Breathless

I can hardly get a handle on what I see out of New Orleans. It's not that I find it hard to believe, it's when I think of the numbers... the number of people, the depth of the water, the time it will take to clean that up... All of these numbers are huge. I also hear of the damage done to Biloxi... It was not so long ago that I was there myself. Keesler AFB was smashed... the water by the Commissary/BX was six feet deep! That, by the way, is the same street that went past the Library, so I assume it got destroyed as well. Well, the thousands of tech school students there should be having an interesting time. You can bet that as soon as that base is straigtened out, a small army will be moving out into Biloxi to do good deeds. Red Horse is already on scene. I hope I get a chance to go down there and pitch in with those guys, but I very much doubt it.

As usual, people and organizations are pouring support into the area. Corporate donations from Wal-Mart and Lowes are headed down there, both companies announcing that these donations will not be accounted for, there will be no bill to foot except by those companies.

We will pull out of this. This is a blow to the entire world, but we will recover.

I would call on those who are politicizing this, though, to stop right now. It's not going to help one person or divert one gallon of water. Pitch in or shut up... okay, pitch in and shut up.

Don't Panic

Remain calm at all times, especially while driving. I don't care if there is a spider on your face. Keep at least one hand on the wheel at all times... your life, not even your car, is worth risking for the sake of an arachnid. Now, before you think that I've gone without sleep for three days again, I'd like to point out that I bring this topic up because a woman in Germany decided that a good reaction to a spider on her face would be to let go of her vehicle's directional control... I'm judging by what hapened next that she made no effort to slow down. What happened next? Oh, her car, without guidance but still possessing considerable forward speed, found its way to a tree... The vehicle did not stop even close to on time. I can't blame the car, as cars have never been noted for their intellect or decisiveness. On top of that, the driver was not too helpful about telling the car what to do because she was too busy screaming.

Please, PLEASE, do not be like her! If I get creamed by an effectively pilotless vehicle because the pilot was doing something other than driving, I will be very upset. In all seriousness, there is nothing a spider can do to you that matches what a car crashing into sationary object can. Panic kills... don't do it... ever.

By the way, you arachnaphobes out there might want to stop reading here.

Okay, I don't know if it's really a spider, but the Demodex folliculorum does have eight legs. It lives in hair follicles... human hair follicles. Nearly everyone has them. Like Earth though, they're mostly harmless.
The moral of the story? There's always something crawling around on/in your face. Chill. Don't let go of the wheel. You'll be fine. Oh, the German lady... she's fine. Her car didn't make it, though. Is a spider worth a car?
This sort of reminds me of a woman I met who was afraid of moths of all things... she just about went into cardiac arrest anytime she saw one. I'm guessing that this woman in Germany behaved in a similar manner around arachnids and some fool let her get away with it. Okay, I am sleep deprived...

Spiders and cars aside, don't panic. It's never the right thing to do.
Don't panic.

Chipotle Banana Pancake

IMAO XIV...

A review of Sin City and trip to Turkmenistan to un-ban Sarah K from the internet!

I could not have said it better...

Senator Helms has spoken his piece on abortion.
I could not agree more. We can do so much better than killing unwanted children in this day and age... It's funny, how we as a society allow it to continue here while condemn the extermination of unwanted children in other societies... Perhaps an unborn child looks different to us, somhow less worthy of the rights that we so viciously claim for ourselves. To me, a child is child... a child unborn, if left alone, will be walking their own path and forming their own oppinions soon enough. I mean, I was an unborn child once! So was every last person reading this.

Plans

There a lot of people running around, particularly in Washington, who are complaining about how things are going in Iraq. They point to all kinds of numbers that look bad, point to all manner of percieved shortfalls.

Not one has proposed a solution other than simply cutting and running... not one.

The U.S. has an exit strategy (we leave when Iraq stands by itself) and those of us in the military are working hard to see that plan to fruition.

You may disaggree with this war, but don't call for its end without offering a realistic alternative.

Some random links...

Well, when in England, do as the English do. Okay, but this is just wierd. Is it wrong that I'm amused by it?

Next up, we have the vertigo inducing dream of the Hualapai Tribe, architect David Jin, and Lochsa Engineering. I hate the idea of turning natural wonders into accessible tourist locations, believing that one should have to work at it to get to them, but this is just plain cool, sci-fi cool!

Lastly, a rehash of an old post of mine: You can't negotiate with some people, because they want you dead and nothing else will satisfy them.

Out of Hand

PT is getting way out of hand... by the way, I run PT in my unit... so it's all my fault. That's OK, what does not kill us will probably not be as much fun as what does, but there will be less paperwork.

Today seemed to be nutshot day, too... nobody escaped this time. I hope that does not happen for a very long time... at least there were no rocks in my knee.

100% pass record still... now it's time shoot for 100% of members with excelent (90 or better) scores.

I was worried when I got this program, but now it seems that not only is headway being made, but we are having a lot of fun doing it. Everybody needs to PT! Good for you... good for me... ooooooh riiiiigt...

The Guilt

All the buzz is about this lately... Sounds like a guilty concience to me... a deeply guilty concience trying desparately to rationalize something horrible. Good luck with that.

I think that that study is Grade A Male Bovine Excrement, but more importantly, I belive that the sensation of pain is irrelevant to the debate.

With great vengeance and furious anger...

Behavior like this and this must be nipped right now!

I suspect that the first incident is not related to military service, but we shall see if the vermin are ever caught... either way, I'd like to see them rot. I'm looking for more info on the second incident. All I can figure so far is that it happened/is still possibly happening.

No matter what you think of the wars our country (and Great Britian... and Canada... and Australia... and Poland... and Germany... and Japan...) are involved in, under no circumstances is it acceptable to berate the soldiers who went there. To demonstrate against wounded soldiers... there is a special place in hell, to quote Firefly... Nobody I have ever met would do such a disrespectful and unnacceptable thing, but then maybe I'm wrong because there are people out there who are doing this!

I'm going to try and find out more about this and see if I can't find a name. The names of such shameful need to get out so that the holders of those names can be corrected, or failing that, shunned.

Some, however, get it right. Read all the comments, too: This is more like it... I'd be humbled to the ground by that, but anyway... That was a cool story even if it is over the top...

Rhetorical Why

When something to do with our military goes wrong, it's headline news. When the military excels beyond expectations, there is silence. Why? Why do I have to read insider publications and listen to word of mouth accounts from actual troops to get good news out of Iraq and Afghanistan? Why are the troops over there describing a completely different war than the world media?

You Think?

Once again, the movie industry ponders the meaning of life...

I've said it once and I'll say it again: Originality! That's all you have to do and you will get your audience. Tell the stories that have not been told, or try telling correctly the all the stories you've screwed up so badly. Seriously, how many book based movies didn't skitter off into the puckerbrush? Also, take some risks. I see the same things repeated ad nauseum in different movies. It's so bad that it does not take genius to not predict what will happen next in a film, but even what the next line will be just because the same devices are used over and over again.

I find it funny that Hollywood thought it was an end unto itself, but that it is now slowly waking to the idea that it has customers, not followers, and is subject to the laws of supply and demand.

XIII

Yeah, baby, yeah! You know what to do...

Also, after you listen to the podcast, take some time to calm down, then be sure to leave comment for Frank J. and the IMAO crew.

RIP

Robert Moog passed away today. You musicians will pricking your ears up about now, but for the rest of you, this man invented the musical synthesizer*. He died from an inoperable brain tumor**. He was only 71.

For the record, his early synths, despite their analogue cheesiness ( I say quirky coolness), seem to be regaining popularity. Great, I say! I love the way they sound!

Now, I just hope Les Paul sticks around with us for a while longer.

*Yes, I know all about the theremin, but that's a not really a synth.
**Synth haters, show some respect and hold your jokes, please.

Riot Gear

Here's a quintessential dissorgaized outburst:
Every time I see a mob or a riot, it just makes my blood boil. Why people do that is beyond me, but there is definitly never an excuse for it and I would dearly love to see harsh (Robert Heinlein harsh) punishments given to those involved.
From the first time I saw one, I tried to figure out how to stop them. I continue to draw a blank. A crew served machine gun keeps popping up in my mind as a good idea, but I know it's not: too many innocents about. Tear gas is cool (been gassed myself... SPICY!) but it can cause panic as people who riot in the first place are weak minded, uncollected, and generally stupid and there's almost never anyone around who has any when you really need it. Perhaps some sort of mass anesthetic gas? Ah, there can never be a panacea for such things... it always take lots of trained professionals...
hmmm...

Nature watch

I would just like to point out that it is gorgeous here at the moment... perfect weather! Just the right temperature and just enough humidity for a mild haze... perfect. Well, I could stand it to be way more humid, but hey, it still feels really nice out. What's really cool is that the clouds are just right to make the moutains appear in their full relief: usually they look flat. I'm in a good mood, too... just thought I'd share.

Have a good day, everybody.

From bad to worse...

Apparently, George Bush is a terrorist and we are using nuclear weapons in Iraq... so says Cindy Sheehan, I am not making this up. Well, see my earlier post about terrorist versus freedom fighters. As far nukes go, I know a thing or two about nuclear weapons and we have not used one in anger since, oh, 1945. I really wish this woman would back off, all the more so now that she has gone off the deep end and lied about our military. I can't believe that the nuke comment is an honest mistake, either: It does not take a genius to figure out that we are not using WMD in Iraq.

Related posts:
Finish It
The Big Difference

IMAO XII

Podcast XII... be there... shoot, if you don't read IMAO on a frequent basis, there is something wrong with you... or do I have that backwards... Anyway, I go religiously, so you should too. Seriously, if you have not been over there, baptize yourself with this. It's how I found it.

Note: I don't hate the French.

Finish it

Cindy Sheehan is so completely out of line that it blows my mind. First off, she acts as if her son's life was her own, that she still held sway over him. NO! He's his own man. He was doing what he wanted to do. I know she misses him, I remember having to run through a few things with my own mother concerning places I'll go and what could happen there. Any death is tragic, but listen to the soldiers for once! We want to finish, those there 100 times more so! Ask any of them!

Now, I said that I had the answer to Cindy's question, why here son had to die. Here it is:
Casey Sheehan did not believe that he was better than anybody else.
There... if you can't understand this, you are missing a key part of what America is and what it is to be selfless.

Cindy Sheehan is a disgrace, unworthy of her own son. You can argue until the cows come home about whether we were right to start this war, but you'd be a fool to argue for ending it prior to its end. To disagree is just fine, but her behavior is vulgar, disrespectful, and unconstructive.
Seriously, are we supposed to just turn tail and run? Are we supposed to concede defeat when we are winning? Are we supposed to turn our backs on yet another nation, like we did in 1975?
May the day never come.

I recommend Michelle Malkin for more.
Charlie Foxtrot out.

Arm Grenade, Put Back in Pocket

This Gaza pullout has been bugging me for a while, but now as I see it happen, I know that it will end badly. I think the only possible good sides of this are, first, the stellar behavior of the IDF in a most distastful situation, and second, giving the PA enough rope to hang itself.

Mark my words: giving up that land will not save a single Israeli life. It will not lead to peace. We have all seen how the PA, Hezbollah, and their associated cronies behave and we know what they want... The don't want land, they don't want a home, they want every last Jew dead. They have proven this time and time again with their actions. I say again, this will end badly... there will be no change. This is such a bad move.

Now, I just now found out that some empassioned fool took a rifle from a soldier and killed three Arabs and wounded at least one more. Real smooth, dude. He's one guy and he is actually feeding a world of hate, irrational as it may be. I hope he rots. I also hope that this pullout is nothing but rope to hang the PA... 'destroyers and usurpers, curse them'.

Now, not all is darkness and murk: Check out Israelity... the Petel post left me rolling.

EDIT: It seems that the 'Palestinian' loons are fully in support of the Gaza withdrawl. What follows is from DEBKAfile (Sorry, there is no tag to link.):

<>Just ahead of their eviction, Kfar Darom inhabitants ordered to stay in shelters after coming under Palestinian fire. Israeli troops shot back.

August 17, 2005, 8:37 PM (GMT+02:00)

Palestinians also shelled Morag and Neve Dekalim in course of their evacuation. No casualties. A large bomb belt was discovered and detonated in controlled explosion near Shirat Yam.

As I was just saying, the foes of Israel have zero interest in peace, they only want to kill Jews. Let the self-hanging begin.

EDIT 2: Hmmmm...

EDIT 3: As I have said, the enemies of Israel can not be compromised or negotiated with. Nobody better suggest negotiation! How much blind hate do need to see from Hamas et al before the west stops pressuring Israel to compromise?

Let there be light

Random aside:
I had another of those obnoxious globe lightbulbs burn out in my bathroom... arg. Well, I have been replacing any burned out bulbs in the house with compact fluorescents, but I have resisted this in the bathroom because a spiral buld would look odd. Well, I found globular compact fluorescants at the BX today. Two of them, even though they claim 60 watt light equivalence, are brighter that the four 55 watt globe incandescants that I used to use... I left two of the old bulbs in for looks, but disconnected them.
Nifty: I may not save much gasoline, but I can save some power.
The downside is that with all that white light, the room looks, somehow, dirtier than it used to.

Your life is more than enough

I was taking a tour of the CNN news loop this morning as I waited to leave my post for the night* and what do I see but another story on Flight 358. Now, what do you suppose some of the passengers are up to? Envigorated by their second chance at life, grateful to halve escaped the jaws of firey death, it seems at least four of them are so happy to be alive when they should by all rights be burned to a crisp, they have...

FILED A LAWSUIT...

It's a class action suit, and one of two that judge is looking at. I really can't believe this...well, I can, but that's the sad part. This is not a first, either. Air Transat Flight 236 ran out of fuel at 34,500 feet. She was 150 miles away from anything, but the pilots brought her down without fatalities. There was a lawsuit... settled for 7.65 million...

Okay, I am hopping mad about this! This is beyond a 'for cryin' out loud' moment. I hate lawsuits in general, but this is because every one that I hear of is assinine... if anyone can tell me of about 200 just suits, I'd have a great deal more faith in mankind... anyway...

When you nearly die, but live anyway, your life is enough. Screw pain and suffering (the favored lawsuit claim), most people in the free world do not know the meaining of either word, particularly the latter. Injury? So what? In neither of these cases was anyone trying to hurt anyone else. Injuries happen. Life is a risky proposition... you can't live in a bubble, free from all possibility of harm. If you live life, you will be hurt and you should not be surprised when it happens.

In both these cases, the people who are filing the suits are turning around and slapping their saviors in the face, from the pilots who mitigated the severity of the crashes (though 236 not nearly as bad as 358) to the airlines who chose planes made by good engineers. You do not turn on those who help you, EVER. It is dishonorable in addition to being wrong. I hope the people filing suits of this nature become pariahs until they can prove that they are ready to be grown-ups again.

Let's look at the final aspects of this before I hit the hay...

Tragedy is not a license for profit. You are not entitled to money because something bad happened to you. If sombody sets out to do you harm, fine, punish them. Justice is on your side. However, if you incure damage and blame it on somebody who made a good faith effort to do you right and you try to hold them responsible, you are out of line. If you go further and demand money, you are no better than a thief and YOU are the one who is wrong.

I can certainly understand that injuries cost money to treat (I've incured many...), but you are not entitled to get another person to pay for it. Now, if an airline (in this case) helps out a bit, great! Good on them! Air France has been kicking money, as much as two grand, at the passengers of 358... however, nobody has a right to demand anything from them! If you are not in my camp already, you pay attention here... you pay attention WELL: You are entitled to nothing! You deserve nothing! When you incur a risk and the possibility of failure becomes definite, you are the only one responsible. You got on the plane. You got in the car. You skied down the hill... Nobody at the airline or the car company or the ski area wants to hurt you! They want you to keep doing business with them, in fact. There are the odd exceptions, but overall, it'a allllllll YOU! Be an adult, take responsibility!

So, I hope that the scumsucking leeches plaintiffs see the error of their ways, grow up, and thank the Good Lord, Air France, and Airbus for saving their lives. Yeah, I just insulted people I've never met... but people like them just make everything cost more for all of us.

Tune in soon for some words about Cindy Sheehan and an answer to her question! Yes, I know the answer! I have it right here, and no, it's not freedom.

*It's not a contradiction... welcome to my world.... Charlie Foxtrot out.

WOOT!

Discovery has landed! I am beyond relieved... ummmm... Podcast XI from IMAO is out, too... that's all I have. I want a good night's sleep... a weekend would be nice too. I'm very tired.
Be excelent to each other...

You can't schmooze in Crawford

Laura Ingraham had a comment that left me in stitches:

There is a lot of grousing right now about The President going to his ranch in Crawford... something about taking vacations and all that... yeah, whatever. I say leave the man alone. For cyring out loud, it's not like he's leaving his Presidential duties adrift while he's there.

Well, Laura's theory is, that unlike the last President's vacation spots, Crawford is a one horse town. There is one restaurant or something like that, and it ain't fancy. You can't schmooze there like you can in Martha's Vinyard... or Jackson Hole... or Miami... You can't hang out and look cool, so most of the paparazzi types can't swim in their usual ponds and flaunt their stuff infont of the rich and famous.

HA! Nothing like a bit of genuine to uncover the disingenuous... shoot, I don't even know to spell that word...

Oh, man... priceless. I think Laura Ingraham is my favorite talk show host now...

Good Landing

There is an aircrew out there that needs some recognition: the crew of Air France Flight 358. Their Airbus 340 did not land so well, but all 309 people aboard were safe... and, there were no ground casualties! Kudos, guys and gals!
You can read bout the details here and here.

This is the first time that an A340 has crashed.

In other aviation news, the astronauts on the Discovery are effecting repairs to their craft's belly. We have never tried that before, but terra incognita is nothing new to the men and women of NASA, either. The mood up there seems to be upbeat, even if a a lot of peole down here are worried sick. Never to make light of the hazards of manned space flight, some of you may be surprised to know that orbiters are usually damged on every flight... this problem that Discovery is having with the fabric insulation is nothing new at all. In previous flights, though, it has not been as severe. The prayers and wishes of the world are certainly with those up there.

For what it's worth, I think they will make it back just fine.

The comically named Virgin Galactic (comical because they do sub-orbital space tourism) is gearing up. Sir Richard Branson and Burt Rutan have teamed up to form The Spaceship Company. They are working on a bigger version of the Scaled Composites Spaceshipone, a typical Rutan creation that won the Ansari X-Prize last year (hey, remember that?). The SS2 will be bigger and will require a bigger mothership, being designed from the get go to ferry passengers up to black sky and back. Naysayers beware: Burt Rutan is unstopable!

Now, for that ski vacation on Mars... damn, they don't have those... yet...

#10

IMAO podcast number 10 is up... there are many spew-whatever-you-drinking-on-your-monitor moments, including an 'evisceration' of Keanu Reeves. The state addressed in this issue is Georgia.
Why are you still here?

Heh... Evil Overlord Furby... heh heh... I knew it!

What passes for my brain

Is it August already? It was ski season last night, or so it seems... and all that stuff I was supposed to have gotten done by May is still not done. Wow.

Okay, enough abut me.

Former President Carter is lashing out at the war on terror... again... as usual... He is still calling the interment operation at Gautanamo Bay an embarasment, etc...
Yes, Gitmo, home of the dreaded Harry Potter torture... There is nothing untoward going on down there and there never has been. By claiming that there is, former President Carter is making himself the fool. At least he is smart enough not to say outright that anything we are doing is causing terrorism, I have to give him that.

He was also trying to say that the war in Iraq is unjust and unneccessary... this from the man who saw nothing wrong with the Venezualan elections...

His words are a lovely opportunity to point out some things that have been percolating though what passes for my brain.
When would have been a better time to bring Saddam down? Surely, nobody could abide this man staying in power. How many thousands did he kill? How many chemical and biological weapons did he use? How many chemical and biological weapons did he export to splinter gorups? If anything that U.S. has been doing lately troubles your concience, what Iraq was under Saddam Hussein should be giving you nightmares that land you in the assylum. So, should we have stepped in? Perhaps years ago, when the first set of UN deadlines came and went without any cooperation from the man... perhaps years in the future, when Saddam finally got his atom bomb? Just how much were we supposed to let go by? Were we supposed to negotiate for another 12 years?

It is clear now that huge numbers of Iraqis did not like the way things were and not only desired but were willing to fight for democracy and a bit of freedom. We made sure/are making sure that they have it. How is this a bad thing? How is the establishment of a fair goverment a bad thing? How is the liberation of millions a bad thing? Are there people out there that honestly believe that they deserve to live in peace, prosperity, and freedom, but that others do not? Are there people who think that that they are somehow better than people that live elsewhere?

With the execution of this war, Saddam and his network have been removed and/or destroyed, removing one of the more malevolent regimes out there and replacing it with a far more just form of government. All of the Iraqi WMD production capability is gone. Many of the WMD have been neutralized. One of the few avenues for Islamofacists to obtain nuclear wepons is gone. Terrorists that are intent on killing Americans are swarming to Iraq where American and Iraqi troops are cutting them down... saving us the trouble of hunting them.

Could somebody please tell me what could possibly be bad about any of this? It all looks good to me.

Charlie Foxtrot out.