Don't put your tongue in a socket. The taste of power is too refined for you.

 

*** India/Pakistan

The Washington Times has this very interesting military analysis of the potential India/Pakistan war. The article/editorial is written by a former undersecretary of defense from the first Bush administration, and it discusses each country's forces, as well as tactical advantages and disadvantages. India obviously has a much larger army. But I was surprised to see that Pakistan has a superior air force.

The article also asserts that diplomatic pressure is unlikely to prevent confrontation, and that the war may commence at any time.
posted by David at 2:08 PM

 

* Health

I love this headline: Late-Night Drinking Impairs Surgical Skill Next Day. According to this brilliant study, surgeons who stay out late drinking suffer a noticeable decline in surgical performance the next morning.
posted by David at 1:57 PM

 

** India/Pakistan

Salon has got an interesting discussion of the India/Pakistan situation. Premium content, yada yada.
posted by David at 10:51 AM

 

* Sports

This article explores Sacramento's inferiority complex with respect to Los Angeles in the context of the current NBA semifinal. I never did like Sacramento anyway.
posted by David at 10:05 AM

 

*** Terrorism

This article from the New York Times Magazine provides a very in-depth discussion of nuclear terrorism possibilities.
posted by David at 2:31 PM

 

* Star Wars

Rumor has it that Padme (Natalie Portman) maybe inserted into future editions of Return of the Jedi, and that Jar Jar may be inserted into future editions of Star Wars.
posted by David at 4:19 PM

 

* Media

According to this NYTimes business section article, Tom Brokaw will remain as NBC's lead anchor until the Novermber 2004 election, at which time he will be replaced by Brian Williams.
posted by David at 4:45 PM

 

* World Cup

The World Cup starts in just a few days. This year, for once, Brazil is not expected to do particularly well. This NYTimes article explains why.
posted by David at 10:51 AM

 

** India/Pakistan Conflict

As today's Debka.com article indicates, nuclear threats continue in India and Pakistan.
posted by David at 1:52 PM

 

*** Religion

Terrific premium Salon article discussing evangelical Christian support of Israel. This article is worth reading even if you are not interested in Israel, because it sheds light on the 46% or so of the American population that describes itself as born-again.
posted by David at 3:41 PM

 

* Military

This NYTimes article discusses military readiness and the impact that an attack on Iraq or North Korea might have on American military capabilities.

I find this interesting because I have had conversations with several people who stated that the US could take on the entire Islamic world in a war and prevail. This article shows that that is not the case. While the US could beat one country at a time, it certainly could not take on a whole host of countries at once.
posted by David at 3:20 PM

 

** Tech

As you may or may not know, the Content industry has been lobbying Congress to enact legislation that would inhibit or prevent digital piracy. The main effort has been to pass a bill called the CBDTPA. This is a bad idea.
But even if that law were to pass, the Content industry would still have a big problem: people can always use analog devices to circumvent the digital protections that would be mandated. For example, even if my MP3 software prevented me from making unauthorized digital copies, I could always just play a music file and then record the output with an analog device.

So now, of course, the Content industry is trying to "plug the a-hole", i.e. the analog hole. They want to require any analog device to shut off if it encountered watermarked content. This is a really really really bad idea. For example, theoretically if you were recording a wedding on your camcorder, and the DJ played a copyrighted tune, the camcorder would shut off if it heard the magical watermark that would be included with all copyrighted content. This would be very comical if it weren't so scary. Slashdot commentary on this issue is interesting, and is available here.
posted by David at 2:00 PM

 

* Terrorism

This Salon article states that French authorities warned the FBI of links between Moussaoui and Al Queda well before 9/11. (Premium content, sorry, but you should subscribe anyway).

In my opinion, the FBI is going to end up taking the fall for the pre-9/11 intelligence fuckups. It's just too convenient, since Mueller became FBI Director very shortly before 9/11. And the previous Director, Louis Freeh, was a Clinton holdover.
posted by David at 3:10 PM

 

*** Terrorism

Uh, let me put it this way. If you are reading this sentence, then you really really should read Debka's May 22 story entitled Fresh Mass-Casualty Terror Wave Plotted for Israel and US - Engineered by Arch-terrorist Mughniyeh. This is way scary. Unfortunately, since I started reading Debka a month or two ago, they have proven to be fairly prescient. If this is correct, well ... read it for yourself.
posted by David at 7:14 PM

 

* Tech

Software radios. Virtually unlimited bandwidth. Is it possible? How would it affect the telecommunications industry. Some interesting things to think about from this Dan Gillmor article.
posted by David at 6:50 PM

 

* Politics

As I'm sure is obvious to all of my readers, the latest terror warnings from the Executive branch seem to be designed to distract the country from focusing on the intelligence failures pre-9/11. Today's Media Notes article does a good job of summarizing the articles on this issue.

* Entertainment

The surviving members of the Grateful Dead are reuniting for a concert for the first time since Jerry Garcia died in 1995.
posted by David at 10:11 AM

 

** Politics

A chilling article on the possibility of a nuclear war between India and Pakistan. Biased to the Indian perspective, but nonetheless a scary read.

And when you're done reading that article, then read this one, by a retired Major General from the Indian armed forces, which argues that it's time for India to retaliate "assymetrically" against Pakistan for the latest violence in Kashmir. The author of this article thinks that it would be unlikely for Pakistan to respond with nukes. But, he argues, even if Pakistan were to launch nuclear weapons, only the northern part of India would be affected, whereas Pakistan would "cease to exist." Yikes!
posted by David at 3:32 PM

 

* Politics

Here's another excellent article on the Condi Rice lie that I've been writing about. The article contains the relevant text from her press conference. It concludes::

For people like Condi Rice to suggest they had never considered this possibility of suicide hijackings is either a bald-faced lie--or a more scathing indictment of our anti-terrorism establishment than any memo the president actually did see.

posted by David at 9:52 AM

 

** Entertainment

This entertaining article argues, not too unconvincingly, that in the Star Wars universe as depicted in the five movies so far, the Empire is good -- preferable to the Rebellion.
posted by David at 2:59 PM

 
Salon.com is doing a great job covering KnowledgeGate. There are five or six excellent articles on the subject posted in their Politics section. Most require registration, but, hey, you oughta subscribe anyway.
posted by David at 2:43 PM

 

** Politics

In my earlier post today, I argued that Condi Rice's justification for not being able to predict 9/11 was a fabrication. Today's Debka article goes into more detail about this issue, and does an admirable job of explaining why Rice's statement is not particularly believable.

Not to mention, of course, the 1999 federal report that warns of possible Al Queda suicide plane attacks.
posted by David at 4:22 PM

 
Oh, there's some good stuff this morning. Here's an article about a state court judge who smoked pot. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ordered a hearing to consider evidence about whether a death sentence rendered during his pot smoking days should be overturned.

And did you know that Neil Young is a Reagan supporter? This and everything else that you didn't want to know about Neil is discussed in this article.

Finally, I can't resist mentioning the unusual Condi Rice press conference yesterday. (Articles are everywhere, so I'm not going to link to one). She almost makes a convincing case that the government had no reason to predict 9/11, but her argument falls in one critical aspect. She stresses that while the governement had warning of hijackings, it had no idea that the hijacked planes could be used in suicide attacks pre-9/11. This is a fabrication. Al Queda's MO is to do suicide attacks, and other governments had prepared for plane missiles in the past (e.g. at a G8 meeting in Europe). In my opinion it was implicit, at least, that any plane hijacked by Al Queda would be used as a missile.
posted by David at 9:58 AM

 

** Tech

If you have a hotmail account then you need to read this article. They've opted you in to some bad stuff. And if you have time, Slashdot has some additional interesting commentary here.
posted by David at 11:13 PM

 

** Politics

Cheney Says U.S. Faces Threat of Worse Attack. I have to quote Cheney from this article:

An investigation must not interfere with the ongoing efforts to prevent the next attack, because without a doubt a very real threat of another perhaps more devastating attack still exists.

The people and agencies responsible for helping us learn about and defeat such an attack are the very ones most likely to be distracted from their critical duties if Congress fails to carry out their obligations in a responsible fashion.

In other words, don't investage what we knew, because if you do we will become distracted. And then we will fail to stop the next terrorist attack.

It sure sounds to me like they're trying to set up an excuse if another attack comes -- blame it on the Democrats and the Media.
posted by David at 10:15 PM

 

* Media

Some of my readers will find this tidbit interesting. Adam Moss, the editor of the New York Times magazine, has made it into the news in connection with the sacking of Andrew Sullivan. I'm not inclined to give Mr. Sullivan much press, but since Adam Moss is well-known to much of my audience, I have to at least give this story a mention.
posted by David at 10:54 AM

 

* Entertainment

I've been waiting for the Salon review of Attack of the Clones. Well, it's finally here, and I'm kinda worried. I was able to dismiss all of the other bad reviews, but I tend to agree with Salon's perspective on these types of movies. I'll still be seeing it, of course, (tickets Saturday afternoon), but the bad hype is starting to get to me.
posted by David at 10:39 AM

 

** Politics

The biggest threat to American security may not be the Israel/Palestine conflict -- it might actually be the Pakistan/India situation. According to this Washington Post article, Pakistan prepared nuclear bombs for possible deployment in 1999 during a border conflict with India.

Nuclear bombs are useless unless other countries believe that you may use them, no?
posted by David at 10:45 AM

 

* Media

This article, written by a Pakistani journalist, describes the post-9/11 jounalism frenzy in Pakistan. Due to a lack of local knowledge, the professional international media had to rely upon local Pakistani journalists to help with tasks from securing hotel rooms to providing briefings on local politics. These Pakistani "fixers" made between $200-$300 per day for their services, and had a large impact on media coverage. A nice, behind the scenes look at international journalism.
posted by David at 1:56 PM

 

*** Politics

Today's Debka article is a must read. They argue that Palestinian statehood issues are on the back-burner right now, while Saudi Arabia and Jordan vie for control over the West Bank. Apparently Saudi Arabia is allied with Egypt and Syria, while Jordan is with the US and Israel.
posted by David at 11:52 AM