Stale of the Union January 25, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Bush Administration.2 comments
Why is it that every Bush speech sounds the same? Freedom this, Terror that, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, Terror, Freedom, blah, blah, blah. How can anyone take this creep seriously? His words are empty, devoid of any life. He is a robot, spewing forth meaningless ones and zeros.
Last night, on CNNI, they showed the reactions of three Republicans to the speech. Their total lack of empathy for other human beings was shocking, the utter depth of their ignorance stupefying. One said Bush was sincere and doing the best job he could. One said Bush had made things good in Iraq. These sickening comments made my skin crawl.
The Age newspaper sums up the speech well: (excerpt of editorial, and news report.)
President Bush pleaded with the Democrat-controlled Congress. Since he provided no new reasons to strengthen his argument in favour of a strategy he admits is based on failure previously to stabilise Iraq, the President’s chances are slim.
It was a fumbled 60 minutes, (his words) rang hollow, sending gloomy echoes across a country and out over a world largely opposed to American involvement in Iraq. … his familiar refrain with the usual lyrics (“protect”, “freedom”, “danger”, “security”). To (Bush), Iraq is a war in which America can be victorious; to much of the wider world, it is a diabolical mess largely of America’s making that has to be cleaned up, not won. The President is marooned; America is isolated.
Breaking News from the 5pam Buck3t!!!11!~! January 25, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Internet.add a comment
So the spammers have gone from being honest (Remortgage your home, Enlarge your penis) to pretending to be your bestest friend (Check out what Todd said about you!) to avant-garde poetry (lifeless vending machine, questioning lifeboat, omnipresent desegregation).
Now we’ve got fake newsheadlines. I wonder what they’ll come up with next…
Everything in Iraq going well!!
Bush’s NEW Plan will Succeed
Bush’s Approval Rating: 89%
Hot Hot Heat January 9, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Melbourne.1 comment so far
I really hate the heat. The past five or so days have been incredibly hot. I’ve managed this summer rather well, until this week. I can handle one or two hot days, but five in a row (I think it was five, the long days just started blurring into each other) I just can’t take.
I can’t think. I started reading On The Road by Jack Kerouac. I was really enjoying it (I can’t wait to read more American beat writing) but I couldn’t read one word while it was hot. Paul Cézanne despised the heat and couldn’t paint when it was hot.
At the end of 2006 there were several bushfires in country Victoria. Our area (Melbourne’s south, by the beach) is over 200 kilometres from the fires, yet the smoke made its way to us. Photos below.
The only fire problems we had was a minor grass fire along a freeway. A man’s overalls spontaneously combusted, he threw it out of his truck and it set fire to the dry grass. And a few days ago our power went out. Apparently there was a small fire at the substation. The power was off for almost four hours. If we had thought the heat was bad we had no idea how bad it could get without power.
Lying in bed, my shirt sticking to my back, bemoaning the oppresvive heat, my mother in the background worrying about the contents of the fridge and the freezer, I thought about the residents of Baghdad. 6 hours of power a day. In weather that can reach over 50c (around 121F).
I really wish I could say this made me feel much better about my situation, that although I was very uncomfortable there were people worse off. But it didn’t.
I really, really hate the heat.
Victorian Bushfires – Photo #1 January 9, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Melbourne, Photography.add a comment
Sun blocked by bushfire smoke, originally uploaded by dave128.
Early morning sun behind smoke (and yet we live nowhere near the fires.)
Victorian Bushfires – Photo #2 January 9, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Melbourne, Photography.add a comment
Smoke from fires, originally uploaded by dave128.
Behind that cloud of thick smoke was a beautiful blue sky. It was hard to breathe outside that day.
Victorian Bushfires – Photo #3 January 9, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Melbourne, Photography.add a comment
Victorian Bushfires – Photo #4 January 9, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Melbourne, Photography.add a comment
Australian reaction to Saddam Hussein’s killing January 3, 2007
Posted by dave128 in Human Rights, Invasion of Iraq, Media.1 comment so far
I’ve been pleasantly surprised by the general reaction of Australians to the hanging of Saddam Hussein. If newspaper letter sections and phone/internet polls are anything to go by, the vast majority of Australians are against the killing of Hussein.
The Herald Sun, a Murdoch owned Melbourne tabloid, ran a phone poll asking “Was death the right punishment for Saddam Hussein?” 87.3% (2, 171 callers of an overall 2, 489 callers) said no.
W hile Melbourne’s broadsheet newspaper, The Age, recorded 73% opposition to the hanging.
The Herald Sun’s editorial reiterated their stance against capital punishment, saying the scenes from Baghdad only reinforced this position. Saddam died without dignity, the paper said, and the verbal abuse he received seconds before he died was a “terrible indictment on the Iraqi justice system.”
Both newspapers have been filled with letters aghast at the execution, with letters supporting the killing a tiny minority.
It goes without saying that I do not agree with this execution. I am vehemently opposed to capital punishment (in other words, state sponsored murder) without exception.
My first thought when I heard Saddam was dead? “So they’ve (America and other western governments and companies) got away with it.”
There’s no doubt that Saddam Hussein was a tyrannical dictator responsible for the torture and killings of at least several hundred thousand people, if not over one million. But his crimes were not committed in isolation. Saddam Hussein received help from the west, including the US government and US and French companies.
A brilliant French documentary, Saddam Hussein: le procès que vous ne verrez pas, (“Saddam Hussein: The Trial the World Will Never See”, a very prophetic title that) details all of this so beautifully.
Indeed, it’s one of the greatest pieces of television I have ever watched. Seeing Donald Rumsfeld confronted with the footage of him shaking hands with Hussein is priceless (Rummy looks bewildered and stammers and says “well… that’s interesting!”.)
Unfortunately, the only reference I’ve seen so far to the west’s involvement in Saddam Hussein’s crimes was on SBS World News Australia (the same channel that aired The Trial The World Will Never See). Here is the relevant excerpt of the 30/12/06 bulletin:
LEE LIN CHIN [NEWSREADER]: He (Saddam Hussein) was due to face a second trial and this one over the gassing of thousands of Kurds at Halabja. Why do you think the death sentence was carried out before that trial?
CLIVE WILLIAMS [intelligence analyst with the Australian National University]: Many people will say that it was intended to silence Saddam before he could talk about his links to the United States and in particular to chemical supplies because during that period before 1990 he was a close ally of the United States and the US assisted Saddam in his war against Iran.
The co-director of The Trial…, Barry Lando, has a blog and a few months ago wrote an excellent article about this very topic: The Trial in Iraq We’ll Never See.
This mobile phone video that was released on the net of the execution has directly contradicted official accounts of the execution (“He was a broken man,” he (Iraq’s national security adviser, Mowaffak al-Rubaie) said. “He was afraid. You could see fear in his face.” Hardly. What execution was he watching?) and of course the taunts, absent from the silent official video. [I've just heard on the news that the man who filmed the second footage has been arrested]. And now Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Miliki wants to quit his job (though really, who could blame him?).
This whole thing (the invasion, the trial etc.) has been a deadly farce from the beginning. The government lies over Saddam’s execution only highlight that corruption (relatively small, in regards to things such as death squads) continues to exist irrespective of whether Saddam Hussein is alive or not. His hanging is hardly a “milestone” for Iraq, a “turning point.” It’s merely another ghastly pot hole on a road where humanity has been all but crushed.
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Click here to find out more about the documentary “Saddam Hussein – The Trial The World Will Never See”
The BBC’s John Simpson on the mobile phone video: Saddam hanging taunts evoke ugly past
Riverbend, as always, provides an articulate assessment, along with the raw honesty and immediacy that only living in Iraq can bring: A Lynching…
