Sunday, November 30, 2008

Loaded question

Is Joe McCarthy the father of the modern Republican Party?

More on Mumbai

Glenn Greenwald makes an important point about revisionism, 9/11, the Mumbai attacks, and cycles of violence.

It turns out Pakistan was going to send its Director General or whatever of the intelligence forces to help investigate the Mumbai attacks, but now he's not going--they're sending a "representative."

Is the ISI trying to piss off India? I was hearing theories before this even happened that the ISI and/or army had essentially gone rogue (since it was assumed that no remotely sane Pakistani government could have any interest in starting something like this) and were behind the attacks. This is the kind of thing that is either a ridiculously bush league political/diplomatic mistake--which is not really what comes to mind when I think "ISI"--or a deliberate snub to India. Why would you do that?

Shocking as it may seem, clearly there are some things I'm missing here.


Finally, it seems that two of the terrorists may have been British-born Pakistanis. If this were a novel I would probably be clutching my skull at the sheer symbolic recursiveness of it all, but IT'S (potentially) REAL. WTF. Past not dead, not even over, amen.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

AMAZING.

This is the funniest thing ever (to me): http://counterterrorismblog.org/2008/11/frustrated_claims_of_proobama.php

Maybe the wingnuts and al-Qaeda can fight a battle of mutually assured destruction over who has been more egregiously victimized by pro-Obama media bias. Then I can laugh and laugh and laugh.

Wednesday, November 26, 2008

Ah, demos.

Ta-Nehisi said this was the best photo collection of Obama's campaign around. I had no idea how right he was--these are fucking awesome pictures, as photographs and as a representation of Obama's candidacy. Go Boston Globe!

Also, I love the first two comments:

sigh....really? I don't see how any of you can trust a politician. The terms "politician" and "blood-sucking parasite" are synonymous, and yet for some reason, all of you people think that this man actually has YOUR best interests at heart, just because he tells you so? HA! Never believe ANYONE who tells you that they will put YOUR interests above their own. The country has been given to a man who lies for a living, and everyone is celebrating. Gee, I wonder why our nation is falling behind?
That said...the pics above are nice and dramatic, but can we get some that show reality, not glamour? Thanks boss.


and

Nothing in my life has been more thrilling than this Presidential experience! I love it beyond measures that can be explained!

I just love the measured and reasoned discourse of the public, don't you? John Stuart Mill would be proud.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

In words and pictures

Here is a very important post about the potential Big Three bailout, the real vs. shadow economies, and the places that built this country into the economic juggernaut we all believe it to be. It's beautiful and the photography is, too.

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Post-feminist, bitchez

Melissa McEwan has a typically insightful post up about a political reframing that's taking place around women's reproductive health services.

Question: How long do you think it will take before history is rewritten so that the legislation which would "provide pregnant women with health care, child care and money for education -- services that could encourage them to continue their pregnancies" becomes the sole province of the Very Serious Centrist Men (possibly including our new president-elect) who found the "middle ground" on abortion that extremists on both sides couldn't find, despite the reality that feminists have been advocating for exactly these social services for longer than I've been alive?

Don't answer that. It's rhetorical.

I find it fascinating (where fascinating = completely bloody infuriating) that these ideas will probably only now get a hearing at long last because the frame has switched from "things women need, irrespective of their circumstances" to "things that will ensure women make more babies."

Post-feminist, bitchez.

Nepal treating gay and transexual citizens like human beings

Fancy that.

Nepal's supreme court ruled to "grant...protection to gays, lesbians and transgender community in the country. It also open doors for gay marriage rights and end [sic] all discriminatory laws."

It's worth reading the article--particularly where they discuss the role of Hinduism toward the end.

It remains to be seen what this will mean in practice, and I haven't read the decision, but nonetheless: congratulations, Nepal!

Sunday, November 16, 2008

Defender of what?

Whoa!

Prince Charles wants to change British law so that when he accedes the throne he'll be entitled "Defender of Faith," rather than "Defender of the Faith," to reflect Britain's multidenominational society. (Apparently he originally wanted "Defender of the Faiths," but that caused too much controversy.

It would be really interesting to look over the documents and statements surrounding this discussion and see exactly why and how "Defender of the Faiths" was more controversial than "Defender of Faith". My first thought is that simple, indefinite "Faith" can mean whatever the hearer or reader thinks it means, and so Anglicans can go on thinking it means Anglicanism, while "the Faiths" irrevocably and unavoidably acknowledges and validates other faiths. You can keep ignoring religious minorities with the former version, and indeed depending on how you define "faith" you can even argue that the title still doesn't describe them. It's harder (though still not impossible) to do that with the latter version.

Praxis

I went to the Prop 8 protest yesterday.

It was fucking fantastic. We marched down the middle of Michigan Ave. and stopped traffic.

Monday, November 10, 2008

Isn't it just so true?

In Soviet America, comik strip laugh at you!

Secrets, secrets are no fun

Secret Order Lets U.S. Raid Al Qaeda in Many Countries

Doesn't sound too bad till you read this:

"The United States military since 2004 has used broad, secret authority to carry out nearly a dozen previously undisclosed attacks against Al Qaeda and other militants in Syria, Pakistan and elsewhere, according to senior American officials.

"These military raids, typically carried out by Special Operations forces, were authorized by a classified order that Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld signed in the spring of 2004 with the approval of President Bush, the officials said. The secret order gave the military new authority to attack the Qaeda terrorist network anywhere in the world, and a more sweeping mandate to conduct operations in countries not at war with the United States."

Since 2004 they had this. They were already bombing Pakistan in 2006. I'm amazed Musharraf held on as long as he did.