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2003.03.23 : 2003.03.29

Saturday, March 29, 2003

Blab. Our Swiss contingent reveals a new business model for central governments. And about time, too!

Word has leaked out that our eastern neighbor is for rent.

Have been there a few times, I can wholeheartedly recommend it.  We've been discussing this for a few weeks now. It's really quite funny.

- Morton 

This is actually pretty interesting.

[T]he entire country of Liechtenstein — all 62 square miles of it — could be for rent, as if it were some sort of oversized alpine cottage. [...]

Its recently amended Constitution, which gives extensive powers to the governing prince, has been denounced as dangerously retrograde by two committees in the Council of Europe. Some people mistake it for Luxembourg.

With tourism down, businesses cutting back on frivolous expenses and the worldwide economy in flux, the "rent-a-state" program is intended to draw attention to Liechtenstein's "Heidi"-esque charms and its advantages as a destination for conventions, corporate retreats and the like. Organizations that take part will pay about $320 to $530 a day per person — for groups up to 1,200 people — for access to the country's hotels, restaurants, meeting places and sports facilities.

Companies will also be able to temporarily "brand" buildings and institutions with their own logos.

We can only hope that other central governments (no names!) will abandon their violent, coercive ways and indulge in this same kind of farcical, amateurish capitalism.

Blab. A reader discovers our Generic Literature section, with surprising results.

Free Verse 

Words as if 
prose? Arrangement 
cryptic, nonrhymesense 
meterless. A glimpse of 
imagery, as through darkened glass. 

I really like that.  It is very beautiful.  I have written it into my book of poetry.  You should write more.

Oh, it is not! And the idea of writing more than we do makes our head hurt. It does.

Our personal fav, by the way, is this:

Limerick (III) 

There once was an X from place B 
That satisfied predicate P 
He or she did thing A 
In an adjective way 
Resulting in circumstance C

Simply fabulous. And not ours!

Blab. A random freaking reader writes:

"The foundation of all mental illness is the unwillingness to experience legitimate suffering."

Carl Freaking Jung

This is either obviously true or obviously absurd, depending on the definition of legitimate. But then, that's our usual reaction to Carl Freaking Jung.

"The Republican form of government is the highest form of government: but because of this it requires the highest type of human nature, a type nowhere at present existing."

Herbert Freaking Spencer

Neither of these claims are obvious to us. Indeed, both seem suspect. But then, that's our usual reaction to Herbert Freaking Spencer.

WAR PIGS

Generals gathered in their masses,
just like witches at black masses.
Evil minds that plot destruction,
sorcerers of death's construction.
In the fields the bodies burning,
as the war machine keeps turning.
Death and hatred to mankind,
poisoning their brainwashed minds.
Oh lord, yeah!

Politicians hide themselves away.
They only started the war.
Why should they go out to fight?
They leave that role to the poor, yeah.

Time will tell on their power minds,
making war just for fun.
Treating people just like pawns in chess,
wait till their judgement day comes, yeah.

Now in darkness world stops turning,
ashes where the bodies burning.
No more War Pigs have the power,
Hand of God has struck the hour.
Day of judgement, God is calling,
on their knees the war pigs crawling.
Begging mercies for their sins,
Satan, laughing, spreads his wings.
Oh lord, yeah!

Black Freaking Sabbath

This, OTOH, is incontrovertible and incomprehensible. But then, that's our usual reaction to Black Freaking Sabbath.

Blab. A loony leftist peacknik type writes:

On the war thing...

While the sideshow distract us...how many, how far, how deep the sand, who said what on the telly today... it is good to remember that we (AKA The Coalition) started this war without provocation, unless you count being a real shit to his own people and having once invaded Kuwait, provocation.  Ran out of fingers counting up the number of leaders who have been real shits to the natives, many of them "friends" of the USA.  Bet we'll not go after them any time soon. 

Geez, I'm feeling grumpy as Steve.  Think I'll go throw up on the pillow in the guest room.

If you're willing to bring a guest room along, we will gladly let you replace our current "pet".

Blab. A reader sends us a blind but unfortunately not sensory deprived link.

Mmmmm....

Weight Watchers cards from 1971? These are particularly frightening to us because we think we remember them from the kitchen of our childhood.

That would explain quite a bit.

Blab. On our reader's recent admonition to create a new fashion statement, a reader who is Helen writes:

<<< Sir: Shave your head and look like an artsy-fartsy, psycho, semi-conformist, techno rockstar-dweeb. Then, buy a hat. >>>

But then I would have to divorce him.  Not a good thing for either of us.  And even more I would miss Saturdays and Sundays in bed and he would miss.......... 

... all his money?

Blab. A reader seems to perceive challenge in a statement of ours, when we only intended to portray slavering admiration.

"We're sure that the New York Times will be very interested in this story."

You might want to consider the fact that the Truth and what the NYT reports on don't intersect as heavily as you seem to believe. On the other hand, you seem pretty well pre-disposed to hold a certain viewpoint despite what the inconvenient facts happen to be, so maybe just plugging into the NYT and happily nodding your head is just fine. 

Let's review. We asked where all those hundreds of thousands of Iraqi forces were, when we could only account for a few thousand of them. Our Treasured Reader informed us, with great authority, that some large fraction of them had simply evaporated as a result of clever U.S. psyops. We were very impressed by this, not having heard it previously, and suggested that the NYT would be similarly impressed.

Now, perhaps we were wrong to approach the issue in this manner. Our Treasured Reader states, as fact, that the NYT isn't entirely truthful, and that we are somehow predisposed to have missed this fact in our somatic blear. OK. We are happy to believe that some publication other than the untruthful NYT would be impressed by the amazing facts behind the evaporation of a "sizable chunk" of the Iraqi troops. We can only hope that our Treasured Reader will stoop to point us at the article, in whatever publication, that details these true facts.

'Cause we are completely fascinated.

Blab. A reader who has been guilty, guilty, guilty of criticizing The Coalition writes:

Sorry to have slighted The Coalition in a previous missive.  It is substantial and I apologize. 

And well you should, Treasured Reader.

There must have been shock in Baghdad and awe in Paris last week when the White House announced the news that Palau had joined the "coalition of the willing."

Palau, an island group of nearly 20,000 souls in the North Pacific, has much to contribute. It has some of the world's best scuba diving, delectable coconuts and tapioca. One thing Palau cannot contribute, however, is military support: It does not have a military. [...]

Palau is one of six unarmed nations in the coalition, along with Costa Rica, Iceland, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia and the Solomon Islands. Then there's Afghanistan.

Yes, but Palau promises not to throw rocks at overflying U.S. warplanes. And that's all it means to be part of The Coalition, after all.

Blab. A reader posits the astonishing notion that some Web sites correct their really bozonic malaprops.

I guess they read it a few more times, since they have changed it to "tirade". Well, that's no fun then.

Shocking! How dare they?

Blab. A reader suggests ...

something to add to your Christmas list

Opera. Babes. Beyond imagination.

There's truth in advertising for ya!

Blab. Our Swiss contingent returns with this.

We are so cool!

- Morton 

No doubt you are!

But may we be so bold as to make a tiny observation? An announcement of a fabulous new computer display that does not actually show a picture of the display is ... how can we say this? ... not exactly the pinnacle of PR acumen.

In our uninformed opinion, of course.

Blab. Recently, we asked you to find a good, long list of companies that can put out oil fires, just in case the recent political furor - oh, look - caused Cheney-linked Halliburton to be disqualified as the sole company contracted to put out oil fires in Iraq.

Closest I can find on the directory of oil well fire fighters is this, which appears to be more of a directory of companies that make equipment for the job, rather than doing the job itself.  Sorry I couldn't do better... 

Close! 

It's not the top list, and they're companies only in Texas....  But it's got more than three.

- Felis Lynx

Pretty good! We hope the bureaucrats can benefit from your careful study.

Blab. A reader wonders stuff.

I wonder what will happen if Iraq uses nerve gas on American and British soldiers.  I wonder if the French and Germany, et al. will change their positions. 

Yes, they will. Germany will move into France (and it wouldn't be the first time, would it?) while France (in an unusual development) will move into Germany.

Blab. A reader who is flunking arithmetic writes:

Gulf War II = Vietnam War I? 

Gosh. That seems unlikely to us. But then, we're not an expert political scientist like Dubya, so what do we know?

Blab. A reader takes credit for random events.

Well, we've brought down Richard Perle, though he is just as nuts as ever, and still working for Dumsfeld to deal with evil and Global Crossings.  Hmmmmm. 

We recommend taking credit for putting your trash in the proper receptical when leaving the theater of war. That's what brings us great solace, anyway.

Blab. Several days ago, we bitched and moaned about receiving a single piece of spam addressed to a userid that we had only ever given out to Allura. Astonishingly, Allura herself responds!

steve,

i have been trying for several weeks to track down how my list got spread.  i have had several complaints about it, and i can't figure it out.

the list was never public, never sold. and in fact, it was never even "online".  i'm baffled.

and i'm sorry.

Isn't she a charmer? Heck, in the scheme of things, her mailing list having fallen into the sticky clutches of some evil spammist is probably much more of a hassle to her than it is to us.

So let's help her out, Treasured Readers! Which genius among you can explain how Allura's private mailing list fell into the diseased hands of a spammer?

Blab. A reader is confused. Big surprise there, eh?

Subj: The coming of wisdom

I was ever so confused about the war run by The Coalition.  (What are those 75 Polish soldiers doing?  I imagine them securing the bowling alleys, but that comes from the side of me I try to suppress, sometimes with no result.)   But now, thanks to a twenty-one year old in Virginia, and the BBC who has invited him to speak to us, along with others, I understand. 

"This calls for delicate removal of the current government, and it is currently under way. " 

See? 

Delicate removal. Is that like subtle evisceration?

Blab. A reader notices a rare political Helenism.

overheard: Americans are sticking our necks out in other people's business  (sticking our necks out; sticking our noses in other people's business) 

Duly recorded, and thank you infinitely for your contribution to World Knowledge.

Blab. A detractor writes:

I think you are a dude. You just dont realise your dudeness yet. 

We swear upon a stack of random papers that we have never shown up at a ranch in city slicker clothes. That we recall.

Blab. On our story of the departure, from our workplace, of a valued colleague, a reader writes:

Sir: You have my condolences.

Thank you, but we do not deserve your condolences. Our colleague does.

More comprehensively, a reader writes:

I worked at Research for nearly 20 years. In the 90s it got so bad we were going to lunch every week for a departing co-worker, thinking we might be next; management "suggested" that we stop the practice. Very few of the people I'd worked with were still there by the time I left and the world-class math department, run so well by Winograd, was destroyed by a group of people who should never have been made managers. (Rating world-class researchers on a bell-curve and by personal business commitment is absurd. Haven't these managers EVER studied Deming's work? Doesn't IBM TRAIN managers anymore?) I still keep in touch with a few friends who were let go.

Your friend is in for a shock because, in the "real world" it is rare to keep the same job for more than 18 months. Two years is something of a personal best among my friends.

Another hard part is that computer people tend to be very mobile. Almost everyone I keep in touch with has moved hundreds or thousands of miles away. If this isn't just a "office friend" you'll find that it takes a great deal of time and effort to maintain the connection because, in general, the highly intelligent, highly movitivate ex-researcher is always too damned busy and hard to get on the phone.

In any case, spend the $800 or so and buy Deming's tape series.  Have ALL of your management review the bell-curve tape (about #9, methinks).  Then hunt down the fool that designed the new rating system and get rid of him. He has cost IBM more than it knows.

My sympathies on your loss.

Dorian

Goodness! We lived through those same awful times in IBM Research in the 1990s. Our own group did not bleed people at that time. Quite the opposite, we hired like crazy, growing from half a dozen people in 1989 to fifty people some ten years later. We have had going away luncheons for pretty much everyone who ever left our group: IBMers, contractors, summer students, whatever. It just seemed like the right thing to do.

We have lots of opinions on how to evaluate the performance of researchers; but we won't go into that here.

Blab. On what may be a similar point, a patriotic reader points us at this.

Zackly.

Yow. The cover of the current issue of National Geographic has what just might be the sweetest picture we've ever seen. This Web version doesn't do it justice, but it's all we have to show here.

Yow. rebecca's right. These are some great maps here, hundreds of them, of Iraq &c. For all you map fetishists out there. (And we can feel your moist breath on our neck, so click on the link and back off, OK?)

Yow. Dubya. Kim Jong Il. IM transcripts. Screamingly funny. (Kafkaesque)

Plurp. Dubya would like us to believe that The War is all going according to plan, and that any discouraging words that we may have heard are just propaganda.

Well, maybe not.

"We thought this would be a liberation of Iraq. We thought the people would be throwing flowers at us," Colonel Gentry said. 

"But it’s been a lot more hostile than that."

Dubya also assured us that this little conflict was just against Iraq, and wouldn't inflame the region.

Well, maybe not.

Mr Rumsfeld said the movement of military supplies, equipment and people across the Syrian border "vastly complicates our situation". Asked if he was threatening Damascus with military action, he replied: "I'm saying exactly what I'm saying. It was carefully phrased.”"

Mr Rumsfeld also said that hundreds of revolutionaries of the Badr Corps, who are trained, equipped and directed by the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard, were operating inside Iraq. He said American forces would be forced to treat them as enemy "combatants" and the Iranian Government would be held responsible for their actions. 

The surprise threats raised the spectre that the war could suddenly and quickly spiral out of control. 

So, no problem there.

Plurp. Late breaking news.

There must have been shock in Baghdad and awe in Paris last week when the White House announced the news that Palau had joined the "coalition of the willing."

Palau, an island group of nearly 20,000 souls in the North Pacific, has much to contribute. It has some of the world's best scuba diving, delectable coconuts and tapioca. One thing Palau cannot contribute, however, is military support: It does not have a military.

But then, Palau promised not to throw rocks at any U.S. warplanes that might fly overhead, which is all it takes to be part of The Coalition these days.

Plurp. Is there anything more impressive than this definitive statement from little Ronny Dumsfeld today?

The regime of Saddam Hussein is gone; it's over; it will not be there in a relatively reasonably predictable period of time.

We don't think so.

Yo. Ooh. Assassins.
 

Friday, March 28, 2003

Plop.

Today was not a good day. I had to say good-bye to a colleague whom I have known for fourteen years and with whom I worked very closely for nine. It was not something I wanted to do.

I feel like I've been kicked in the chest. I find that I am depressed, and angry, and my hands are shaking.

So, if I don't seem like my usual happy, convivial self, it's because I'm not. And it's just not a blogging kind of mood.

I hope you'll forgive me.

Thursday, March 27, 2003

Blab. Our polite reader regains its memory.

Sir: Forgive me.  This is the site to which I was referring. 

So, another anti-establishment anti-war site with a long list of blogs that doesn't list Plurp. Feh.

Blab. A reader loves that techno diagram from yesterday.

Layers have widths? Really?! Goodness. Layers clearly have thickness but widths? As in, how wide is a string? The whole concept wrinkles my picture.

Dorian

Well, those layers have widths. We don't know why, but they do!

Blab. For some reason, we are sometimes copied on those awful chain letters that our more socially deprived readers insist on sending all over the Internet. This one seems rather oddly targeted.

Subj: Fwd: SICK OF ALL THE SADAAM-SUPPORTING ANTI-WAR PROPAGANDA?

HERE'S A WEBSITE FOR THE REST OF US

Actually, we were rather enjoying all the Sadaam-supporting anti-war propaganda in whatever style of capitalization. Weren't you?

Blab. Our polite reader returns with a heartfelt question.

Sir: Is this an example of the kind of sacrifice expected of  the American people?

Bush has told visitors he is sleeping well and exercising regularly. And the official said Bush has given up desserts to try to bring down his running time. "In these type of times, he becomes even more disciplined than usual," the official said.

Yes, Treasured Reader, this is the kind of patriotic sacrifice that we are all expected to make in these troubled times. What's that you say?

Sir: Is GW Bush giving up desserts or deserts? 

Well, he certainly shows no signs of giving up deserts, does he?

Blab. A reader feigns politeness.

Sir: Shave your head and look like an artsy-fartsy, psycho, semi-conformist, techno rockstar-dweeb. Then, buy a hat. 

But ... but ... we look silly in a hat.

Blab. Another reader joins our burgeoning collection of groupies.

Wow! You are a pony-tail kinda guy! here was I thinking you were a regular businessman dude.

Why, thank you kindly, ma'am. And we assure you that we are none of those three things.

Blab. Samuel F. Clemens writes:

"It is by the goodness of God that in our country we have those three unspeakably precious things: freedom of  speech, freedom of conscience, and the prudence never to practice either of them."

Mark Freaking Twain! 

The world needs more great freaking writers.

Blab. You know what we haven't had in quite a while? We haven't had a good conspiracy theory in quite a while! Unfortunately, our readership isn't helping.

The Halliburton Conspiracy

No, it's not a conspiracy theory, but rather a defense for Halliburton having been chosen to put out the Iraqi oil well fires, despite having once employed Dick Cheney and there having been no open bidding process.

One of the points raised is that "there is no company in the world more qualified to handle the oil field problems than Halliburton". Which got us to wondering: just how many companies are there that put out oil well fires?

So here's a great Web Search O' The Day^TM contest: Find, on the Web, a reputable list (not your own!) of companies (more than three) that put out oil well fires. We weren't smart enough to find such a list! When you do, tell us all about it.

Blab. An eagle-eyed reader sends us content.

Not really a Helenism, but certainly some manner of malapropery.

tirade + rant = tyrant

That's wonderful! We're sure they read that several times, too, and every time it looked right to them.

Plurp. From a conference yesterday at work.

I have some straw dolls that I want to tee up.

It's at least a Helenism, and maybe even a double Helenism in a way that we don't understand. But it makes our head hurt, so we're not going to add it to the list.

Plurp. B8 d t++ k s+ u- f i o+ x-- e l- c--

Plurp. We had a dream last night. (Yes, we are going to tell you about a dream we had; live with it.) In this dream, we were a young freshman member of the X-Men. The other X-Men had these really cool super powers: one had blasting rays that came out of his eyes, another could generate immense thunderstorms.

We had an altogether wimpy super power: we got vague feelings about the likely outcome of some proposed action.
 

Blasting Ray Guy:	Let's go attack the Bad Guy's citadel!
Us:	Umm, well, uh, I don't think so.
Thunderstorm Woman:	Or we could raid his mountain hideout!
Us:	Uhhhhh ... yeah. Yeah, that's probably OK.

And off they'd go, leaving us behind.

When we woke up, it occurred to us that that's pretty much the actual super power we have in real life.

We are either bolstered by this, or depressed. We're not sure which.

Plurp.

After being shaved,
the blue dog
looked like an artsy-fartsy, psycho,
semi-conformist, techno rockstar-dweeb

Wednesday, March 26, 2003

Blab. A polite but forgetful reader writes:

Sir: Do you know of this site?  It is another side to things as you can see. 

Yes, that's clear.

Blab. A reader lectures us on poor taste. Talk about coals to Newcastle!

It's one thing to invade a country that has not declared war, and to drop bombs and risk lives, and all that, but it is in very poor taste to show pictures of dead or captured Americans.  You got that???

We have such trouble keeping track of etiquette these days.

Blab. A reader points at an interesting, if random factoid.

The company that has the contract to put out the oil fires during Operation Iraqi Liberation (OIL) is Halburton. The ex-CEO is Dick Cheney. This give a whole new meaning to "Conflict of Interest", no?

Dorian

Actually, no. That's what it always meant, isn't it?

I just returned from my local corporate cafeteria, which quite naturally provides live coverage of our ongoing exercise in preemptive warfare. There I happened upon an extraordinary datapoint for your consideration.  It seems that the Halliburton Company, former employer of one Dick Chaney, has been awarded the contract to put out oil fires in Iraq.  Now, my question:  Is this merely the appearance of impropriety, or is it an out-and-out conflict of interest?

We're sure it's just a coincidence, but the question obviously causes enough cognitive dissonance that neither of our stalwart correspondents could spell both Cheney and Halliburton properly. Fnord.

Curiously, Halliburton was gearing up to help rebuild Iraq even before the war started.

[The Halliburton ad] sought employees in several fields to work in the "Central Asia region," including mechanics for M1 Abrams tanks and M2/3 Bradley armored fighting vehicles -- the kind of weaponry the U.S. Army is currently moving toward Baghdad, the capital of the central Asian nation called Iraq. 

The ad, placed by KBR Government Operations, a unit of Kellogg Brown & Root, the construction unit of Halliburton Co., ran in the Chicago Tribune Feb. 9 -- more than a month before the war in Iraq started. 

Halliburton spokeswoman Wendy Hall said the ad was not designed to seek workers for any specific job. 

Obviously another coincidence.

Blab. On where all those Iraqi troops are, arithmetic genius Ronald Dumsfeld writes:

A sizable chunk of the "missing" 343k troops decided to become civilians after US psyops. Once again the "stupid" Bush administration gets "lucky." How did Dumsfeld luck into that strategy?  Of course, this all has a familiar ring. Like when Reagan was going to get us all blown up in MAD mushroom clouds, and instead "stupid cowboy" Reagan "luckily" wound up pressing the Soviet Union into a corner where they collapsed of their own weight.

Too bad we didn't have someone "smart" like Jimmy "take Afghanistan" Carter or Alan "unilateral disarmament" Cranston in there.

At some point certain people need to face the fact that every time they make a prediction they wind up being entirely wrong, and they need to take the ideological blinders off and re-examine their underlying assumptions. 

Wow! This is the first we've heard of the results of U.S. psyops, and certainly the first we've heard of such dramatic triumphs! We're sure that the New York Times will be very interested in this story.

Oh, we seem to have found a few more of those Iraqi troops.

Administration sources had said that as of Saturday, Republican Guard formations were holding around the capital, with no reported surrenders or defections. That's where three Guard divisions are posted, believed to number as many as 80,000 troops.

We'll keep looking!

Blab. Our dilemma about having long hair and a convertible prompts the following insightful observation from a reader whose abilities rival those of Sherlock Holmes himself.

you dont have long hair in the picture 

Actually, the picture has no hair at all, only pixels. A picture that does have hair (though not the hair currently on our head) is here.

A reader more attuned with our mental processes writes:

Sir: Perhaps you can get some insight into your top down/long hair dilemma here.

"This page is for short haircut stories and experiences. Please feel free to contribute to this page. In keeping with the concept of this website, please don't contribute your hair fantasies. Thank you."

Or, perhaps this might help.  or this.  The Shriners drive those little convertibles too. 

We are grateful for being connected, ever so blatantly, with buzz-cut fetishists, whose mere existence was, until now, a carefully guarded secret. Readers are encouraged not to click on those links. Especially that last one. Too scary.

Anyhow, how can you tell how long their hair is?

Blab. Our sign fetishist writes:

In keeping with my obsession with signs, this morning I took note of a bumper sticker (a uniquely special category of signage) as I approached the Dulles Toll Road outside D.C.: 

My Karma Ran Over My Dogma 

I must admit that this declaration sent my mind racing (a real achievement these days).  To what, I wondered, did the message refer?  Was it a personal spiritual revelation?  Did it indicate the driver's rejection for dogmatic religion in favor of a Zen-based fatalism?  Was it symptomatic of a moment of political clarity?  Or does it foretell an unhappy meeting between the Miata and the Blue Dog?  Any light shed by Plurp readers will be greatly appreciated. 

Darla 

We are not wise enough to know the answers to your deep and eternal questions. Perhaps our readers are.

We are just barely wise enough to determine that My Karma Ran Over Your Dogma beats My Karma Ran Over My Dogma by more than two to one. We are not wise enough to know what that means.

Blab. A reader regards us as the Source Of All Truth^TM. Correctly, from our point of view.

Since reality needs checking, I come to my favorite neighborhood bar to ask, do I have this right?  It is okay to spend craploads of money to bomb the bejesus out of Iraq using the children of oridnary people to do the work, but it is rude (or is it "evil"?) to show photographs of the dead if they are members of The Coalition?  Is that right? 

Yes, that's right. And thanks for asking!

Blab. A reader with inside information tolls the bell.

I think Dr. Plurp should wish his Midwest Correspondent a happy BIG birthday.  Like, it's one of the BIGGEST.

Dear reader, after a certain point, they all seem huge. We do understand, however, that our Treasured Midwest Correspondent has now officially passed into Geezerhood. May we have a moment of silence, please.

Plurp. What are you poor, lost souls searching for on our humble site? Well, last week, it was this:

1. helen naked pitures
2. quorn naked pictures
3. angelina jolie
4. first person to milk a cow
5. mia
6. arsenic poisoning pictures
7. britney
8. first person milk cow
9. first person to milk cow
10. get an elephant in a refrigerator

All you cow milkers? You worry us. Go away.

Plurp. We love this, though we cannot express why.

Grid architecture can be thought of a series of layers of different widths.

Plurp. In other news, an apparent miscalculation in the New World Order results in Australia and Japan falling beneath the U.S. and (old and new) Europe, while the rest of the world sinks into the sea.

Film at eleven.

Plurp.

The blue dog
ran over your
karma

Tuesday, March 25, 2003

Blab. Our one polite reader asks:

Sir: Is this too cynical? 

Not at all! We like to think of it as just cynical enough.

We don't, personally, believe this is a "war for oil", as the simplistic slogan goes. But, hey, what do we know?

Blab. A friendly reader wants us to check its careful calculations. Naturally, we are always glad to do so.

All right, let me see if I understand the logic of this correctly. We are going to ignore the United Nations in order to make clear to Saddam Hussein that the United Nations cannot be ignored. We're going to wage war to preserve the UN's ability to avert war. The paramount principle is that the UN's word must be taken seriously, and if we have to subvert its word to guarantee that it is, then by gum, we will. 

Peace is too important not to take up arms to defend. Am I getting this right? 

Further, if the only way to bring democracy to Iraq is to vitiate the democracy of the Security Council, then we are honor-bound to do that too, because democracy, as we define it, is too important to be stopped by a little thing like democracy as they define it. 

Also, in dealing with a man who brooks no dissension at home, we cannot afford dissension among ourselves. We must speak with one voice against Saddam Hussein's failure to allow opposing voices to be heard. We are sending our gathered might to the Persian Gulf to make the point that might does not make right, as Saddam Hussein seems to think it does. And we are twisting the arms of the opposition until it agrees to let us oust a regime that twists the arms of the opposition. 

We cannot leave in power a dictator who ignores his own people.  And if our people, and people elsewhere in the world, fail to understand that, then we have no choice but to ignore them.

PETER FREUNDLICH 

Uh, yeah, that sounds pretty accurate to us.

Blab. A reader alleges a certain mental synchronization between someone well known and us. This frightens us.

"I'm not a fan of real life. Real life's got some strange kind of rules."

-- Actor NICK NOLTE in the New York Daily News.

He's on to something. 

We never thought of Nick Nolte as a soul brother. Well, not until now.

(And tsk, naughty reader, for not providing a link to your otherwise baseless accusation.)

Blab. A reader suggests yet another set of national exams.

Subj: Mental Health Exams

Since we don't have a national health program in place, I though it might be a good idea to start a little fund right here in Plurpville, for the neediest.  And from where I sit, Richard Perle is certainly needy.  Have you seen those eyes?  Have you heard him speak, read his body language, watched his spittle betray him?  Maybe Dr. Mel will have a look at him at his institute for the very, very nervous.  I know I would feel better if someone had a look. 

In place of urine sample, doctor, quotes follow.

"'At the end of the day,' Perle replied, his voice dripping with patience for his student, 'Iraq is an easy kill.'"

Richard Perle: "Thank God for the death of the UN"

One of George W Bush's "thinkers" is Richard Perle. I interviewed Perle when he was advising Reagan; and when he spoke about "total war", I mistakenly dismissed him as mad. He recently used the term again in describing America's "war on terror".

"No stages," he said. "This is total war. We are fighting a variety of enemies. There are lots of them out there. All this talk about first we are going to do Afghanistan, then we will do Iraq ... this is entirely the wrong way to go about it. If we just let our vision of the world go forth, and we embrace it entirely and we don't try to piece together clever diplomacy, but just wage a total war ... our children will sing great songs about us years from now."

In London's Daily Mirror, Paul Gilfeather writes that Perle argued that even if the inspectors report perfect compliance on the part of Iraq:

"Evidence from ONE witness on Saddam Hussein's weapons programme will be enough trigger a fresh onslaught."

Oh my goodness.  Ring the bell for mental health and then let's sing the great songs for little Dickie Perle and his total war guys. 

We are confused at your desire to start mental health exams among our readership, though perhaps you know best in this regard.

We do think that songs are important, though, especially in times of great societal stress. We encourage our reader to compose the great songs of this particular conflict now, before it's too late, and tell them to us so we can post them here. And make you famous and stuff.

Blab. A reader expresses a random opinion on that Dilbert Helenism from yesterday.

well, it was spontaneously uttered by a character in popular fiction, which is close enough.  As far as I can tell, Helen is entirely fictional anyway. 

We know we will regret having done so, but the decision of the judges is final, no matter what drugs they were on.

Blab. A reader who might be the fictional Helen expresses an opinion on this topic.

Steve, let's accept the Dilbert Helenism.  It was obviously spoken in haste by a cartoon character.

--Helen

Uh, yeah, that sounds like a reasonable criterion to us.

Plurp. We have a question. And it's not meant to be an impertinent question, really, and we're sure that People Smarter Than Us have already thought about it and have a Dandy Answer. We just can't figure out what it is.

So the question is: Where are all of the Iraqi armed forces?

It seems like such a simple question, doesn't it? But let's do some advanced arithmetic. In what may be the largest battle so far, "coalition" troops think they killed, oh, maybe 300 Iraqi troops. There have been a few other battles in which the "coalition" claims to have killed a few dozen Iraqi troops. Let's be generous and assume that 2,000 Iraqi troops have been killed thus far.

In Basra, there are maybe 1,000 Iraqi troops left. The "coalition" says they have a bit fewer than 4,000 POWs so far. That makes for something like 7,000 Iraqi troops accounted for.

Iraq is believed to have 350,000 troops. Subtracting 7,000 from this number leaves ... borrow 1 ... 10 minus 7 is 3 ... Oh! 343,000 troops unaccounted for, or 98% of the total Iraqi force.

See? That just seems like a big number to us. Where is this gigantic mass of people?

In particular, if some reasonable fraction of them just happen to be, oh, say, on the weak 200 mile supply line of the "coalition" troops advancing from the south, wouldn't that be ... bad?

Plop. So here we are, back from a week of "vacation" characterized by three days of solid work (in a location different from our alleged vacation location) and four days of pretty much nothing but travel. Imagine, just imagine, how much fun it was.

And, upon our return, we discover that Him Whose Name Soils Everything has kindly peed all over Helen's pillow (Note: Helen's; not ours), leading our cat sitter insistently to it just to be sure his point was made, and deposited, well, certain deposits in the bathtub (and on the bath mat) just for fun.

We do so love having a cat.

Zoom. We had the opportunity today to practice our long-unpracticed kata, Drive Car, Top-Down Style. We must make some time in the near future to practice another long-unpracticed kata, Wash Car.

Plurp. Note to self: Practicing the above kata is seriously incompatible with long hair.

We seek wisdom from our reader who (a) drives a Miata, (b) had (until recently) long hair and (c) is male. (And you know who you are!) How did you avoid terminal tangles?

Plurp.

The blue dog
volunteered urine samples
to anyone
who asked

Monday, March 24, 2003

Blab. A reader confronts us with a conundrum.

From today's Dilbert (Scott Adams):

Alice, Let's not reinvent a dead horse.

Dorian

What to do? We don't want to accept, willy-nilly, Helenisms constructed merely to be such. We generally believe that Helenisms are spontaneous utterances, and that the utterer is (at the time) unaware that any malaprop has occurred.

We reluctantly, and probably arbitrarily, log the above as a Helenism. Don't like our judgment? Get your own blog and create your own genre of malaprop!

Blab. A reader tempts us to ignore it by sending, without any useful editorial comment, a nonetheless mildly interesting ...

[link].

Blab. A reader obsessed with malpractice writes:

Here is an interesting site: it features medical mistakes. It is an online journal and forum on patient safety and health care quality.

Dorian

It's fun! You can submit any story you want. All you need is one of those hard-to-obtain email addresses!

Flying Object Hits MRI
An infusion pump being used for routine sedation in a child undergoing an MRI scan flew across the room and hit the MRI magnet, narrowly missing the child.

We are tempted to submit one involving a missing industrial air conditioning unit after routine bowel surgery.

Blab. A reader get all Biblical on us.

It's easier to thread a camel toe through the eye of a needle than to imagine it.  Please try. 

He said camel toe. Heh, heh, heheheh.

Blab. The sales manager of Vivisimo writes:

I think it is so neat that there is this vast Coalition warring with that really bad guy, Sadam Hussein.  I looked the Coalition up in Google and my favorite Vivisimo, of which I am alleged to be the sales manger, and did not get a lot of direct hits, as it were, though the Coalition, about which I hear from a soldier named Frank, which I suppose he might be, lower case, but didn't get very much "hard data" as you technically inclined people would say.  But still, it's neat. 

He was saying today that the Coalition (I wonder if it should be The Coalition, like The New Yorker...oh, well, must soldier on, as it were) was bombing this and striking that, and I got this picture of just all kinds and types and colors and uniforms doing stuff in this Operation Liberation Iraq, or whatever it is called (they all talk so fast!,) but then upon further digging (I know, I'm just supposed to shut up, listen and believe, but there you go, that's me) I find that the Coalition is almost all US ad I call us, the good old USA.  So I am waiting for the Pledge, Under God, goddammit, to be revised so we can all pledge our allegiance to the Coalition and thus make the world a better and coalesced place.  I hope you agree.

Yrs,

McD

Of course we agree, Treasure Reader. Now what, exactly, did you say again?

Plop. Just in case you forgot.

[T]he Justice Department and FBI have dramatically increased the use of two little-known powers that allow authorities to tap telephones, seize bank and telephone records and obtain other information in counterterrorism investigations with no immediate court oversight, according to officials and newly disclosed documents.

The FBI, for example, has issued scores of "national security letters" that require businesses to turn over electronic records about finances, telephone calls, e-mail and other personal information, according to officials and documents. The letters, a type of administrative subpoena, may be issued independently by FBI field offices and are not subject to judicial review unless a case comes to court, officials said.

You have zero privacy anyway. Get over it.

Plop. Today's synonyms for kill.

1. Take care of
2. Deal with
3. Address
4. Target
5. Neutralize
6. Hit
7. Attrit

What if we just said kill? Or murder? Hmm? What would that be like?

Plurp.

The blue dog
wondered what
that would be like

Sunday, March 23, 2003

Blab. A reader advocates:

Less war, more beets! 

Most of our international problems could be solved by dropping sufficient quantities of beets on Iraq, Korea, and France.

Instead of "shock and awe", we would have "beets."  Imagine the impact of megatons of beets raining down from the sky. 

Don't drop them on Russia, however.  They actually like beets.

Alternatively, we could use peas.  Lots of peas.  Then the slogan of the US military could be:  "All we are saying, is give peas a chance." 

We are hard pressed to imagine a more miserable, a more degrading future than the shock of a constant stream of beets plummeting from the sky, or the awe of awaking, in the hazy aftermorning, to the site of beet fragments, strewn hip deep across the lifeless landscape.

Blab. A reader rudely sends us a great story without the corresponding link. Naughty reader! But, in the interest of world peace, we publish it anyway.

Microsoft had to withdraw an ad that shows a dodo, a mastadon, a sabre-toothed tiger and a hacker with the caption:

"Microsoft software is carefully designed to keep your company's valuable information in, and unauthorized people and viruses out.  Which means that your data couldn't really be safer, even if you kept it in a safe. Which is great news for the survival of your company. But tragic news for hackers."

It was published in Time magazine in november.

Dorian

It's a riddle! Who's the dodo, right?  Hmm ...

Yo. We were wondering about this.

In the opening hours of the war against Iraq, American and Australian special forces flew deep into the country and seized or blew up specific command posts far from Baghdad to prevent officers there from ordering the use of chemical and biological weapons, according to officials of the coalition forces.

The outposts were selected for urgent, risky attacks because intelligence agencies had reported that the field commanders had operational control of those weapons, and might have been given standing authority by Saddam Hussein to use them even if he were killed or could no longer communicate his orders.

It will be interesting to read what actually happened when this is all over. If, in fact, we ever get to know.

Plop. Spam warning!

When we give out an email address for some new site, we often use a unique email address that would allow us to figure out if said new site gives our email address out to Evil Spammists.

Little did we expect this kind of nasty behavior from a fellow bloggist. Nonetheless, we were dismayed to find, in our inbox last night, a piece of obscene spam (literally!) with an email address that we have only used to receive Allura's private blog. This greatly disappoints us, and we can only hope that Allura has a Really Good Explanation for it.

Maybe Allura is ... spamming.

Plurp.

The blue dog ...
Allura ...
beets.

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