Time for another installment of "what's wrong with this article?"...

Here's the article: NY Times: "US may be forced to go back to UN for Iraq mandate"

"The Bush administration, which spurned the United Nations in its drive to depose Saddam Hussein in Iraq, is finding itself forced back into the arms of the international body because other nations are refusing to contribute peacekeeping troops or reconstruction money without United Nations approval."

-Note the difference between the headline & the opening statement -- "may be" vs "is". Now, "may be" while somewhat suggestive still has some squeeze room to pass as an objective statement; "is" is clearly opinion. But I don't see the words "opinion" anywhere in here, do you?
-So we went in without UN approval...and? No matter what one thinks about the war, to operate with the view that the UN even has the power to actually stop wars is a sign of delusion. Plenty of things happen without UN approval every day.
-The author of this article seems to believe that the nations witholding aid are completely justified. He can believe that all he wants, but if this is intended to be an objective article he cannot insert that viewpoint into it, and must instead remain neutral. Personally I'm on the fence about it: while it's pathetic to expect people who didn't support our action in the first place to assist with the cleanup, it's equally so to politicize the plight of the Iraqis in the name of internationalism. The only people who's opinion mattered in deciding this was our own representatives (who probably would've went in on even less) & the iraqis, who we couldn't exactly ask until now...

And that's just from the first sentence.

"With the costs of stabilizing Iraq hovering at $4 billion a month and with American troops being killed at a steady rate, administration officials acknowledge that they are rethinking their strategy and may seek a United Nations resolution for help that would placate other nations, like India, France and Germany."

Define "steady rate". A number would've been more fair than using a term that inherently escalates the perception of damage.

"Administration officials contend that they are being practical, but within their ranks are policy makers sharply critical of the United Nations and those who would consider it humiliating to seek its mantle after risking American lives in the invasion that ousted Mr. Hussein."

-Being critical of the UN is labelled as impractical. Brilliant.
-"consider it humiliating"...as if saving face is automatically more important than getting the job done. Granted, there's probable cause for such a charge, but again, a "straight news" article is not the place for it.

"Mr. Powell said Security Council Resolution 1483, which was approved in May and calls on all members to assist in Iraq's reconstruction, should be enough "cover" for countries to claim an endorsement from the United Nations. But he acknowledged that the nations that matter most are not buying that."

"There are some nations who have expressed the desire for more of a mandate from the United Nations, and I am in conversations with some ministers about this, as well as with the secretary general of the United Nations," Mr. Powell said. "

-If it was approved then it is enough "cover". Ironically, for them to not help out according to that resolution is to engage in "anti-globalist unilateralism" or whatever the World System Theorist buzzphrase of the day is. Speaking of which...
-I guess it's OK for other countries to scoff at UN resolutions but not the US. Nice double standard.
-"the nations that matter most"...which would be ________? And doesn't the idea that some nations are more important than others fly in the face of the point of an aspiring world government?

"Even supporters of the administration's policy say its efforts are in jeopardy, and minute military planning gave way to disarray once the major combat ended.

"It's increasingly clear there was really some underestimation of the number of people who would be required after the regime fell, and the length of time required to stay there," said Paul Saunders, director of the Nixon Center, a nonpartisan research organization whose honorary chairman is Henry A. Kissinger."

Named after Nixon, Honorary Chairman is Kissinger. Nonpartisan?

I guess "Mr. Marquis" (I hate how they constantly address heads of state as if they were grade school principals, it's annoying and smacks of sucking-up. I could care less who they are, I'll calll them by their first name if I feel like it) decided that to allieviate his already-huge Left bias he should throw the right-wingers a bone. Either that or he's been sniffing glue.

And this guy more than likely doesn't even realize that his position is showing through.

Anyone still out there that thinks true objectivity is possible? I've got a bridge to sell you...

Hey, we gotta depart from the real world sometimes: Steve Denbeste gets an eyeful of anime crotch. Fanservice indeed...

This is just going to have to be one of those moments where we're left at "I do not understand this culture". They have comics of women being donged in every hole possible by weird alien creatures, animated shows that look like the entire point was to see how much nudity they could throw in, and vending machines scattered around w/ used schoolgirls draws in 'em. I'm no moralist myself at all, this feeling I have about it isn't one of being offended, more like being deeply puzzled. Here in the US we engage in similar stuff too, even today (ever notice on Fear Factor there's always a woman among the contestants that's packing double-Ds?), yet the way that the japanese approach sex-as-entertainment is overwhelmingly blatant in comparison -- show even 1/5th this kind of stuff in the US and you'd have a bunch of "family concern" (read: bible-thumper) groups up your ass, decreeing the fall of mankind because someone drew toons with distinctly human features. "The traditional values of this country are in danger of leaving us and being replaced with CHAOS thanks to YOU!" they'll say, as if what we watch on TV makes us run outside chanting "kill, rape, pillage" just before acting on it.

Yet Japan, a country with much more sex in their entertainment than us, has like 1/5th our sex assault rate.

One could figure three things from this, one concrete the other two either/or:

1) the Jeebus freaks are wrong (duh). It is an insult to our intelligence to assume that popular culture can make otherwise normal people lose their minds. This is clear. Which brings us to the other two...

-Maybe it's possible that the opposite effect actually occurs? The japanese may be somewhat unintentionally applying saturation as a psychological approach: bombard people with as much "smut" as possible and they grow bored of it to the point where they yawn at the idea of acting out any of it whether they have a grip on reality or not. If that's the case, then not only is it the common capitalistic give-em-what-they-want ethic at work, but also some admittedly damn good social engineering to boot (rare that social engineering can EVER be called "good", but in this case it seems to be very painlessly achieving it's result).

-Or...it could just be that we look at titilation from a completely different vantagepoint, which they couldn't understand either if they tried. Taboo is a reliable attraction -- people like being "bad". From that perspective, while we say that what is common in Japan is highly deviant, in our own minds by sending our inner perv slinking through the shadows we're actually being more deviant than if we went for their approach and flew our freak flag every sunrise before breakfast. We call them weird because that helps us solidify our weirdness to ourselves. The difference in rape/molestation rates? Maybe we're just dumb, who knows?

Parting thought: If I knew women in real life with legs this spectacular that wore skirts that short, I wouldn't be here typing this ;^)

Yet another example of why religion is garbage.

Just click, it explains itself.

We knew it'd happen somewhere along the line: Gray Davis recall effort sparks a lawsuit.

Backers of Gov. Gray Davis filed a lawsuit Tuesday claiming that paid signature gatherers violated election laws while compiling petitions to force a historic referendum on whether Davis should be replaced. The suit came a day after groups trying to recall the Democratic governor for what they say is gross mismanagement announced they had gathered more than 1.6 million signatures, nearly double the number needed to force the referendum...

Tuesday's suit asks a state judge to require state election officials to set aside petitions gathered in three of California's most populous counties and closely examine the backgrounds of the petition circulators.

Under state law, Taxpayers Against the Governor's Recall claims, circulators of any petition to recall a state official must be registered California voters. An attorney for the group, Paul Kiesel, said organizers of the recall effort bused in paid signature gatherers from Arizona and Washington state -- including at least three convicted felons -- put them up in cheap hotels, and told them to register to vote using the addresses of the hotels to qualify as petition circulators.

Hmm...let's think about this for a moment.

Now, I understand exactly why they have this law. I wouldn't want outsiders coming along screwing with the affairs of my home state either, that's dirty. However, if they got almost double the signatures they need to trigger the recall, then doesn't this at least suggest that maybe the people of California are seriously pissed at Gov. Davis' performance enough to the point where the sig gatherers are following a trend, outsiders or not? If they were to charge that the signatures were fake or coerced by some type of trick, then I'd see their point, but until further notice this looks like grabbing for straws to me.

You'll be glad to know that my computer is all better now.

All that trouble over ONE file it took all of 5 seconds to repair. Call me weird if you want, but I find it rather odd that such a procedurally minor problem completely locked me out of Windows.

National Review is airing a debate on intervention in Liberia. Here's an eye-opening part from the "against" column:

"This intervention may be technically in line with the Bush National Security Strategy, but if it is, it reveals that that strategy has little to do with protecting American security. For example, Carstens points approvingly to the strategy's stated aim to "make the world not just safer but better." This phrase gives me the chills. Better by whose standards? At what cost? For how long?"

And why?

I could care less about "improving" the world, I just want it to not f^&$ with us, that's good enough.

So the FBI wants to get more minorities to join them. Eh, they need to understand why they get the bad rap they do before that could happen.

from the same story:

"The class at Morgan State University in Baltimore tried to counter that perception by changing the FBI's acronym to "Fresh, Bold and Innovative." Although that idea was rejected, the students kept the theme in their campaign slogan: "The FBI is keeping it fresh, keeping it bold, keeping it innovative." The class arranged an "FBI fun night" at which agents and their families met college students in a relaxed setting."

Am I the only one that suspects that those agents were taking notes?

Hugh Hewitt of the Weekly Standard: "hmm...we can't compare Iraq to post-WW2 japan, so how about Germany?

Wrong again. This is a different culture, if we keep rehashing past occurences to address the present then it'll be no surprise when we screw up again. Forget about the comparisons, just do what needs to be done to encourage some form of democracy and get the hell out.

If this doesn't characterize the sheer absurdity behind islamists, I don't know what does. Just look...

From a book excerpt in The Observer:

Didar was talking to me in the office of the PUK security chief. While he spoke the chief went to a cupboard and pulled out the jacket that had been taken off Didar when he had been arrested. It had two slabs of TNT over the chest and in the small of the back and was made of blue nylon. A belt contained more explosives. There were two metal switches, one for the jacket and one for the belt. I sat and clicked them back and forth, listening to the metallic tick, as Didar continued.

"After seeing the jacket I went back to our base."
"What date was it?", I asked.
"It was the 12th of June," he said. "Because it was during the World Cup."
You were watching the World Cup?"
There were no televisions because they were haram [forbidden]. But I was following it in the newspapers."
What was your favourite team?"
"England. Michael Owen and I like McManaman and David Seaman."
"England is your favourite team and you are about to blow yourself up in the jihad against kufr?"
"Politics is one thing. Football is something else."

Didar was driven to a house on the outskirts of Halabjah. He had dinner at the house of a sympathiser. Then they watched a Jackie Chan film on a DVD.


Yes, kill the non-believers, but not before cheering on their sports teams & watching their movies...*sigh*

A note:

My home computer is currently experiencing the electronic equivalent of a coma, so postings will be somewhat sparse until further notice.

I would like to ring Bill Gates' neck right now...