future suicide bomber

I just read this article on msnbc... it's hard to imagine a situation in which the intelligence could be so wrong as to bomb the life out of a large wedding party.

Iraq:
Confirmed US dead: 4151
Confirmed US injured: 30,000
Estimated Iraqi dead: 1,033,000 (as of August 2007) acc to Opinion Research Business survey

Afghanistan:
Confirmed US dead: 582
Estimated Afghani dead: 2700

World Trade Center attacks: 2974

I don't think this math adds up very well.

And I think I might want to join up and fight against anyone who bombed the life out of my future spouse and entire extended family.

What's in a name?

Does anyone else find this utterly ridiculous?

My favorite quotes from the article:

"The teacher's conviction under Sudan's Islamic Sharia law shocked Britons and many Muslims worldwide. It also inflamed passions among many Sudanese, some of whom called for her execution."

"Sudan's influential Council of Muslim Scholars had urged the government on Sunday not to pardon Gibbons, saying it would damage Khartoum's reputation among Muslims around the world."

She let her class name the teddy bear Muhammad, so she should be executed? And not pardoning her would cause Muslims around the world to be offended? What is wrong with these people?

May 15 Gas Out

Why this won't work: it's stupid. Okay, so there are more complicated reasons. But when I first saw this on Myspace, I thought it was another bad joke. Because I just saw a front page article on it on msnbc.com, I've decided that it's clearly not a joke.

Why is this idea stupid? A number of reasons. 1) Not buying gasoline for one day won't damage profits at all. It just means Americans will fill up their gas guzzlers the day before or after, thereby ensuring that profits remain stable. 2) The idea itself assumes that we're stupid enough to believe that we, a nation of perpetual consumers, will have any impact on anything by changing habits for one day.

This is like just about every other American idea - fix it quick'n'easy. The only way to make a real dent in the profits of large oil companies is to reduce the total amount of gas consumed, not reduce the short term amount of gas consumed on May 15. In real world terms, what this means is that you should ride a bike, bus or train, or carpool, or go shopping for a more fuel-efficient car. Now that would actually make a difference. For those of you who already are, kudos to you. For any of you driving a vehicle getting less than 20mpg (which is still pretty lousy), get a different car.

Op-ed on VT Shooter

Alright, it seems like everyone else is weighing in with an opinion on this issue - I also, being the silly vapid follower that I am - will also weigh in. After all, there is nothing more fun than venting one's opinion on a topical subject to the web/world at large for public consumption.

My first reaction - after the initial horror and disbelief started to recede somewhat - was annoyance at CNN. CNN Intl had switched to CNN local coverage of the event. Let me say that there are few things I hate more than American TV news coverage, and the coverage of this event was no exception, for a few reasons.

• The newscasters look like plastic dolls who have had too much cosmetic surgery and are wearing too much TV makeup and have spent too much money on their haircuts.
• The initial coverage was AN HOUR of uninterrupted footage of whatever the newsfolks could get their hands on, meaning cell phone interviews with students, replaying over and over and over again of cell phone images, and lots of pictures of police cruisers.#
• It was on CNN Intl!! Apparently, nothing else in the world was happening at that point.

Which leads me to my second reaction, which set in after there was a short break in the coverage for international - imagine that, on CNN Intl - news. They reported that dozens of people had died in roadside bombs in Iraq and a car had been blown up in Afghanistan. THAT WAS IT. A few sentences. Then they went straight back to the coverage of the crazy gun-toting student.

In the days that followed, CNN showed even more how completely retarded the whole American news media really are. Instead of asking real questions of people, they asked questions about how people felt, and interviewed random people who may or may not have known either the victims or the shooter. My favorite awful piece of video was an interview with the shooter's family's neighbor where they let her speak one sentence then let her break down on camera and that's what they showed on tv. The crying, the sobbing, the EMOTION of it all, people! It's not about objective reflection: it's about how this makes you FEEL.

As far as the actual event itself, and what questions it raises for us as a society regarding gun-control, social maladjustment, university bureaucracy, and universal health-care - these are issues that will be with us for a while, and I think will get worse. In our society, there is such a premium placed on perception and image and not reality that I think more and more people will continue to feel that they are outside of 'mainstream' society. One of the interviews about the shooter focused on his inability to relate to women in a normal manner.

As far as gun control: gun control is not an issue that is going to be resolved anytime soon, as I see it, for a couple of reasons. 1) There are a number of perfectly sane, normal people who use their guns in perfectly sane, normal ways. Thus, one cannot make the argument that guns cause violence, making it harder to make the argument to eradicate them. 2) There are too many guns available in the US that are not held in a legal fashion and thus any gun control law would have the difficulty of drafting legislation to control illegal guns. When there are already laws prohibiting their use, what else are you going to do? 3) Guns only make violence easier, they do not cause the violence.

The coverage of South Korea's reaction to the massacre is something I found interesting. Nearly everyone interviewed expressed shame and remorse because the entire reputation of South Korea had been damaged. Their sense of community pride was so important that even a Korean who had long since moved to the United States could cause an emotional reaction.

Perhaps the problem isn't guns, or universal health care. Perhaps it isn't the failure of gun sellers to follow laws meant to protect ordinary citizens from crazy people. Perhaps the problem lies in a society that values superficiality and selfishness instead of friendship and honesty. A society in which 'news coverage' means focusing on how people FEEL, not on the news. An election system that got us George Bush because he seemed like he would be more fun to hang out with at a barbeque than Al Gore. In many ways, we create these people who go crazy ourselves. Maybe we ought to take a little time and examine our own lives before throwing stones and casting blame upon anyone else we can think to blame.

Friendly Fire Incident

The friendly fire incident four years ago in which two U.S. A-10 fighter pilots fired on a British tank group and killed one man has been a fascinating exercise in the difference in spin between my only two international news channels that are in English.

On CNN Intl, the pilots are described as distraught and obviously upset when they realized what they had done. The "experts" interviewed by the anchorman and anchorwoman pointed out the difficulties the pilots faced, from faulty information to simply the uncertainty of the situation, the 'fog of war.'

On BBC, the incident was reported as the U.S. not being able to keep its communications together (remember, this was four years ago during the initial invasion - I'm sure we've gotten better since then). My favorite difference was when the widow released a statement saying how upset she was at the casual language the pilots used after they realized that they had fired on friendly troops. She said this just proved how completely callous they were.

On CNN Intl, pilots swearing equals distraught (American males express distress by swearing, they also express happiness, excitement, anger, envy, and other emotions in a similar fashion); on the BBC to the widow, it apparently means callous and stupid.

Perhaps this is a cultural difference. Or perhaps CNN and BBC are much more loyal than they would like to say they are.