Current, and recent, events

I have a cold. Colds suck. I hate being sick, life comes to a halt. So, since nothing interesting is going on this week I'll take the chance to comment on a couple news pieces that I missed during the Dark Ages of my blog.

First of all, Freedom Fries. Wow. This is quite possibly the single most childish idea I've ever heard from an adult. And it came from a member of Congress? What an embarassment. Lawmakers in Pennsylvania tried to pass a law banning French wines and other beverages imported from our reluctant allies. Many restaurants and "patriotic" citizens boycotted French's mustard. This was followed by other various silly boycotts, including the South Carolina legislature attempting to boycott tires which they did not realize were made in their own state. So, in response to a political dispute the leaders of the Land of the Free harmed American businesses and attempted to reduce the American consumer's freedom to choose. Yay.

Despite the happy picture of Iraq Bush tried to paint, this last week has been a very difficult one for major cities like Baghdad and Basra. Political leaders like Rumsfeld made empty promises that the US would stop the looting while many in the military claimed that it was not their job to stop the looting. The very same day that Rumsfeld made the claim, "Where [US troops] see looting, they are stopping it." was one of the worst days of looting. One story emerged of an Iraqi shopkeeper screaming "Is this your liberation?" at a US tank crew who stood by watched as his hardware store was pillaged. The situation was handled badly enough to prompt two of Bush's senior advisors to resign in protest. The coalition forces have disbanded Iraq's law enforcement but not replaced it, they have damaged the country's infrastructure but not repaired it, they have eliminated the basic provisions for the population (food, medical, etc) but not yet provided any. Are they liberators or destroyers? As Bush's former cultural advisor Martin Sullivan pointed out, this is a pre-emptive war and these things could have been planned for. Sadly, I'm aware of only two services that the US military came into Iraq ready to provide. The Pentagon had a radio station ready to set up and broadcast propaganda. And before the war started a company had been contracted to extinguish and seal any flaming oil wells.

In lighter news, a pair of farmers here in SoCal put 30,000 live chickens in a wood chipper. That must have been some mess to clean up. Also, police in Indiana responded to an injury call to find out that the cause was two Amish fellows drag racing buggies.