Archive for January, 2009

Last week Buckethead pointed out this video:

Remember, George W. Bush was just like Hitler and his administration was Nazi. This sort of thing, meanwhile, is constructive. I mean, Bruce Springsteen didn’t play at Bush’s inauguration, did he?

(Uncomfortable question time: Aren’t these people saying that they weren’t being great mothers and great fathers before Obama was elected? That only now they will represent their country with pride, dignity, and honesty? That they didn’t care for the elderly until now? That they didn’t meet their neighbors? Suddenly they’re going to worry about the environment today? Seriously, I was doing a lot of these things already. Why weren’t they?)

Obviously the video is drivel. The problem is that many people are going to buy the drivel. Buy it by the bucket.

Ace:

Celebrities Who’ve Maligned America for Eight Years Suddenly Announce “We’re All In This Together”

Remember when they put out a similar video after 9/11? Nope, me neither.

He also uses a naughty word.

The Iowahawk transcription is, predictably, a bit funny.

Dirk Benedict as Starbuck

Dirk Benedict seems upset.

There was a time, I know I was there, when men were men, women were women and sometimes a cigar was just a good smoke. But 40 years of feminism have taken their toll. The war against masculinity has been won. Everything has turned into its opposite, so that what was once flirting and smoking is now sexual harassment and criminal. And everyone is more lonely and miserable as a result.

Witness the “re-imagined” “Battlestar Galactica,” bleak, miserable, despairing, angry and confused. Which is to say, it reflects in microcosm the complete change in the politics and morality of today’s world, as opposed to the world of yesterday.

For the record, at one point I was telling people that I thought the new BSG was maybe the best sci-fi television series ever. I had my quibbles with some of the politics and with some of the twists and turns in the storyline, but it was overall outstanding.

Then, one day, I basically lost interest. I don’t think I’ve watched since Starbuck (the girl one) flew out of the cloud or something at the end of an episode or season or whatever. We TiVoed the following episodes but never got around to watching them. Sometimes I wonder what ever happened with those people, but I don’t wonder hard enough to watch.

Also for the record, I’m not much of a television watcher to begin with. So my opinion on the viability of television shows doesn’t really count for much.

Regarding Benedict’s points about feminism, sexual harassment, and the “un-imagining” of BSG, I’ve got to say that even if I don’t agree 100% with him on everything, I think he’s coming from the right direction on most of it.

Antietam Overview: Map by Hal Jespersen, www.posix.com/CW

See Jespersen’s full collection of Civil War maps. Great reference source.

Cat pic.

USS Green Bay (LPD 20) to be commissioned tomorrow:

Named for the Wisconsin city that’s home to the NFL’s Green Bay Packers, the ship is decked out with city and team paraphernalia, including team logos affixed to a pair of capstans, on sofa pillows in the chiefs’ lounge and on crew members’ official ballcaps. There’s even a life-size photo of famed former Packers quarterback Brett Favre, on a bulkhead by the enlisted mess.

The crew named the main passageway leading from the ship’s large flight deck as the “Hall of Heroes,” and plaques detail the story of Wisconsin-born sailors and Marines killed in combat.

Let’s hope they finally get one right in the LPD 17 class. The first couple were pretty shaky and the third still suffered from stuff you’d think they’d have ironed out by now.

USS San Antonio (LPD 17) spend 25 days in a Bahrain port for emergency repairs during a deployment but has now joined the hunt for pirates.

Meanwhile, the Makin Island (LHD 8) is now scheduled to be delivered in May rather than, well, two months ago.

The Devil, of course, is in the details. But these 5 Policy Changes Obama Should Make Now all seem to make pretty good sense and would appeal to most people on both side of the aisle. (via Instapundit)

Very timely: Inside Gitmo: The True Story Behind the Myths of Guantanamo Bay by Gordon Cucullu:

The U.S. military detention center at Guantánamo Bay—known to the public as Gitmo—has been called the American Gulag, a scene of medieval horrors where innocent farmers and goat herders swept up in Afghanistan and Iraq have been sequestered, tortured, and abused for years on end without access to legal counsel or basic medical services.

Gordon Cucullu, a retired army colonel, was so appalled by these reports that he decided to see for himself. In a series of visits he inspected every corner of the camp and interviewed dozens of personnel, from guards and interrogators to cooks and nurses. The result—coming just as the Obama administration wants to close the facility—is a riveting description of daily life for both prisoners and guards. Cucullu describes the six camps reserved for different levels of compliance, details the treatment of prisoners, and examines their experiences in detail, including the techniques used to interrogate them, the food they eat, their medical care, how they communicate with one another, and the many ingenious ways they contrive to assault and injure their guards.

While some prisoners were indeed treated harshly in the early days, when the hastily built camp was flooded with battlefield captures and fears ran high of another 9/11-style attack, Cucullu finds that these excesses were quickly corrected. Current treatment and oversight routines exceed the standards of any maximum-security prison in the world.

Despite what the public has heard, these are not innocent goatherds but dedicated jihadists whose overriding goal—as they themselves candidly say—is to kill Americans. Should they now be released to return to the fight, perhaps on American soil? Read this book and decide for yourself.

Jack Murtha Volunteers his District to House Gitmo Detainees

Murtha only has a minimum security prison in his district. But he says he’d have no reservations about holding detainees there in a maximum security prison.

“Sure, I’d take ‘em,” said Murtha, an outspoken critic of the Iraq war. “They’re no more dangerous in my district than in Guantanamo.”

Jeebers.

Is dissent still patriotic?

No, but it’s probably racist. We’ll see, but I continue to fear that race relations may be set back quite a bit during the next few years. I hope I’m wrong.

Meanwhile: “I pledge to be a servant to our President…”

Next week: The director’s cut with the big “Kumbaya” scene restored…