I see that Bush apparently doesn't think much of the recent Amnesty Report blasting his administration for Guantanamo, etc. etc. etc. Not too long ago, Timothy Burke wrote a very nice post on a relatively neglected aspect of the larger debate about torture and abuse. It's unfortunate that Bush doesn't understand the main point Burke makes there.
Update: Ah, and if there's anything to this, then it's an even greater shame that Bush doesn't get Burke's point.
Some good, reasonably inexpensive jazz coming up. Details below the fold.
Sunday, May 28th: At Barbes, at 7pm:
ROY NATHANSON QUARTET with special guest Marc Ribot. Jazz Passenger Roy nathanson will be joined by his former bandmate in the Lounge Lizards as well as regular associates Sam Bardfeld (Violin) Tim Kaya (bass and vocals) and Gerald Cleaver (Drums). Roy's latest project (which will be touring Europe under the name of "the Barbes band") draws in part from his old songbook - made popular by the likes of Elvis Costello, Debbie Harry and Jimmy Scott - but the focus is on new pieces which feature Roy's storytelling: an assortment of quirky narratives, memories, aphorisms and stream of consciousness monologues which range from moving to poignant to outright funny. The narratives are incorporated in tight musical structures which include sung choruses, quotations and superb arrangements and ensemble playing.The drummer, Gerald Cleaver, is great. Haven't heard any of the others yet. The bass player will briefly be our roommate in a few days (he's moving in, we're moving out, so we'll overlap by a month).
But - tough call - at roughly the same time (6pm-8pm), at the Bowery Poetry Club:
Gersoritzviklellan + Weiss/Sacks TrioThe cover is $7 for that show.
Gersoritzviklellan - which features:Ben Gerstein - trombone
Jonathan Moritz - tenor saxophone
Eivind Opsvik - bass
John McLellan - drumsWeiss/Sacks Trio - which is featuring:
Jacob Sacks - keyboard
Thomas Morgan - bass
Dan Weiss - drums
On Tuesday, May 31st, my current roommate Vinnie Sperrazza has a gig at the 55 Bar at 7pm. Great drummer too. No cover, but they expect you to buy a drink. Later in the evening around 10pm, same bar, Dave Binney's Balance is playing. Should be good.
Same night at Nublu at 9pm, Bill McHenry is playing. I saw him play with a different group there last week and really enjoyed the show. No cover.
Barbes should be fun all night on Wednesday, June 1st. At 8pm, there is this:
MALABY/SANCHEZ/RAINEY - Tony's playing is thick and powerful, nimble and lyrical. Whether composed or improvised, his music is so carefully crafted it always feels written. What he delivers in the end is old-fashioned beautiful music with unbelievable emotional power. The Malaby/Sanchez/Rainey Trio may be of his finest vehicles. The interaction between the three ferquent collaborators is near-telepathic. Their first release Alive in Brooklyn was recorded live at Barbes - with Angelica Sanchez on keyboard, Tom Rainey on drum and tony Malaby on saxophones. $8Great stuff. And then at 10pm, the second half of Eivind Opsvik's CD release party:
Eivind Opsvik OVERSEAS II - CD Release ConcertI saw the first set of the first CD release party last week at the 55 Bar and enjoyed it thoroughly.
Tony Malaby - tenor saxophone, Loren Stillman - alto sax, Jacob Sacks - piano, Jeff Davis - drums, Eivind Opsvik - bass and compositions. In 2003 Norwegian Bassplayer Eivind Opsvik released his debut CD on Fresh Sound Records; "Overseas". The Press said: "Eivind Opsvik has an unusual gift for writing small, poignant pieces of music"(New York Times) "The excellent debut recording …shows what happens when a musician puts the whole range of his imagination into play" (Downbeat) In the month of May. The follow up "Overseas II" features eleven new compositions by Opsvik complemented by the spirited playing of his band. - $8
I start to laugh, but it comes out all twisted and bitter: Analysts Behind Iraq Intelligence Were Rewarded.
Like this: Ha ha ha hmmmph.
I don't read the NYT editorial or Op-Ed page any more, and I especially don't read Thomas Friedman any more. Life is too short. But life is not too short for mockery of Thomas Friedman. Here and here, you'll find some funny Friedman poetry - a new, but very promising, sub-genre of literature.
Woo hoo. I ordered the Frog Eyes CD, "The Golden River," a few days ago, and it just came in the mail. It's awesome.
The music is hard to describe. The lead singer sounds a bit like David Bowie would sound if he had a nervous breakdown and thought he was Tom Waits. It's sad and manic and strange - and very much worth the $12 I spent on it (including shipping and handling!).
I don't have much to say about the deal struck by the Senate "moderates" regarding the filibustering of federal judges. My view is well expressed by Noz. The deal has Democrats refraining from filibustering unless there are "extraordinary circumstances," but effectively lets the Republicans decide which circumtances are extraordinary; that is, it puts that judgment in the hands of those whose judgment motivated Democrats to filibuster in the first place. I would have preferred to let the Republicans change the rules, and made them deal with a public that saw the measure as an unacceptable power grab. I know that I should not have that much confidence in the populace, but I do think such a decision by the GOP would have been something of a last straw. But I might well have been wrong in that.
Democrats seem to be happy that they have the filibuster in their hands for an upcoming fight over Bush's first Supreme Court nomination. But the Bush people seem confident that this the Dems' hope is a false friend:
One thing that is clear, he and others said, is that Bush will pick someone with a strong conservative judicial philosophy. And the Bush team is banking on the idea that Democrats cannot filibuster a nominee who is no more conservative than the three appellate nominees they just agreed to let come to a floor vote. "Outside of the president nominating Jack the Ripper, I don't think there's the stomach to filibuster," said Sean Rushton, executive director of the Committee for Justice, formed to support Bush judicial nominees.A "nominee who is no more conservative than the three...they just agreed to let come to a floor vote." So Janice Rogers Brown, who seriously believes that any interference by the government with the workings of a laissez-faire economy is unconstitutional, is to set the benchmark by which only a more conservative judge can be acceptably filibustered according to the recent agreement. Great deal. Though I did read somewhere (where?) that there may be reason to think at least one of the judges accorded a vote by the agreement will not be confirmed, owing to "No" votes cast by some Republican signatories. Hopefully that will be Brown, but my hunch is that the political salience of the state v. religion issue will make a "No" vote for Priscilla Owen more likely from non-theocon Republicans. I hope I'm wrong.
And speaking of free markets, am I the only one to dectect a hint of indelicacy in the name of the latest mass military operation in Iraq, Operation New Market?
Two cool shows coming up . . .
First show: Tomorrow (Tuesday, May 23rd), Bill McHenry is at Nublu at 9pm. Nublu is one of those silly bars with no sign outside. Get directions on the website and then just look for a door with a blue light over it. Trust me. And remember the secret handshake I taught you.
Second show: Wednesday, May 24th. Eivind Opsvik is having one of his two NYC CD release parties. (The CD features multiple sets of musicians, I think, so having two release parties makes a certain amount of sense.) This one is at the 55 Bar at 10pm. Cover is probably $8 or $10.
Yet another paper I'll never have time to read . . .
Families, divorce and voter turnout in the US
Julianna Sandell and Eric PlutzerAbstract: How large a role does the family play in civic development? This paper examines an important aspect of family influence by tracing the impact of divorce on voter turnout during adolescence. We show that the effect of divorce among white families is large, depressing turnout by nearly 10 percentage points. Using data from the National Education Longitudinal Study of 1988, we demonstrate that the impact of divorce varies by racial group and can rival the impact of parentsrsquo educational attainment, which is generally regarded as the most important non-political characteristic of onersquos family of origin. We attempt to explain the divorce effect by examining the mediating impacts of parental voter turnout, active social learning, income loss, child–parent interaction, residential mobility, and educational attainment.
As Bush speeches were being drafted in the prewar period, serious questions were also being raised within the intelligence community about purported threats from biologically armed unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).And, of course, there were always those pesky aluminum tubes.In an Oct. 7, 2002, speech, Bush mentioned a potential threat to the U.S. mainland being explored by Iraq through unmanned aircraft "that could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons." The basis for that analysis was a single report that an Iraqi general in late 2000 or early 2001 indicated interest in buying autopilots and gyroscopes for Hussein's UAV program. The manufacturer automatically included topographic mapping software of the United States in the package.
When the list was submitted in early 2002, the manufacturer's distributor determined that the U.S. mapping software would not be included in the autopilot package, and told the procurement agent in March 2002. By then, however, U.S. intelligence, which closely followed Iraqi procurement of such material, had already concluded as early as the summer of 2001 that this was the "first indication that the UAVs might be used to target the U.S."
When a foreign intelligence service questioned the procurement agent, he originally said he had never intended to purchase the U.S. mapping software, but he refused to submit to a thorough examination, according to the president's commission. "By fall 2002, the CIA was still uncertain whether the procurement agent was lying," the commission said. Nonetheless, a National Intelligence Estimate in October 2002 said the attempted procurement "strongly suggested" Iraq was interested in targeting UAVs on the United States. Senior members of Congress were told in September 2002 that this was the "smoking gun" in a special briefing by Vice President Cheney and then-CIA Director George J. Tenet.
By January 2003, however, it became publicly known that the director of Air Force intelligence dissented from the view that UAVs were to be used for biological or chemical delivery, saying instead they were for reconnaissance. In addition, according to the president's commission, the CIA "increasingly believed that the attempted purchase of the mapping software . . . may have been inadvertent."
In an intelligence estimate on threats to the U.S. homeland published in January 2003, Air Force, Defense Intelligence Agency and Army analysts agreed that the proposed purchase was "not necessarily indicative of an intent to target the U.S. homeland."
Nathan asks some good questions.
Would you believe it's Canadian politics?
There's some hilariously wacky stuff going on North of the border, eh.
I walked over the Brooklyn Bridge yesterday with two friends. One friend noticed a sign posted on the Brooklyn side. Something like: "Attachments of any kind to the bridge are strictly prohibited by law, etc. etc. etc." But it's a lovely bridge, and that seems a bit much to ask.
I wish I had more time to write about this here, and indeed to write a letter to the editor. However, just take a look at the conclusion the WaPo editorial writers draw after five or six paragraphs recounting the "Carnage in Iraq":
Yet, as the insurgents increasingly go after Iraqi civilians, one thing has become clear: Theirs is not, as many people maintained before the Jan. 30 elections, a struggle against American "occupation." It is a fight against a legitimate government trying to operate under the principle of self-rule -- and trying for the most part, notwithstanding terrible provocations, to include every ethnic group. As Mr. Rumsfeld said, their only strategy is butchery. That doesn't mean they are sure to lose; their barbarism can go a long way toward slowing the economic and political progress that Mr. Rumsfeld said is necessary. It does mean that the United States is right to help the Iraqis battle back.Great! Proof positive that the resistance is resistance to "legitimate government", not resistance toward a government chosen in blind elections, without the voice of a majority of the minority Sunnis, and which has yet to call for the removal of US troops despite poll after poll saying that the majority of Iraqis want it and despite its being a campaign promise by the current Iraqi political "leaders". I am of course not advocating violence, but the idea that resorting to the targeting of innocents is somehow a move away from the ultimate goal of getting the US the hell out of here is sheer lunacy. The "insurgents" know where the country is vulnerable, and they're looking to make a huge dent.
Finally, the WaPo writers make my point, even though they believe otherwise. The US will never allow a regime that is not made in its own image. This is perfectly clear from what Bremer et. al. has done, and what Iraqi political leaders have refused to do. And so resistance toward--and carnage in the hopes of destabilizing--the Iraqi government (i.e., the occupation's Iraqi government) is indeed resistance toward "the economic and political progress that Mr. Rumsfeld said is necessary." A government committed, for reasons of might over right, to the US's vision of economic and political progress in Iraq is a government begging for resistance. Add to that the heavy fortification of the Green Zone, and you have a recipe for a general campaign of violence could appear only to the willfully blind as a campaign against the abstract concept of legitimacy.
Good golly, I wish I had time to read this book:
Adapting Minds:
Evolutionary Psychology and the Persistent Quest for Human Nature
David J. BullerWas human nature designed by natural selection in the Pleistocene epoch? The dominant view in evolutionary psychology holds that it was -- that our psychological adaptations were designed tens of thousands of years ago to solve problems faced by our hunter-gatherer ancestors. In this provocative and lively book, David Buller examines in detail the major claims of evolutionary psychology -- the paradigm popularized by Steven Pinker in The Blank Slate and by David Buss in The Evolution of Desire -- and rejects them all. This does not mean that we cannot apply evolutionary theory to human psychology, says Buller, but that the conventional wisdom in evolutionary psychology is misguided.
Evolutionary psychology employs a kind of reverse engineering to explain the evolved design of the mind, figuring out the adaptive problems our ancestors faced and then inferring the psychological adaptations that evolved to solve them. Evolutionary psychologists claim many discoveries based on this approach, including the evolutionary rationale for human mate preferences (that males prefer nubile females and females prefer high-status males) and "discriminative parental solicitude" (the idea that stepparents abuse their stepchildren at a higher rate than genetic parents abuse their biological children). In the carefully argued central chapters of Adapting Minds, Buller scrutinizes several of evolutionary psychology's most highly publicized "discoveries." Drawing on a wide range of empirical research, including his own large-scale study of child abuse, he shows that none is actually supported by the evidence.
Buller argues that our minds are not adapted to the Pleistocene, but, like the immune system, are continually adapting, over both evolutionary time and individual lifetimes. We must move beyond the reigning orthodoxy of evolutionary psychology to reach an accurate understanding of how human psychology is influenced by evolution. When we do, Buller claims, we will abandon not only the quest for human nature but the very idea of human nature itself.
Since this space is being used for oh-so-useful things these days, I do feel bad asking this. But ask I shall. Does anyone else get Sunday, April 24's news when going to this webpage? And if you don't--i.e., if you get today's news--do you know why my firefox browser keeps giving me yesterday's yesterday's yesterday's...news? Thanks!
UPDATE: I guess all I had to do was refresh my browser. But this still should not have happened. I had deleted the cache and cookies several times since April, 24. Oh well.
Explanation here, piece below the fold.
Headline: HOW CAN BRITAIN STILL USE THE MERCHANT OF DEATH? Strapline: Today the UK will promise to curb arms traffickers. But the MoD is hiring planes from a dealer linked to Bin Laden.By Andrew Gilligan. Evening Standard, Monday, 9th May 2005.
Victor Bout [sic] is the most notorious arms trafficker in the world. Linked to Osama bin Laden by the British government, linked to the Taliban by the US government, he was described by a New Labour minister as a "merchant of death" who must be shut down.
Yet an Evening Standard investigation has found that, just two months ago, a Victor Bout company was hired by that very same British government to operate military flights from a key RAF base.
Bout, a 38-year old Russian, owns or controls a constellation of airlines that have smuggled illegal weapons to conflict zones for the past 15 years. He has been named in countless official investigations and reports - the most recent only last month. The authorities in Belgium, where he used to work, have issued a warrant for his arrest. In 2004, the US froze his assets and put him on a terrorist watch list [not that they stopped him flying to and from Baghdad, TYR].
But between 6 and 9 March this year, according to official Civil Aviation Authority records, two Victor Bout charter flights took off from RAF Brize Norton in Oxfordshire. The cargo was armoured vehicles and a few British troops. The client was the Ministry of Defence.
The charters were operated by an airline called Trans Avia. It was named as one of Mr. Bout's front companies by the Government itself - in a Commons written answer on 2 May 2002. The Government cannot claim ignorance of Bout's dubious links. The Foreign Office minister Denis MacShane reassured MPs: "The UK has played a leading role in drawing international attention to Bout's activities, initially in Angola and Liberia and more recently relating to Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda".
A specialist aviation journal reported that the "al Qaeda link" was Bout's role in supplying bin Laden with a personal aeroplane - in the days before September 11, when he had a little more freedom of movement. Could Trans Avia have gone legit since then? Not according to the United States Treasury Department. Only two weeks ago, on 26 April, the Treasury "designated" Trans Avia as one of 30 companies linked to Bout, "an international arms dealer and war profiteer". Bout "controls what is reputed to be the largest private fleet of Soviet-era cargo aircraft in the world", says the Treasury press release. "The arms he has sold or brokered have helped fuel conflicts and support UN-sanctioned regimes in Afghanistan, Angola, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone and Sudan. Notably, information available to the US government shows that Bout profited by $50 million by supplying the Taliban with military equipment when they ruled Afghanistan."
The story doesn't end there. Another two flights were made in the same three days of March by an airline called Jet Line International, also from RAF Brize Norton. A further three flights were made at the same time from another base, RAF Lyneham. The destination was Kosovo. The client, once again, was the Ministry of Defence.
Yet Jet Line, too, is a company that has been accused of close connections to Bout. According to the authoritative US newspaper, the Los Angeles Times, it appeared on a list of Bout companies circulated by the State Department to US diplomatic posts around the world.
"There is no doubt at all about the links between Jet Line and Bout," says Johan Peleman, the researcher who wrote the UN report. "It's one of his most important assets." Intelligence agencies say the same thing. Jet Line's office address in its base at Chisinau, Moldova, is the same as that of Aerocom, a company exposed by the United Nations as involved in sanctions-busting and arms-smuggling to the brutal rebels of Liberia. According to the UN, Aerocom was involved in the illegal smuggling or attempted smuggling of more than 6,000 automatic rifles and machine guns, 4,500 grenades, 350 missile launchers, 7,500 landmines, and millions of rounds of ammunition in breach of a UN arms embargo.
Tracking down the registration numbers of the sanctions-busting aircraft, it turns out that the Jet Line aircraft that flew the MoD flights in March were previously registered to Aerocom. They are in fact the same planes.
Bout's activities have helped cause quite literally thousands of deaths in many of the worst places in the world. Born in 1967, he served in the Soviet air force and then military intelligence, where he developed a gift for languages. When the USSR broke up, he "acquired" a large fleet of surplus or obsolete aircraft, which he used to deliver arms and ammunition also "acquired" from old Soviet stockpiles. That weaponry fuelled some of the most savage wars in Africa. Charles Taylor's insurgent guerrillas used Bout weapons to destroy Liberia. In Sierra Leone, the Revolutionary United Front (RUF) used Bout weapons to terrorise the country, seize the diamond mines, and chop off their opponents' hands.
None of our business? Well, the RUF's Bout-supplied weapons were almost certainly used to attack British troops engaged on the Sierra Leone peacekeeping mission in 2000.
Bout's planes would arrive at obscure African airstrips, loaded with weapons, then leave heaped with diamonds, coltan - vital for making mobile phones - and other precious minerals in return. "He was apolitical," said one UN official. "He would fly for anyone that paid." Bout's willingness to go places that no-one else would go made him the market leader in the arms-trafficking business. Little wonder, therefore, that the then Foreign Office minister Peter Hain said "The murder and mayhem of Unita in Angola, the RUF in Sierra Leone, and groups in Congo would not have been as terrible without Bout's operations." He was truly "a merchant of death", Hain said [and for a long time I respected Hain for it, too - TYR].
Bout used to operate from Ostend, in Belgium, where a shabby hotel in the city centre acted as his informal marketplace. There was a flight departures screen in the hotel bar, so he could keep track of his planes' movements. Then he was forced to retreat to Sharjah, in the United Arab Emirates - and after September 11, to Moscow, where he controls his empire through front companies such as Trans Avia. "You are not putting facts. You are putting allegations," he tells journalists on the rare occasions they manage to get through on his Russian phone number. [Actually, the quote comes from his surprise appearance on Ekho Moskhy radio in 2002 - TYR]
Britain has been embarrassed by dodgy airlines before. Last year, the Department for International Development promised a full investigation after the Standard exposed its use of Aerocom on an aid flight to Africa. The problem is that few reputable carriers want to fly to Kosovo, Iraq, Darfur or some of the places where the government needs transport. And the airline brokers used by Whitehall seem to have learned surprisingly few lessons from past embarrassments.
In a statement, the Ministry of Defence said the fact that its broker "seems to have used an aircraft in Jet Line International livery" was not the same as saying that the MoD itself had contracted Jet Line. But, whatever hairs the MoD may choose to split, the payout - for Mr. Bout - is the same.
Today and tomorrow, at the MoD's vast procurement headquarters in Bristol, defence officials are holding a special conference with human rights groups and arms trade campaigners. The purpose is to persuade them that the government is serious about cracking down on the scourge of arms trafficking.
One good way to start might, perhaps, be to stop putting British taxpayers' money into the pockets of the worst arms trafficker in the world."
I joined a gym here in Brooklyn today. I really can't afford it, but in the last six months I've become a fitness fanatic, and in another way I can't afford not to. The sign at the checkout counter read:
"Employees" only behind the counter.Loved that.
The "employee" behind the counter seemed not unfriendly, in a gruff Brooklyn-meathead sort of way. After I had signed the paperwork and paid he said, "OK, you're all set now, buddy."
My lovely wife has a show tonight (Friday, May 13th) with 4inObjects:
Venue: The Friend's Seminary (15 Rutherford Pl.) (Right around E. 16th and 3rd Ave in Manhattan)
Time: 7:30pm-9:30pm
Cover: $10.00
It is vitally important that no one ever use the word "seemingly" again. Such an ugly, ugly word . . .
Two days in a row now, a stranger has called me "buddy." It may be that my linguistic intuitions are a bit off on this. A lot of New Yorkers seem to use the word in a slightly less condescending and insulting sense than I'm used to. Still, it rankles.
Shorter Saletan: The more creationists lie about their views and intentions, the more impressive I find them.
I'm looking forward to seeing how the Bush administration deals with the case of Luis Posada Carriles.
At long last, let the silenced voices be heard.
A fairly serious security flaw has been found in Firefox. But there's an easy fix, until they patch it: just go into Tools --> Options --> Web Features. Then make sure that "Allow websites to install software" is unchecked. It's checked by default, which is extremely stupid, so you'll probably need to do this.
I'm insanely busy now, so I won't be posting much for at least a week.
Update: Oh yeah, and Mac-heads can wipe that silly smirk off their faces.
On Friday, my lovely wife has a show. On Saturday, there's Tubapalooza. Details for both shows below the fold.
Details for the first show:
Friday, May 6th, 2005Then there's Tubapalooza. It's got quite the lineup. I have to miss this show, but that doesn't mean you do!The Yoon Sun Choi and Jacob Sacks Duo with special guest Mat Maneri (viola)
(The Restless Music Series)
Venue: 5C Cafe
Location: New York, NY
Time: 7:00pm-9:00pm
Cover: $8.00
Ron Caswell's TUBAPALOOZA
Saturday, May 7th 2005 9pm - very late!@ Zebulon
258 Wythe Avenue (betwixed Metropolitan Ave. and N. 3rd)
Brooklyn, NY 11211 (Williamsburg)
L train to the Bedford Stop
A FREE night of nothing but great TUBA bands!
4 bands 4 FREE!
http://roncaswell.com9pm - Susan Watts and the Fabulous Shpielkehs Susan Watts, mighty trumpet princess of Philadelphia's
klezmer Dynasty, House of Hoffman.
http://susanwattsonline.com10pm - the Knobs!
Polished and turned on!
http://theknobs.us11pm - Who's Yo' Crawdaddy?
Daddy's got some gumbo for you!
http://whosyourcrawdaddy.com12am - Slavic Soul Party
Brash and strong as slivovitz, Slavic Soul Party! is downtown's answer to Balkan brass band music!
http://slavicsoulparty.com
Nine year old boy to my nine year old brother: "Man, Anakin is such a dork."
I think that about says it all. When I was that age, I wouldn't have dreamt of saying that Han or Luke was a dork.
If you can believe it, people are still arguing about how prominent the humanitarian justification for the Iraq War was prior to the war. There's a lot to be said here, but I'm not going to say it. Rather, let my modest contribution to this debate be simply to point out that there is a big difference between offering a humanitarian justification for a war and actually fighting a humanitarian war. The former has been an important part of selling wars for an awfully long time, including, e.g., the Spanish conquest of the New World (souls were apparently saved on that occasion, you know). The latter - a rare, rare beast indeed - has a very special character. That's because if it's genuine, the goals shape the conduct of the war in all kinds of ways.
My modest suggestion, then, is that even if Bush and Blair had sold their respective publics on the war entirely on humanitarian grounds, the war itself would still not have received a proper public defence. Because whatever the justifications offered for this war publicly, the war itself had goals that were not primarily humanitarian, and those goals have shaped the character of the war and the occupation. They have meant that whatever was argued for, what was delivered was far from a humanitarian war. Rather, we got a war with some decent humanitarian results, mixed in with an awful lot of suffering. Please see my take on the occupation to see what difference I think this makes.
So although trying to nail down precisely how much pre-war weight Bush publicly gave to the humanitarian justification for war is a worthwhile project for some purposes, and I wish the people doing this the best of luck, even the best case for Bush on this count still has him offering a dishonest argument for the war he waged.
Paul Boutin has a piece in Slate on Wikipedia. It's not a very good article, and the poor fellow's email in-box is no doubt already full of indignant responses. I'm sure a technorati search tomorrow will bring up a host of superb rebuttals. This won't be one of them. I would just like to point out how odd this paragraph is (and I'm even too lazy to put the hyperlinks in):
But excessive nerdiness isn't what's keeping Wikipedia from becoming the Net's killer resource. Accuracy is. In a Wired feature story, Daniel Pink (kind of) praised the hulking encyclopedia by saying you can "[l]ook up any topic you know something about and you'll probably find that the Wikipedia entry is, if not perfect, not bad." But don't people use encyclopedias to look up stuff they don't know anything about? Even if a reference tool is 98 percent right, it's not useful if you don't know which 2 percent is wrong. The entry for Slate, for instance, claims that several freelance writers are "columnists on staff" and still lists Cyrus Krohn as publisher months after the Washington Post Co.'s Cliff Sloan took over.Just how different, exactly, does Boutin think that makes Wikipedia from, oh, say, Slate? I find mistakes, typos, errors of judgment, etc. etc. etc. all the time in major publications, including Slate. (Slate, to its credit, now runs a Corrections column.) And yet somehow Slate manages to be useful to me, even if I can't - oh, to have the innocence of a child again! - take everything it says as gospel truth. I suppose that Boutin could say that there's a big difference between reference materials and publications like Slate. Well, sure. But they're both alike in this respect: Both are more or less fallible, and neither typically deserves the kind of credence that Boutin thinks is due to reference materials but not Wikipedia.
I don't follow British politics very closely, but somehow I had managed to get a semi-favourable impression of Ann Clwyd. Not any more. This letter in the Guardian makes me sick:
Haifa Zangana (Comment, April 22) accuses the multinational forces in Iraq of using a "modern form of napalm" against the people of Falluja, "a crime that has been met with silence not just by Tony Blair but also by Ann Clwyd, his human rights envoy". In fact I raised the allegations with Foreign Office minister Elizabeth Symons, who told me in her February reply that "the reports are completely without foundation. Coalition forces have not used napalm - either during operations in Falluja, or at any other time." It's a pity Zangana ignores those Iraqis working with great courage to rebuild the country after the horrors of Saddam.There's no charitable explanation for this letter. Clwyd must know that the U.S. used a modern form of napalm in Iraq; incompetence simply can't suffice here as an explanation. It's just a lie - and a depressing one too, considering what Clwyd's job is supposed to be.
Ann Clwyd
Prime minister's special envoy on human rights in Iraq
I've never believed that offering a humanitarian justification for the war in Iraq requires anyone to lie about U.S. conduct. So why does Clwyd act as if it does?
What was I thinking? Veiled Conceit is simply a work of genius. The most recent offering is especially funny.
I've returned to the U.S. after visiting my family in Ottawa. My papers were reprocessed at the border, as usual, but with a twist this time: apparently they now fingerprint all international students. That was mildly annoying, but I'm a guest here so I won't make a fuss. Anyway, I've always worn gloves when I burgle houses, so there's not really much to worry about.
I'm extra busy this week, so don't expect much from me in the way of posting.