crook and a coward and that FDR got us in the war on purpose to save Europe’s ass again. The warm glowy feeling you discuss was not there so why wonder why we don’t have it now.
I know men who fought at Iwo jima who saw Japanese soldiers shot if they tried to surrender because they did not know what to do with them. I know of at least one incident in Europe at Dachau when hundreds of Germans were shot. Today the press would be all over these incidents. Back then the press and the soldiers came from the same class of people. Today we have upper middle class white people going after poor folks from the sticks. Or so they think.
Bush’s agenda might just be to finish what he started and if FDR had to put up with half the crap Bush does there is no way we could have fought and won that war much less rebuilt Japan and Germany afterward.
I just read John Adams by McCollough and His Excellency George Washington by Joseph Jeffers and both of those presidents had to make very unpopular decisions. If they had been interested in making everybody happy [like you seem to think presidents are supposed to] the United States would be part of south Canada today.
Yeh…they just over-ordered mimeograph ink last month and had to use it up somewhere.
I’ve seen london
I’ve seen France
I’ve seen Saddam’s underpants.
I am sorry I just could not help myself. I am sure some evil American put a gun to some Brit’s head to make him publish those peictures. surreal.
Woo Hoo, TerrYE!!!
Frsh Air,
I think the NYT piece was designed as the MSM’s come back after the Newsweek debacle,along the lines of “We couldn’t prove that one but this one is true”,
also to capitalise on the prisoner abuse theme.The MSM won’t stop attacking the Bush administration until the last helicopter lifts off the American Emabassy in Baghdad.
“I tried but couldn’t make Heideggar do a little dance. Arrogant, pathetic bastard.–yama-arashi
“I’ve seen London
I’ve seen France
I’ve seen Saddam’s underpants.”—-Terrye
These cracked me up big-time. LOL
Buddy,
Bowl of sake? You have a lot to learn about Japanese bathtubs. And that’s 5:36 a.m. to be exact. Oooops. Forgot to sleep again. Drink, pass out, wake-up, work. Can’t seem to keep that straight. I guess its all for the better. I hate waking up with a hangover.
Charlie-san,
A man of many languages. But I can never figure out what you guys are getting at with your English transliterations.
PeterUk
I share your thoughts about unruly land masses off the coasts of perfectly swell islands,
Ahhhhh. Past six. Gotta go. If you hear a story about a man falling asleep as he waited in line for his train and tragically fell to his death before the oncoming local, while murmuring something about islands and continents and BushLincolnifithadonlybeenTeddyandnotFranklin, that would be me. No flowers please. Give a few bucks to a poor blogger somewhere.
Terrye,
The Sun newspaper lives by underwear,apart from page three where no underwear is customary for the page three girls.Saddam Hussein is lucky is wasn’t the Sport.
Yama,
You’ve never seen a German doing the Heidiggitydegger?
Peter:
Think of what Saddam put on tape. the son of a bitch.
I think the press is underestimating the amount of disgust they are engendering among the population. I mean come on this kind of stuff happens and one thing about our military it does not tend to brush it off. They are hard on their own.
I heard someone say that the Republicans are losing support, if so it is not because they are too rough, but because they are not rough enough. People want them to act like Republicans and stop being so frigging sensitive. If they wanted sensitive Kerry would be president.
We have 150,000 men in the ME. If 1% of them do something wrong, that is 1500 men. Is the Times going to do this crap with every incident?
I heard about a young woman in Yemen who is about to be stoned to death, maybe they could take a break from trashing the US military and go do a story on that.
And I won’t read it. I have made myself a promise to never read the NYT again and I intend to keep it.
Rick, I missed that, but “The Producers” mise-en-scene “Springtime for the Fuerher” can’t have been far behind…ach, where is Zero Mostel when ya need ‘im?
Terrye, I’d like to see Gunga Dan go do some penance-coverage of that Yemeni girl.
Buddy,
It’s kind of interesting if you’ve never seen anyone dance to a march before.
Yesterday the Times did a story to the effect that we might lose in Iraq and today this.
I bet that whenever Osama and Zarqawi are feeling low and need a shot in the arm, you know…. a reason to keep fighting and killing all it takes is a copy of the New York Times and they feel like there is hope after all.
This report on a survey is terribly bad news for the “every silver lining has a dark cloud” crowd. The reporting on the results is a real crack up.
OT but important.
http://redstate.org/story/2005/5/20/122244/721
Nice, simple call to Hewitt:
—
Are they still saying they oppose the war, but
“ support the troops?“
Carol — in perspective:
1. Dems are hostage to the Moonbat wing which opposed the AFGHAN WAR and predicted a bloodbath and abject defeat.
2. Dems are actively hostile to military affairs and know nothing about military matters. Quick name ONE Democrat who has made military affairs and the “RMA” or Asymmetric Warfare a specialty?
3. The Media/Commentariat is essentially a branch of the Democratic Party and profoundly ignorant of military matters. WSJ reporters ask if the Marines fought in WWII, NYT reporters are impressed that Rangers are organized in rifle companies (hint: the entire ARMY is organized around rifle companies). The Media consistently is afraid of places where the Military is strong and nonchalant where the Military is weak.
4. Asymmetric Warfare was anticipated in a 1995 paper by obscure Chinese PLA colonels, who warned that CHINA itself was also vulnerable to these attacks as it modernized and became more wealthy. China has an ongoing (i.e. from the 10th Century onwards) problem with Muslim Separatists in the West who blow up markets and such. Not well reported but very significant.
5. The Democratic Party is essentially the Party of pre-9/11 policies which Clinton himself recognizes is a disaster. The one area where Bush trumps is that he will at least fight and the Dems won’t even do that. Instead of endless carping and a desire to pay off terrorists who kill us in futile appeasement (they always want more) there is not even the basic political WILL to find a way to achieve decisive victory over our enemies and go the hell home (which used to be the province of Democrats).
6. Muslims in Saudi and other places routinely descrate Korans, and burn bibles and behead those who possess them. Islam simply does not tolerate ANY display of ANY other religion. You can get the death penalty by public beheading simply for possessing a bible in Saudi.
7. Soft power has advantages and limits. Please explain to me how soft power will stop the genocide in Darfur, keep people from being massacred in the Balkans, remove Saddam, stop the Iranians from going nuclear and setting off a regional nuclear arms race, the same in North Korea, remove the Taliban, or deter another massive terrorist attack on the US.
Dems who believe that force is immoral, “hug a thug” works internationally as well as domestically, believe that soft power offers a way to “have it all” principally avoiding the expense and political cost of a military. I suggest that the advent of modern technology means a terrorist in Karachi can be in New York a day later, to become the main operative in a plot that can kill thousands, even millions, of New Yorkers.
Cold War History suggests that deterrence and MAD worked to make both sides understand that an attack would result in mutual destruction. Kumbayah, soft power, and making the enemy love us was useless (though it did serve as a political check domestically to refrain from provocative moves). We face a current enemy more than willing to trade Teheran or Islamabad for New York and Washington, and figure themselves the winners. Soft power is likely a component of this (diplomacy to arrange mutual interests between ourselves, the Indians, Chinese, and Russians who all face terrorism and Islamicists directly on their territory and borders) but not the decisive componenty. Unless you believe that men with guns and the will to use them (demonstrated from Beslan to NYC) can be faced down by Ghandi-esque actions.
That’s the position of the Democratic Party and at best it’s hopelessly naive and stupid.
“I think the NYT piece was designed as the MSM’s come back after the Newsweek debacle,along the lines of “We couldn’t prove that one but this one is true”,”
—
Peter,
Limbaugh predicted just that, the morning before it happened.
Not that they are predictable at all.
I’ll follow up that the abuse at Bagram is not surprising. It takes a lot of expertise and control to manage prisoners, and the US Army and military is set up for finding and defeating the enemy in battle, not operating prisons.
Here in California we have FAR WORSE scandals in our own prisons, which are far from the worst in the Nation. Google Pelican Bay for the abuse there which has gone essentially unpunished, and took place in a controlled environment, absent daily IEDs and mortar attacks.
Rockford, and prisoners whose doctrine features heroic suicide.
Fortunately, though, the US public is well aware of the state of our domestic prisons, thanks to intrepid, thorough investigative reporting on this major public interest story by the New York Times.
/sarcasm
PeterUK–
What’s the deal with the Islamo-nuts in Grosnover Square? Read about it on LGF. Women dressed like Magic 8-Balls. Looks like black eye-slits are all the rage in Piccadilly this spring.
Helpful Harry
New slogan to replace “All the News,” etc: La Resistance Continue.
Rockford, your “That’s the position of the Democratic Party and at best it’s hopelessly naive and stupid.” may beg the question, “But how do you know ‘Ghandi’ wouldn’t defeat the jihad?”…may I suggest an answer, that it has already been tried, and is known as “the last half of the 20th century”?
Fresh Air,
If you follow the link on LGF to Getty Images you’ll see that this is the standard inflated MSM crowd scene.The distance shots show there to be maybe 50-100 there.
What is more concerning is the fact that no one was arrested for our newly minted hate speech laws.Even then there is enough for breach of the peace,incitement etc.I wouldn’t bet on a prosecution though,or a deportation.
““But how do you know ‘Ghandi’ wouldn’t defeat the jihad?”…”
—
That Passenger Peace Train Exchange Program was a Masterstroke.
Buddy
It certainlt was,it was called the Partition of India (1947)
Peter, that India is so prosperous, progressive and buoyant sorta throws open a speculation comparing the apparant value of parliamentary government and its administrative, civil-service, education and military systems to, well, 9th century charismatic transcendentalist holy-man politics, doesn’t it? I mean, what Ghandi wanted was foreigners out, but leave their system alone. And the Raj ended with dignity all-around.
Buddy,
I agree,but we have to look at the other side of the line.
Yamasan — I can relate but I have never quite figured out how to insert unicode in Roger’s blog. “Very good”, no?
Hmmm … 很 垝 ? Hot damn, that worked!
垝 了 !
Looks like hell in Firefox, though.
Rick:
Well I guess the bad guys will just have to try harder won’t they?
Hewitt – R Simon,Austin Bay Interview .
13 min mp3
. Hewitt – R Simon,Austin Bay Interview
—
Transcripts will be at Radioblogger.com
—
Folks say Jay Rosen is smart and fair, but he appears blind:
Sees no agenda in last few days!
(Would he gain his sight back if someone read him Coulter’s latest?)
—
That transcript will be there also.
Anybody Have a link to that train exchange program?
We had plenty at local forum right after 911, but recently tried and did not find.
Quite Graphic.
…Someday I’ll search the basement of this hard drive, if it doesn’t die first.
Charlie:
Comes up fine in IE:
So Carol Herman was right after all, huh?
All I see is 垝 E86 haven’t tried to convert it to Japanese as that will not, for me, materially advance the information derived.
How about that Hot Tub Sake Player?
Is he up yet?
Larsen:
Spent any time in Travis County?
Ronnie Earl, the Jerk hounding Delay.
Bill Burkett, well, you all know.
Dan Rather’s Daughter:
Employee at Dem Party there.
Dan Rather, gossip monger looking for work:
Gave speech to Dem Party Party there.
Quite a place, I’d wager.
Doug, it comes up fine in FIrefox as well, it just looks like hell. Chinese writing is fine art: the Unicode glyphs look like they were block printed by a 5 year old. (Much like my calligraphy, as a matter of fact.)
As to Carol’s notion: 不 垝 ! 不 對 !
Sure, it’s next door, Austin/state gov’t/Univ of Texas, my and my whole clan’s alma tomater. Memogate’s hometown, too!
I’m SO proud!
Ankay Ooyay Eekspay Igpay Atinlay, Arliechay?
I’m not going to name names and I don’t mean to be mean, but…
There is a commenter here who has a stream-of-consciousness style that swerves from sometimes making good points to… well, sometimes I don’t follow what the hell she (whoops, I mean they) is talking about.
And, the posts are so longwinded and rambling that they take up the whole screen and I can’t see who posted it unless I scroll down. And, I can tell without scrolling down who posted it. Every time.
And, I can’t decide, if the interesting punctuation is a sign that it is time to take the meds. Or if it’s just trolling. ya know?
just sayin.
Nessman, the station manager wants to know if you’re reading this stuff on WKRP’s time.
Nessman,
Ask Charlie to put it in unicode, then maybe you can have Buddy Larsen translate it into Latin.
In Partes Tres, of course.
Les,
Some people don’t know that if you use anything but Reynolds Wrap (doubled for safety, of course) you’re bound to wind up with micro-cracks. Even the tiniest micro-crack lets the rays through and then – well you’re really not responsible for what you write, are you? Just think of it as micro-cracked communication.
Nessman is training writers for the station. Helps probably to have that Cincinnati sensibility.
Rick, the trick is plenty of bubble-wrap (3M’s is most reliable) inside the double-thick Reynolds. The little air chambers absorb those damn sub-reality waves that get in thru the microcracks, which seem to always form during “conferences”.
What a great idea! I was getting so tired of washing the spray on insulation out of my hair every morning that I was thinking of shaving my head. I’ll give it a try tomorrow.
Oh, glad to help. I know it’s bad right now, what with the Transmitters breeding like rabbits.
“(3M’s is most reliable)”
Quite frankly, I always trust 3M, they are good at what they do. Sorry, this was not meant to be a product endorsement.
From Buddy Link:
“Dear Dr. Dobson,
Iím a 12-year-old boy named Ben and me and my friends think that letting girls put their mouth down there doesnít really count. What do Jesus and you think?
Ben
He entered the e-mail address, the subject line “question for doctor Dobson from Ben,” and pressed “send.”
Dr. James Dobson chuckled, turned off his computer, and went to count his millions.
Damn! forgot there’s no garbage cans.
Please don’t get angry w/me again Buddy.
Ahh, Luther, aren’t we all, in the end, “product endorsements”?
Now it’ll just sit there like a Cincinnati Air Freshener
I saw that Dr. Dobson entry…don’t stop there, there’s hundreds of others, some really good…you landed on an uncool one.
Too bad schools are so uncool.
(except for 60′s leftovers)
Here’s a local blast from the past in my search for those trains: (no luck) – Beret Namedrop.
Kuri,
“I proposed community control of the public education system through the existing School-Community Based Management law…
The existing public education system is busted. Even my dear friend, General Eric Shinseki, couldnít manage the existing Hawaiiís system. Both of us were educated in the public school system from k to 12 on Kauai from 1947 through 1960 and today we both donít recognize the system.
—
Anonymous,
Its too bad Shinseki doesn’t recognize that the black beret was a symbol of excellence for the rangers……
It was a nice Forum.
Until the liberals shut it down.
Very liberal of them.
How, in heaven’s name, did Roger L. Simon collect a posse of right wing commentators, who go around and label people’s opinions they don’t like as something done by trolls? These are adults talking?
By the way, just to go back to the comment I made about Drudge showing the first day’s receipts for Star Wars, turns out the film opened to RECORDS. And, the sum made history. Even though so many other films, so far, this spring, have tanked.
And, even though it seems there’s comments on right wing sites that says the film stinks. Is boring. And, should have come out without any sound to it.
While, I’ve read reviews (including Ebert’s almost giving this one 4-stars), that claims this fantasy film is “anti-Bush.” What a big investment people are making, on the Net, to attempt to make this movie a less than stellar event.
Same thing happened when Arianna Huffington began blogging. People said she was drowning. And, she’d never attract any “A” list people to comment on her site. While, meanwhile her site looks very interesting. And, has a pretty interesting lineup of celebrities and pundits. Something tells me she’s not drowning. (She’s not even in water, be it hot or cold.) And, there’s a lot of nastiness in the air.
HOWEVER, there’s also been a SWING. Happens all the time when you’re in business. YOu can get lots of “foot traffic,” only to lose it. And, stuff that’s “in style” becomes less popular.
Is it possible Bush is losing popularity? Is it possible Americans don’t liked to be bullied? Is it possible we have fewer friends around the globe? Including, in Afghanistan and Iraq, there are two countries not exactly reaching goals towards democracy at all.
Sure, Roger was once a liberal. He says so. He lives among liberals. He’s said this, too. So, I’m quite surprised that he’s unaware of the shift. (That’s why I mentioned the money receipts for Star Wars. You can’t reach profits like that without a strong audience. Kids are in school, ya know, on Thursday’s opening day. Didn’t matter. Star Wars is also an old franchise. Like the Rolling Stones. So, whose watching? If it’s an older crowd, mixed in with the youth; then there’s an appeal out there that hasn’t been blessed by the Evangelicals.
There’s nothing you or I can do about the mess now in the senate.
And, like I said, events turn. I can even remember how Rommell, in June of 1942, was licking his lips and bragging, that Hitler “WON.” All that was left was mopping up.
Some mopping up, huh, when the tides turned.
I don’t expect to have answers until events come to pass. What would be nice? That enough republican senators treat Frist’s nu-ku-lar option as the poison it is. Are senators brave? No. Not necessarily. But they are cunning. And, they can fight back now, or lose so much that it will make the GOP as a party IRRELEVENT.
Can’t happen? Nixon tried all the stunts you’re seeing today. Done by the same group of people who are now in the White House, too. As if, somehow, no lessons were learned at all. But what do I know?
All of this will eventually come to pass. And, whatever it is, it’s gonna be history. Because never has a group of religious fanatics come this close to tearing at our Constitution. But we shall see. “Vicimology” for the “creation scientists.” UNbelievable.
And, if Bush gets his way? John Aschcroft replaces Rehnquist on the Supremes. Oy. Vey.
Carol,
Right wing? No offence, but I stopped reading your postings long ago, but not because your ideas were offensive. No. I stopped because it struck me that all you managed were attitude and lengthy lists of prejudices and preconceptions. I have little patience with such, call it what you will.
“Arianna Huffington began blogging. People said she was drowning.”
—
Was that that poor girl in Ted’s Oldsmobile?
“blogging,” …and I thought gurgling was way past morbid.
I usually come to this blog for intelligent comment. But now that I read someone relating the success or failure of the new Star Wars film to politics, I may have to reconsider.
“And, whatever it is, it’s gonna be history.”
Yup.
Or, as Jocelyn Elders used to say:
“We’re all gonna die of somethun.“
Ho hum…okay let’s have the John Ashcroft transgression list. Here, let me start it for you:
1) white 2) guy 3) devout 4) Homeland Security, which broke up over a hundred terror plots under him but how do we know any of them would’ve succeeded anyway huh 4) not a Democrat 5) hmm, at a loss, help me here, Obi-Wan Ka-Carol.
Oh, yes, made the Dems look bad in 2000 by graciously relinquishing his senate seat to a widow lady, when he had a vastly stronger legal case to contest the election than Alg Ore had in his Florida attack on the election laws. That’d be #5, Lord Obi-Wan-Carol.
Lighten up, Buddy,
They didn’t accuse him of bringing that plane down did they?
—
…and it was somebody else that took down the one in Minnesota, right?
That was one Well Stoned Party afterward.
A real “Wake” Up Call to America, so to speak.
“Alg Ore had in his Florida attack on the election laws”
—
He played on our fears.
I would like to add that, as a novelist, I found the opening paragraphs of this story particularly badly written, as if taken from the pages of pulp fiction.
Roger—
You’re being too kind.
So they were evidence. Evidence of what? That a man occasionally smoked a stick of tea, a man who looked as if any touch of the exotic would appeal to him. On the other hand lots of tough guys smoked marihuana, also lots of band musicians and high school kids and nice girls who had given up trying. American hasheesh. A weed that would grow anywhere. Unlawful to cultivate. That meant a lot in a country as big as the U.S.A.
Okay, so I quote the best and, laid aside last night,…
It helps if you dress like a detective. Detective dress kinda square. If you look like a detective people are gonna think you’re packing something.
Are you?
Am I what?
Packing something?
Only an asshole gets killed for a car.
…cult favorites.
Good week to watch basketball and reality shows. Bad week to listen to/read politicians/civil servants and news media/news media critics.
Charlie,
I didn’t get any Kanji. Is that what you were trying to print out? Just blocks and strange symbols. I know very little about computers. The one I’m using is a loaner from a friend. Oh well.
There’s something about a closed mind that brings no enlightenment. While the zealots dream they’re going to take over the judiciary. WHich I don’t even think is possible.
What can happen, ahead? What are my choice? Can I go outside the box? Arlen Specter is undergoing chemotherapy. He’s not going to cave, now, and look like Dr. Frist’s sock puppet.
Let’s say, Dr. Frist pulls him from chairing the judiciary committee? Choices? If Specter quits the senate for health reasons, Governor Rendell of Pennsylvania is a democrat. A democrat comes into the senate. So, the republicans lose one.
Can they lose others?
If you go out of the box, and try to see a shift in power, you sure could see a change, ahead. Why’s that? The moderates in the GOP are always held back from seeking the presidency because of the primaries that go through the conservatives territory.
And, as the democrats head to the MIDDLE, one party, before the other, GETS TO THE MIDDLE. How many republcans could you shake out of the tree that would make the senate fall to the democrats?
Now, if Specter leaves, who does Rendell choose. The democrat, Barbara Hager. In ’06, which can get to be very competitive, Santorum could lose to Casey. That’s 2 democrats from one state, Pennsylvania. That has the 2nd largest senior population outside of Floriduh.
Oddly enough, American political winds are always shifting. And, they shift the most when a president becomes unpopular. We’ve had a few, recently. LBJ, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Bush I, and soon, perhaps, this Bush, too?
I don’t know what happens in the future. But neither do you, folks. Only that the social-conservatives want something, here, very badly; while lots of other people don’t want them to have it at all. (Gee. It would have been so much better “uniting instead of dividing.” Where did I hear that, before?)
But it ain’t over, till it’s over. However, like the weather, the storm clouds form, first. Can Dr. Frist even back down, now? The price of being driven to frenzy.
When Lincoln won in 1860, 4 southern states called for their legislatures to meet. People didn’t panic. It was a habit of southerners to claim they’d leave the union. “Then, they’d go out for a glass of water.” Here? It was thought they’d go out for two glasses. And, then come back. But they didn’t. They thought they could win the war. Didn’t do that, either.
Same old states. New form of nuttiness because they think God talks to them, directly. And, they get peeved when they don’t get what they want. And, getting along is not something that flows through their blood. Good luck to ya. I’m not betting on Dr. Frist, here, having a winning hand.
And, I am betting that what’s going on in Iraq is getting to look as rediculous as Saddam in his underpants. By the way, if the Iraqis are waiting for me to apologize, I hope their holding their breaths.
Huh? What! Oh, never mind.
26 Million Breaths to hold, that should keep em busy. It’s *their* breaths though, and I’m all for they’re right to choose.
I’ve seen London
I’ve seen France
Saddam looks rediculous in his underpants.
—Carol
Carol:
Sweetie. I am not trying to be unpleasant but I find it very difficult to read your posts. My mind strays, I suffer confusion and I move on. I very rarely get to the last line. edit.
If you think Bush is a bully, then you are too young to remember LBJ. If he had not been a bully there never would have been a civil rights act passed.
Just what are you bitching about? I have a hard time understanding what you are saying. I feel like I am reading a Virginia Wolf novel when I read your post.
Who is making you do anything? I would say Bush’s popularity will stay in an area not too high or low; but he is president not head of the pep club.
“But it ain’t over, till it’s over.”
—
Was that Jocelyn Elders, or Joseph H. Garagiola?
I thrive on confusion.
Reminds me of my childhood.
…and all the rest.
I think Carol fails to udnerstand that Frist is probably not as right wing as she is and I know Lugar isn’t. In fact I think Carol’s whoe use of wings is a tad ponderous.
But if the point of the post as something to do with the issue of the filibuster in regards to judicial nominees then I think she might stop gazing at her navel and read the Constitution. It is an issue of seperation of powers and the true meaning of advise and consent.
I think it would be better to have an up or down vote no matter which party is in control.
Carol,
You knew Rommel,personally? Of course that would be before 1944,I was only two then and living in a different country and never got to meet him.You know how difficult traveling is during total war,always some Stuka trying to sink the ferry,submariners machinegunning ones life raft,makes visiting such a chore.Anyway,I’m all agog, what was he like.Of course most people think of him as the Desert Fox,but I remember him fondly as the man who tried to kill Hitler,I’m sure you do too.
Peter:
ahh yes. The desert fox. I am thinking of that scene from Hamlet, he is holding a skull and saying I knew him well.
Carol has that effect on me.
melodramatic.
Carol says she does not know what is going to happen. But I do. I know everything and right now I know I am going to sign off and get ready for work because I have to work this weekend.
it is like magic.
In Partes Tres, of course.
You’ve got to have a lot of Gaul to try that.
I didn’t get any Kanji. Is that what you were trying to print out? Just blocks and strange symbols. I know very little about computers. The one I’m using is a loaner from a friend. Oh well.
Dammit. You know, I should have thought of that — I pulled them from a han zi online dictionary, since I was “talking” Mandarin, but I should have used the kanji group. Since I learned in the days of Wade-Giles, I never trust my pinyin.
Okay, it was hen3 hao3 ….
… and if you read Chinese better than you write English, I’ve very jealous.
Carol’s whoe use wings?
That *would* be ponderous.
Unique, though.
Heavenly Even.
Maybe they could flap around meh rheum afterward.
…while I have a cigarette.
Peter, I was sitting on the edge of my bed, having a cigarette,
thinking:
Ya cant knock a Stuka for trying.
But then, I guess some cant can’t not knock a Stuka, I suppose.
Some things are inspirational.
Esp when they’re flapping their wings around your rheum.
Trying to sink the Fairy.
“You’ve got to have a lot of Gaul to try that.”
Sorry, can Buddy have your permission, sir?
Sagdad of Bagdad Dreams:
72 Stukas
Flapping their Wings.
He’s at the Jazz Marlboro again.
What if there’s no their there?
Yep..Smokin’ Joke Camel….
I figure when you’re talkin the ME.
(i KNOW: do it a lot)
Self Centered.
I wish.
Pardon my dullardness, but, finding myself without my own jazz marlboro, your posts would be less incomprehensible if they contained enough “words” to make an occasional “sentence”.
A bit like Carol, but more brief.
Saddam would like less grief,
about the brief.
(Not that we/he always gets what we want.)
The flying winged things in meh rheum was longer.
I just thought I’d perform a public service and
tighten up the ship.
So to speak.
In less than ten years America was twice attacked by barbaric and fanatic Islamofascist yet self-loathing Americans, Vietnam-blinded journalist, Hollywood’s bejeweled bottom-feeders and the oh-so-righteous International Community not only expect but demand that America show her soft side by bending over and allowing ourselves to be kicked in the (sic)again.
I will NEVER FORGET!
The enemy is not my friend.
(I am sick to death of self-loathing, bottom-feeding, blinded by Vietnam, friends of that International community of racists and sexist Americans)
—Is it possible Bush is losing popularity? Is it possible Americans don’t liked to be bullied? Is it possible we have fewer friends around the globe? Including, in Afghanistan and Iraq, there are two countries not exactly reaching goals towards democracy at all.—
He’s never been popular.
Bullied into what?
We’ve never really had “friends.”
We’ve been at this democracy game for almost 230 years, and we’re still working on it.
How long did it take Japan and Germany?
MTV generation, I want it yesterday.
Even Europe’s still working on it and they’ve had 60 years. They’re going backwards.
I thought I was wordy….
Congrats, Ms. Herman, you’ve surpassed me.
Here come Gomer Pyle!
Here come Hawkeye!
Or maybe they’ll do it right?
“I’ve heard anecdotes that the US press really rallied behind Finland, against USSR, in the immediately pre-WWII Russo/Finnish war. I think even the Duranty’d press was appalled at the giant bear eating up the Reindeer People.”
Yep, underdog and all… I don’t think going back to NYTimes dispatches in the 1930s/1940s would show you much more than just how imperfect and generally negative [if it bleeds, it leads...] journalism is. There were some Communist sympathizers in important positions, but I don’t think the rank and file were anything like what we now have to suffer today. The 1960/70 revolutions in the academia and intelligentsia created this monster imo.
I agree, Cutler…it’s a simple matter of what’s inside the preponderance of the round things on top of the meat puppets sitting in the offices where the pencils is.
60s “arrogance of power” so miffed the youthful ‘Ballard 500′-to-be that they set out to prove the antithesis, “power of arrogance”. And have succeeded quite well, in the proper self-hating non-booshwa fashion.