Tuesday, August 06, 2013 

How US national security policy works.

1. Allow incredibly wide access to various databases, and then act surprised and outraged when the occasional Manning/Snowden decides the wider public should know about the war crimes/corruption/abuse of civil liberties that are contained within those files.

2. Charge whistleblowers under the Espionage Act, a law drawn up during the first world war designed to target those undermining the war effort.  Alternatively, in the case of Manning, go one step further and actively pursue him on charges of aiding the enemy, on the basis that someone in al-Qaida might have downloaded a few of the thousands of files he sent to Wikileaks at some point or another.

3. When trying to regain the initiative following Snowden's revelations, leak to the New York Times and CNN that messages intercepted between the leader of al-Qaida central and al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula were the basis for the closing of embassies throughout Africa and the Middle East, making it abundantly clear to the enemy that if they didn't already know they were being listened to, they most certainly do now.

(P.S. The blog is loading slowly due to on-going problems with the server.  All data is being transferred to a replacement, but it's taking a while.)

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8/06/2013 07:20:00 pm | |

Wednesday, August 11, 2010 

An "Islamic mosque" and political language.

There's been a lot of hyperbolic rhetoric expressed against the plans to build an Islamic cultural and community centre within 2 blocks of where the World Trade Center used to stand, and also the inimitable Sarah Palin coining the neologism refudiate in the process. Best so far though has to be this effort by Bryan Fischer, from the American Family Association:

Permits should not be granted to build even one more mosque in the United States of America, let alone the monstrosity planned for Ground Zero. This is for one simple reason: each Islamic mosque is dedicated to the overthrow of the American government.

Not because of his casually asserted claim that every single American Muslim must therefore be dedicated to overthrowing the federal government, something that the more out there Christian organisations in the US usually stake out as their territory. No, far more interesting is his use of a tautology: why exactly would you ever need to describe a mosque, defined solely by both Chambers and Merriam-Webster as a Muslim place of worship, as an "Islamic mosque"?

The only explanation I can think of, without it being a mistake which has been left uncorrected, is that it just sounds scarier. Islamic mosque. A mosque, regardless of what goes on it, is just a building, and generally non-threatening. Islamic by comparison, feels like a harsh term, almost oppressive, harder than Muslim, colder even than Islam itself. Islamic extremist, Islamic radical, both seem to go together, or the media makes it seem like they do. Hence Islamic mosque makes perfect sense for those trying to build opposition to the Cordoba initiative, and what seems stupid on first glance is instead a cynical piece of political language, calculated and primed for maximum effect.

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8/11/2010 09:51:00 pm | |

Friday, December 07, 2007 

Amerikkka.

No, he doesn't look sinister at all.

It is of course terribly easy to look on in horror at the various political vagaries surrounding the American presidential campaign, but that doesn't stop it from being similarly amusing. As long as those it involves then don't become president.

What then are Mitt Romney's, emerging as a Republican front-runner alongside Rudy Giuliani, favourite books?

“What’s your favorite novel?” is a perennial campaign question, the answer to which presumably gives insight into leadership.

When asked his favorite novel in an interview shown yesterday on the Fox News Channel, Mitt Romney pointed to “Battlefield Earth,” a novel by L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology. That book was turned into a film by John Travolta, a Scientologist.

A spokesman said later it was one of Mr. Romney’s favorite novels. Asked about his favorite book, Mr. Romney cited the Bible.

That would be Romney, a Mormon, selecting as his favourite novel a book by the founder of Scientology and general fraud L. Ron Hubbard, he who formed his own religion in order to get stinkingly rich. Still, that's at least more honest than Joseph Smith and his "visitations" by the Angel Moroni, which just happened to lead to him being able to keep more than one wife. He also seems to be somewhat hedging his bets in selecting the good book as his favourite work of strictly non-fiction, over the less inspired Book of Mormon. Even if you were being charitable towards the more lucid moments of say, Job or Revelation, and decided to ignore that Job is essentially an almost meaningless parable which just showcases how useless belief in God essentially is, and that Revelation has some stunning imagery and elements of allegory as long as you dismiss the interpretations of it as any sort of prophecy, you'd be hard pressed to consider it as any great work of literature. It is however a masterpiece compared to Battlefield Earth, or indeed any of dear L Ron's output.

As well as choice of books, Romney made a lacklustre attempt to channel the spirit of JFK in delivering a speech on how his faith would in no way influence his decisions were he to be elected, the irony being that he was forced into making it because of the Christian right's views on Mormonism. In doing so he actually inferred that the current interpretation of the division of church and state was too rigid, which in a nation where politicised religion has never been more powerful ought to start alarm bells ringing. It also gave birth to this staggering quote:

"Freedom requires religion, just as religion requires freedom."

Even if we accept that some of our ideals or norms and values originate in Christian theology, it is laughable to claim that freedom requires faith to continue, while it is willfully blind to ignore the tyrannies which have been imposed through the ages of the basis of religion. The current ones might be more associated with Islam, but even the briefest knowledge of history gives examples of the past atrocities carried out in the name of Christianity.

Speaking of which, it's not much of a surprise to learn that the CIA decided to disobey orders to hand over all related evidence to the 9/11 commission, instead deciding to destroy two taped sessions of state-sanctioned torture:

"The tapes posed a serious security risk," the CIA's director, Michael Hayden, told agency employees in a statement yesterday. "Were they ever to leak, they would permit identification of your CIA colleagues who had served in the programme, exposing them and their families to retaliation from al-Qaida and its sympathisers."

And not of course allow for prima facie evidence of the legally questionable practice of water-boarding to emerge, nor for the men responsible to be brought to account, who have now been helpfully pardoned and given protection from prosecution. The United States remember, does not torture. It just doesn't get caught doing it, or it lets its sub-ordinates do it instead. Whilst all the Democrat presidential candidates have condemned the use of torture in the "war on terror", the only Republican front-runner to do so is John McCain, who was himself tortured during his captivity in Vietnam. Two others with no chance of winning, the libertarian Ron Paul who has strongly denounced it, and Alan Keyes, who has tied himself in rhetorical knots, have been the others to join him. Our friendly Bible thumper Mitt Romney, meanwhile, called instead for Guantanamo to be doubled in size.

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12/07/2007 10:35:00 pm | |

Wednesday, June 20, 2007 

Quote of the week.

Likewise, air force pilots are urged to bomb sensitively.

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6/20/2007 06:42:00 pm | |

Tuesday, May 29, 2007 

We're doomed.


The world's first creationist museum, which tells visitors the Earth is only about 6,000 years old, has opened its doors in the American midwest.

The Creation Museum claims dinosaurs such as Tyrannosaurus rex lived alongside ancient civilisations but were strictly vegetarian before the Fall of Man and that the Grand Canyon was created by Noah's flood.


Quite so. Why else would the T-rex have had those huge teeth other than to carefully chew only the most succulent foliage available?

Mark Looy, a co-founder of the privately funded centre, said: "The guests were very happy with the museum experience.

"Of course, we had some naysayers come through and engage us in conversation, and that's fine - we want them."

It would perhaps be unkind to suggest that Mark's second name is only an n away from accurately describing his beliefs, but his mindset pales into insignificance compared with the man responsible for some of the museum's hi-tech exhibits:

When Mr Marsh was asked to explain the existence of fossilised remains of man's ancestors, he replied: "There are no such things.

"Humans are basically as you see them today. Those skeletons they've found, what's the word? They could have been deformed, diseased or something.

"I've seen people like that running round the streets of New York."


That's that then. Our evolutionary ancestors are still with us, except they're now dressed up in suits, racing around Wall Street and performing their daily task of being masters of the universe. It all makes sense. How could we have possibly have not noticed?

Over on the Answers in Genesis site, the organisation which has helped fund the "museum", John Upchurch informs of us of how he came to believe:

Many years ago, I first heard about creationism from the mocking pages of an anthropology book and the ridicule of an astronomy professor. I laughed, too—once. But as I was wandering through the corridors of the Creation Museum, watching the videos and reading the exhibits, I kept thinking back to the letter that Ken Ham’s mother sent AiG just before the opening festivities. Her prayer was that the museum would “stand up to the world as a beacon of God’s love, power, and grace.” And that is my prayer, too—that those who are tempted to scorn this museum will, as I did many years ago, find out that creation and science attest to the reality of what God tells us in Genesis.

That reality would involve a spirit being creating the world in seven days, making man and woman in his image, then letting a rogue angel infiltrate the garden of eden disguised as a talking serpent, urging Eve to partake of the forbidden fruit that God had so helpfully installed as a test to whether his subjects would obey him, which she and Adam then do, with God casting them out as a result.

And we think the Scientologists are crazy.

Related post:
Pharyngula - The Creation Museum

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5/29/2007 07:13:00 pm | |

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