Lance-d again
Looks like the Froggies' little bicycle tour is going to be won by an American again, for the fifth year in a row, much like their wars. And this American only has one testicle, which is, of course, one more than any male in France has. The German almost got him in the time trial, but slipped and fell in the typical French lousy weather, which reportedly surrendered as it saw an American approaching. The only other rider ever to win five Tours de France was Miguel Indurain, who was, needless to say, also not a Frenchman. And Eddie Merckxxxxxxxx won a few too. Let me see - was he French? Hey, whaddyou know, non! Belgique. But the American did not ask the UN for permission before winning and had no allies from Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, Monaco and Andorra, so obviously his victory was bought and paid for by Dick Cheney's oil company.
Friday, July 25, 2003
Rant-alicious!
Listening to Rush just now, I couldn't believe how he tore into a liberal caller. It was a classic rant, righteous and to the point and articulate beyond belief! Sometimes he really hits it. I think he's been much better lately, in the last year or so, than in the previous ten years or more I've been listening to him. Maybe he'll have a transcript up on the website. It needs to be used and used and used again until the electrons wear out. There's a campaign coming up!
Listening to Rush just now, I couldn't believe how he tore into a liberal caller. It was a classic rant, righteous and to the point and articulate beyond belief! Sometimes he really hits it. I think he's been much better lately, in the last year or so, than in the previous ten years or more I've been listening to him. Maybe he'll have a transcript up on the website. It needs to be used and used and used again until the electrons wear out. There's a campaign coming up!
Thursday, July 24, 2003
Australians take Henderson Field
Is this a headline from 1943? No, today. But it's not the pesky Nips the Aussies and their allies are up against. Seems as if the Solomon Islanders have given up on the cargo cult and decided to help themselves to each others' goods. It's just spooky, having heard tales from my father about his service in the Army Air Corps in New Caledonia, where he was commissioned, Woodlark and Guadalcanal. Something about training with broomsticks because they didn't have enough rifles, with the Japanese a couple of hundred miles away. And, yes, he flew in B-17s from Henderson Field, after a few thousand Marines and other GIs had died taking it out of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
Is this a headline from 1943? No, today. But it's not the pesky Nips the Aussies and their allies are up against. Seems as if the Solomon Islanders have given up on the cargo cult and decided to help themselves to each others' goods. It's just spooky, having heard tales from my father about his service in the Army Air Corps in New Caledonia, where he was commissioned, Woodlark and Guadalcanal. Something about training with broomsticks because they didn't have enough rifles, with the Japanese a couple of hundred miles away. And, yes, he flew in B-17s from Henderson Field, after a few thousand Marines and other GIs had died taking it out of the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere.
Wednesday, July 23, 2003
Couldn't happen to a nicer psychotic dork
The execrable Gray Davis will have to face a recall election. Unfortunately, it looks to Drudge like The Terminator has got other fish to fry. Like it matters in the People's Republic of California, where everyone's a Democrat and the budget regularly sets aside larger sums than the entire gross national products of Mexico, Guatemala and Brazil for the care and feeding of illegal immigrants from - Mexico, Guatemala and Brazil. But just maybe it'll keep the Democrats busy and Davis, terminal loose cannon that he is, in extremis, may say some things about his fellow Dems that will come in handy in next year's dustup. Davis is not the kind to go down quietly like Torricelli, even after the ritual visit from the Clinton Political Death Squad. Could be fun, folks.
The execrable Gray Davis will have to face a recall election. Unfortunately, it looks to Drudge like The Terminator has got other fish to fry. Like it matters in the People's Republic of California, where everyone's a Democrat and the budget regularly sets aside larger sums than the entire gross national products of Mexico, Guatemala and Brazil for the care and feeding of illegal immigrants from - Mexico, Guatemala and Brazil. But just maybe it'll keep the Democrats busy and Davis, terminal loose cannon that he is, in extremis, may say some things about his fellow Dems that will come in handy in next year's dustup. Davis is not the kind to go down quietly like Torricelli, even after the ritual visit from the Clinton Political Death Squad. Could be fun, folks.
Tuesday, July 22, 2003
Iraq and Vietnam
So, it looks like we have a little progress on the anti-Ba'athist front. With all the comparing to Vietnam that's been going around lately, I thought I'd speculate what the war in Vietnam would have been like if we had had the same kind of success there that we've had in Iraq. Let's see. Treating Kuwait as South Vietnam, a Republican president in 1962 would have driven Ho Chi Minh's armies out of South Vietnam in 100 hours. He would have stopped short of invading North Vietnam and then had twelve years of relative peace, accompanied by air patrols over two-thirds of North Vietnam, while Ho defied UN resolution after UN resolution, then in 1969, kicked out UN inspectors. The Democrat president who had taken over in 1964 threatened, blustered and sent cruise missiles, but did nothing effective after he survived being impeached for lying to a grand jury. In 1974 Ho would have defied yet another UN resolution ordering him to turn over weapons of mass destruction and, under a Republican president elected in 1972, we would have invaded. In three weeks, Hanoi and Haiphong would have fallen and we would have had several divisions on the Chinese border, supported by complete air superiority. For a few more weeks, the Vietminh would have conducted a guerrilla campaign, almost managing to kill one GI a day, until, in late 1974, we had killed General Giap and Ho's son (did he have one?) and were hot on the trail of Ho. If we manage to snag Saddam soon, which seems likely, the parallel to Vietnam would reveal that we took Ho Chi Minh into custody and made possible a democratic transition. The differences? Oh, yeah. Iraq has more people than North Vietnam, far more resources and was supposed to have the entire support of the Arab world. Sure. Vietnam=Iraq. If only.
Update
Looks like Austin Bay has been reading Conundrum:
or great minds think alike. There's a bit more, though, if you want to push the analogy. What if the Viet Minh (or Cong) had, in about 1970, flown airplanes into the not-yet-built Twin Towers - ok the Empire State Building and Pentagon? Would the bombing of Haiphong and Hanoi have seemed so unjustified then? Would the antiwar demos have abated a bit? Remember, Muhammad Ali said "I ain't got nothing against no Viet Cong." But just maybe he would have had if the Vietnam "conflict" only were truly more similar to the anti-Ba'athist and anti-terrorist war.
So, it looks like we have a little progress on the anti-Ba'athist front. With all the comparing to Vietnam that's been going around lately, I thought I'd speculate what the war in Vietnam would have been like if we had had the same kind of success there that we've had in Iraq. Let's see. Treating Kuwait as South Vietnam, a Republican president in 1962 would have driven Ho Chi Minh's armies out of South Vietnam in 100 hours. He would have stopped short of invading North Vietnam and then had twelve years of relative peace, accompanied by air patrols over two-thirds of North Vietnam, while Ho defied UN resolution after UN resolution, then in 1969, kicked out UN inspectors. The Democrat president who had taken over in 1964 threatened, blustered and sent cruise missiles, but did nothing effective after he survived being impeached for lying to a grand jury. In 1974 Ho would have defied yet another UN resolution ordering him to turn over weapons of mass destruction and, under a Republican president elected in 1972, we would have invaded. In three weeks, Hanoi and Haiphong would have fallen and we would have had several divisions on the Chinese border, supported by complete air superiority. For a few more weeks, the Vietminh would have conducted a guerrilla campaign, almost managing to kill one GI a day, until, in late 1974, we had killed General Giap and Ho's son (did he have one?) and were hot on the trail of Ho. If we manage to snag Saddam soon, which seems likely, the parallel to Vietnam would reveal that we took Ho Chi Minh into custody and made possible a democratic transition. The differences? Oh, yeah. Iraq has more people than North Vietnam, far more resources and was supposed to have the entire support of the Arab world. Sure. Vietnam=Iraq. If only.
Update
Looks like Austin Bay has been reading Conundrum:
Because Vietnam was no Iraq. As a military pal recently said to me, if Vietnam were Iraq, the United States would have occupied Hanoi, killed or dispersed the Politburo and utterly destroyed the North Vietnamese Army. Laos and Cambodia would not have served as sanctuaries for communist troops and supplies. (Syria understands this difference.) Southerners from Saigon would be part of a new national council in the process of drawing up a democratic constitution.
That's the minute answer -- America won a big military victory, and did so quickly.
or great minds think alike. There's a bit more, though, if you want to push the analogy. What if the Viet Minh (or Cong) had, in about 1970, flown airplanes into the not-yet-built Twin Towers - ok the Empire State Building and Pentagon? Would the bombing of Haiphong and Hanoi have seemed so unjustified then? Would the antiwar demos have abated a bit? Remember, Muhammad Ali said "I ain't got nothing against no Viet Cong." But just maybe he would have had if the Vietnam "conflict" only were truly more similar to the anti-Ba'athist and anti-terrorist war.
Blowin' in the Wind? - Not!
Too bad, Greenie-weenies! The idea of getting free power from the wind is provably insufficient for a modern industrial economy. But feel free to go back to the days before heating and airconditioning and washing machines and refrigerators and dishwashers and electric stoves and water heaters. Let's see, who would it be that would draw water, carry wood, wash clothes by hand, shop every day? Women and servants? Oh, excuse me, I guess that's OK, then.
Too bad, Greenie-weenies! The idea of getting free power from the wind is provably insufficient for a modern industrial economy. But feel free to go back to the days before heating and airconditioning and washing machines and refrigerators and dishwashers and electric stoves and water heaters. Let's see, who would it be that would draw water, carry wood, wash clothes by hand, shop every day? Women and servants? Oh, excuse me, I guess that's OK, then.
Monday, July 21, 2003
Trust the Scots
The Scotsman, not a reliably rightist paper, appears to have the goods on the BBC. Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch. Trust the Caledonians to press the attack home when others won't. (Full disclosure: I'm a son of a son of Arran) Maybe the Blair/Raines fiasco in New Amsterdam emboldened the media critics - led by everyone's friend "The Sun" - to plunge the long knives in. Odd how things turn around so fast. Ideally, for libertarian/objectivist objectives, the scandal about David Kelly's suicide will start the BBC down a slippery slope to well-deserved oblivion and put the Kibosh on Blair's Clintonite Labour Party as well. Imagine having to pay the government to even HAVE a TV!! Bad enough here in the United States of Free America we are forced on penalty of imprisonment to pay for a channel which hardly any of those who pay voluntarily watch. Now if I only trusted Ian Duncan Smith to be a choice, rather than an echo....
The Scotsman, not a reliably rightist paper, appears to have the goods on the BBC. Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch. Trust the Caledonians to press the attack home when others won't. (Full disclosure: I'm a son of a son of Arran) Maybe the Blair/Raines fiasco in New Amsterdam emboldened the media critics - led by everyone's friend "The Sun" - to plunge the long knives in. Odd how things turn around so fast. Ideally, for libertarian/objectivist objectives, the scandal about David Kelly's suicide will start the BBC down a slippery slope to well-deserved oblivion and put the Kibosh on Blair's Clintonite Labour Party as well. Imagine having to pay the government to even HAVE a TV!! Bad enough here in the United States of Free America we are forced on penalty of imprisonment to pay for a channel which hardly any of those who pay voluntarily watch. Now if I only trusted Ian Duncan Smith to be a choice, rather than an echo....
Life its own self
I love the dawn chorus. I love the silhouette of trees against the sky at dusk. I've been seeing a lot of both lately. It's hot in Tallahassee, hot and muggy and full of life, unfortunately including live mosquitoes. It's a month after summer solstice now, the days have shortened somewhat, but not enough to cool them off. That won't happen until, probably, November. So I've one-third of July, August, September and October to crouch frightened by lightning storms, stock up on candles and flashlight batteries for the inevitable ouragon. Only no hurricanes ever hit. I've been in Florida thirteen years now and none of the dozens of threatening cyclic monsters have found me, punished me for my presuming boldness. Check that, sixteen years, counting three when I was little, in Tampa in the fifties. A monstrous hurricane hit Tampa when we were vacationing up North (Carol? 1954?) And then when we came south for the winter of school and work, another hit New England right where we had been. Another girl's name, before hurricanes lost their sex, became hermaphroditic, before the NOAA or Congress or whoever spit in the wind and tried to make everyone believe women were no worse than men. Hah!!
I love the dawn chorus. I love the silhouette of trees against the sky at dusk. I've been seeing a lot of both lately. It's hot in Tallahassee, hot and muggy and full of life, unfortunately including live mosquitoes. It's a month after summer solstice now, the days have shortened somewhat, but not enough to cool them off. That won't happen until, probably, November. So I've one-third of July, August, September and October to crouch frightened by lightning storms, stock up on candles and flashlight batteries for the inevitable ouragon. Only no hurricanes ever hit. I've been in Florida thirteen years now and none of the dozens of threatening cyclic monsters have found me, punished me for my presuming boldness. Check that, sixteen years, counting three when I was little, in Tampa in the fifties. A monstrous hurricane hit Tampa when we were vacationing up North (Carol? 1954?) And then when we came south for the winter of school and work, another hit New England right where we had been. Another girl's name, before hurricanes lost their sex, became hermaphroditic, before the NOAA or Congress or whoever spit in the wind and tried to make everyone believe women were no worse than men. Hah!!
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