Sean Paul Kelley's blog

Review: Going Palin

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 11:47:00 -0800

I think that should be a new version of 'Going Postal:' Going Palin is when a wingnut politician goes off the deep end.

Millions of copies will be sold of a book written by someone who can't write, intended for an audience that doesn't read, about the thoughts of a person who doesn't think. God is dead.

Can I get a hallelujah?

Ode To 'Something'

Sat, 21 Nov 2009 11:30:49 -0800

My buddy—we’ll call him ‘A’—and I are sitting on his back porch. His dog is spinning around wildly in circles, chewing on an old, smelly, dog-slobbered rag. The dog likes to set the rag in my lap, as some kind of canine-human bonding trick. “A” and I have both had far too much to drink.¹

“Dude, have you seen those new thingeys?” he asks.

“What-huh?”

“It’s one of those doo-dads you see on TV, man!”

I look up from the computer in my lap. We’ve been chatting across the porch to each other via instant messenger, checking our emails and generally acting like the GenX slackers we are. We call it ‘compunicating.’

“Are you high?” I ask. I punch the key board, shooting a quick, “you’re a freak’” IM back to him across the internets.

“No,” he says. “But pass the Scotch.”

“At least you know what that is,” I tease.

“C’mon man, you know what I’m talking about, they were advertised during the last Superbowl. They sell ‘em at, um, uh, whosamawhatsit!”

“What on God’s green earth are you talking about?” I sigh. I grab the bottle of scotch and pour him another drink. And one for me. He smiles. He’s having a hard time focusing his eyes. The dog starts barking.

“Eh, freak, you know what I’m talking about. Those thingamabobs!”

“Yeah, thanks. That helps. . . ” And before I can finish he says, “They’re about yay-high and about half the size of my, umm, uh, left foot.” He holds it up for good measure.

“You need help.”

“No, I don’t,” he says and coughs, lights up another smoke. “Ack, it’s on the tip of my tongue. I can’t get it out. It’s like one of those damn gahooters we had a few weeks ago.”

“Huh?”

“You’ve seen ‘em. We had one for a while in our whosamajiggy.”

“Whydontwejustaskyergirlfriend,” I IM him and then say, “She’ll know what you’re talking about you ingrate. Hey! ‘E’, ‘A’ has a question for you.”

“Honey,” he yells, “you know that whomagutchey we saw last night. What’re they called?”

“Oh, yeah,” she says, “those thingamajigs that hang from the doo-hickey on the whatchamadoodle?”

“Guys,” I say, “I’d hate to listen to one of your lover’s spats.”
---------
¹ Dialogue inspired by Schott's Weekend Vocab.

Exhibit 1,231 In Our Creaking Infrastructure

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 08:55:34 -0800

Flying is the pits, especially in America. It's also getting worse:

A failure early Thursday morning of a system that feeds flight plans to air traffic controllers snarled thousands of flights in the eastern United States. By mid-morning the system was working again, but the backlog caused wide airport delays.

The same system failed in August 2008, but it was not clear if the cause was the same this time. The system, the National Airspace Data Interchange Network, situated in Atlanta with a backup in Salt Lake City, was a casualty of another failure in the tightly linked [system], one official at the Federal Aviation Administration said. Technicians were still trying to determine the cause of the glitch.

This is just another argument for a better, more comprehensive and expanded rail system in the United States. Sure, it's not a 'shovel-ready' infrastructure project, but it is one that will help grow the economy, create jobs and increase the quality of life for many Americans.

The airlines would surely lobby against such a thing, however, just like Southwest lobbied heavily against a high-speed regional Texas rail system several years ago.

Empires of The Silk Road

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 07:51:21 -0800

The publisher--they wanted me to review the book?!?-- recently sent me a copy of Christopher I. Beckwith's book, Empires of the Silk Road: A History of Central Eurasia from the Bronze Age to the Present. I've already read the book and have my own well worn, dog-eared, underlined and highlighted copy. So, the first person to email me at my personal email address--or a PM--I'll mail this copy to, if you are so inclined.

Book has already been claimed.

Christian Charity in Our Times

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 07:34:59 -0800

And people wonder why I am not a Christian anymore:

Posters to various message boards tell stories of seeing bumper stickers with the message “Pray for Obama – Psalm 109:8” on the highway, only to look up the verse and find, “Let his days be few; and let another take his office.” …

Anyway, now it’s a real thing: CafePress is selling T-shirts and bumper stickers . . .

However, as a number of commentators have noted, the wording that follows this bumper-sticker appeal is somewhat more disturbing:

Let his days be few; and let another take his office.
Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.
Let his children be continually vagabonds, and beg: let them seek their bread also out of their desolate places.
Let the extortioner catch all that he hath; and let the strangers spoil his labor.
Let there be none to extend mercy unto him: neither let there be any to favor his fatherless children.
Let his posterity be cut off; and in the generation following let their name be blotted out.
Let the iniquity of his fathers be remembered with the LORD; and let not the sin of his mother be blotted out.
Let them be before the LORD continually, that he may cut off the memory of them from the earth.

Love thy neighbor, indeed.

US ARMY GUIDE: Hand To Hand Combat With Zombies

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 07:04:32 -0800

Just because I'm on a zombie kick (I watched Zombieland last night, Fun movie):

Never underestimate the zombie

Zombies are not mindless hunters. They are swifter and craftier than one might expect. A lone zombie can burst out of hiding and take a chunk out of you in the blink of an eye.

Never engage a zombie if you can avoid it

Though zombies are surprisingly quick in confined spaces, they are not swift runners. Engage the zombie only when you are trapped, and escape is not an option.

Focus on the task; keep fear out of your head

No one, no matter what their powers of description, can fully prepare you for your first encounter with a zombie. Their grotesque appearance and smell, along with the inhuman noises they emit, can induce a level of fear and terror that precludes rational response and causes one to freeze. You must not react to the zombie's appearance. Focus instead on delivering a combination of offensive and defensive strikes that will buy you enough time to escape.

Journalistic Malpractice

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 06:14:26 -0800

I'm a frequent critic of President Obama, but sometimes it's really important to read between the lines. Yesterday the AP posted this story. In it the writer reports that the upcoming 'jobs summit' at the White House isn't about jobs:

President Barack Obama says creating jobs isn't the goal of a coming White House forum on jobs and economic growth.

And the headline reinforces the lede:

Obama: Job creation not goal of Dec. 3 jobs forum

However, a close reading of the story in question would leave the reader confused:

More after the jump.

The president told NBC News on Wednesday that the purpose of the Dec. 3 summit is to figure out how to encourage hiring by businesses still reluctant to do so.

Confused? Well, after taking a look at the transcript of the interview with NBC's Chuck Todd its pretty clear what happened. Todd was looking for a 'gotcha' moment:

Q Right before you left for this trip in Asia, you announced that you were going to convene a jobs summit. This smacks of one of those classic Washington answers to a tough problem: convene a commission, convene a summit. How is this going to create a job?

Obama didn't take the bait. Here's his answer:

Well, that's not the goal. We're doing all kinds of things to make sure that employment is accelerated. Our first job was to make sure that economic growth was happening -- and we're starting to see that now. As I said even when we first passed the stimulus package, job growth tends to lag, it tends to happen after. So what we're seeing now is businesses are starting to invest again, they're starting to be profitable again, but they haven't started hiring again.

He answers Todd's question about the whole 'convening a summit' trope in the negative. And then goes on to very clearly state the jobs are the priority.

And so now a new meme might be floating out there, a la Gore invented the internet, etc. . . that Obama isn't trying to create jobs. Great work AP.

Make The Rich Pay?

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:44:38 -0800

The results of this poll are pretty interesting:

Americans don't want to shoulder the cost of President Barack Obama's health care overhaul themselves. They think the rich should pay for it.

I don't think it will happen that way, however. As a matter of fact, I know it won't. At least not yet. But it's another indication that Americans are much more progressive, especially when it comes to taxation, than politicians realize--I also think it is an indicator of just how pissed the middle class is with the wealthy in this country.

As I have noted many times here, I am in favor of a return to golden-era Eisenhower-like taxation, but I'm not holding my breath. If the Democrats really wanted a decent health-care plan, one that creates real health-care cost savings across the board, however, they could push one through. Instead we'll get a mushy-halfway plan that will be more of regressive tax on the middle class. But we all knew that, didn't we?

Obama At The Wall

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 08:46:39 -0800

President Obama visited the Great Wall of China yesterday. Having seen the Wall in many different places in China, from the Badaling, where Obama visited, to the perilous angles and heights of Simitai and then all the way out in the West at the Jade Gate where the Han and T'ang walls peter out into the sand I can attest to its hold on the imagination. I've seen some amazing places in my travels but my first experience with the Wall stands head and shoulders above any other experience in China. The Great Wall is one of those places that is both cliche and profoundly impressing. It lives up to the hype.

If you are inclined to learn more about the Great Wall, its provenance and history I highly recommend this book by Julia Lowell. It is an insightful narrative history of the 'Long Wall,' its place in the Chinese psyche and that of the West. From the first tentative tamped earth ramparts built to keep out the marauding Rong and Di tribes to the massive Qing Walls that President Obama visited yesterday it is a wonderful, easy to read romp through Chinese history.

Carrie Prejean?

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 11:11:29 -0800

What am I missing? I keep seeing this woman's story pop up everywhere, from Daily Kos to the Huffington Post. I mean, who really cares? Why do we expend so much useless energy on stories like this? (And yes, I do recognize the irony of me posting about it.)

On that note: I had dinner with my Mom last night and even she was talking about her. Good grief.

What? Huh?

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 10:55:59 -0800

Not ragging on Krugman here. Rather I'm pointing out a little irony in some of the economic arguments we've heard the last few years.

First this:

But with the financial crisis abating, this process is going into reverse. Last week’s U.S. trade report showed a sharp increase in the trade deficit between August and September. And there will be many more reports along those lines.

Wasn't the export sector, lead by a weak dollar, supposed to help the economy? (Of course, my contention has always been, how can you export your way into growth when you've eviscerated your manufacturing base, right?)

And then this:

Unfortunately, the Chinese don’t seem to get it: rather than face up to the need to change their currency policy, they’ve taken to lecturing the United States, telling us to raise interest rates and curb fiscal deficits — that is, to make our unemployment problem even worse.

Isn't this what the IMF/World Bank tells developing countries to do in the even of a crisis? We dispense the medicine, but when someone tells us to take the same, well, you know.

Last Of The Tasmanian Devils?

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 09:09:59 -0800

I grew up a hunter. One of my fondest memories was learning to shoot a .410 with my Dad and then quail and dove hunting in the Brush Country of South Texas. One of the cardinal rules of hunting was, as my father always said, "never kill something you're not going to eat." I once shot a crow for the hell of it. My punishment was a healthy serving of real crow that evening. I can say I have literally eaten crow. (It's not so good. And the lesson was learned.)

I've hunted deer a few times in life as well, but as I grew older, sitting in a blind above a sendero waiting for a deer to show up and eat the corn below didn't quite seem sporting.

My father and I traveled to a lot of wild places in the US when I was younger, too. One of the joys was seeing the local wildlife. (At the time it was boring, but now I am grateful.) Somewhere along the line I developed a sense of conservation and appreciation for wildlife in its native setting. So I don't hunt now. If I had to, I could, but it seems pointless. I prefer to watch nature in all its glory. And that's what makes stories like this all the more heartbreaking.

I have seen a badger, ferocious but cute critters that they are. And I saw a mongoose in India. But I doubt I'll ever see a Tasmanian Devil in the wild.

Sometimes I think that if more people grew up hunting they might well appreciate nature's bounty even more. I know this may sound odd, but there is a strange communion between the hunted and the hunter at the time of death. I don't know why this is, but I was always grateful for the animal's sacrifice and the food it provided. It seems that appreciation is lost on we moderns. More is the pity.

Randroids On The March

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:24:57 -0800

This is golden:

2009's most influential author is a mirthless Russian-American who loves money, hates God, and swings a gigantic dick. She died in 1982, but her spawn soldier on. And the Great Recession is all their fault.

It's a brilliant take down of Rand.

One more quote. I just can't resist:

The days during which that 19-year-old has Rand's worldview vectored into his cerebral cortex are feverish and sleepless. Days of beautiful affliction during which the intransigence of others—roommates, a coed the patient has been hitting on, professors, parents, everyone—are shown to be the product of their shortcomings, their idiocy and sublimated envy of the patient's intelligence and talent. Days during which the infected comes to see himself and Roark/Galt as avatars of one another: superheroically mirthless protagonists in a drama of historical import. It's the damnedest thing. One day you've got a bright young kid dutifully connecting the dots of his liberal-arts education; the next, he's got Roark and Galt in the marrow and has become . . . an insufferable asshole.

Heh!

When You Know Things Are Frothy

Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:18:18 -0800

I'm not a contrarian, although I suppose on the face of it I probably come across as one. I'd label myself a skeptic more than anything else when it comes to markets. A skeptic in the sense that I rarely buy the official narrative. More of a realist I suppose. But that may just be a personal and intellectual conceit.

One of the official narratives I've been hearing a lot of lately--maybe not so much a narrative as a lot of cheerleading--is about gold. Now, there is a secular case to be made for gold. That case rests mostly on a falling dollar and the inverse correlation between our domestic markets and the rise in gold. The case has merit.

But when I see a story like this, one that says gold has a lot longer to climb, the red-flags of my bullshit detector go off. (Metaphor mixed on purpose.)

My question: where have we heard this before? And who's next? James Glassman of Dow 36,000 infamy?

Pretzel Politics

Sun, 15 Nov 2009 10:54:22 -0800

Lex has a great post on the pretzel politics of Afghanistan:

Mikhail Sergeyevich applies the idiomatic phrase “…… vydelyvnet Krendelya” to Karmal. We could use it do describe Karzai, Obama, Clinton, McChrystal, et. al.. It translates literally as “….. is walking like a pretzel.” The figurative meaning is that someone is staggering and weaving like a drunk; that is, not being straight-forward.

The Soviets had the exact same problem with Afghan government legitimacy that the US is having now. They had the same problem with the Pakistan-Afghan border land that we have now. They had a better Afghan Army to work with and still had the problems we’re having. History may not repeat itself, but it rhymes and in this case we’re merely looking at history translated from Russian to English.

As I have said, over and over again: Afghanistan is easy to conquer but impossible to hold.

And Chuck Spinney chimes in with some observations about this news story at the Times of London:

More after the break.

The Afghan debacle is becoming a case study of how political debate in Versailles drips in a naturally self-organizing way to protect the dysfunctional status quo.

As I indicated yesterday and in September, the fundamental flaw that set the stage for the current policy making fiasco was the unexamined analytical hole in General McChrystal's escalation strategy -- namely, its dependence of the rapid expansion of the corrupt and ineffective Afghan national security forces. McChrystal did not analyze this corruption/ineffectiveness issue, but that crucial omission was ignored the hoorah accompanying the immediate leaking of report by his allies buried somewhere in the Versailles apparat. The only alternative that surfaced during cacophony of the ensuing months, the so-called Biden plan, was equally reckless, because it also glossed over this analytical hole by advocating that we substitute a greater reliance on robotic drones for boots on the ground (drones create their own problems) and further accelerate training of the Afghan forces. With Versailles leaking like a sieve, the debate became a ridiculous fact-free exercise in macho venting. Now, it is beginning to look like Ambassador Eikenberry (a former Army general and possibly an adult to boot) has moved to pull everyone's fat out of the fire by blaming the chaos in the escalation debate on corruption by the Karzai government (true enough), but not surprisingly, this blame is being treated implicitly in Versailles as if were a new development that has arisen suddenly since McChrystal's supporters leaked his fatally flawed report. In this "new" rush of developments, the attached report in the Times [UK] can be forgiven if it inadvertently helps to reinforce the collective amnesia, because it does not connect the dots to link the obvious flaws in the original McChrystal strategy and the cynical leaking of that report which together put the whole dripping circus into motion.

Mr. Obama is in a no win situation, and the time to cut his losses is past due. Hopefully, he has learned a lesson and heads will roll. But I fear the more likely outcome will be double down with some form of mushy middle course, possibly adorned with Mr. Karzai's carcass twisting slowly in the wind, that protects everyone in Versailles, if only in the short term.