CD Shopping Saturday

For anyone who might care, reviews of the new Mudhoney and Carrie Akre CDs will probably be coming in the next couple of days.

Aw Hell...

This AP article scares the bejesus out of me (link via Sean Kirby):

Support for the First Amendment has eroded significantly since Sept. 11 and nearly half of Americans now think the constitutional amendment on free speech goes too far in the rights it guarantees, says a poll released Thursday.

Of course, poorly structured polls can mean fuck-all, and the AP isn't giving any details about the questions or sample. However, knowing the number of anti-hate-speech freaks on the left and their bible-thumping brethren on the right, a number of this size doesn't really surprise me. It terrifies me, but doesn't surprise me.

Sweet Merciful Crap, They Didn't Strike

I am, quite frankly, stunned. Major League Baseball's players and owners actually had the combined foresight and intelligence necessary to continue playing baseball and making millions of dollars. Most amazingly, it looks as though the player's union actually backed down and made considerable concessions to the owners. The fact that the players would avert the strike in this situation is really unprecedented, because the players have been beating the living crap out of the owners at the bargaining table since the beginning of free agency.

Of note, as best I can tell:
1) Revenue sharing increases from 20% of annual revenue per team to 34%. That will lead to a lot bigger pool for middle to small market teams to draw on.
2) Luxury taxes are levied on teams whose total player salaries exceed a set amount ($117 million in 2003, 120.5 million in 2004, etc.). This will discourage the big market teams from big spending and help limit the highest player's salaries to the merely ridiculous.
3) Mandatory, random steroid testing.
4) No teams will be eliminated through the 2006 season.

1) and 2) will have similar effects, in that they are both two tools to take from baseball's rich and give to baseball's poor. Both will take a lot from both big salary teams and, indirectly, from many big salary players. 3) was the easy one for this round. Neither the players or the owners really wants steroid testing, but they also have little choice (it's amazing that baseball avoided steroid testing for so long anyway!) 4) is the fan favorite, the part that everyone can understand: don't take away the Twins, or the A's, fer crissakes. I don't believe that was ever really a solution, it was just the owners pathetic way of crying out to the public.

This agreement, believe it or not, is most of of what baseball really needed to do to guarantee owners, players, and fans a future (albeit short term) for baseball. I really can't say enough how surprised I am that they didn't screw this thing up again. I'm not really sure why the player's union decided to do the right thing, because they have had and will continue to have the upper hand against the owners. But they did the right thing, both for themselves and for baseball. Sweet merciful crap, I really can't believe it.

[For more details on the points of the agreement, see Jayson Stark's ESPN Article -Mojo]

The Sooner The Better

John Bono has started the The Donahue Show Death Watch over at the Big S. Unfortunately, I think the fecal-brained idiots running MSNBC won't figure out how fucked they are until a week after the election, when they look at the ratings and find that the cartoon network was a more popular source of election coverage than our pal Phil.

Sane Google Hits?

Well, the new site is finally starting to get indexed on Google, and I'm getting bunches of Google hits. Surprisingly, aside from the guy looking for hairy breastfeeding porn, the searches have been relevent to stuff I've written about, like the new Weezer video, or the jihad training camp in Oregon.

What is the world coming to when Google is actually sending people to the information they want? (except for the breastfeeding guy, I can't really help him)

More Delicious Pro-War Propaganda

Mike Hendrix is keeping the home front's spirits high with some delightful updates to WWII artwork:

He's got a couple of 'em up now, but I'm hoping he'll create some more!

Enviromentalist Flavored Jolly Rancher

Suman Palit, while discussing enviros and old-growth logging, introduces me to a new phrase, but one now firmly in my lexicon: Watermelon Environmentalists, those who are green on the outside but red on the inside. I don't know if Suman came up with this phrase or not, but I'm taking it and running.

So from here on out, when you hear me talking about those damn dirty Watermelons, I'm not talking about poor-quality produce....

Texas Tea

Various levels of outrage and disgust have been vented across this section of the blogosphere lately (most notably from the esteemed Bill Quick) regarding Bush’s meeting with Saudi gasbag Prince Bandar at the President’s Texas ranch. While I can agree with the sentiment, I see one very valid reasons to temporarily placate the Saudis. They’re still important for the only reason they’ve ever been important: oil.

The Saudis are not our friends (quite the opposite, actually), but if we were to turn our military might on the Kingdom without replacement sources of oil, the short-term economic results could be disastrous. America would be hurt, but Europe would be unable to run truck transports for several months, and Japan would be completely fucked. Even if we can take the Saudi oil fields in a relatively orderly fashion (and even the best of military operations are rarely as clean as we’d like) we’re still looking at several months of confusion and chaos in the oil markets. The long term solution is Russian oil, but their production will take many years to increase to our needed levels.

However, I think a solution to our Saudi problem is already an inevitable destination: Iraq (source image swiped from the UK Times site, blue circles show the location and size of oil deposits)

Iraq is another of the world’s top oil producers. Its two biggest oil fields are near Basra in the south and Kirkuk, easily accessible from both the northern and southern no-fly zones. In any invasion of Iraq, these would almost certainly be second in line to be secured (after scud launchers). With a capacity of around 3 million barrels, Iraq has roughly 1/3 of Arabia’s capacity, but some analysts have estimated that, if invested in, Iraqi oil fields could produce almost 8 million barrels a day within 5 years, thus rivaling the Saudis.

My opinion is, after Saddam is gone, send in the Russian oil companies (with help from our boys) to dramatically improve Iraqi production. The Russians will be happy, getting all their soviet-era loans repaid and lots of new business to boot, the new Iraqi government will be happy, because the money flowing in will give them strength and stability, and the rest of the world, with the exception of OPEC and the eco-weenies, will be happy with new sources of oil.

However, even in the short term, and without an increase in production, a pro-western regime in Iraq, pumping oil at full capacity could substantially help us with our real goal in regards to the Saudis. We don’t need to invade Saudi Arabia, but to bankrupt it, and remove the funding for all the terrorists currently plotting to vaporize our cities.

Whether Bush is planning it or not, the long-term result of the invasion of Iraq will be to weaken the Saudi Regime’s control on world oil prices, and remove more and more of their revenue which could be turned against us. Keeping the Saudis happy for the next six months will help to destroy them within the next five years. And this is undoubtedly a good thing.

I Love Evil Capitalism

I've found my new investment strategy. Advice on gambling, tobacco, alcohol, and defense stocks, all in one place.

Ughh...

Baby boomer nastalgia must fucking stop. Before it's too late.

With Us Or No?

The AP is reporting that Turkey, which some had already credited with operating troops within northern Iraq, is now publicly distancing itself from the US planned attack:

Instead of military force, Ugur Ziyal, undersecretary in the Turkish ministry of foreign affairs, suggested the United States apply what he called "therapy" to Iraq.

He offered as an example trying to tighten trade sanctions designed to force Iraqi President Saddam Hussein to abandon weapons programs.

Wasn’t turkey four square against sanctions of any kind, even a few mere months ago. What, are the great sufferings of the Iraqi people somehow no longer a pressing concern? Yeah man, therapy will work just great...

Towards A New Wilsonianism? I Hope To Hell Not.

The foremost article in this month’s Foreign Affairs is Michael Hirsh’s Bush and the World. The piece is yet another in a long line of multilateralist ramblings about the need for "consensus" in the "International Community." The brief abstract is as follows:

George W. Bush experienced the terrible new reality of terrorism on September 11 as directly and emotionally as did any other American. The difference was that he could do something about it. Days after the attacks, the president first gave voice to his doctrine: you are either with us, or with the terrorists. But one year later, there is little clarity about the direction of U.S. foreign policy. To fight terrorism and protect U.S. interests and ideals, the only practical solution is to bolster the international community that the United States helped create.

Although it doesn’t state anything new, it is a good summary of the multilateralist position, and probably as good an attack on the unilateralists as you’ll be able to find (that’s not necessarily much of a compliment). I’ll try to summarize and discuss why I think this position is wrong.

Hirsh believes that although the Bush doctrine, with its "you’re either with us or against us" rhetoric, may have succeeded in the short term goal of ousting Al Qaeda and the Taliban, and in strengthening the relationship between the US and Russia, the current lack of policy focus makes these gains pointless. The Administration uses the Bush doctrine to move from one new conflict or effort to the next without actually finishing anything, and is currently piddling away any further positive opportunities. I actually agree with him on this point, but where I see a time where we should be acting decisively, he thinks it’s time to call a pow-wow with our friends to make some good o’l consensus plans.

In relation to Bush’s rhetoric about defending the free world, Hirsh has this to say:

While Bush talks of defending civilization, his administration seems almost uniformly to dismiss most of the civilities and practices that other nations would identify with a common civilization. Civilized people operate by consensus, whether it is a question of deciding on a restaurant or movie or on a common enemy. The yearly round of talks at institutions such as the G-7 group of major industrialized nations, NATO, or the World Trade Organization (WTO) are the social glue of global civilization. The mutual desire for security and an eagerness to benefit from the global economy supplies the motivation. Diplomacy is the common language.

Civilized people say "please" and "thank you" and generally don’t try to analyze the rationale of the guy who’s mugging you. If they’re nice, they might call the police, but they certainly wouldn’t blame you for getting your wallet stolen. And if they were really your friend, they wouldn’t have to find consensus on whether or not to stop the next mugger from hitting you. Stop being a putz Hirsh.

Anyways, after this he rattles off the usual complaints about the US opposing the ICC, withdrawing from the Kyoto treaty, and generally being a selfish, mean-spirited country. Bush is only out for American security, and that’s making a lot of our friends around the world mad. Our nation is dependent on a global economy while unilateralist neo-conservatives (in complete control of the White House) are eager to tear down existing international institutions while offering no real solutions of their own. Blah blah blah. To be fair, Hirsh does recognize a fault lies with the Europeans for not recognizing their own weakness and the necessity of action in preventing WMD from being used against the west, but then he moves on to pointing out the real problem.

You see, we lack a clear global vision for the future of world peace, when it is most needed. What is the answer? A new Wilsonian internationalism, of course. What we need, acording to Hirsh, is a "new international consensus" which, while recognizing American dominance, uses established international institutions, such as the UN and ICC to achieve stability. Any other approach threatens to send America down the same toilet trajectory as any previous empire.

Like most multilateralists, Hirsh is looking backwards at the problems of the pre-9-11 world. It’s true, it would be nice if the Euros went along with us and helped out with intelligence, peacekeeping, and nation building stuff. Consensus is great, and building consensual agreement is vital in trade pacts and commerce. However, consensus and bureaucratic alliances are slow to move, and the time to act is now. Quoting Henry Kissinger on the importance of "deepening the ties that bind nations together" doesn’t help the multilateralist case, since Kissinger himself has recognized that we’re in a new geopolitical era, where the old tactics of isolation and containment of threats no longer works against fanatics out to destroy us. And of course Wilson died a beaten man for a reason. His system stood by (and appeased) as Nazi Germany started the most horrible war yet, and it wasn’t because the US didn’t join the League of Nations, it was because Wilsonian ideals had no real-world power.

I have several very flippant rebuttals to Mr. Hirsh. First, he talks about "sacrifices" that American politicians need to make in order to bring America more inline with the "International Community." People who suggest sacrifice are never to be trusted, as they are almost always working for very bad ideas. Second, he seems to think the current International system is fundamentally sound, and that treaties like Kyoto will actually solve the problems it claims to. Hell, we can’t even accurately define what the long-term dangers of global warming are, "the degree-by-degree warming of the globe" Hirsh cites may be a fact, but a solution to the problem has not been found. And it certainly wasn’t devised ten years ago by a bunch of hacks and diplomats.

Another thing that irritates me about Hirsh’s views (notably that America must give up some of its sovereignty to preserve global order) is that it’s downright undemocratic. Kyoto was only killed by Bush after both parties in Congress had completely rejected it. No one was in favor of it. The cowboy just did the honorable thing and put that sumbitch out of its misery. The ICC is totally incompatible with our Constitution, and American voters have no interest in radically changing the basic laws of our government just to please the Europeans. Most Americans know the ideals of the multilateralists, but realize that they are just that: ideals. The real world is a wild and savage place, and I’m certainly unwilling to neglect my nation’s security to organizations that fund suicide bombers, or are willing to negotiate with despotic governments who are developing WMDs for use against American cities.

The global political system that Hirsh thinks is the only future for world security is rotten to the core. The UN is filled with unrepentant socialists, America haters, and Jew-baiters. Syria is on the UN security council, while the US has been booted off the UN Human Rights Commission. How can we rely on these types of organizations to protect us? The old system of permanent alliances, which worked so well against the steady threats of German militarism and Soviet expansionism, is impotent against the nimble and dispersed enemies now intent on destroying us. Once these enemies acquire WMDs, the issue is no longer one of power or diplomacy, but of survival. We can take quick, preventative, unilateral action to prevent our enemies from hitting us, or we can wait rely on consensus-building alliances and the "international community" to take their sweet time to sanction any action to defend ourselves.

And here’s just a little something to consider for all you multilateralists: if a single nuke goes off on American territory, the world will know what true imperious American unilateralism looks like. For the record, it looks an awful lot like mushroom clouds and radioactive glass.

Drunken Debauchery

So I’m still recovering a bit from my buddy’s bachelor party last night. I’m the best man, so I had no choice but to partake heavily. And since most of the partygoers were fairly naïve, engineer nerd types, I had to lead them. Unfortunately, I happen to subscribe to the "leadership by example school". After a few cases of beer, and many many lap dances at our finest local "gentlemen’s club", I’d say it was a fairly successful night. Only a week till the wedding, though.

I’m still not completely up to speed, but the new Foreign Affairs appeared on my doorstep sometime over the weekend, so hopefully that’ll give me some ideas for posts.

Girly Music For Macho Men

Big, burly, beer guzzling men like myself shouldn’t like a band like Dressy Bessy. Girl fronted power-pop singing happy sounding little ditties just shouldn’t appeal to red meat eating John Wayne worshippers like me. But they do.

Dressy Bessy is another one of the many fine bands belonging to the Denver-based Elephant 6 collective. Fronted by the distinct voice of Tammy Ealom, and sharing Guitarist John Hill with the Apples In Stereos, the band can be described by one simple word: catchy.

Their first album, Pink Hearts Yellow Moons, was one of the most infectious albums I’ve ever heard. Songs from this album have found their way into the soundtrack for But I'm a Cheerleader and the Powerpuff Girls. Every song was a catchy example of super-sugary indypop. There was no resisting its quirky charms.

SoundGoRound, the band’s second full album, isn’t quite as infectious or sugary as their first album, but it’s still a solid album. Led by singles like That’s Why and Buttercups, the album will have you singing along after the second or third listen. Quality stuff.

Damn Ayn Rand

As all 5 or 6 of my regular readers have probably noticed by now, the past week or two have been pretty slow on ol’ captainmojo.com. I just haven’t been in the mood to write much of any significance. I get these spells every couple of months, where I would rather just read than write. Well I’ve just been through one of these spells, catching up with some of the reading I’ve been meaning to get through for years.

Among the history and science fiction books, I spent the last several days slogging through Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged. Holy Jeebus is that a tome. I know it was her masterwork, but God damn it woman, bigger is not always better. 1074 pages of 7 point type. John Galt’s speech, the climax of the book, is 52 pages long and just restates all the other revelationary monologues found throughout the book. It was a philosophy lecture, which would be great in a philosophy book, but this was fiction, and all of her ideas in this speech could have easily been condensed with some clear writing to about 20 pages.

About 50% of the book is mind-numbingly slow. It’s chock-full of endless inner monologues and self analysis, some of my least favorite aspects of modern writing. The mind is the center of Rand’s philosophy, so a certain amount of this introspection is needed, but the same themes are beaten into your head time and again. Yup, the thinking heroes are filled with a love of life, while the socialist idiots trying to take over are, in reality, vile anti-life scum. Reason is necessary for human survival, and rational selfishness is a virtue, gotcha. I figured all that out after the first five inner monologues, and I pretty much agree with you Ayn, so I really don’t see the need for the following 300 reminders.

The dialogue is so-so. Rand doesn’t seem to believe in subtlety, which is fine and all, but casual conversations are never supposed to sound like a logic book. And if one more character uttered Rand’s catchphrase, “check you premises” I would have screamed. One character, fine, but it seemed like every smart character came up with the phrase spontaneously. Everyone said it in the same condescending tone. Christ, I don’t care if they were right, that irritated the shit out of me. And in the edition I read (the 25th anniversary edition), there were dozens and dozens of typos. Not just missing commas and shit, but misspelled and randomly placed words, as if the editors just blindly ran the book through word’s grammar check, accepting it all.

However, aside from the typos, the other 50% of the book is pretty damn good, inspiring even. Rand could be a decent fiction writer when she kept things moving. The actions and events of her story illustrate her ideas far better than the ponderous speeches and minds-eye lectures. This is equally true of her shorter works like Anthem. Her egoist philosophy is something I agree with, for the most part, but philosophical novels are meant to be relatively easy introductions to ideas, but this one is a goddamn chore.

Elvis, Savior Of The Free World

In honor of the 25th anniversary of the King’s death, Glenn Reynold’s latest TechCentral piece links Elvis’ conquest of mass media to the defeat of totalitarianism. And, by god, I think he’s right.

Question of The Day

OK, I've had a question that's long tugged at the back of my brain. What is the most popular variety of donut?^* This is my question of the day, and I'd like you guys to help me answer it. Please list your favorites in the comments section, and hopefully we'll be able to figure out which variety of sugar and fat reigns supreme.

As for me, I like few things as much as a white-frosted white-cake donut, with rainbow sprinkles:

Yummmm-my!

^*Note: by donut, I refer not just to traditional cake donuts, but to all the glorious forms found in donut shops, be they eclairs, bars, crullers, claws, old fashions, holes, or anything else one might find in a Winchells or Krispy Kreme. This does not include, however, cinamon rolls or other members of the sweet roll family.

The Highway To (Cable News) Heaven

Ian at Fierce Highway agrees that our current cable news situation is intolerable. While I bitch and moan, however, Ian schemes and plans, and boy does he ever have a solution to my TV Dilemma — BNN, the Blogger News Network:

I'd be willing to bet that schools like the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern is right now educating an eager young group of intelligent journalists eager for the chance at a revolutionary new station, no matter the risk or the meager pay. It's a rough economy after all, and who's the most willing to risk it all than those without a whole lot?

Field reporting and in-depth investigation crews could thus be staffed out of J-School recruits. The editorial boards, then, would be made up from the blogging world. Some of us, myself included, might not be the best "reporters", but we're damn good at content choice and helping explore the issues involved in a story. Plus, there's nothing like a whole group of obsessive writers for focusing on content quality.

Area desks would obviously draw from the various types of bloggers out there: entertainment, politics, foreign affairs, military affairs, economics, human sexuality, etc.

I've even got a tentative board in mind:

CEO/President: Glenn Reynolds

CFO: Megan McArdle

COO: William Quick

Chief Legal representation: The Volokhs

Editor-in-Chief: Ken Layne

Head Anchor: Stephen Green -- he really belongs on the board, but, come on, can't you just see this guy doing not only the news but heading the prime-time opinion show?

Go read the rest.

Three years ago Ian's initial piece alone would have been enough to secure ample venture capital. Damn this economy!

Between MSNBC's idiot programming, FOX's inept fact checkers, and CNN's raw evil, we, the decent, thinking people of the world, demand a new choice!

Good Editing Is Hard To Find

Swiped from Tim Blair's site:

JOURNALIST GILES COREN recently wrote a book review for the Times of London in which he dismissed a certain work as a literary stunt. Part of his review ran as follows:

The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog. Very clever. All 26 letters of the alphabet in a 35-letter sentence.

But a subeditor changed the "the" to an "a". Read Coren's calm, measured response to the alteration and subsequent error here.

It's the funniest thing I've read in weeks.

I Warned 'Em, But Did They Listen?

Reynolds, Quick, and Green all briefly mention the ratings disaster that is Phil Donahue's new MSNBC show. I just want to say...

Ha! You MSNBC Idiots! I told you so! I told you so! What did you expect the ratings to do? It's Phil Donahue fer Chrissakes! Hahahahaha!

There, I feel better now.

Mail Calling

R. Lee Ermey freaking rocks!

And he really hates goddamn watermelon.

Gammons Gives It To 'Em

ESPN's baseball guru Peter Gammons gives his reaction to the upcoming strike:

What these billionaires and millionaires and all their high-priced lawyers had better understand is that they don't matter. All those people who lost their jobs and their savings at Enron matter. The police and firemen who can't get raises in New York City, with all its Wall Street green, matter. All those folks whose family stores were systematically run out of business by the Wal-Marts of the world matter. Or teachers, always the bottom of the priority ring, all the way up to those in the academic world who devote their lives to dealing with childhood diseases or osteoporosis and get paid about a fifth of what a rookie backup catcher makes. They matter.

Millions of people matter, including hot-dog vendors and clubhouse kids and grounds-crew workers. But baseball owners and players don't.

He's absolutely right.

If a player strike lasts more than a week, the blowback from fans will be as bad, if not worse, than when the '94 strike killed the season. And they can't count on another amazing season like '95 to bring people back. The issues the two sides are willing to risk killing MLB over are ridiculously petty.

President Bush has stated he'd be furious if the strike happens. That's great, but the pres needs to threaten more than fury. Revoking MLBs Anti-Trust exemption should do nicely.

These assholes are gunning to destroy the best game in the world. Screw them, might kill the MLB organization, but baseball will survive. I'm watching the Little League World Series right now, and, aside from the wussy-ass aluminum bats, it's pretty good baseball. And there's neither a Steinbrenner or a Selig for me to wish death upon.

Goddamn Big Media Sloppiness

Who's doing the fact checking for Fox News? They just described the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Kennedy as the "only fossil fueled carrier in comission". I've heard this about five times on FNC and it annoys me every time. What about the two non-nuclear Kitty Hawk class ships, Kitty Hawk and Constellation? Both are still in comission (although they'll probably be retired within the next ten years). The Kennedy is a modified version of the Kitty Hawks.

This is not some big secret or esoteric bit of knowledge that Fox would have to spend endless hours researching. It's one of the most basic aspects of the US Navy's carrier fleet. Irritating.

Ye Gods Of Rock And Roll

35 years ago today, Elvis Presley died. I have no first-hand experience of his Elvisness, as his death predates my birth by a little more than a year. Elvis to me is a mythological figure, a man who shook his hips and made a nation, and then the world worship him. Perhaps he wasn’t the most original musician in the world. He certainly wasn’t the brightest guy in the world. But the women loved him, the men thought he was cool, he was a patriot, and he had amazing hair. The world could use a few more men like him.

Hail to the king baby!

Coup? What Coup?

Agence France-Presse is reporting that the Venezuelan Supreme Court has decided not to prosecute the leaders of the April coup that temporarily removed Hugo Chavez from power. Also mentioned in the article is a reaction from the American governement:

In Washington, the US State Department hinted that another coup could be in the making in Venezuela and warned US citizens in Venezuela that there could be civil unrest.

The US embassy in Caracas told its citizens in Venezuela to closely monitor local radio and television broadcasts for drastic or unexpected changes in the content of news programming -- often a sign of political turmoil.

As Richard Jahnke has repeatedly discussed over at El Sur, Chavez is hanging precariously to power, and over the last few months, his approval rating has plummeted. is autocratic methods, his buddy-buddy relationship with Fidel Castro, and his total mismanagement of his nations economy, is breeding revolution.

Ouch!

Seanbaby sifts through a tremendous amount of psychotic 70's era self-defense books to bring us sweet, sweet comedy, in Kick To The Groin comics:

Comic adventures written while drunk, assembled while hungover, and based entirely on seventies self defense books. Note: since all of the original and rad self defense instructions are left in, you may learn thousands of diagrammed ways to kick someone in the groin, finish them off with several more kicks to the groin, then keep their groin pinned down while their balls wait for help to arrive.

Bless his sick, sick heart.

Wobble Watch: UK edition

American troops are moving, whatever plans the Pentagon has come up with seem to be focusing our troop strength, but will the British join us?

Recent statements from Tony Blair and the British Parliment seemed to cast doubt on any British commitment to the invasion of Iraq. However, the Telegraph is reporting that NATO's ACE Mobile Force is being disbanded. The British are withdrawing their troops from the force, in order to make them available in Iraq.

It's up!

Blogcritics.com is live! Go check it out.

Turning My Back On Man, Joining Tarzan In The Forest

I like technology. I like modern civilization. Despite my general loathing of people, I love the convenience of living in the city. Our industrial society has given even the poorest of us a level of wealth unprecedented in human history. For this wonderful standard of living I’ll put up with an awful lot.

Living in a city, I tolerate crowds, pollution, noise, and crime. I do this gladly, because I have a supermarket a mere two blocks from my apartment, where I can buy beef jerky and pork rinds 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. But one thing can turn me from my normal consumer goods and tech-loving self into a raving maniacal luddite. I speak of light pollution.

Yes friends, I like to look at the stars. I really like watching meteor showers and the like, and this year’s Perseid shower was supposed to be excellent. So I hike over to the local playfield a couple of blocks from home, away from the harsh street lights. I was certainly not expecting a pristine starscape, but I was hoping to get a better view than my small well-lit porch could offer. However, I was destined to be disappointed.

Lights from throughout the Greater Puget Sound megalopolis create a vaguely pink haze around the horizon. No worthwhile stargazing can be achieved. Even the brightest of stars are difficult to make out at darkest midnight. Aside from the Big Dipper, Cygnus, and Cassiopia, no constellations can be discerned. After nearly 45 minutes of gaping upwards I returned home in defeat, having only seen one piddly, barely visible, shooting star.

I hate this accursed light pollution. It makes me want to find some cave in the desert and turn into an ascetic, boozed-out, heavily armed, Howard Hughes-like hermit. Well, to be honest, I was planning on doing that regardless of any light pollution, but the damned lights make me want to do that now, instead of in my waning retirement years. Damn city living!

Oh well, guess I’ll go buy a six-pack and a bag of pork rinds to take the edge off my celestial disappointment.

Oh Goody!

Ashley Banfield, everyone's favorite Canadian war slut, is starting her five-week tour of post 9-11 America right here in Seattle. Which is just swell. But look lively San Francisco, she'll be grilling your locals tomorrow!

The Day Is Near

Blogcritics.com launches tomorrow, and to break in the site, Eric Olsen has set up an online interview with RIAA president Cary Sherman at 11 AM eastern tomorrow. Go to Tres Producers for the announcement and a list of everyone involved.

Bery Bery Good To Me

Matt Welch links to an interesting Baseball Prospectus article by Shane Demmitt on the surprising success of the Anaheim Angels. They’ve overcome dismal stats in home runs and walks with excellent pitching, consistent hitting, and an exceptionally low number of strikeouts. Demmitt’s analysis shows just how unlikely this team’s success is.

At this point in the season, the Halo’s are behind my beloved Mariners by a mere 2 ½ games, and even if the M’s are able to stave them off, they’ll have a good chance at the AL wildcard. Like last year, the AL West is going to probably be the most exciting race in baseball, with three of the four teams still in contention (of course, the post A-rod Rangers are nowhere to be seen. Heh-heh). Both the M’s and Angels have done well over the past two seasons with consistent and timely hitting, while the A’s have been a much better longball team. All have had good pitching. It’s an exciting race.

Unfortunately, this may be the last year when all three are so equally matched. There’s uncertainty over who will buy the Angels, now that Disney wants out, and their decision to pay Darin Erstad $32 million for four years was unwise. The Angels are currently operating on a league average payroll of $60 million, and unless they increase that, they won’t be able to keep the talent they have when the younger guys' contracts come up. Of course, the poor A’s currently have a bottom-scraping payroll of $30 million. Their reliance on young talent is great for the current season, but as more and more of their players demand higher salaries, the team is doomed.

Despite the intra-division rivalry, this irritates me. I use up all of my baseball loathing up against the hated Yankees and the vile Braves. I like all the AL West teams (I even used to like the Rangers), and the two worthy opponents for my Mariners could dry up within a couple of years. Salary isn’t everything, but to keep a consistently good team, ownership needs to invest enough resources, and it doesn’t look like the A’s or Angel have the full commitment of their ownership.

Of course, this is all irrelevant if the bastards go out on strike, ensuring the death of MLB.

Drink When You're Thirsty

Dartmouth Medical school professor Heinz Valtin, MD, tells us that drinking 8 glasses of water a day is probably unnecessary. Despite the fact that the “8 glasses a day” mantra is repeated ad nauseum by everyone from doctors to aerobics instructors to fat businessmen, there is no scientific evidence to support the claim that the average person needs this much water.

Also debunked is the commonly heard: “if you’re thirsty, you’re already dehydrated.” In actuality, your thirst is triggered when your blood concentration has risen by less than two percent, and your body isn’t dehydrated until your blood concentration has risen by more than five percent.

Best of all, Valtin claims that caffeinated beverages and perhaps even beer can probably be “counted towards daily fluid intake” in a positive way. Good news all around.

He's Back

The newly wed VodkaPundit is back from his honeymoon. A gaping hole in blog roll is filled. Rejoice!

Do Not Go Gently

Mike Hendrix links to Charlton Heston's announcement that he's suffering from Alzheimer's. It is an impressively brave and noble statement, worthy of your attention.

Good luck Charlton. This next beer is dedicated to you.

Sky Stuff

I just saw the International Space Station pass overhead. It's impressively bright, almost as bright as Venus. It takes about 90 minutes to complete an orbit, so it moves across the sky very quickly. If you get a chance, check if it's visible to you. It's pretty damn cool.

I Told You Soccer Was Evil

Now we know why all the Euros desperately want to get in good with Libyan strongman and (former he claims) terrorist Col. Muammar Gaddafi. They need people to buy up their soccer teams:

Fans of cash-strapped football team PAOK [a Greek team -ed] have sent a letter to the Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi pleading for his help in saving the club from financial ruin.

We ask you to be the saviour of our souls and the leader of the new revolution

PAOK's largest supporters' club sent the letter to the Libyan embassy in Athens, calling on Colonel Gaddafi to oust the team's unpopular owner George Batatoudis.

"Gaddafi, our God, buy PAOK," the Reuters news agency quoted the letter as saying.

"We ask you to be the saviour of our souls and the leader of the new revolution, that will originate in the north," the fans pleaded.

And here I thought George Steinbrenner was evil. Yankee fans got nothing on these fruitballs...

Surf Euro-Weenies Must Die!

Everybody's all in a tizzy over Adrian Hamilton's piece in the Independit calling for a European pre-emptive attack on the world's most powerful "Rogue State", the good old US of A.

This call to arms is obvious satire, with Hamilton just substituting America for Iraq, claiming that the US is hypocritical. People are overreacting to the military aspect of piece, and almost ignoring the moral relativism and disgusting smugness that lies underneath. I almost thought this piece was a satire of real radical lefties, but then I read some of the guy’s other stuff. It’s tough to tell where the satire ends and where the bitter Euro-weenie begins. Let’s look at a few points, shall we?

[on the historical possibilities of regime change]

The last century doesn't provide such good examples, of course. To have "changed regime" in Berlin in the early Thirties would have meant overturning a democratically elected leader in Hitler.

And God knows we could never do that. Even though Hitler pretty much wrote down his plan for attacking the Soviets and removing the Jews, it would be wrong to remove democratically elected leaders. Why, if Tony Blair just up and started rounding up Pakis and putting them in gas chambers, we shouldn‘t do anything. I mean, talk about democracy, he really clobbered the Tories last election, he can do whatever he wants.

It has a government in power without the legitimacy of a democratic majority, in the hands of a coterie from a single part of the country and clearly aiming at a dynasty of rule. Its rhetoric is one of violent aggression against anyone seen as its enemies. It [sic] opponents are locked up without trial or the right to habeas corpus.

Yup, Bush Jr. is just as much of a brutal, un-elected dictator as Saddam Hussein. For the record, the US has lacked “legitimacy of a democratic majority” for over a decade, as Clinton (who was loved by Euro-leftists) never got 50% of the vote, and only 43% in ‘92. Oh, and those terrorist nutjobs down in gitmo are just a bunch of pro-democracy demonstrators we locked up for the hell of it.

Of course it has a peculiarly obnoxious regime, ready to poison its own people with corrupt capitalism and deregulated pollution.

Yup, we all know how well steadfast socialism and regulated clean-air has worked for you Europeans. So how’s those unemployment numbers coming along guys? And your wonderful socialized medicine? Not waiting too long for that kidney, are you pal?

It is no friend of democracy, having announced its refusal to deal with the only two elected leaders of the Islamic world – Khatami in Iran and Yasser Arafat in Palestine, the latter the only Arab leader ever elected with western observers checking the process. The country has armed and succoured state terrorism and assassination by the Israelis. It has installed the worst sort of warlord gangsters in Afghanistan and, according to "intelligence", been party to upsetting (albeit briefly) the elected president of Venezuela. The world cannot afford to await its next move.

Democracies that support terrorists are just as much our enemies as dictatorships that do. Of course, this sentence applies much more to the collaborationist states in Europe, since Khatami is powerless, and Arafat was never really elected. And for Hugo Chavez, I think his own people will take care of that problem for us very soon, thank you very much.

Given time, this rogue superstate might then be able to take its place once again among the family of peace-loving nations.

Can’t you just sense the deep joy this sentence brought its author, the deep, almost sexual experience he has when describing the US as an evil, dangerous rogue. The raw smugness and bitter tone of of this piece is impressive. However, anyone who can’t tell the difference between the Bush administration and the Iraqi Ba’athists, even in satire, certainly can’t be taken seriously on enything else. Putz...

More Macho Gun Drooling

Yes friends, we are now clearly in the 21^st century. We may not have flying cars, robot prostitutes, fusion power plants, or a Mars colony, but we do have a buttload of cool-looking futuristic guns hitting our militaries in the next ten years.

Aside from the the Israili Tavor I mentioned yesterday, we've got everything from the US Army's large Objective Individual Combat Weapon (OICW), to the sleek and predatory FN 2000 (mentioned by Dave Worley over at Dailypundit's comments section). Reader Steve also brings my attention to the wee FN P90, which is a really neat looking gun.

Wobble Watch: UK Edition

So, after previously (sort of) declaring that Britain will back America’s inevitable attack on Iraq, it looks like Tony Blair is getting second thoughts about the invasion. And, according the Telegraph, a recent poll of UK voters placed British support for George Bush below that of the dreaded Conservative Party (good lord, ranking our noble President with those savage child-rapeing Thatcherites, outrageous!), and that there is “deep-seated unease among voters about America's intentions.” What the poll means by “unease” or what the actual questions or numbers are, or who the participants were isn’t given (typical), but it looks like Blair, being the good Clinton-clone that he is, he wants to focus group the thing to death.

Actually, all the clamoring for a parliamentary debate seems quite reasonable, for the same reason that our congress needs to debate Iraq, and actually declare war. Unfortunately for both nations, the executive has been handed all powers to make war, and the legislative bodies lack the cajhones to take responsibility for real decisions. Blair will be able to ram through any military options he wants, and congress gave Bush carte blanch after 9-11, because they were too cowardly to consider actually declaring war on anyone.

Well, at least the Bush administration, with all its congressionally approved dictatorial powers, is willing to do what’s necessary, even if we must do it alone.

Quote Of The Day

Listen three-eyes, don’t you try to out-weird me. I get stranger things than you free with my breakfast cereal.

-Zaphod Beeblebrox

Guns Are, Like, Cool.

Have you seen the Tavor assualt rifle? StrategyPage is reporting the Israelis have decided to replace all their M-16s with it. This gun is probably the coolest looking weapon in the world. Its smooth, bullpup design just screams, "I am from the future. I am not interested in that maintaining the time-line crap those Star Trek wussies are always on about. I have come simply to kill, destroy, and manipulate events so that I am at the top of the food chain in the grisly, post-apocalyptic world I inhabit."

And isn't that the message that all good assault rifles should convey? Hell, it even comes in a funsize version.

Slasher Flick Heaven

Enough of this pansy-ass Jason in space crap. All true horror movie fans only want the answer to one simple question: who would win in an all-out slaughter-fest, Freddy Krueger from the Nightmare on Elm Street series, or Jason from the Friday the 13th series? The answer may be near, now that New Line Cinema has finally given the go ahead for a Freddy vs. Jason movie.

I personally think Jason would probably win, what with him being a completely indestructable psycho killing machine. However, Freddy has a helluva lot more personality, plus he's crafty and that knife-glove is just cool, so I think I'd be rooting for him. Either way, it's gonna be fun to watch...

Pedigree Schmedigree

What's your blog's family tree look like? I just discovered Blogtree, and I think it's a pretty damn cool way to view how blogs relate to each other.

And, yes, I'm the unholy offspring of Stephen Green and Bill Quick. I'm sure it's as big a shock to them as it is to you.

*UPDATE* Blogtree appears to have a bandwidth limit that they've used up. Bummer.

*UPDATE* It's back up again. Huzah!

Amen

Finally, there's a church for people like me. Yes friends, I think the Beer Church is an organization we can trust and believe in. If I can only combine their spiritual wisdom with my own forthcoming Church of John Wayne, I think I'll have the perfect theological weapons.

I Do Have Nice Hair

The Which Democratic Presidential Hopeful Are You? quiz is by
Babel Log and Captain Mojo

Oh Yeah, I Feel Safer

Eighty-year-old Fred Hubbell, an old man who made a snide remark in a Connecticut airport, paid for it by being hauled off in cuffs to a holding cell for a half hour, and then getting a $78 fine:

Near the end of the second full-scale pat-down he and his wife, Grayce, had undergone by Transportation Security Administration guards, just steps from boarding a 7:30 a.m. flight they had almost missed, he saw the screener poking into his wallet.

...

"I said, `What do you expect to find in there, a rifle?'" he said. When the trooper asked me, `Do you think that was an appropriate remark?' I said, `I do.'" That's when Hubbell was taken into custody by Trooper Wayne Foster.

Dana Cosgrove, head of the federal security force that moved into Bradley last week, sees it differently.

"What he said [regarding the wallet] was, `You better look at it real good; there may be a rifle in there.' And all that the people around him in the waiting room heard was the word `rifle.'"

In the end, Hubbell apologized and will pay the fine.

A seemingly trivial matter, but indicative of problems with these bunko "Zero Tolerance" policies. Why did this all happen? Because some dumbshit was either unwilling or unable to let a little sarcastic remark slide. Let me help you out Einstein. If you're flipping through a small object, like, say a wallet, and the tired, irritated and violated victim of your groping says that there might be a large and dangerous object hidden in said small object, the chances are high that there really is no dangerous object. You see, falsehoods like these are a form of humor we call "cracking wise," and are meant to blow off steam in tense situations. They do not indicate this man seriously intends anyone any harm. Idiots.

How do actions like these by airport security personnel (and I’ve heard of many of them) make me any safer when flying? And what does this say about these security people when they can’t tell the difference between a dangerous terrorist and a tired and pissed off old man in a hurry to catch his plane? I don’t care what your boss told you about “Zero Tolerance” rules relating to people mentioning guns, this type of detention is totally inappropriate.

I’m all for extensive airport searching, but if a person doesn’t have the basic English skills and above-80 IQ necessary to parse this old dude’s harmless quip, then they are not going to catch a real terrorist.

A Few Personal Notes

What’s up with all the damn weddings going on? I freaking hate weddings. A girl I went to high school with just got hitched today, and another friend is getting married in a few weeks (and I’m the best man for that one). Both of them are younger than me. I suddenly feel very, very old. I already felt like an old man at 21, and now at 23 I feel downright ancient. Blah...

However, in more pleasant news, Cornflake was here in Seattle this weekend visiting from his self-imposed exile in San Diego. We went out for wings and beer, and then returned to the Mojo-pad for some beer and poker. One of our other friends decided to drink too much malt liquor (bleh!) and ended up worshipping the porcelain god. Good times. Good times.

But best of all, though, was the results of the poker game. Ending a 4 year streak of unbroken poker losses, I ended the night $13.00 up. This is big. Like, dogs and cats living together big. The luck plain has warped dangerously, and the very fabric of space and time has been damaged. Beware my friends, for these are the end times.

Sorry Cornflake, I just had to get a little bragging in.

Weekend Must Reads

Two quick items everyone should read:

In his latest piece, Stephen Den Beste defines the Bush Doctrine, and then goes on to discuss waging pre-emptive war on Iraq, among other things. As usual, the skipper of the USS Clueless gets it, and does a far better job describing what's at stake in the war than I can.

Also, Ian over at Fierce Highway has a post about recent news that Saddam Hussein is planing to equip Palestinians with chemical or biological weapons. The threat to Israel is clear, and once they hit the Tel Aviv, New York, Washington, or Seattle is next. Just reason #3457 why Saddam needs to be killed.

The Mouse is Swift

Remember when I wondered how long it would take before the Pennsylvania miner's story becomes a made-for-TV movie? Well, now we know who'll be making it:

The nine Pennsylvania coal miners who were trapped underground for 77 hours have sold the TV and book rights to their story to The Walt Disney Co. for $150,000 each, their lawyer said Saturday.

The deal includes a movie for Disney's ABC network and a book to be published by the Burbank company's Hyperion Publishing division, Pittsburgh attorney Thomas Crawford said in an interview.

What Price Peace?

Bush is “Furious” over the Hebrew University bombing that killed 5 Americans. That’s swell Gerogie, get in line. However, then he goes on to give us this filthy string of words I’ll charitably describe as rancid cat shit:

Appearing with Jordan's King Abdullah, Bush said, "I am just as angry as Israel is. I am furious that innocent lives were lost.

"But even though I am mad, I still think peace is possible,"

Bush said the United States is "responding to the murder of Americans. ... We are responding by working with our Arab friends and Israel to track these people down."

As for the term “mad,” well, I get mad when my phone bill has a mistake on it. The emotion we label “mad” is way to damn limited to cover the outrage and anger this should be stirring in the hearts of all decent people. Violent and uncontrollable fury seems much more appropriate.

And PEACE?!?! With who? Hamas? Hezbullah? Islamic Jihad? Yassir? Those are your choices folks, and none of them want anything to do with a peace that leaves a single non-eviscerated Jew in the Middle East. There is currently no “moderate” Palestinian leader, no Arab Shimon Peres, to turn to.

With the University bombing, Hamas has taken an irreversible step. Not only are they attacking civilians, but they’re targeting foreigners generally, and Americans specifically. This was not a randomly chosen location. In order to pull off this remote control bombing, the terrorists had to infiltrate and carefully plan the operation. Hamas chose a university frequented by foreign students, mostly Americans. The bomb exploded in the “Frank Sinatra” cafeteria for chrissakes. This bombing was a direct assault on American citizens.

Peace hasn’t been possible for almost a year. Ever since Arafat’s formerly secular Fatah gang started strapping nailbombs to teen girls and screaming bloody jihad, there has been no possibility of any meaningful peace process. There is only a barbaric war, in which Israel’s enemies now directly target Americans. This points out for even the most idiotic of American Islamofascist apologists that Hamas, and all their terror piss-ant buddies (including Yassir) are our clear and dedicated enemies. This is something most of us in the blogosphere, or, at least in this little corner of it, have known for many months.

As for our Arab friends helping us “track these people down,” I’m sure that’d be all fine and dandy, if these were just criminals we need to arrest and bring to trial. Oh, they’re criminals all right, but they’re also warriors, waging their battles on civilian populations. Justice in this case does not come from a judge’s gavel, but from the cold hard steel of a pistol.

War is bad. That is without question. War brings death, and death is about the worst thing possible. But the quest for peace is slowly killing thousands of innocent men, women, and children. However, war is sometimes the only moral alternative to a smoldering, death-ridden peace, which is what the current situation in the Middle East is. Besides, there is no peace to be had. Israel’s in as much of a war with these thugs as we are with Bin Laden’s ball-lickers. Now their war is ours and we need to assist them in every way.

The half-assed incursions that the Israelis have so far tried are ineffective because they are indecisive. The power base for terrorists remains intact every time, despite an Israeli military victory at every possible battle. This is a real war, and it needs real offensive action by Israel, not to take a town or two, or kill one or two Palestinian leaders, but to crush all organized Palestinian resistance.

Wars only end when one side is the victor, and the other vanquished. The Palestinian death culture will only be stopped when the IDF controls every town in the West Bank and Gaza, when the paramilitary gunmen are killed to the last man, when Arafat and his entire kleptocracy is taken out, and when every last militant is hunted down and lies in a shallow grave. Then Israel can choose the new Palestinian “leader” they want to deal with. And if there isn’t an appealing candidate available, they can create one. Then peace negotiations can begin.

Is this violent? Yup. Brutal? Uh-huh. Imperialistic? You betcha. Are there any alternatives? None that don’t leave thousands of innocents dead once Hamas gets a few of Saddam Husein’s chemical warheads. More of the current directionless conflict will leave more piles of dead bodies in Israeli streets. There’s been enough of that, and it’s time to stop it once and for all. There is no hope for Peace. Now we can only strive for Victory.

Filthy Mammals

The San Francisco Gate (via Jeff Jarvis) brings us word of a fascinating new world sport:

It doesn't rank with the Tour de France or World Cup just yet, but breast- feeding en masse is rapidly gaining status as a new international competition.

The world champions of mass lactation are Australians, who set a Guinness World Record with 536 moms nursing simultaneously in a movie theater in New South Wales last Aug.