Allen November 10th, 2004
Question: What do you call an activity that doesn’t seem to work, but whose adherents keep practicing — hoping one day to cause the Gods to shine with favor upon their efforts?
Answer: Cargo Cult Rituals
(Alternative Answer: Exit Polling)
Allen November 9th, 2004
John Hawkins has advice for both Republicans and Democrats over at Right Wing News. Yes, yes, I know. Lots of lefties will never read that site, but he does offer some good advice.
In my November compress-weblog-postings-because-of-NaNoWriMo, here is my analysis:
To the Democratic Party: Shut Up Then Put Up
To the Republican Party: Put Up Or Shut Up
Allen November 9th, 2004
For an overview of the Battle for Fallujah, I direct you to Beldar Blog.
Readers will recall the same pattern of operations in Najaf where US infantry secured the buildings and rooftops while vehicles advanced on the streets below. In Najaf as in Fallujah too, apparently, US forces did not advance on a single broad front but snaked in to seize key areas, breaking up enemy defenses into pockets which can no longer support each other. The pockets may be further isolated by bulldozing fire lanes. The low number of casualties so far indicates that US forces have successfully sidestepped enemy forces the way a broken field runner dodges tackles. The Strategic Studies Institute warns that heavy casualties may result from assaulting “mini fortresses”, but many of those redoubts may be entirely bypassed and fields of fire cleared around them.
Much, much more to read. While at times it reads almost like a Clancy novel, I’m not certain that it is that far off the mark.
Allen November 9th, 2004
In Clausewitz & The Triangle, Grim examines the prinicpal concepts of Clausewitz and how they relate to the Iraq war.
After yapping endlessly below about how I don’t have time to devote to my weblog, I decided to knock an essay out that I have long had bookmarked. After spending too much time (given that I still need to work on my novel), I posted it to Typepad, only to have TP (or more likely the network) croak on me.
I don’t want to re-create my original post, but only the highlight the more relevant section to today’s news.
From Clausewitz’s book (quoted in the essay):
Kind-hearted people might of course think there was some ingenious way to disarm or defeat an enemy without too much bloodshed, and might imagine this is the true goal of the art of war. Pleasant as it sounds, it is a fallacy that must be exposed: war is such a dangerous business that the mistakes which come from kindness are the very worst. The maximum use of force is in no way incompatible with the simultaneous use of the intellect.
Cast your mind back to the original fight in Fallujah when American contractors had just been killed. American forces were ready to take back the city when they were called off by Iraqi and American politicians. Our hands were stayed by those who wished to be merciful.
How many additional US and Iraqi forces will now die or be wounded because we were "merciful?" How many bombs and IEDs are now awaiting our forces now that we have given the terrorists time to prepare? How many innocent Iraqis died at the hands of the Islamic fascists in Fallujah?
How much will our mercy cost us?
Speaking of the costs of mercy, how many innocent Iraqis died because Powell didn’t want to break the will of Saddam at the Highway of Death? How many billions of dollars and thousands of lives did that little slice of mercy cost?
If you search Google for the terms powell highway death, most of the sites will lefty leaning sites supposedly detailing Powells war crimes. My point being is that how many of these sites detail the war crimes by showing mercy? Probably not enough. If we had broken the will of Saddam during the 1st Gulf War, would we be where we are today?
Allen November 8th, 2004
Although database problems at work have calmed down quite a bit, I still have lots of open projects that I need to finish up. While I can normally write in my weblog during my ‘off-times’, I do not have any ‘off-times’ right now to speak of.
Normally this leaves my evening to write weblog entries, but since I am involved in the NaNoWriMo this month, my evenings are taken up with this writing (2900 words so far — behind in the count that I have set for myself).
Unfortunately, this leaves the weblog rather dry. I’ve ‘draft-marked’ some stuff in Typepad, but don’t really have time to develop my entries like I would like to. So I’ll probably do a ‘minimalist comment’ type weblog entries but will hopefully not become so minimalist as to post ‘Heh’.
I refuse, however, to perform a link-dump. I might have to resort to this, but have resisted so far.
Allen November 5th, 2004
I keep hearing that we are a deeply divided nation that needs healing. That the split requires healing.
So, here it goes.
Everyone braced and ready?
OK. Everyone feel better?
Allen November 5th, 2004
Say, have you seen my passed out wookies?
I’ve never been a wookie, never really hung out with wookies. But I’ve known quite a few wookies in my time. My favorite picture is the “I rely upon the kindness of strangers” wookie in the Hall of Fame. Good enough friends to get it into the tent, but not so good as to get it all the way in.
[Via Froggy Ruminations]
Allen November 5th, 2004
With the apparently imminent death of vile terrorist scum Nobel Peace Prize winner Arafat, rumors are flying that remaining leaders of the Palestinian Authority are in secret talks with Disney corporate executives for a transfer of technology.
Hopes are that this will help avert a civil war among the Palestinians.
Allen November 5th, 2004
Charles finds that the price of HP ink is a price far above rubies.
Noting that crude is currently hovering around $50 per barrel, he extends the price of a HP ink-jet cartridge ($35 per pop) and finds it runs $292,000 per barrel.
For other liquids and their relative prices, I direct you to cockeyed.com’s The Price of a Gallon.
As best as I can determine, my future fiscal independence lies in cornering the scorpion venom market — $2,137,217,910 per barrel.
Partisan Democratic Venom is running at $0.0002 per barrel on the spot market. No doubt because of the abundant supply.
Allen November 5th, 2004
Caught in a nightmare where he is a Cassandra.
Telling us of the impending doom.
Telling us of the future that awaits us.
Telling us that all the votes not counted in Ohio went to Kerry.
Mr. Greg Palast, living his nightmare in…
The Twilight Zone.
Pity poor Greg Palast. He’s tried to tell us about how evil the Shrub and company are. He’s tried to show us how vile they are.
But we refuse to listen. We refuse to hearken to the lone voice in the wilderness telling us…
Ellipses below are mine.
Bush won Ohio by 136,483 votes. In the United States, about 3 percent of votes cast are voided—known as “spoilage†in election jargon—because the ballots cast are inconclusive. Drawing on what happened in Florida and studies of elections past, Palast argues that if Ohio’s discarded ballots were counted, Kerry would have won the state. Today, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reports there are a total of 247,672 votes not counted in Ohio, if you add the 92,672 discarded votes plus the 155,000 provisional ballots. So far there’s no indication that Palast’s hypothesis will be tested because only the provisional ballots are being counted.
…
Most voters in Ohio thought they were voting for Kerry. At 1:05 a.m. Wednesday morning, CNN’s exit poll showed Kerry beating Bush among Ohio women by 53 percent to 47 percent. The exit polls were later combined with—and therefore contaminated by—the tabulated results, ultimately becoming a mirror of the apparent actual vote. [To read about the skewing of exit polls to conform to official results, click here .] Kerry also defeated Bush among Ohio’s male voters 51 percent to 49 percent. Unless a third gender voted in Ohio, Kerry took the state.
So what’s going on here? Answer: the exit polls are accurate. Pollsters ask, “Who did you vote for?”
No, Greg. That shows how exit polls are not accurate. Did they ask every single person coming out of the polling station? Or did they ask a sampling of people? And when did they take these polls? Early in the day when the notBush crowd was fired up and ready to vote? Did they take the poll at every polling station?
And the provisional ballots? You apparently can divine with your Cassandra-induced powers that they were going to break for Kerry. Those 97K discarded ballots? Are we going to go into the dimpled chad dance and divining the voter’s intent? Who gets to channel the poor voters mind, Greg? I know of a lawyer that apparently has the ability to channel the thoughts of the poor and downtrodden. I have no doubt that he would be your perfect candidate for this job.
Give it up and get a real job. Your candidate lost and, more importantly, you lost Greg. Because you are part of that smarmy intellectual elite who knows better than the rest of us how things are supposed to go. If the rest of us would just shut up and sit down and listen to our betters, we’d all be in our happy place. Bzzt! Wrong country, wrong year, Gregory.
I used to write a column for the Guardian papers in London. Several friends have asked me if I will again leave the country. In light of the failure—a second time—to count all the votes, that won’t be necessary. My country has left me.
Two points of note, Greg. Guardian? Snort. Friends asking if you will again leave the country? Snort.