"If extremism is now indeed dead and the Democrats won because they sought the center and because they promised a solution, then another item on the agenda should be reflections by the October surprise crowd and by extension the blogosphere.
I know that this election is just a warm up for 2008, and I know that cooperation and resolution is a long shot given the prize to come. But as much as I am tickled by the rejection of the extremism of Cheney and Rumsfeld, I also hope that the election will serve as a repudiation of those who think or argue that national security is just a political instrument.
The conspiracy crowd was wrong about an Iran October surprise or some other Rovian bombshell that would turn the tide: The truth is that wars are not deviously being planned and that the Iraq war wasn't a devious conspiracy. It was as much a product of visionless Democrats who supported it."
* JoGo:
"Rigged Elections [Jonah Goldberg]
Oh, by the way, I'd just like to say that all of you lefties who were sooooooo convinced the GOP rigged its elections and would do so again? You look like paranoid idiots now (most of you did then too by the way). That goes for you RFK Jr.
If the GOP was going to steal any elections it would have been these, no? Though I'm sure the Moonbats will keep the complaint handy for the next time they lose an election fair and square."
* amy:
"Los Angeles Times Editor Forced to Resign Over Refusing Newsroom Job Cuts* arkin on rumsfled:
And back in the United States, the Chicago-based Tribune Company has forced out Los Angeles Times editor Dean Baquet over his refusal to cut as many one hundred newsroom jobs. His ouster comes one month after the Tribune Company fired Los Angeles Times publisher Jeffrey Johnson on the same grounds. Chicago Tribune managing editor James O’Shea has been named as Baquet’s replacement. The Chicago-based Tribune company also owns 10 other papers including the Chicago Tribune, two dozen TV stations including KTLA in Los Angeles and the Chicago Cubs baseball team.'
"The firing was about the election, pure and simple. The American people has spoken.
But it is also a political move to force the Democrats into a partnership with the administration: Okay, we've gotten rid of the bad guy, now what do you want us to do?
[]
I think Negroponte is probably on his way out, and the number two at the State Department has to be decided. Hadley is weak but I don't see him being replaced."
* guardian:
"Australia suffers worst drought in 1,000 yearsyay, us.
[]
He added that the Murray-Darling river system, which receives 4% of Australia's water, but provides three-quarters of the water consumed nationally, was already 54% below the previous record minimum. Last month it recorded its lowest ever October flows. Inflow this year was just 5% of the average.
[]
The drought has set off a fierce political debate in Australia about climate change. The country has maintained, with the US, a sceptical stance on the issue, and Mr Howard has refused to sign Australia up to the Kyoto agreement. However, polls suggest he is increasingly out of step with public and scientific opinion and the drought has forced him to demonstrate concern.
With an election due within a year and the environment emerging as a big political issue, Mr Howard last month announced several "green energy" projects. He now concedes that climate change is taking place but argues that the Kyoto process is flawed because it does not include the big polluters - India, China and the US. But last week new UN figures showed that Australia's emissions of greenhouse gases were the highest per capita in the west, apart from Luxembourg, and that they had grown by 1.5 tonnes a head since 1990.
Australia now emits almost as much carbon and other greenhouse gases as France and Italy, which each have three times its population."
6 comments:
Arkin: "The truth is that wars are not deviously being planned and that the Iraq war wasn't a devious conspiracy." - aw, bullshit. Too many people have died from that fiction. Let's put Arkin's kids next to an Iranian nuclear reactor and trust that a bad outbreak of missiles doesn't spontaneously occur. You can question everything, but not their good faith or basic decency. Unfortunately, that's how we got here.
ps. Arkin should go read one of my favourites, Solzhenitsyn's Gulag Archipelago...two vols, 1400 pages, each page showing just one more facet of the complete social destruction that occurs when you start accepting lies at a public level. People like Arkin never notice the changed paperwork till it's all too late. Then shoving people into cattle trucks all seems perfectly reasonable...idiot!
D - arkin is indeed a freak. i'm not sure why i read him - perhaps its like watching a train wreck or sumthink.
k - lol
If Jonah can get Ken Blackwell's dick out of his mouth long enough for a diaper change, I'd like him to know he'll soon be blubbering like a pussy as all his criminal heroes one by one perish in flames. He tries so hard to be like them, but he's still not even a good liar.
Our climate is semiarid, and we're about ten feet below normal over the last five years. Developments outside Austin, TX are drilling wells into a dry water table. This is in stark contrast to a fallen elm tree on some property my dad sold about ten years ago which probably started growing 400 or 500 years ago and had a trunk about 12 feet in diameter at the base. Now, elm trees are stunted and most new trees are scrub oak which don't get tall, have hollow trunks and die young.
Uranus predicts: water resources will become the most important issue worldwide within 20 years, probably sooner. This sounds like a job for our military--heaven knows, they could use some humanitarian work after six years under Jonah's Ultimate Love Interests.
uranus - lol re jonah.
water shortage really is a problem - and soon we won't have any fish in our oceans either. yuk.
too many people on the planet me thinx. i don't know how we're going to solve that one. perhaps endless war is actually good for the environment
In fact, environmental impact is mentioned as a justification for war, generally by the "conservative right," which also wrongly insists abstinence effectively controls disease and population growth while simultaneously foregoing any discussion of zero population growth. The drawdown of water sources as a result of increased exploitation in areas also experiencing dryer conditions is demonstrated clearly by the depletion of the Ogallala aquifer. Having traveled extensively in this area, I'm very aware of how important the aquifer is, and how urgent the problem is. Two thousand years ago the desert southwest of the U.S. was wetter than today, and supported a large population. It slowly started becoming dryer about 1,500 years ago, and after 300-400 years became so dry most people migrated from the area. So, natural climate change appears to be a more significant factor even in long-term drought than population growth or man-made global warming. But, all this happens during a period of relative climate stasis. Consider the possibilities during an ice age, extraordinary volcanic activity or a large meteor impact. The earth is a closed ecosystem, so it should be possible to manage resources during periods of climactic stasis. Sometimes I think we don't consider how fortunate we are, because we're always just one volcanic event away from a new dark age.
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