Gary Farber

CPT Thomas J. Casey’s Bronze Star

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by Gary Farber

Published this morning in the Valencia County News-Bulletin of New Mexico: 

Casey1029

John Casey will tell you the story of his son. He will tell you Thomas J. Casey was always polite and well behaved as a child — had a great attitude, competitive and a team player. 

Casey will tell you Tom made it through the rigors of the Albuquerque Academy and graduated cum laude in 1997 from the University of New Mexico with majors in Spanish and Portuguese.

And Casey will tell you the part of his son's story that he dearly wishes was unwritten.

On Jan. 3, 2008, Army Capt. Thomas J. Casey gave his life defending the men in his unit while on a mission in Iraq. He was 32-years old.

In recognition of his actions, the Army awarded Tom the Bronze Star Medal with Valor. His father and family received the medal on his behalf during a ceremony last month at Fort Riley, Kan. The Bronze Star Medal with Valor is the fourth-highest combat award given by the U.S. Armed Forces.

To be awarded the medal with the "V" device, a soldier's team members must give testimony before the Army's Decoration Board.

From that testimony, and the investigative report written about the day his son died, Casey says he has a pretty good idea of what happened out in the "hinterlands" of rural Iraq.

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Said The Red Queen

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by Gary Farber

First, we don't kill all the lawyers.  

Let's continue the examination of the lawfulness of the killings of American citizens Anwar al-Awlaki and Samir Khan I began in my post, Off With Their Heads!

(That various other non-citizens, including Muhammad Salme al-Naaj and Abdul-Rahman bin Arfaj, and another several Yemenis, were killed is another debate, but they should not be forgotten, either.)

Consider the justifications presented for these killings:

#1: Did they commit "treason"?  Possibly so!  

Sticking point: the U.S. Constitution says very clearly:  

Section 3 - Treason 

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

It's almost as if the drafters of the Constitution considered this!  

Our Constitution specifically defines "treason" and the only way someone can be convicted of it.  As You Know, Bob (everyone), the U.S. Constitution is superior to U.S. laws, which can't violate the Constitution.  So al-Awlaki and Khan can't have been put to death because they committed "treason."  

The President has taken an oath to uphold the Constitution.

#2: It was justified to kill them because of their propaganda and speech.  

Unfortunately for this argument, the Constitution also rules it out with the little-known, obscure, First Amendment freedom of speech. 

Let's move on to more serious arguments.

But first let's jump to the White House presenting its official response as press secretary Jay Carney explains, and is questioned by Jake Tapper (!) of ABC News: 


video platformvideo managementvideo solutionsvideo player
 

Some quotes: 

TAPPER: You said that al-Awlaki was “demonstrably and provably involved” in operations. Do you plan on demonstrating or proving –

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Papers, Please

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by Gary Farber

Children.

Who we hates, we do, because their parents are illegal immigrants. 

And in Alabama, this is now happening: 

FOLEY, Alabama — Many of the 223 Hispanic students at Foley Elementary came to school Thursday crying and afraid, said Principal Bill Lawrence. 

Nineteen of them withdrew, and another 39 were absent, Lawrence said, the day after a federal judge upheld much of Alabama’s strict new immigration law, which authorizes law enforcement to detain people suspected of not being U.S. citizens and requires schools to ask new enrollees for a copy of their birth certificate. 

Even more of the students – who are U.S. citizens by birth, but their parents may not be – were expected to leave the state over the weekend, Lawrence said. 

"It’s been a challenging day, an emotional day. My children have been in tears today. They’re afraid," he said. "We have been in crisis-management mode, trying to help our children get over this." 

Foley Elementary has the area’s largest percentage of Hispanic students, about 20 percent of its student body. 

Under the new immigration law, schools must check the citizenship status of any student who enrolls after Sept. 1. 

The students must present a birth certificate. Those who cannot do so have 30 days to submit documentation or an affidavit signed by a parent or guardian saying that they are here legally. 

Why?  Federal Judge Sharon Lovelace Blackwell.  

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Off With Their Heads!

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by Gary Farber

I say we just kill all accused murderers from now on.

Think of the money saved, the deficit, and, of course, the children.

Now that we've established that the courts and Constitution don't matter, let's just jail all the accused criminals, too. Why lose sleep? They're murderers and criminals! The state says so. 

All Presidents need the power to assassinate people simply because they say so. What could go wrong? 

This matters not.

Amendment 5 – Trial and Punishment, Compensation for Takings.

Ratified 12/15/1791.

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

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You Have The Right To Freeze And Be Utterly Silent

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by Gary Farber

The Fourth Amendment continues to be onion-peeled into nothingness.  KENTUCKY v. KING puts another nail in the coffin as police gain the right to kick in your door simply because they hear movement within your dwelling.

Obviously that's probable cause, because noise indicates a crime. 

Does that make sense to you?  It does to 8 out of 9 members of the Supreme Court.

ALITO, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which ROBERTS, C. J., and SCALIA, KENNEDY, THOMAS, BREYER, SOTOMAYOR,  and KAGAN,  JJ., joined. GINSBURG, J., filed a dissenting opinion.

Here's the gist: 

[…] 

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., writing for the majority, said police officers do not violate the Fourth Amendment’s ban on unreasonable searches by kicking down a door after the occupants of an apartment react to hearing that officers are there by seeming to destroy evidence.

In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote that the majority had handed the police an important new tool.

“The court today arms the police with a way routinely to dishonor the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement in drug cases,” Justice Ginsburg wrote. “In lieu of presenting their evidence to a neutral magistrate, police officers may now knock, listen, then break the door down, never mind that they had ample time to obtain a warrant.”

The case, Kentucky v. King, No. 09-1272, arose from a mistake. After seeing a drug deal in a parking lot, police officers in Lexington, Ky., rushed into an apartment complex looking for a suspect who had sold cocaine to an informant.

But the smell of burning marijuana led them to the wrong apartment. After knocking and announcing themselves, they heard sounds from inside the apartment that they said made them fear that evidence was being destroyed. They kicked the door in and found marijuana and cocaine but not the original suspect, who was in a different apartment.

The Kentucky Supreme Court suppressed the evidence, saying that any risk of drugs being destroyed was the result of the decision by the police to knock and announce themselves rather than obtain a warrant.

The United States Supreme Court reversed that decision on Monday, saying the police had acted lawfully and that was all that mattered. The defendant, Hollis D. King, had choices other than destroying evidence, Justice Alito wrote.

He could have chosen not to respond to the knocking in any fashion, Justice Alito wrote. Or he could have come to the door and declined to let the officers enter without a warrant.

“Occupants who choose not to stand on their constitutional rights but instead elect to attempt to destroy evidence have only themselves to blame,” Justice Alito wrote. 

Right.  Let's get more detail.

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Executive Decision

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GUEST POST by McKinneyTexas, NOT by Gary Farber

First, thanks to Gary Farber for the kind invitation to guest post.  Initially, I'd begun a sort of semi-reflective, Kumbaya piece but then it occurred to me that my role was to introduce of bit of diversity here at ObWi, to provoke thought from the other side of the spectrum.  So, here it is: your dose of provocation:

One glaring fault of the Left-in-Power is its lack of respect for the constitutional process on that most fundamental question of committing the country to war. 

First, under Clinton and then under Obama, US troops were committed to combat operations overseas when no US vital interest was at stake and certainly no attack on US citizens or interests anywhere was imminent.  Neither commitment was subject to public debate, or more importantly, authorized by congress.

Compare this to the much reviled Bush II administration and its wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. 

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Drones Don’t Declutter, And Neither Do Expulsions

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by Gary Farber

We can't "win" militarily in Afghanistan any more than we could in Vietnam. 

"AfPak" is still AfPak, no matter that it displeases Pakistan, no matter how the U.S. placates.

It's one war, and it can't be won militarily without invading Pakistan.  Anyone up for that? 

2 US servicemen mistakenly killed by drone attack in Afghanistan [UPDATE, 3:41 p.m., PST: erroneous link fixed; thanks, Ugh!].

[…] The Marines under fire were watching streaming video of the battlefield being fed to them by an armed Predator overhead. They saw a number of "hot spots," or infrared images, moving in their direction. Apparently believing that those "hot spots" were the enemy, they called in a Hellfire missile strike from the Predator.

Technology will triumph.

It worked in Vietnam! We're winning.

After all, unlike Vietnam, there are no safe havens across borders: Pakistan Tells U.S. It Must Sharply Cut C.I.A. Activities:

Pakistan has demanded that the United States steeply reduce the number of Central Intelligence Agency operatives and Special Operations forces working in Pakistan, and that it halt C.I.A. drone strikes aimed at militants in northwest Pakistan. The request was a sign of the near collapse of cooperation between the two testy allies.

Pakistani and American officials said in interviews that the demand that the United States scale back its presence was the immediate fallout from the arrest in Pakistan of Raymond A. Davis, a C.I.A. security officer who killed two men in January during what he said was an attempt to rob him.

In all, about 335 American personnel — C.I.A. officers and contractors and Special Operations forces — were being asked to leave the country, said a Pakistani official closely involved in the decision.

It was not clear how many C.I.A. personnel that would leave behind; the total number in Pakistan has not been disclosed. But the cuts demanded by the Pakistanis amounted to 25 to 40 percent of United States Special Operations forces in the country, the officials said. The number also included the removal of all the American contractors used by the C.I.A. in Pakistan.

This is what we call "big news."

It's also, when you read between the lines, leverage, and there will be a trade-off, and you'll have to read between the lines, at best, and look carefully at the right sources, to find information about it when it happens, should said information be findable — but traces always surface on the internet:

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Pottery Barn Libya, Pt 2: Anthony Cordesman, One Man Army, or Give Peace A Chance?

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by Gary Farber

In Pottery Barn Libya, Part 1, I began explaining the situation in Libya.  Now, more, and what America and NATO should do.

The tactical day to day sway of battle does not matter, save to those brutally slaughtered in it,  and suffering from it.  Suffering greatly.

What matters are the choices America and Europe make.  

Naturally, Joe Lieberman and John McCain want bombs away, all-out regime change.  Nothing makes John McCain happier: Back on the Battlefield: How the Libya debate snapped John McCain out of his 2008 funk—and into a fresh fight with Obama.

John McCain has never met a country he wouldn't like to bomb:

[…]

McCain, who insists on visiting Iraq and Afghanistan twice a year, often favors a muscular approach to projecting U.S. military power but is wary of entanglements with no exit strategy. The old aviator, who had both arms repeatedly broken in a Hanoi prison camp, says that experience has “also given me a sense of caution in light of our failure in Vietnam.” While McCain opposed the U.S. military actions in Lebanon and Somalia, he is sympathetic to humanitarian missions—and would even consider sending troops to the war-torn Ivory Coast if someone could “tell me how we stop what’s going on.”

Pressed on when the United States should intervene in other countries, McCain sketches an expansive doctrine that turns on practicality: American forces must be able to “beneficially affect the situation” and avoid “an outcome which would be offensive to our fundamental -principles—whether it’s 1,000 people slaughtered or 8,000…If there’s a massacre or ethnic cleansing and we are able to prevent it, I think the United States should act.”

McCain: bomb, bomb, bomb, bomb bomb Iran.


 

Bombs away.  "There will be other wars."

McCain: "We are all Georgians now."

Tough guy Anthony Cordesman naturally wants to fight.  Unsurprisingly, he used to be national security assistant to Senator John McCain.

Cordesman, who has, see previous links, always been deeply wired into the militarist networks of the Washington, D.C. village of talking heads and millionaire journalism, has a (surprise!) widely-quoted piece advocating we (surprise!) go all in.

Let's not.

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Pottery Barn Libya, Part 1

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by Gary Farber

What is to be done?

Colin Powell famously said of Iraq, quoting Tom Friedman (who got it wrong)

'You are going to be the proud owner of 25 million people,' he told the president. 'You will own all their hopes, aspirations, and problems. You'll own it all.' Privately, Powell and Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage called this the Pottery Barn rule: You break it, you own it.

Does anyone want to buy Libya, and own it for the next decade?

That's what's on order.

That, or negotiating a way out of this thing.

The Libyan rebels are a mess.  April 3rd:

[…] The rebel army’s nominal leader, Abdul Fattah Younes, a former interior minister and friend of Col. Muammar el-Qaddafi whom many rebel leaders distrusted, could offer little explanation for the recent military stumbles, two people with knowledge of the meetings said.

Making matters worse, the men could hardly stand one another. They included Khalifa Heftar, a former general who returned recently from exile in the United States and appointed himself as the rebel field commander, the movement’s leaders said, and Omar el-Hariri, a former political prisoner who occupied the largely ceremonial role of defense minister.

“They behaved like children,” said Fathi Baja, a political science professor who heads the rebel political committee. 

Little was accomplished in the meetings, the participants said. When they concluded late last week, Mr. Younes was still the head of the army and Mr. Hariri remained as the defense minister. Only Mr. Heftar, who reportedly refused to work with Mr. Younes, was forced out. On Sunday, though, in a sign that divisions persisted, Mr. Heftar’s son said his father was still an army leader. [….]

On March 29th,  Obama's press secretary, Jay Carney told the press gaggle on AF1 that, in essence, he didn't know who the hell these people are, but let's hope for the best:

[…] Q    One of NATO’s military leaders testified on the Hill today that there had been signs of al Qaeda seen amongst Libyan rebels.  How does that affect the White House thinking on engaging with them?

MR. CARNEY:  Well, what I would say is that, as you know, we spend a lot of time looking at the opposition and now meeting with opposition leaders.  And the folks who are in London, the people that — and the leader that Secretary Clinton met in Paris, have made clear what their principles are and we believe that they’re meritorious — their principles.  I think they had a statement today that had some very good language in it that we support. 

But that doesn’t mean, obviously, that everyone who opposes Moammar Qaddafi I Libya is someone whose ideals we can support.  But beyond that, I don't have any detail about individual members of the opposition.

Q    Does it concern you about how much you don't know about the opposition?

MR. CARNEY:  Well, what I would say is that we have met with opposition leaders and we're working with them, but as the President said, and as the opposition leaders who put out a statement today said, it’s up to them to decide who their leaders are going to be.

But we do know something of who they are right now, as Jason Packer explains:

If you let strangers know that you research Libya for a living, there seems to be only one question on their minds: "Who are the Libyan rebels?" I've been asked it at cocktail parties, on ski lifts, at academic seminars, and even by Western journalists in Benghazi who have developed the flattering habit of Skype-ing me at odd hours. Americans seem captivated by this question, perhaps because they have heard senior U.S. officials from Defense Secretary Robert Gates to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to various Republican congressmen proclaim that they do not yet know enough about who the rebels are. I do not take such statements at face value. U.S. statesmen know quite well who the rebels are — but pretend otherwise to obscure the fact that the United States has yet to formulate a comprehensive policy toward them.

The rebels consist of two distinct groups: the fighters and the political leadership.

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Hello, Goodbye: You Say Goodbye, I Say Go To Hell, Glenn Beck

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by Gary Farber

Glenn Beck is leaving Fox News, but not, I'm afraid, leaving us alone.

FOX NEWS AND MERCURY RADIO ARTS ANNOUNCE NEW AGREEMENT
(New York, NY)  Fox News and Mercury Radio Arts, Glenn Beck’s production company, are proud to announce that they will work together to develop and produce a variety of television projects for air on the Fox News Channel as well as content for other platforms including Fox News’ digital properties. Glenn intends to transition off of his daily program, the third highest rated in all of cable news, later this year.

Speculation is, of course, rampant.  

[…] Two of the options Mr. Beck has contemplated, according to people who have spoken about it with him, are a partial or wholesale takeover of a cable channel, or an expansion of his subscription video service on the Web.

Reports this week that Joel Cheatwood, a senior Fox News executive, would soon join Mr. Beck’s growing media company, Mercury Radio Arts, were the latest indication that Mr. Beck intended to leave Fox, a unit of the News Corporation, when his contract expired at the end of this year.

Notably, Mr. Beck’s company has been staffing up — making Web shows, some of which have little or nothing to do with Mr. Beck, and charging a monthly subscription for access to the shows. 

He's not going away. Frankly, this is part of the not-that-slow collapse of the whole "tv network" paradigm that the internet is forcing. "TV' isn't going away as fast as traditional publishing, which is going away much faster than the traditional music distribution business, but it's circling the drain rapidly with streaming and direct deals for iPads and tablets and phones and all sorts of streaming.

Below, the worst of Glenn Beck, but why he's not stupid about media.  Laugh and weep.

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What Is Best In Academic Freedom, Cronon? Not To Crush Your Enemies

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by Gary Farber

The current attempt by the radical "conservative" Republican Party of Wisconsin, which is so typical of the national and other state Republican Party leadership, has met a roadblock.

But a reminder of what the philosophy of the GOP is, here:

Wisconsin Republic Party Leader: Hao! Dai ye! We won again! This is good, but what is best in life?
Cronan: The open steppe, fleet horse, falcons at your wrist, and the wind in your hair.
Wisconsin Republic Party: Wrong! Conan! What is best in life?
Wisconsin Republic Party Leader: To crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women.
Wisconsin Republic Party Leader: That is good! That is good.

We have video of this meeting:


 

And thus the saga of Conan meets Cronan.

What's the latest development?

The Chancellor of the University of Wisconsin, Biddy Martin, has issued a public statement:

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April What? An Open Thread

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by Gary Farber

It's still April 1st on the Left Coast for another two hours and five minutes (when I started this post; an hour and ten minutes when I finished), no matter what date you read above this post. 

Some foolish links are in order!

So, out of order!

Japan is on everyone's mind, but we need to remember than it's not all doom and gloom, and yet in the spirit of helping:

The Tactical Philanthropy Haiku Contest:

Donors want data
Nonprofits measure impact
Experts watch and smile

Hai, ku!  Can you write techie Haiku?  Win $50!

Some past winners I like include:

Chekov in the bay
searching hard for some space fuel
Nuclear wessels
— Jay in Murfreesboro, Tennessee

I bit a zombie.
it was ironic but the
taste was terrible.
— Blake in Tulsa, Oklahoma

Learn from the Jedi.
Discipline, control, respect.
Dangerous muppet.
— Patrick in Anaheim, California

Packets of photons
Streaming by our planet's sky
their address divine
— Michaline in Chicago Illinois

Eat Theobromine.
Drink methyltheobromine.
Heliophobe, I.
–Zach in Tyler, Texas

Why kill Wash and Book?
Are they thinking what I am?
Firefly Zombies!
–Barak from East Brunswick, New Jersey

Advice for commenters arguing with bloggers:  

Don't argue with a
Mobius strip because it
Will be one-sided
–Jimmy from Poughquag, New York

Let there be peace:

Take me to the black
I am a leaf on the wind
My Serenity
–Jennifer in Dallas, Texas

And this speaks to, for, and sometimes it seems to be me:

I am all around,
Yet some can't seem to find me.
I am Internet.
–Terry in San Francisco, California

Read the rest!  Funny!

Did I say "geeks"?  Not yet! Let's read Henry Jenkins talk about gender and game design with James Paul Gee!

There's nothing bloggers like better than catching out the New York Times in embarrassing goofs! 

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GOP’s Radical Breakage Continues

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by Gary Farber

Who is "Wisconsin's most dangerous professor"?  He's William Cronon.  Who he?  He's this incredibly threatening man:

[…] In 1991, Cronon completed a book entitled Nature's Metropolis: Chicago and the Great West, which examines Chicago 's relationship to its rural hinterland during the second half of the nineteenth century. In 1991, it was awarded the Chicago Tribune's Heartland Prize for the best literary work of non-fiction published during the preceding year; in 1992, it won the Bancroft Prize for the best work of American history published during the previous year, and was also one of three nominees for the Pulitzer Prize in History; and in 1993, it received the George Perkins Marsh Prize from the American Society for Environmental History and the Charles A. Weyerhaeuser Award from the Forest History Society for the best book of environmental and conservation history published during the preceding two years. 

[…]

In July 1992, Cronon became the Frederick Jackson Turner Professor of History, Geography, and Environmental Studies at the University of Wisconsin ­Madison after having served for more than a decade as a member of the Yale History Department. In 2003, he was also named Vilas [pronounced "Vy-lus"] Research Professor at UW-Madison, the university’s most distinguished chaired professorship.

Cronon has been President of the American Society for Environmental History, and serves as general editor of the Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books Series for the University of Washington Press.  […]  He has served on the Governing Council of The Wilderness Society since 1995, and on the National Board of the Trust for Public Land since 2003. He has been elected President of the American Historical Association for 2011-12.

Born September 11, 1954, in New Haven , Connecticut, Cronon received his B.A. (1976) from the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He holds an M.A. (1979), M.Phil. (1980), and Ph.D. (1990) from Yale, and a D.Phil. (1981) from Oxford University. Cronon has been a Rhodes Scholar, Danforth Fellow, Guggenheim Fellow, and MacArthur Fellow; has won prizes for his teaching at both Yale and Wisconsin; in 1999 was elected a member of the American Philosophical Society' and in 2006 was elected a Fellow of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters as well as the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

He is obviously a Maoist of the worst Marxist–Leninist sort! 

How do we know?  Because the Republican Party of Wisconsin wants him investigated.

The Republican Party of Wisconsin has made an open records request for the e-mails of a University of Wisconsin professor of history, geography and environmental studies in an apparent response to a blog post the professor wrote about a group called the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC).

Professor William J. Cronon, who is the president-elect of the American Historical Association, said in an interview Friday that the party asked for e-mails starting Jan. 1.

The request was made by Stephan Thompson of the Republican Party of Wisconsin. In his request, Thompson asked for e-mails of Cronon's state e-mail account that "reference any of the following terms: Republican, Scott Walker, recall, collective bargaining, AFSCME, WEAC, rally, union, Alberta Darling, Randy Hopper, Dan Kapanke, Rob Cowles, Scott Fitzgerald, Sheila Harsdorf, Luther Olsen, Glenn Grothman, Mary Lazich, Jeff Fitzgerald, Marty Beil, or Mary Bell."

Most of the names are Republican legislators. Marty Beil is the head of the Wisconsin State Employees Union and Mary Bell is the head of the Wisconsin Education Association Council.

Cronon said the university had not yet complied with the open records request. The e-mails would be subject to the state's open records law because they were written on an university e-mail account.

The university has an e-mail policy that states, "University employees may not use these resources to support the nomination of any person for political office or to influence a vote in any election or referendum.”

Cronon said he did not violate the policy in any way. "I really object in principle to this inquiry," Cronon said of the party's open records request.

Thompson was not available for comment. But in an statement, Mark Jefferson, the party's executive director, said, "Like anyone else who makes an open records request in Wisconsin, the Republican Party of Wisconsin does not have to give a reason for doing so. […]"

What was Cronon's offense?  He wrote an Op-Ed piece for the terrorist-loving New York Times.

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“Fightin’ for my Rats!”: Teapartiers and the Social Theory of William Tecumseh Sherman

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 Guest Post by HK, not by Gary Farber As the seemingly remote Civil War Sesquicentennial gradually floods into our lives over the next four years, we'll find — just as those of us who were around for the Centennial did — that a surprising number of issues from that period which we thought were settled, … Read more

Self-Evident

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Guest post by Amezuki, not by Gary Farber

You all know me by a different pseudonym, and I'll reintroduce myself properly later.

But in the meantime, a word from our Founders:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.

The Declaration of Independence stands, in my mind, as one of the greatest political documents in history.

Like our Constitution, it stands on the shoulders of many other exalted works, and my opinion is not in any way intended to denigrate those works–but what makes it stand out in my mind is not just the role it had in the birth of our nation, but in the simple, unequivocal and straightforward statements of first principles it contains.

Foremost among these is the well-known passage I quoted above. Its evocative power was such that Martin Luther King, one of the most eloquent speakers and users of language our nation has known, had no need to embellish it further when quoting it, save to correctly note that it was a promise our country had yet to fully honor. "All men are created equal."

Think about that for a moment. All men. You will notice a distinct lack of footnotes, equivocation, qualifications or exceptions to the word "all".

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Snog In The Fog: Science Fiction And Weekend Open Thread

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by Gary Farber

If you happen to be in the environs of the San Francisco Bay Area from March 11th through 13th, I’ll be here:

FOGcon: March 11-13, 2011, at the Holiday Inn Golden Gateway Hotel

Fogcon is this (links mine):

The Friends of Genre Convention (FOGcon) is a literary-themed San Francisco SF/F con in the tradition of Wiscon and Readercon. Each year we’ll focus on a new theme in speculative fiction and invite Honored Guests ranging from writers to scientists to artists. We will build community, exchange ideas, and share our love for the literature of imagination.

Theme for 2011: The City in SF/F

Honored Guests: Pat Murphy and Jeff VanderMeer; Honored Editorial Guest, Ann VanderMeer; Honored Guest (Posthumous) Fritz Leiber

“There is more than one road to the City.”—Ursula K. Le Guin

The theme of this, the first FOGCon is:

Whether a glass-edged utopia or a steampunk hell, the city plays a central role in many works of speculative fiction. It can be an arena for conflicts between cultures, a center of learning or vice, a court of power and corruption. In its gutters and government buildings, the city reveals the values a society claims and those it actually honors. Because the city is open to everyone, it’s a place where new things can happen. No wonder it is such a rich topic for so many writers.

Lots of other kewl people will be there.  There will be programming!

I’m particularly, given the time-change, and our ability as science fiction people to slipstream, looking forward to these bits of programming:

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Winning Wisconsin, Pigs & Hippies Together: This is OUR HOUSE!

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by Gary Farber

Don't tell me we can't win this.  Wisconsin Police Have Joined Protest Inside State Capitol.

From inside the Wisconsin State Capitol, Ryan Harvey reports:

“Hundreds of cops have just marched into the Wisconsin state capitol building to protest the anti-Union bill, to massive applause. They now join up to 600 people who are inside.”

Ryan reported on his Facebook page earlier today [Friday, Feb. 25 -gf]],:

“Police have just announced to the crowds inside the occupied State Capitol of Wisconsin: ‘We have been ordered by the legislature to kick you all out at 4:00 today. But we know what’s right from wrong. We will not be kicking anyone out, in fact, we will be sleeping here with you!’

Ryan Harvey's video from Friday:


 

 My quotes:

[…] This is not a budget issue! This is a CIVIL RIGHTS ISSUE!  […] Mr. Walker!  […] We know pretty well now who you work for!  [applause] Let me tell you who WE work for! [points to self and police emblem]  We work for all of these people!  [applause] We are not here, Mr. Walker, to do your bidding!  We are here to do their bidding!  […]  Mr. Walker, this not your House!  This is all of our House!  [camera pans 360°]

I want to give this officer a big fat kiss on the mouth.

Pictures from Ryan Harvey, February 25, Occupied Capitol Building, Madison, WI:

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The New Republican Congressional Revolutionary Volunteers Of America

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by Gary Farber

Congressman stops short of calling for Obama assassination. Georgia Congressman Paul Broun's Tuesday night’s town hall meeting:

The first question of the night (confirmed by Broun’s office) was “when is someone going to shoot Obama?”

Broun’s response, Athens Banner-Herald (Georgia):

The thing is, I know there’s a lot of frustration with this president. We’re going to have an election next year. Hopefully, we’ll elect somebody that’s going to be a conservative, limited-government president that will take a smaller, who will sign a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare. He then segued into Republicans’ budget proposal.

Today: Loughner indictment expected by March 9, trial in Sept.:

Dylan Smith, TucsonSentinel.com

Prosecutors said they will indict Jared Lee Loughner on more federal charges by March 9, a court order said Thursday. U.S. District Judge Larry Burns said in the order that he expects a trial to begin before Sept. 20. Loughner, 22, is the alleged gunman in the Jan. 8 shooting that authorities call an assassination attempt on U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords.

[…] Six were killed and 13 wounded in the attack on a constituent meet-and-greet at a Northwest Side grocery store. Giffords remains in a Houston rehab facility, recovering from her wounds.

Georgia Congressman Paul Broun had best not hold town meetings on Obsidian Wings. Posting Rules:

[…] Calls for the assassination of any person will be subject to immediate banning. Exceptions are made for legitimate military targets in time of war, being put to death after being convicted of a capital crime, etc. — basically, the things that make a killing not 'assassination' to begin with. As before, this is not a prohibition on criticism, vituperation, and all those other good things; just a recognition that there's all the difference in the world between passionately disagreeing with someone and calling for that person's death.

We would ban someone from here for such a statement. But Republican Georgia Congressman Paul Broun lets it pass without a word and:

[…] Broun’s press secretary, Jessica Morris, confirmed that the question was indeed, who is going to shoot Obama? “Obviously, the question was inappropriate, so Congressman Broun moved on,” she said.

We wouldn't just move on, if we noticed that here.

But it's okay if you're merely a Republican Congressional Representative.

Move along. Nothing to see here.

In June, Greg Sargent wrote: Sharron Angle floated possibility of armed insurrection:

Here's another one that could be tough for Sharron Angle to explain away: In an interview in January, Angle appeared to float the possibility of armed insurrection if "this Congress keeps going the way it is."

I'm not kidding. In an interview she gave to a right-wing talk show host, Angle approvingly quoted Thomas Jefferson saying it's good for a country to have a revolution every 20 years — and said that if Congress keeps it up, people may find themselves resorting to "Second Amendment remedies."

What's more, the talk show host she spoke to tells me he doesn't have any doubt that she was floating the possibility of armed insurrection as a valid response if Congress continues along its current course.

Asked by the host, Lars Larson of Portland, Oregon, where she stands on Second Amendment issues, Angle replied:

You know, our Founding Fathers, they put that Second Amendment in there for a good reason and that was for the people to protect themselves against a tyrannical government. And in fact Thomas Jefferson said it's good for a country to have a revolution every 20 years.

I hope that's not where we're going, but, you know, if this Congress keeps going the way it is, people are really looking toward those Second Amendment remedies and saying my goodness what can we do to turn this country around? I'll tell you the first thing we need to do is take Harry Reid out.

Larson says Angle was floating the possibility of armed insurrection if Congress keeps it up under Reid et al.

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Scott Walker Reports To The Boss, David Koch

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by Gary Farber

Don't believe how it works?  Then listen for yourself.

Let's go with Adam Weinstein's take:

Is that really Scott Walker? [Update: Yep.] A New York-based alt-news editor says he got through to the embattled Wisconsin governor on the phone Tuesday by posing as right-wing financier David Koch…then had a far-ranging 20-minute conversation about the collective bargaining protests. According to the audio, Walker told him:

  • That statehouse GOPers were plotting to hold Democratic senators' pay until they returned to vote on the controversial union-busting bill.
  • That Walker was looking to nail Dems on ethics violations if they took meals or lodging from union supporters.
  • That he'd take "Koch" up on this offer: "[O]nce you crush these bastards I'll fly you out to Cali and really show you a good time."

Now check it out yourself:


 

The rest:

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The Wisconsin Waltz

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by Gary Farber

As flames of revolution spread across the Mideast, the fight against anti-union bills is spreading across the American Midwest.

David Dayen, aka dday, points out that Ohio, Indiana See Protests Against Anti-Union Bills:

Wisconsin remains the main battleground for the broader assault on worker’s rights. But elsewhere in the Big Ten states and across the country, these battles have moved forward. In Ohio, Gov. John Kasich is pushing pretty much the exact same bill as Scott Walker in Wisconsin. Known as SB 5, the bill would strip collective bargaining rights from Ohio public employees. SB 5 is a piece of legislation, so Kasich isn’t trying to implement this under the cover of a budget bill. However, he has said that if he doesn’t get what he wants out of SB 5, he will put those items into the next budget bill. Alternatively, this could go to the ballot. So SB 5 won’t be the last showdown. The Governor, aping Scott Walker, claims this is a fiscal issue, but nobody can explain how much money SB 5 would save.

Many Ohio Republican legislators are already looking askance at SB 5. With pressure rising from state editorial boards and organized labor, the State Senate may not have the votes to get this thing out of committee.

OB-MQ832_unions_G_20110220193255

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You Say al-Gaddafi, They Say al-Qaḏḏāfī, Let’s Colonel The Whole Thing Off

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By Gary Farber

Libya appears to be in full revolt.  Residents say troops defect in Libya's Benghazi:

Members of a Libyan army unit told Benghazi residents on Sunday they had defected and "liberated" Libya's second city from troops supporting veteran leader Muammar Gaddafi, two residents said.

Habib al-Obaidi, who heads the intensive care unit at the main Al-Jalae hospital, and lawyer Mohamed al-Mana, told Reuters members of the "Thunderbolt" squad had arrived at the hospital with soldiers wounded in clashes with Gaddafi's personal guard.

"They are now saying that they have overpowered the Praetorian Guard and that they have joined the people's revolt," al-Mana said by telephone. It was not possible to independently verify the report.

Obaidi said the bodies of 50 people killed on Sunday had arrived at the hospital in the late afternoon. Most had died from bullet wounds.

Tripoli flagpole

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The Revolution Will Not Be Televised; It Will And Has Been Tweeted

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by Gary Farber

Revolutions have happened in the Mideast?  How?  Why?  Because this is the 21st century, and the revolution is online.

A picture is worth a thousand words, and I will give you 5000 in five pictures:

Egypt

Experiation%20date_%20from%20twitter%20user%20@nadiae 
 
 
Political%20Pictures%20-%20Best%20Egyptian%20Protest%20Signs 

Political%20Pictures%20-%20Egyptian%20Protest%20Signs 

Political%20Pictures%20-%20Egyptian%20Protest%20Signs-1 

What happened?  This.   

[…] 

The exchange on Facebook was part of a remarkable two-year collaboration that has given birth to a new force in the Arab world — a pan-Arab youth movement dedicated to spreading democracy in a region without it. Young Egyptian and Tunisian activists brainstormed on the use of technology to evade surveillance, commiserated about torture and traded practical tips on how to stand up to rubber bullets and organize barricades.

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The Media in Sixteen Snappy Paragraphs

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Guest Post by John Emerson, posted by Gary Farber, to cover Gary while traveling, but who was delayed by hotel internet service going out.

(Everything below is expressed in its maximal form, as per my normal modus operandi. Readers may want to trim certain passages in accordance with their own tastes.)

Everyone talks about the media, but no one has been able to do anything about it. I share the common opinion that the disaster of contemporary American politics is in large part the result of the corruption and dishonesty of the media, and I also believe that this corruption is deep-rooted and unlikely to change, and that as a result we are between a rock and a hard place somewhere up shit creek. Eight years ago I thought that the internet would change things, but that hasn’t seemed to have happened. A lot of us are now better-informed than the media want us to be. But there are not enough of us and we remain a powerless minority, even (it has turned out) within the Democratic Party.

I am not trying to replace the libraries of media criticism that already exist, but merely to sum up my understanding of the situation in a few snappy phrases.

AMBIENT OPINION

 

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Remeet Liberal Japonicus, New ObWi Front Pager, Longtime Presence

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Posted by Gary Farber, introductory guest post written by Liberal Japonicus.

Hello. (image of Ricky Gervais hosting the Golden Globes)

  Ricky-gervais-host-golden-globes

I'm liberal japonicus and my name has suddenly appeared on the sidebar. I'm still trying to figure out what this may mean, but one thing that it seems to suggest is that it is necessary to post something in the way of an introduction.

I'd note that in Japan, where I reside and where half of my genes are from, it is called a jiko shoukai ('self-introduction') and if you go to almost any small group meeting in Japan, you'll find a portion of it devoted to going around the table and doing said jiko shoukai.

Even if you are practically positive that you know everyone in the room, on the off chance that there is one newbie present, or someone has been struck with retrograde amnesia in the past 24 hours, everyone has to stand up, introduce themselves, not forgetting to add a little tidbit of new information that really isn't important, but allows those assembled to feel like they know you a bit better.

So a few quick facts.

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Walk Like An Egyptian

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by Gary Farber

Blender:

Robert Fisk:

Exhausted, scared and trapped, protesters put forward plan for future.   […] Sitting on filthy pavements, amid the garbage and broken stones of a week of street fighting, they have drawn up a list of 25 political personalities to negotiate for a new political leadership and a new constitution to replace Mubarak's crumbling regime.

They include Amr Moussa, the secretary general of the Arab League – himself a trusted Egyptian; the Nobel prize-winner Ahmed Zuwail, an Egyptian-American who has advised President Barack Obama; Mohamed Selim Al-Awa, a professor and author of Islamic studies who is close to the Muslim Brotherhood; and the president of the Wafd party, Said al-Badawi.

Sights:


 

Fisk again:

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We Control The Horizontal

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by Gary Farber

Appearances matter.  To control information is to control.  "Don't judge a book by its cover" is a popular saying that will cause anyone who sells books or works in publishing to ROFl ("roll on the floor laughing"), because it's exactly what people do, though no one wants to admit to doing it.  It's always someone else.

In Egypt, we're seeing this play out. Mubarak intensifies press attacks with assaults, detentions:

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak unleashed an unprecedented and systematic attack on international media today as his supporters assaulted reporters in the streets while security forces began obstructing and detaining journalists covering the unrest that threatens to topple his government.

Democracy Now!


 

[…]

In the past 24 hours alone, CPJ has recorded 30 detentions, 26 assaults, and eight instances of equipment having been seized. In addition, plainclothes and uniformed agents reportedly entered at least two hotels used by international journalists to confiscate press equipment. On Wednesday, CPJ documented numerous earlier assaults, detentions, and confiscations. Mubarak forces have attacked the very breadth of global journalism: Their targets have included Egyptians and other Arab journalists, Russian and U.S. reporters, Europeans and South Americans.

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De Nile Truly Is A River

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by Gary Farber

There are many expert reporters on Egypt, obviously, and tons of scholars.  But let's start with the excellent generalist on international policy that everyone has, I hope,  been reading for many years — and if you haven't you should start last year or whenever — Laura Rozen. Some good news and bad news:

Earlier today, I was on a panel discussing coverage of the Egypt unrest, and someone mentioned that no one had seen it coming.

But that is not the case. Several foreign policy scholars and former officials have been urging the U.S. administration for months to prepare for the end of the Hosni Mubarak era and the instability that would accompany it.

Now that the administration has found itself scrambling the past few days to, first, try to avert a bloodbath in Egypt and more broadly, figure out what to do amid a hugely complicated power transition there with much at stake for the U.S., it's worth noting the people who have been pleading for policy attention on this issue long in advance. Chief among them, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace's Michele Dunne, a former NSC and State Department Policy Planning official, and the Brookings Institution's Robert Kagan, who co-chair a bipartisan working group on Egypt.

I (and others) wrote about their efforts to get the U.S. policy community to pay attention. See "W.H. pressed on Egypt democracy," from September:

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We Can Haz Kitty Open Thread With No Guns!

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by Gary Farber

One Thousand and One Nights of no Open Threads it has not been, but let one begin! 

Tell your stories! 

One Thousand and One Nights (Arabic: كتاب ألف ليلة وليلة‎ Kitāb 'alf layla wa-layla; Persian: هزار و یک شب Hezār-o yek šab) is a collection of Middle Eastern and South Asian stories and folk tales compiled in Arabic during the Islamic Golden Age. It is often known in English as the Arabian Nights, from the first English language edition (1706), which rendered the title as The Arabian Nights' Entertainment.[1]

The work as we have it was collected over many centuries by various authors, translators and scholars across the Middle East, Central Asia and North Africa. The tales themselves trace their roots back to ancient and medieval Arabic, Persian, Indian, Egyptian and Mesopotamian folklore and literature. In particular, many tales were originally folk stories from the Caliphate era, while others, especially the frame story, are most probably drawn from the Pahlavi Persian work Hezār Afsān (Persian: هزار افسان, lit. A Thousand Tales) which in turn relied partly on Indian elements.[2] Though the oldest Arabic manuscript dates from the 14th century, scholarship generally dates the collection's genesis to around the 9th century.

Let me frame that for you.  I foreshadow.  We are all unreliable narrators.

But some of us haz friends who are kitties.


 

Download We Can Haz Grooming Vid 2011-01-30 002

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The Unbearable Triteness of Whiteness & Why The Term “Political Correctness” Must Die

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by Gary Farber

Always read Ta-Nehisi Coates.  He's one of the best.  In The Unbearable Whiteness of Pro-Lifers and Pundits, he reminds us of how Santorum became a Savage Google bomb.

And Rick Santorum is still running for the Republican plum.

Santorum has said he is considering candidacy for the Republican nomination for President of the United States in the 2012 presidential election. On September 11, 2009, Santorum spoke to a group of Catholic leaders in Orlando, Florida. He told the leaders, "I hate to be calculating, but I see that 2012 is not just throwing somebody out to be eaten, but it's a real opportunity for success." He also scheduled appearances with political non-profit organizations that took place in Iowa on October 1, 2009.

Santorum re-iterated his consideration of a 2012 run in a e-mail and letter sent on January 15, 2010 to supporters of his Political Action Committee saying, "After talking it over with my wife Karen and our kids – I am considering putting my name in for the 2012 presidential race. I'm convinced that conservatives need a candidate who will not only stand up for our views, but who can articulate a conservative vision for our country's future," Santorum also writes. "And right now, I just don't see anyone stepping up to the plate. I have no great burning desire to be president, but I have a burning desire to have a different president of the United States."

He gives me different burning desires. 

Coates: 

Last week Rick Santorum proved himself to be Rick Santorum:

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Getting in your Face(book)

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21st Century Gary Farber presents:

A guest post by liberal japonicus:

I got pulled into Facebook when my horn teacher got into it and cajoled/threatened/ordered us to join. I did and immediately hooked up with a number of people who I had lost touch with, which was a gas. However, within a day of joining, I had friend requests from 3 people from my 1st grade elementary school class. At that point, I made the decision to not send friend requests. I'd still accept friend requests, (and still do) accept friend requests, but by drawing a line there, it makes it a bit easier to manage.

So I was curious who in the ObWi family is using Facebook and how they are using it.

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One Way To Connect

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by Gary Farber

ONE WAY TO CONNECT can be this:

This is America:

This is something we can do:

To Beat Back Poverty, Pay the Poor:

The city of Rio de Janeiro is infamous for the fact that one can look out from a precarious shack on a hill in a miserable favela and see practically into the window of a luxury high-rise condominium. Parts of Brazil look like southern California. Parts of it look like Haiti. Many countries display great wealth side by side with great poverty. But until recently, Brazil was the most unequal country in the world

Everything connects:

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Speak To The Kitty At The Old Address! We’re Just That Indecisive: Another Open Thread!

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by Gary Farber

The  "Email Me" link under the kitty at the top left of this blog is now open for business and listening again.  That's obsidianinfo at yahoo dot com.

If you wrote to obsidianinfo at yahoo dot com in recent years, and received no answers, which has happened to many of you — in fact, there was nothing personal about it, I assure you — you weren't being singled out to be ignored.

Honest. It wasn't you. It's me.

I apologize. Blame me.

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The BABBLE Continues: An Open Thread

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by Gary Farber. This is a variant of this post. Per previous announcement: The ObWi Bay Area Bloggers Bullsh*t League of Earth = ObBABBLE's second meeting is announced. WHO: This is an open gathering; anyone reading this is invited.  In actuality, the main connector is that I can get you to read this.  You are … Read more

He Was A Freelance Writer. He Had It Made.

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“He was Joe Mayer, freelance writer. He had it made.”

— Charles Bukowski

A friend of mine needs your help.  I’m asking you to help him. 

Not because you know him, though you may.

Not because you like him, or his opinions, because you may not.

Not because he’s special, though he is.  (We all are.)

But because he needs the help.

And everyone who needs help should be helped.

Who is Roy?

Edroso

I can only tell you some things I know. 

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MAJ. Andrew Olmsted On Gays In The Military

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by Gary Farber.

Major Olmsted is no longer with us; he died a hero.

Doctor Science wrote a superb post in the last week of December on DADT and Rape Culture, which didn’t get remotely the attention it deserved, because, of course, it was just after Christmas, and before New Year’s, in America, according to the majority calendar.

Spirited debate did result in comments, and the debate, while tedious and understandably offensive to many, nonetheless had many comments I thought worthwhile.  Open debate is something we try to aim for at Obsidian Wings, though like all bloggers, we have our personal views and prejudices.

I’m extremely grateful to long time and valued commenter Mike Schilling, who has been writing smart stuff online at least since the Nineties on Usenet, for reminding us, and me in particular, of the late Major Andrew Olmsted’s, former co-blogger here on Obsidian Wings and elsewhere (see our upper right sidebar, please), first under his own name, and then under the pseudonym of “G’Kar,” from his beloved Babylon 5, which was one of the best serial space operas yet made for American television, words and views about gays in the military, written December 21, 2007 in a post entitled Military Musings.

Andy started off talking about the M4 carbine, and then moved onto this, which I’ll quote, because he isn’t here to do so himself:

[…] Now, on to other topics, like heterosexism in the military and the breaking of the Army. While I am sure that what OCSteve recalls as the situation extant in his unit when he served prior to Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell (DADT) may have been the case in his unit, I find it less plausible that a similar situation obtained across the entire military. As Jesurgislac points out, the military was discharging people vigorously for their sexuality throughout the 1980s; DADT may have made matters worse for gays and lesbians, but they were far from accepted before that policy arrived. I have nothing but contempt for a policy that permits convicted criminals to serve while asking people to leave simply because their sexuality or gender does not fit neatly into society’s binary system.

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