Oh ... and

Mister Bush, you are nothing like Franklin Roosevelt or Harry Truman. Compairing yourself to them only makes you seem that much pettier and mean.

Well it had to be

Too good to last.

He'd get up (not without some trouble), shower, get dressed and get his stuff and get out to catch the bus without grumbling too badly. When I got home he'd have whatever chores I'd written on his list done and be ready for whatever chore would earn him his game time. Pretty smooth so far.

But this afternoon his case manager (who is also his English teacher) called me. He's not doing his work or he says it's done but when checked it's not.

Then I get an email from his math teacher. He's not working in groups and when he does he's "expressing disapproval verbally" of the people he's working with.

Back to the same lack of social skills which always seems to get him in so much trouble. Time for another talk and that will probably lead to more Drama.

Now I'm not opposed to drama. I like it in some of my television, in movies, in the books I read and in the games I play. I just don't want it in my living room "live". But I live with a teenager now so there's no avoiding it.

It's not that I hate

humanity and wish they were all dead. No, it's just that when I have to drive while some of them are out there I get frustrated at their seeming incompetance, negligence and downright stupidity. Reckless, fatal stupidity.

And I don't wish they would all die, I just wish they would do the stupid things they so like to do somewhere behind me so I don't have to put up with it. I decided on the way home last night that I hold humanity in disdain but like having them around the way you like to have the TV or radio on in the background while you work on something else, something interesting. And if they were all dead this would be a pretty empty, boring place. I admit it, sometimes their stupidity is fairly amusing.

However it seems that humanity is determined some times to wipe itself out. I mean even the founder of New Orleans wrote later in his memoirs that it probably wasn't a good place to make a settlement and while it had marvelous scenery and a wonderful natural harbor, it would be prone to storms and other dangerous acts of nature. But we build a big city there anyway. And we build it under sea level so we have to put up levees and pumps to keep the ocean out. How much sense does that make? Doesn't it just scream that you have some sort of self-destructive urge and you won't be happy until it's fulfilled? Until you're wallowing in your misery slowly dying?

And when the Police Chief goes on national television and pleads with you to leave your homes and go to higher ground, isn't the rational thing to do to follow his advice? Even though I'm a homeowner now and it would be a hard decision to abandone the house, you can't rebuild your life, home and property if your dead now can you?

Six months ago I would have donated a few hundred dollars to Red Cross to help with their relief efforts. These days, since my grocery bill has basically doubled, I find I don't have the funds to do that and that makes me a bit more melancholy. And despite my firm belief in Darwin's theories and that Mother Nature is compelled to kill stupid people, I am sad at the pain those people are suffering.

In some strange quirk of fate it seems that Iraq won't get out of the news. Just when things shift from all kinds of attacks and suicide bombs, a mob panics and people are killed in a stampede. I don't know the details about it but it seems like some strange trait of Fate trying to keep them in our mind.

Emergency backup ... politician?

Back when I stayed with Erik & Mary after my house got broken into, Sasha was there with me. She and Nick had an interesting relationship and Mary started calling her the "Emergency Backup Dog".

It occurs to me as I read the piece about the senators being held up in Russia that we really don't need to worry about this sort of thing. For these reasons;

1. We have some 98 other senators so it's not like the minor amount of actual work would decrease. (setting aside discussions about what is actually work and how what they do compares to people who really do have to work for a living)
   
2. Every state has two so if they lose one they're still good (also setting aside speculation that their loss might actually mean more work gets done).
   
3. Are they really as important as they seem to think they are?
   

Of course one of them was a Democrat and that party can't really afford to lose anyone (which sets aside the idea that they've actually been trying to drive people away from them for years). The other was a Republican and a committee leader at that so it could very well have been a good trade-off. Two American politicians for a little media circus for a few days.

Other Stuff

Well the post-by-email didn't initially work but I found the switch to flip. Then it worked too well and posted the entry twice. Hmm.

Been reading too much of the leftist media anti-war stuff. And too much of the pro-war stuff. I read a piece on CNN yesterday about the president's speech in Idaho when he trotted out the "War Mom".

Now I respect the hell out of that family since she has four sons deployed now and her husband and youngest son just returned. However she still can't know how Cindy Sheehan feels unless (God forbid) one of them get hurt or killed.

And Cindy Sheehan seems to be pretty flaky herself. I read something early on that said she tried vehemently to convince her son not to go, even went so far as to offer to drive him to Canada to avoid his committment. He was upstanding enough to tell her he had to go and (unfortunately) fulfill his obligations. And he was killed within four days of arrival so he was still a cherry (what the combat vets called a new arrival who hadn't yet learned what they needed to know to survive the tour).

So it's a murky issue at best.

However, what Bush said just pissed me off.

"There are few things in life more difficult than seeing a loved one go off to war," Bush said in his speech yesterday.

I would ask him "How the fuck would you know?" (I left out the 'you draft dodging, cocaine snorting, party, fratboy fucktard' bit) Your daughters aren't anywhere near having to go to war. And when it was time for you to do your duty you played the golden parachute card and went off to play fighter pilot (until you got bored with it and then wanted to go play governor).

There were some interesting comments in the Memphis Flyer about a pair of their writers who visited "Camp Casey". I don't have a great deal of sympathy for them on the "hot Texas sun" since the men and women deployed have things a *lot* worse (oh boo hoo!). The hispanic family who came to put mementos down at the cross for their dead Marine son was heart-wrenching. Which led into the most important quote of the whole piece (I think)

"I just wish Bush had a plan."

The second most telling piece of it is the idea that everything is staged when it comes to him. The aircraft carrier bit two years ago, the "ranch", his "performance" when visiting the military families.

And then the end,

President Bush could have defused this story on the first day Cindy arrived in Crawford. He could have embraced her, looked her in the eye, and honestly answered her question: "What was the noble cause you keep claiming my son died for?"

But perhaps he didn't because he didn't know himself.

I think he didn't answer because he does know and knows that it would piss off most of America. His "noble cause" is the corporate bottom line of his cronies. (and the fact that he gets to 'play president' now) Or perhaps more accurately, the personal bottom line of those companies CEOs.

Sick on Day 2

So Matt took the bus to school successfully yesterday.

Then shortly after lunch I get a phone call. I think for awhile I'm
going to be dreading the phone ringing since my mind instantly conjures
up all kinds of trouble he could have gotten in to. And it was the
school but it was the nurse. It seems his pink eye had flared up again.
Marlin tells me that he's not going to get over it until he stops
rubbing his eye and washes his hands. So I guess we need to have a more
detailed hygiene talk again. <sigh> At least he wasn't in trouble.

But this morning his eye looked a bit better but still red enough that
they would have sent him home anyway. I took him to the Urgent Care
Saturday and the doc gave him some antibiotic eyedrops. Of course
they're not going to work if he can't remember to put them in ...

At least the school realizes how badly teenagers remember things and
they gave him some sort of "planner" to track his assignments in.

And I'm testing out the post-by-mail option on blogger.com with this
post. I turned on comment verification so I don't get any more comment
spam. And I think it's getting time to try a new style format. This one
is getting old.

A job for the Gene Pool Police

Big Time!

http://www.cantonrep.com/index.php?ID=238435

Video games, movies or TV is responsible for the (hmm 490/65 = ) 7.5% teen pregnancy rate in their high school?

Now I never actually took biology in high school or college, but I'm fairly certain that having unprotected sex with boys is pretty much the only way for a high school girl to get pregnant. There is some speculation that alien abduction may be responsible in some cases but still.

Pretty sure.

Happy resolution

Well Matt rode the bus home yesterday afternoon. It dropped him off on the corner at the next block down, which makes sense since that cross street opens onto the next major street south. He forgot to ask if that's where he'd be picked up but decided to take a chance and wait there today. If it wasn't there'd still be time for me to drive him so I let him go. He seemed to get some satisfaction from being in charge of it himself.

But the window I tried to call the bus place yesterday was 113 minutes with 17 attempts which is one every 6.64 minutes. 6.41 minutes if you subtract the 4 minutes the phone rang with no answer. Heck of a way to run a business but since it became OBE I guess it doesn't matter.

The saga continues

As opposed to "The Saga Begins", a song by Weird Al Yankovic.

http://www.lucasfiles.com/index.php?s=&action=file&id=733

I started calling this Bus company phone number at [checks his notes] 1403 this afternoon. I've called about every five minutes from then till now. Busy every time, except once near three o'clock when there was no answer (the person going to the restroom maybe?).

Great, guess I'm gonna be driving Matt to school tomorrow morning too. At least we don't have to get up *quite* as early then.

Topping himself

As word of the Robertson thing goes around, media types are digging out even more outlandish things he's said.

http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/08/24/news/robertson.php

"Robertson has a history of getting attention for inflammatory remarks. In May he said the threat to the United States from activist judges was 'probably more serious than a few bearded terrorists who fly into buildings.' In 1998, he warned that natural disasters would sweep down on Orlando because homosexuals were flocking to Disney World on special 'gay days.' And he has often denounced the United Nations as a first step toward a dangerous 'one-world government.'"

Whoa!

Do people *believe* this guy?

http://www.cnn.com/2005/US/08/24/robertson.chavez/

It seemed pretty tame until the very bottom.

"Controversial statements are not new to the 75-year-old Robertson.

He has suggested in the past that a meteor could strike Florida because of unofficial "Gay Days" at Disney World and that feminism caused women to kill their children, practice witchcraft and become lesbians."

So this takes him, in my mind, out of the group of people who said unfortunate things they should have thought out first, clearly into the group of people who think the moon landings were a hoax and that Elvis isn't really dead.

Can I join this group? I have a like minded opinion right here ...

"Neo-conservative women raise little Nazi warriors to increase the strength of the Reichstag."

There! Can I be admitted now?

Phase 3

Well Matt started school today. And before anyone takes what I say next personally let me say I mean no disrespect to people who work hard at their jobs and don't mean to offend anyone.

However, this hasn't been a good experience.

Three weeks ago I started getting things ready to register him for school, realizing since he was a new student it might take a bit longer. It took me awhile to get things going and get in contact with the correct school. I met the new counselling secretary (a very pleasant woman) who was very helpful (when you could get ahold of her). However not knowing what questions to ask I didn't get the information I actually needed.

Last Wednesday we went in for his schedule pickup at the school. The week before I had filled out a packet of papers and had only two forms left. But for this event I had nothing but it's name "schedule pickup". Sounds pretty simple, right?

We get to the school and parking is horrendous. Lots of folks there. The first clue this wasn't going to be a good or easy thing. We park and go down to the school and the second thing we see is a long, long ass line waiting to go into the new wing (where the counselling office is). One woman out by the door who appeared to be passing out forms and papers but who was too busy to answer any of my questions (and truthfully didn't even appear to notice I was standing next to her).

More later, have a meeting now.

The second clue this wasn't going to be good. Now I'm no stranger to standing in line, I was in the Army, I know how to (as Arthur Dent says) "queue up". But I'd hate to wait in this hour (or more) long line only to get to the head and find out I didn't actually have to stand in line since I'd filled out all the papers already. However there was no one to ask about this. So I queued up.

After about an hour in the heat we get into the building and turn in one of the two forms I hadn't filled out. We get a checklist and the woman stamps it, telling us to make sure we come back and let her know what Matt's student number is. We move to station 2. We've done this one already and get the stamp and on to 3. About the middle of this process we hit a station where they want money. Now I didn't bring my checkbook (since I ridiculously thought we were only picking up his schedule) and I certainly wasn't going to leave the line to go get it. So I don't get money deposited into his cafeteria account, or order his yearbook (or get hosed into any of the other things where people wanted my money - which is in short supply since he moved in with me). He took his school picture (and he had what I *think* was pink eye that morning so it's not going to be a good picture I think) but didn't actually have to do any of the other stations besides dropping off the emergency info card and actually getting his schedule. However we had to have the list stamped and wait in the line.

Good start, eh?

Monday I finally got ahold of his supplies list. Every time I went to the store before this (about three times) the slot for his school (Jefferson Junior) was empty, all gone. Finally calling the school got me a woman who read me a copy so I got his supplies.

Yesterday I worked on finding out more details about the bus. I had the route list and it said (and I quote)

"BUS # 13-6:45 LEAVDRE, ROYAL ABERDEEN, CHADWICK, PRESTWICK, GLENCARIN, DUNBAR, BENTPATH"

Now our street isn't a major road or anything, but it is about eight or ten blocks long. So if he's waiting down by the house and the bus actually arrives at the intersection with Forum (the major street) then there's no one who can run fast enough to get on the bus. And leaving at 0645 for school that starts at 0800? Granted there are other kids to pick up but still ...?

So I call for the nice secretary but she's not in. I leave a message (still haven't heard back). I call the district and get rerouted to the school. The nice woman there is looking at the exact same document I have so she can't help. But she does give me the bus company phone number. So I start calling them around 1530, busy. I call again 5 minutes later, busy. It continues till just after 1600 when it rings finally. Well it rang because they were closed. Call back tomorrow at 0600. Not helpful but I guess if you come in to work at 6 leaving at 4 is expected.

So, as I told Sharon last night at the game, I don't expect them to run with military efficiency. Hell, the military doesn't even run with military efficiency. But a blind monkey and his deaf cousin could do better.

Hubris, incompetance and recklessness?

http://www.csmonitor.com/

You can laugh all you want at the idea of the Christian Science Monitor, but when I first went to their site (some time late last year) expecting to find another ridiculous fundamentalist site (like http://www.answersingenesis.org/ where they use the dinosaurs to prove that evolution is wrong and the bible is right). I found, instead, a site where they had knowledgeable SME (subjet matter experts) and were surprisingly neutral in their tone, allowing the facts of the issues to be presented without any apparence of bias (true we can't eliminate bias entirely, but they come closer than most American "news" sources).

Anyway the part of this article that got me the most was

"They are afraid to go there because this young man's life and death encapsulate not just the noble intentions of those who went to fight this war but also the hubris, incompetence and recklessness of those who gave the marching orders."

Talking about Cindy Sheehan's son.

Republican Senator Chuck Hagel has started calling for a plan for the withdrawl of American troops from Iraq. Good, Mister Senator, however I would have thought that an exit strategy would have been the second (right after the mission statement) element of the plan that got hashed out at the Pentagon. Calling for it a year and a half after the combat operations are declared over is a bit ... late, don't you think?

And what does the president plan on doing?

A new round of speeches to rally support for the war. Oh, that'll help thing, fix real problems and get us (and them) closer to peace. More speeches (why yes, that was sarcasm you heard). To liken this war to WWII and bring back up the idea that the insurgents are the same kind of people in Al-Queda who made the 9/11 attacks.

Sorry, but there was no lying to the public about why we had to go to war in 1941. And your own investigators have already said there was no link between Hussein and the 9/11 terrorist. Eventunally saying the same thing and hoping it becomes true will become transparent enough for everyone to see through it. (Hopefully even for those riding dirt bikes in support of you)

Not resign?

How can a politician who's been convicted (well, pled "no contest") of ethics violations not resign from his office?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/

Impeach him, Ohio! Jail time even!

War "Correspondant"?

In my wanderings this afternoon I was looking for blogs written by soldiers deployed. I found an NPR piece on several with some interesting content.

http://www.onthemedia.org/

Something tells me that if the internet were as big in the mid 80s when I was in Germany I might have gotten myself in some serious trouble. Now granted the leadership we had was all active Army rather than National Guard people (National Guard officers tend to be even more spastic and draconian since they often feel that the Active guys don't take them seriously - which is somewhat true, I mean how can you feel that a guy who does this soldier stuff two days a month is your equal?) but still, my opinions on some of the stuff we had to do was pretty caustic.

Just ask Tony or Verb!

Sobering

Yesterday after work I took Matt to Jeff Junior so he could pick up his class schedule. I figured we'd take half an hour maybe. No such luck. We didn't get there until 1720 even though I left work 15 minutes early. When we did there were cars parked everywhere and there was a long ass line of parents and kids waiting to get in to a series of "stations". Flashbacks of any number of military personnel processing stations here and in Germany. I even got back into the mode of standing at parade rest while waiting. Stepping forward when the line moved and then back to parade rest. Probably looked funny this fat old man with a short haircut doing that.

And I heard, once again, a sound I thought was forever banished from my consciousness. High school girls giggling and talking about who liked whom, who did what, who was wearing what, etc. Man that took me back and not in a good way. ;-P

Anyway at one point someone had complained to one of the station people about something and I mentioned that we were doing great since no one was shooting at us (an oblique reference to why should we complain compaired to those deployed).

This morning while poking around I found a very sobering picture.



Kind of makes any complaint about anything you have seem like whining, doesn't it?

Renamed

Okay I was playing around with the name of the blog and got several confusing, conflicting things in here now.

At one point I was going to name it the same thing I had suggested for the name of the new building (at work) we were moving in to, "Imperial Intelligence", but George has pretty much cured me of any attraction to Star Wars or anything linked to it. Thanks buddy! ;-P

So we try "Starfleet Intelligence" but that seems kind of blah and there's not really much here related to Trek (for whom most of my attraction was killed years ago by Berman and Bragga, but going there has gotten old).

We'll see what it ends up being called.

Awakening voice?

Well I read a bit more in the news about the Peace vigils and other things and I fear that what will happen is what happened in Vietnam. In so many other ways the two wars are being compared.

The anti-war movement will gain so much momentum that the next President will feel impelled to immediately make a show of pulling troops out. And in the hubub we'll screw over the Iraqis like we screwed over the South Vietnamese in 1975. Ain't we great?

I wonder if they "get it"

While I'm philosophically with the anti-war protestors and groups, I can't help but wonder if they understand what they're asking when they demand we pull out of Iraq immediately. I wonder if they understand

a) We broke Iraq when we invaded (and that's a whole other issue) and we have a moral obligation to try to fix it or help them fix themselves.
b) We simply lack the facilities or equipment to fly 138,000 people half way around the globe on short notice.
c) There's no way anyone (on the planet!) has the wherewithall to move the tons and tons of equipment and supplies we've moved over there.
d) Bush is at least sort of right, if we leave immediately then we doom the Iraqis to decades (if not longer) of civil war when the insurgents move their guerrilla war into the mainstream. And the result will probably be more like Saddam's regime than they'd like to admit. So the whole liberation thing becomes a mere roadbump in the history of Iraqi tyrants.
e) If we leave without accomplishing at least some of our goals, all those who died (on both sides) have died in vain. To no purpose since we can't even point at lame accomplishments and say "they died so this would happen".

But I suspect that the radical liberals who proclaim "Get Out Now" listen as poorly as the neo-cons (who got us into this mess) do.

Agreeing with the Hypocrite

Well I seldom find myself on his side but I agree with president Bush lately. We broke Iraq (such as it was, which wasn't pretty then) so we have a moral obligation to try to fix it.

And it's not that we shouldn't have invaded, things there were pretty bad and it was led by a man who was willing to invade a neighboring country (apparently this is the international line which shouldn't be crossed).

But lying to us about why we should invade was Bush's mistake and I hope it comes back to haunt him.

Now it's come to light that he wasn't appropriately somber when he met with some of the families of deceased servicemembers. I find it inexcuseable that when he met with the families he didn't even bother to learn the names of their dead loved one. And then he behaved like it was a party rather than a memorial. If you believe the media (not a good thing to do I think) then he was rather callous and any time he says "I care" his actions have stated exactly the opposite. And every time he drives by that mother camped outside his ranch he's reinforcing the impression that he doesn't care.

A revisit

Oh and to revisit the issue of theories of origin taught in school, I wanted to point out the "Flying Monster Spaghetti" theory of Intelligent design proposed at

http://www.venganza.org/index.htm

Apologies to those this offends (my position on the teaching of evolution is somewhere in the archives), I find it hilarious.

WTG

A team from the Royal Navy rescued the trapped Russian sailors yesterday (or perhaps the day before, with timelines and all).

(plus I've got to post more so the pix of doofus gets pushed down off the page)

Very deceptive

Setting aside for the moment the idea of the teaching of the "theory" of "Intelligent Design" (my use of quotes may give the reader a clue as to my rough position), I thought the president looked especially pensive and thoughtful in this picture.

http://news.softpedia.com/news/Intelligent-Design-in-American-Schools-5846.shtml

However my guess is he's trying to decide if he wants ketsup on his french fries at lunch. ... Oh, excuse me, his "Freedom Fries".

Luck

To the Russian Navy and the Japanese and US Navy teams trying to help them rescue their submarine.