May 21, 2009
'TIS THE SEASON FOR AWESOME ACTION FILMS
I'm looking forward to seeing Terminator Salvation soon, despite the fact that Cracked is right: it doesn't make any sense. I also loved their calling it "Terminator Salvation (aka Terminator With Batman and Transformers!)." Heh. Whatever, I am still watching it.
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May 20, 2009
A GROKKING POST
I like when other bloggers write about their grokking process. Rachel Lucas is never embarrassed to say, "Hey, I finally get this," and I enjoy reading her for that very reason. She has a new post up about the differences between American and British government. It's a grokking-type post, and I liked it. The comments are worth reading too, I think.
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May 19, 2009
CELEBRATE HOMOGENY
I got an email from an old real-life friend about my Done Waffling post. This friend pointed out that we had a diverse friend group in school, to include Hindus and Muslims, and that exposure to diversity is beneficial for a growing mind. It's a fair point.
My response to that is that no one from our friend group supported honor killings or jihad or shariah.
Look, you all know me by now. You know that I am not really a person who "celebrates diversity." I married someone whose only difference from me is that he likes to sleep. I want to live in a gulch surrounded by people who all think exactly like I do. I don't know if that's an appropriate worldview, but that's who I am. I celebrate homogeny.
But these friends of mine, these other kids who helped make me who I am, they were Americans. Sure, they had a different religion than most of us and they did funny things like fast during Ramadan or not eat beef, but they weren't fundamentally different in value systems than the rest of us. Their families were in the US because they wanted to live under the freedoms and opportunities that the US had to offer, not because they were trying to subvert the system from within.
In short, I don't lump old-school American Muslims in with the ominous groups portrayed in that video.
You don't have to be a WASP to be part of my tribe. But we do have to have common ground: tolerance, respect for the Constitution and institutions of the United States, and an ability to live and let live. Those are decidedly not mainstream beliefs in the communities from whence Muslim immigrants are flooding Europe.
My goal is not to outbreed American Muslims. My husband and I are close friends with two Muslim families that are perfectly lovely, normal, non-terrorist people. My kids could play with their kids any day. And my hope is that their kids will also act as a counterbalance to the extreme Islamofascists' progeny. I consider their kids as part of our American birthrate, not the scary Muslim one depicted in the video.
My goal is to fill our gulch with more like-minded people, to pass on a love for our unique country and all she stands for, and to raise children who can recognize the fundamental difference between the cool brown-skinned kids in their class and the scary enemy.
My response to that is that no one from our friend group supported honor killings or jihad or shariah.
Look, you all know me by now. You know that I am not really a person who "celebrates diversity." I married someone whose only difference from me is that he likes to sleep. I want to live in a gulch surrounded by people who all think exactly like I do. I don't know if that's an appropriate worldview, but that's who I am. I celebrate homogeny.
But these friends of mine, these other kids who helped make me who I am, they were Americans. Sure, they had a different religion than most of us and they did funny things like fast during Ramadan or not eat beef, but they weren't fundamentally different in value systems than the rest of us. Their families were in the US because they wanted to live under the freedoms and opportunities that the US had to offer, not because they were trying to subvert the system from within.
In short, I don't lump old-school American Muslims in with the ominous groups portrayed in that video.
You don't have to be a WASP to be part of my tribe. But we do have to have common ground: tolerance, respect for the Constitution and institutions of the United States, and an ability to live and let live. Those are decidedly not mainstream beliefs in the communities from whence Muslim immigrants are flooding Europe.
My goal is not to outbreed American Muslims. My husband and I are close friends with two Muslim families that are perfectly lovely, normal, non-terrorist people. My kids could play with their kids any day. And my hope is that their kids will also act as a counterbalance to the extreme Islamofascists' progeny. I consider their kids as part of our American birthrate, not the scary Muslim one depicted in the video.
My goal is to fill our gulch with more like-minded people, to pass on a love for our unique country and all she stands for, and to raise children who can recognize the fundamental difference between the cool brown-skinned kids in their class and the scary enemy.
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WHY DOES HE GET TO MEET NETANYAHU?
Yesterday, presented Rachel Lucas style:
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CLEANING
No blogging today. Instead, I've been Facebook updating all day about my cleaning activities. I'm trying to get the house in order because there's a big Blog Meet-Up this weekend: Amritas is coming to visit us. I've known him now for nearly six years, but we've never met in person. It should be a hoot.
I had really let the house go, so a guest is good incentive to deep clean. I even scrubbed the top of the refrigerator...
I had really let the house go, so a guest is good incentive to deep clean. I even scrubbed the top of the refrigerator...
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THE YOUTH VOTE
Lawrence Auster got an email that's too good to not be read in its entirety. It's another exchange about not granting the premise, but it starts from a point I never thought to explore:
(Via Amritas)
What an upside down world we live in. Once upon a time, village elders
were revered because they had lived long enough to know a little bit
about life and propriety. Even in the era of democracy, seniority
systems abounded. It's hard to imagine Grover Cleveland campaigning for
the "youth vote." But today we're told that the least experienced
voters are the ones we should be listening to, even as we worship our
least experienced president.
(Via Amritas)
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May 17, 2009
DONE WAFFLING
I spent all day yesterday waffling on the baby issue. Deep down, I don't feel that confident about going forward. I know you all say that babies are better than dogs, but I just don't know how to believe you. A year ago, I said this:
And now that even more time has passed, and we're looking at pain and money coming into the equation, I feel even less motivation. My husband says it's his job to force the issue and make it happen, because I keep changing my mind. He says doing IVF is my own personal deployment of sorts: no one truly wants to deploy, but they do it because it's the right thing to do and it's part of who they are and their value system.
This morning I found a video via Up North Mommy that stopped my waffling.
It reminded me of a major reason why I wanted to procreate in the first place: to create more humans with my value system. To make more Americans. I don't know how it sounds when I say things like that, but I mean it from the depth of everything I believe in. I'm not just being xenophobic or anti-Muslim; it's the loss of my own culture that motivates me. I'd like for there to be more people in this world like my husband and me, more people for my tribe, more people for our gulch.
And I'm now ready to spend $12,000 to make it happen.
And I was never one of those women who loves babies or wanted to be a
kindergarten teacher her whole life. This may sound terrible, but
there's a part of me that's ready to throw in the towel because the
more elusive it gets, the less important it feels. The less
emotional it feels. I think human beings ought to procreate, and I
think that people with stable, loving homes like ours are a good place
for kids. (And Mark Steyn makes me think I need to have ten of them, to
shore up our numbers.) I was always fairly matter-of-fact about having
a baby anyway, and this year of over-thinking it hasn't helped any. My
husband re-convinces me every day to keep trying, because I'd love to
abandon hope and forget about it.
And now that even more time has passed, and we're looking at pain and money coming into the equation, I feel even less motivation. My husband says it's his job to force the issue and make it happen, because I keep changing my mind. He says doing IVF is my own personal deployment of sorts: no one truly wants to deploy, but they do it because it's the right thing to do and it's part of who they are and their value system.
This morning I found a video via Up North Mommy that stopped my waffling.
It reminded me of a major reason why I wanted to procreate in the first place: to create more humans with my value system. To make more Americans. I don't know how it sounds when I say things like that, but I mean it from the depth of everything I believe in. I'm not just being xenophobic or anti-Muslim; it's the loss of my own culture that motivates me. I'd like for there to be more people in this world like my husband and me, more people for my tribe, more people for our gulch.
And I'm now ready to spend $12,000 to make it happen.
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May 16, 2009
INTERESTING
An interesting tidbit on Pres Obama from an old Christopher Hitchens article:
[David Freddoso's book] has the fairly easy task of showing that Obama comes from a far more “left†milieu than any Democratic nominee
before him. I believe I could prove this by my own unaided efforts:
when Newsweek’s Jon Meacham asked both presidential candidates
for a sample of their reading matter, he got back a fairly strong list
from each. Obama gave John Steinbeck’s In Dubious Battle where someone else might have been content to put The Grapes of Wrath.
Whereas the latter is about suffering and stoicism, the former is about
how the field hands finally rebel, and how the “organizer†helps them
to do so.
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MOTHER FAIL
OK, this probably makes me a terrible person, but I think this is hilarious and if one of my nuttier readers got it for my kid, I would totally crack up and let him play with it. (I can see AWTM's husband or Chuck Z buying it.)
see more pwn and owned pictures
Found by Wife Unit, who totally groks my brand of quirky.
see more pwn and owned pictures
Found by Wife Unit, who totally groks my brand of quirky.
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SWEEP THE NATION
Still the Biggest Missing Story In Politics:
I believe that could be true. I think Republicans lose because they try to out-Democrat their opponents. I think a real, true conservative who stayed on point and principle, who didn't try to beat Democrats at their own game and instead stopped granting them their premises, would take the nation by storm.
John McCain lost fairly narrowly, and do you know anyone who really wanted him as our candidate?
A fiscal conservative, who
was perceived as a fiscal conservative running against a fiscal
liberal, would win a landslide greater than any in the history of these
two political parties. A candidate perceived as both a social
conservative and a fiscal conservative would win one quarter of the
Democrat Party vote, if the Democrat was perceived as a liberal, and
sweep the nation easily.
I believe that could be true. I think Republicans lose because they try to out-Democrat their opponents. I think a real, true conservative who stayed on point and principle, who didn't try to beat Democrats at their own game and instead stopped granting them their premises, would take the nation by storm.
John McCain lost fairly narrowly, and do you know anyone who really wanted him as our candidate?
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May 15, 2009
FROM CRUSHINGLY DOWN TO RELATIVELY ASSUAGED
When I first found out about my balanced translocation, I was so happy to have a reason. I felt this weight lifted, that now I finally knew why I was doomed to so much sadness. I was happy knowing that there was a plan and a way to solve our problem.
But today reality set in, and I feel despair.
I met with the doctor today to discuss IVF. As usual, this man channels my inner Mrs. White. And I left in a daze, not knowing whether I was more disturbed by the flames on the side of my face or by the lump forming in my throat.
Call me naive, but this process is going to cost far more than I anticipated.
All my initial ballpark figures I'd been working with, supplied by people who've done this here in town before and the genetics counselor, well...they doubled today. The PGD that I was told would be around $2000? Nope, it's $5000. Oh, and we have to pay to freeze sperm, since my husband will be deployed. And then we have to pay for the more expensive, extra special IVF that they have to do with frozen sperm. The numbers that I had in my mind of how much all this would cost was half of what it really will cost. And that's even with the sizable discount we're getting because we will be using a military doctor.
And that's per month.
The sick thing is, we have the money. We could pay cash tomorrow for this and not really blink (especially in this absurd economy, where money ain't worth the paper it's printed on). But that's the rub that makes the choice kinda rough.
The local clinic said that they've never had anyone do PGD. The receptionist said that the pricetag scares people away, so no one has ever taken them up on it. And if we didn't have the money either, we would have to resort to good old trial and error: keep on babymaking at home and hoping that we flip heads instead of tails one month. The choice would be made for us by the fact that we had no option to do the expensive treatment.
But it's a bit harder to have that choice to make. It's hard to know that you could just keep flipping that coin for free and eventually end up with a baby, and conversely to know that we could spend many thousands of dollars and still end up with nothing. There are so many ways this hinges on luck. The doctor said that he could probably get 15-20 eggs from me. He said usually about 80% will fertilize. So on the low end, that means 12. Statistically speaking, half my eggs should be duds, so if we could get six good ones, we'd do the first try with three. If we get pregnant, hooray. If we don't, we have three back-ups to try again another month (at a decent-sized repeat fee, of course).
But that's statistically speaking. Of all the eggs I was born with, half should be good. But all those eggs is a far bigger sample size than what they can extract. Heck, we've already flipped three tails in a row. A small sample size of 15 eggs is not necessarily going to break down 50/50, just like 15 coin tosses won't either. (To illustrate: my father is one of 13 children, 7 girls and 6 boys. But I also know of another 13-child family with 12 boys and 1 girl.)
What if we only get one good egg? And what if it doesn't take? What if we spend all this money and come out with nothing in the end? Could I live with that?
Could I live with not trying for it in the first place?
My husband got home from training while I was writing this post. I hurredly cashed today's chips and told him how stressed I was about the whole thing. My husband, the stingiest man on the planet, waved off concerns of money and said resolutely that we are going to go through with this.
Oh, but we can't even begin to get these ducks in a row until at least September. So I had asked the doctor about babymaking at home for the two months until my husband deploys. I asked: if we got pregnant and we had another miscarriage, would that prevent us from going ahead in September? It shouldn't.
So I asked my husband if he wanted to try to take the cheap way out, if he wanted to take another gamble at home and try for a healthy baby the old-fashioned way, to see if we could get away with not spending those many thousands of dollars. He vehemently declared that he is done with babymaking at home and does not want to spend our last weeks together fussing over basal thermometers and pregnancy tests.
My husband managed to take the edge off over this whole thing. I feel much less panicked now than I did when I sat down to start this post two hours ago. (He also said he doesn't want me stressing our for the next few months each time I want to buy a ball of yarn either, because he is the most fantastic husband on the planet.)
So I guess we're going to do this. I think. My husband said, "We paid $500 for that ol' dog, and look how much joy he brings us. The baby will be even better."
Someone with kids assure me that a child is 24 times better than a dog...
But today reality set in, and I feel despair.
I met with the doctor today to discuss IVF. As usual, this man channels my inner Mrs. White. And I left in a daze, not knowing whether I was more disturbed by the flames on the side of my face or by the lump forming in my throat.
Call me naive, but this process is going to cost far more than I anticipated.
All my initial ballpark figures I'd been working with, supplied by people who've done this here in town before and the genetics counselor, well...they doubled today. The PGD that I was told would be around $2000? Nope, it's $5000. Oh, and we have to pay to freeze sperm, since my husband will be deployed. And then we have to pay for the more expensive, extra special IVF that they have to do with frozen sperm. The numbers that I had in my mind of how much all this would cost was half of what it really will cost. And that's even with the sizable discount we're getting because we will be using a military doctor.
And that's per month.
The sick thing is, we have the money. We could pay cash tomorrow for this and not really blink (especially in this absurd economy, where money ain't worth the paper it's printed on). But that's the rub that makes the choice kinda rough.
The local clinic said that they've never had anyone do PGD. The receptionist said that the pricetag scares people away, so no one has ever taken them up on it. And if we didn't have the money either, we would have to resort to good old trial and error: keep on babymaking at home and hoping that we flip heads instead of tails one month. The choice would be made for us by the fact that we had no option to do the expensive treatment.
But it's a bit harder to have that choice to make. It's hard to know that you could just keep flipping that coin for free and eventually end up with a baby, and conversely to know that we could spend many thousands of dollars and still end up with nothing. There are so many ways this hinges on luck. The doctor said that he could probably get 15-20 eggs from me. He said usually about 80% will fertilize. So on the low end, that means 12. Statistically speaking, half my eggs should be duds, so if we could get six good ones, we'd do the first try with three. If we get pregnant, hooray. If we don't, we have three back-ups to try again another month (at a decent-sized repeat fee, of course).
But that's statistically speaking. Of all the eggs I was born with, half should be good. But all those eggs is a far bigger sample size than what they can extract. Heck, we've already flipped three tails in a row. A small sample size of 15 eggs is not necessarily going to break down 50/50, just like 15 coin tosses won't either. (To illustrate: my father is one of 13 children, 7 girls and 6 boys. But I also know of another 13-child family with 12 boys and 1 girl.)
What if we only get one good egg? And what if it doesn't take? What if we spend all this money and come out with nothing in the end? Could I live with that?
Could I live with not trying for it in the first place?
My husband got home from training while I was writing this post. I hurredly cashed today's chips and told him how stressed I was about the whole thing. My husband, the stingiest man on the planet, waved off concerns of money and said resolutely that we are going to go through with this.
Oh, but we can't even begin to get these ducks in a row until at least September. So I had asked the doctor about babymaking at home for the two months until my husband deploys. I asked: if we got pregnant and we had another miscarriage, would that prevent us from going ahead in September? It shouldn't.
So I asked my husband if he wanted to try to take the cheap way out, if he wanted to take another gamble at home and try for a healthy baby the old-fashioned way, to see if we could get away with not spending those many thousands of dollars. He vehemently declared that he is done with babymaking at home and does not want to spend our last weeks together fussing over basal thermometers and pregnancy tests.
My husband managed to take the edge off over this whole thing. I feel much less panicked now than I did when I sat down to start this post two hours ago. (He also said he doesn't want me stressing our for the next few months each time I want to buy a ball of yarn either, because he is the most fantastic husband on the planet.)
So I guess we're going to do this. I think. My husband said, "We paid $500 for that ol' dog, and look how much joy he brings us. The baby will be even better."
Someone with kids assure me that a child is 24 times better than a dog...
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SCARY
Want to have a heart attack about what's in our future? Check out McQ's charts (via CG).
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May 12, 2009
FROM SMALLVILLE TO GITMO
So I'm still watching Smallville, even though it jumped the shark long ago. I can't give up this far into the game.
I've always wondered if the writers intentionally make parallels to the GWOT, or if it's coincidental that I find these metaphors. And lately, Clark Kent's slavish adherence to his moral code has begun to grate on me.
Green Arrow is a good guy, but he doesn't see the world as black and white like Clark does. He killed Lex Luthor to save Clark. And he nearly killed again last week to save Clark again. He's a good guy, through and through, but there's some Jack Bauer in him: he sees that the ends justify the means in some cases, and he weighs the fate of one against the fate of many. And to him, the fate of Clark Kent is intensely important.
He and Clark have butted heads in recent episodes, namely because Green Arrow wants Clark to kill Doomsday (I know, I know, stay with me just a little longer) but Clark wants to try to save him. Then Green Arrow admitted that he had killed Lex. Their animosity culminated in this exchange last week:
When Clark isn't buying it, Green Arrow says that even though they don't always see eye to eye on methods, they're still on the same side. Clark looks him dead in the eye and says, "No we're not."
Clark's life and work is made inherently easier by the fact that Lex Luthor is no longer alive. He is now free to save lives instead of battling Lex, and Lex can no longer try to kill him. Instead of thanking Green Arrow for saving his life and helping neutralize the threat, he insists that, in killing his enemy, Green Arrow has now become his enemy. He denounces Green Arrow and says they're not on the same side...because Green Arrow killed a murderous megalomaniac who was hell-bent on killing Clark Kent, the last, best hope for mankind?
I find that frustrating.
Does that sound like a waterboarding debate to anyone else but me?
What has been bugging me about Clark Kent lately is that he calmly accepts fallout from not taking action. Doomsday has killed hundreds of people, but Clark refuses to kill him out of morality. It's wrong to take a life, no matter whose. And killing Doomsday instead of trying to rehabilitate him is outside the bounds of Clark's code of conduct.
And I call baloney on that, like Green Arrow does.
Clark had the chance to kill Doomsday last episode and he didn't take it. So the body count keeps rising as more innocent citizens of Metropolis keep dying. I don't understand how Clark is making the more moral choice. He doesn't want to be responsible for taking a life, but by refusing to act, his inaction is causing the death of far more people.
In fact, Clark's morality is so black and white that he refuses to even kill in self defense. And I suppose that's a sustainable position for the Man of Steel, but for those of us not blessed with bulletproof skin and the ability to turn the earth backwards on its axis, things may not be so stark.
I find parallels here to the current discussion of enhanced interrogation methods. For me, it's not black and white. There are factors we can't know and can't control. There are choices that have to be made, and the fate of one does have to be weighed against the fate of many. Moreover, I personally find the whole discussion after the fact to be disingenuous. It reminds me of an opening thought experiment in The Black Swan:
So now in hindsight we're trying to assign blame and point fingers, when we -- the general public, those of us who are not privy to top secret documents -- have no way of knowing what was prevented by some of these "enhanced interrogation techniques." And hell, in one case we do have a pretty good idea of what was prevented: Khalid Sheikh Mohammad spilled the beans on further attacks in other US cities. Like Clark Kent, we get self-righteous. We say what we would do in the scenario, but we just simply don't have all the information to make that call. So we discuss it in our homes and our coffee houses, from a position of safety, because other men shoulder the burden of protecting us, thereby enabling us to sip coffee with clean hands.
For me, there is a lot of gray in this issue. There is a line to be drawn, and I believe we should discuss where that line falls. I suppose I have a modicum of respect for people who say they wouldn't use waterboarding even if their own kids' lives were on the line, because I too have said that my values aren't relative, and that I wouldn't abandon my values to save my own family. If you're willing to put your money where your mouth is, I can respect that. It's not my position, but I try to respect its lack of hypocrisy, the same as I do for people who are strictly pro-life in all cases, including rape and incest. Not my position, but at least it's internally consistent. So I can muster respect for the worldview, even if it gives me pause.
Because I still think there is a debate here. I find myself frustrated by people like Jon Stewart, and like Clark Kent, who insist there is no line at all. That doing anything -- even just forced nudity and sleep deprivation -- to protect American lives makes us no better than terrorists.
I just don't think it's that simple.
And the simple-ness of Clark Kent has been bugging me lately.
I've always wondered if the writers intentionally make parallels to the GWOT, or if it's coincidental that I find these metaphors. And lately, Clark Kent's slavish adherence to his moral code has begun to grate on me.
Green Arrow is a good guy, but he doesn't see the world as black and white like Clark does. He killed Lex Luthor to save Clark. And he nearly killed again last week to save Clark again. He's a good guy, through and through, but there's some Jack Bauer in him: he sees that the ends justify the means in some cases, and he weighs the fate of one against the fate of many. And to him, the fate of Clark Kent is intensely important.
He and Clark have butted heads in recent episodes, namely because Green Arrow wants Clark to kill Doomsday (I know, I know, stay with me just a little longer) but Clark wants to try to save him. Then Green Arrow admitted that he had killed Lex. Their animosity culminated in this exchange last week:
GA: You don't have the guts to take out that murdering bastard, so I come in and mop up your mess, and what do you do? You get all self-righteous on me. We do what we have to do, Clark.
When Clark isn't buying it, Green Arrow says that even though they don't always see eye to eye on methods, they're still on the same side. Clark looks him dead in the eye and says, "No we're not."
Clark's life and work is made inherently easier by the fact that Lex Luthor is no longer alive. He is now free to save lives instead of battling Lex, and Lex can no longer try to kill him. Instead of thanking Green Arrow for saving his life and helping neutralize the threat, he insists that, in killing his enemy, Green Arrow has now become his enemy. He denounces Green Arrow and says they're not on the same side...because Green Arrow killed a murderous megalomaniac who was hell-bent on killing Clark Kent, the last, best hope for mankind?
I find that frustrating.
GA: How many more lives are you willing to sacrifice if your plan fails this time, Clark? Put your ego aside; you have a responsibility...
CK: My only responsibility is to do what's right. Like it or not, we stand for something. We set an example for others to follow, and if we don't, then we're no better than the people we fight.
CK: My only responsibility is to do what's right. Like it or not, we stand for something. We set an example for others to follow, and if we don't, then we're no better than the people we fight.
Does that sound like a waterboarding debate to anyone else but me?
What has been bugging me about Clark Kent lately is that he calmly accepts fallout from not taking action. Doomsday has killed hundreds of people, but Clark refuses to kill him out of morality. It's wrong to take a life, no matter whose. And killing Doomsday instead of trying to rehabilitate him is outside the bounds of Clark's code of conduct.
And I call baloney on that, like Green Arrow does.
Clark had the chance to kill Doomsday last episode and he didn't take it. So the body count keeps rising as more innocent citizens of Metropolis keep dying. I don't understand how Clark is making the more moral choice. He doesn't want to be responsible for taking a life, but by refusing to act, his inaction is causing the death of far more people.
In fact, Clark's morality is so black and white that he refuses to even kill in self defense. And I suppose that's a sustainable position for the Man of Steel, but for those of us not blessed with bulletproof skin and the ability to turn the earth backwards on its axis, things may not be so stark.
I find parallels here to the current discussion of enhanced interrogation methods. For me, it's not black and white. There are factors we can't know and can't control. There are choices that have to be made, and the fate of one does have to be weighed against the fate of many. Moreover, I personally find the whole discussion after the fact to be disingenuous. It reminds me of an opening thought experiment in The Black Swan:
Assume that a legislator...manages to enact a law that goes into universal effect on September 10, 2001; it imposes the continuously locked bulletproof doors in every cockpit (at high cost to the struggling airlines) -- just in case terrorists decide to use planes to attack the World Trade Center in New York City. ... The legislation is not a popular measure among the airline personnel, as it complicates their lives. But it certainly would've prevented 9/11.
The person who imposed locks on cockpit doors gets no statues in public squares, not so much as a quick mention of his contribution in his obituary. "Joe Smith, who helped avoid the disaster of 9/11, died of complications of liver disease." Seeing how superfluous his measure was, and how it squandered resources, the public, with great help from airline pilots, might well boot him out of office. ... He will retire depressed, with a great sense of failure. He will die with the impression of having done nothing useful.
The person who imposed locks on cockpit doors gets no statues in public squares, not so much as a quick mention of his contribution in his obituary. "Joe Smith, who helped avoid the disaster of 9/11, died of complications of liver disease." Seeing how superfluous his measure was, and how it squandered resources, the public, with great help from airline pilots, might well boot him out of office. ... He will retire depressed, with a great sense of failure. He will die with the impression of having done nothing useful.
So now in hindsight we're trying to assign blame and point fingers, when we -- the general public, those of us who are not privy to top secret documents -- have no way of knowing what was prevented by some of these "enhanced interrogation techniques." And hell, in one case we do have a pretty good idea of what was prevented: Khalid Sheikh Mohammad spilled the beans on further attacks in other US cities. Like Clark Kent, we get self-righteous. We say what we would do in the scenario, but we just simply don't have all the information to make that call. So we discuss it in our homes and our coffee houses, from a position of safety, because other men shoulder the burden of protecting us, thereby enabling us to sip coffee with clean hands.
For me, there is a lot of gray in this issue. There is a line to be drawn, and I believe we should discuss where that line falls. I suppose I have a modicum of respect for people who say they wouldn't use waterboarding even if their own kids' lives were on the line, because I too have said that my values aren't relative, and that I wouldn't abandon my values to save my own family. If you're willing to put your money where your mouth is, I can respect that. It's not my position, but I try to respect its lack of hypocrisy, the same as I do for people who are strictly pro-life in all cases, including rape and incest. Not my position, but at least it's internally consistent. So I can muster respect for the worldview, even if it gives me pause.
Because I still think there is a debate here. I find myself frustrated by people like Jon Stewart, and like Clark Kent, who insist there is no line at all. That doing anything -- even just forced nudity and sleep deprivation -- to protect American lives makes us no better than terrorists.
I just don't think it's that simple.
And the simple-ness of Clark Kent has been bugging me lately.
Posted by: Sarah at
03:35 PM
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HEH
I heart Chuck Z. His latest post made me LOL, srsly.
Posted by: Sarah at
09:29 AM
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KIDS IN THE HALL
AWTM always reminds me of things that I like. Weeks ago she put up a link to a Kids In the Hall sketch called "Seven Things To Do." I was reminded of how much I love that show and prompted to go buy three seasons of it.
Here's another good one I found, which I think is especially germane today...
Here's another good one I found, which I think is especially germane today...
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08:29 AM
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LINKS
Via Conservative Grapevine:
Melissa Clouthier's Poor, Poor Put-Upon Moderates
Fred Barnes' Be the Party of No
Mark Steyn's Climb
Melissa Clouthier's Poor, Poor Put-Upon Moderates
This is the problem right now. Being a Republican means nothing. Well,
according to the Left and the disgruntled moderates, it means
closed-mindedness. What is especially galling is that moderates
continue to attack what they say is their own side when it’s impossible
to differentiate them from the Left.
Fred Barnes' Be the Party of No
Improving the party's image is a worthy cause, but it isn't what
Republicans ought to be emphasizing right now. They have a more
important mission: to be the party of no. And not just a party that
bucks Obama and Democrats on easy issues like releasing Gitmo
terrorists in this country, but one committed to aggressive,
attention-grabbing opposition to the entire Obama agenda.
Mark Steyn's Climb
Consider this cooing profile of Secretary Powell from Todd Purdum in the New York Times
back in 2002: “Mr. Powell’s approach to almost all issues — foreign or
domestic — is pragmatic and nonideological. He is internationalist,
multilateralist and moderate. He has supported abortion rights and
affirmative action.â€
So supporting “internationalism,†“multilateralism,†abortion, and racial quotas means you’re “moderate†and “nonideological� And anyone who feels differently is an extreme ideologue?
So supporting “internationalism,†“multilateralism,†abortion, and racial quotas means you’re “moderate†and “nonideological� And anyone who feels differently is an extreme ideologue?
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07:22 AM
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VERIZON EVENT HORIZON
Whenever I start to get nervous about the danger of my husband's job, I remember that we've made a formal pact to die on the same day when we're old. Neither one of us wants to live without the other, so shortly after we got married, we just decided we were going to die on the same day. (The black hole idea is a more recent manifestation of this pact.) I know it's basically the Team America "I promise I will never die" fallacy, but when the going gets rough, we find peace in the thought that we'll have our whole lives full of happiness and togetherness and then our matter will be crushed together into infinite density.
Last week, my cell phone died. White screen of death and all. I ordered a new battery, but it doesn't seem to want to hold a charge.
Last night, my husband called from training on a borrowed cell phone. Seems his phone -- a different make and model -- also mysteriously died and won't hold a charge.
Apparently our cell phones also love each other so much that his couldn't live without mine either. They didn't die on the same day, but it was close enough to make us think we put out some serious connected vibes.
And if my phone doesn't get itself charged up here soon, I may throw it into a black hole.
Last week, my cell phone died. White screen of death and all. I ordered a new battery, but it doesn't seem to want to hold a charge.
Last night, my husband called from training on a borrowed cell phone. Seems his phone -- a different make and model -- also mysteriously died and won't hold a charge.
Apparently our cell phones also love each other so much that his couldn't live without mine either. They didn't die on the same day, but it was close enough to make us think we put out some serious connected vibes.
And if my phone doesn't get itself charged up here soon, I may throw it into a black hole.
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06:37 AM
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May 11, 2009
SERVICE COMPLETED
Continuing in my streak of always hitting the smaller percentage, I was one of the group of potential jurors who were released early when they ended up starting fewer trials today than expected. It was bittersweet: I am glad to have the rest of the week free and all to myself, but I was a little disappointed to not see the inner workings of the judicial system.
But I am severely glad that I didn't have to spend another minute stuck in a room with daytime television. I know these shows have viewers, and I apologize if you are one of them, but I cannot stand the talk shows that pepper the day. Moreover, I am just simply not a big fan of public TVs. I was far happier for the first quiet hour with my book and knitting than I was when she turned on that danged TV. If I had to hear any more Dr. Phil, I might've had to plead temporary insanity myself.
In other goofiness, since I get paid for a day as a juror and only was there for a short time, I will almost make as much today as I would've made for the same time at my real job. Which is in itself a tad depressing.
But no time to be depressed: I have a whole week with nothing scheduled. And I literally mean nothing.
It sounds heavenly.
But I am severely glad that I didn't have to spend another minute stuck in a room with daytime television. I know these shows have viewers, and I apologize if you are one of them, but I cannot stand the talk shows that pepper the day. Moreover, I am just simply not a big fan of public TVs. I was far happier for the first quiet hour with my book and knitting than I was when she turned on that danged TV. If I had to hear any more Dr. Phil, I might've had to plead temporary insanity myself.
In other goofiness, since I get paid for a day as a juror and only was there for a short time, I will almost make as much today as I would've made for the same time at my real job. Which is in itself a tad depressing.
But no time to be depressed: I have a whole week with nothing scheduled. And I literally mean nothing.
It sounds heavenly.
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11:51 AM
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JURY DUTY
My husband left this morning for a week of training, and I have been summoned for jury duty. I have no idea how the experience will turn out, but I just hope I'm done in five days.
More later.
More later.
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06:27 AM
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May 10, 2009
A FAMILY
Need more perspective today?
A family came into the store this morning: a father and four pre-teens, probably ranging from age 10-15. They were there to buy a memorial bouquet to put at their mother's grave.
I barely managed to keep the tears in.
My life is good.
A family came into the store this morning: a father and four pre-teens, probably ranging from age 10-15. They were there to buy a memorial bouquet to put at their mother's grave.
I barely managed to keep the tears in.
My life is good.
Posted by: Sarah at
04:07 PM
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