Terrorist Huggers
I'm reading a book now called Fire in a Canebreak. Where I am in the book, the FBI is finding it impossible to find evidence against a single white man in a town where a mob of 20 was responsible for the last mass lynching in the US.
Someone writes a letter to his senator that says something like this: If this had been a crime against four white people, the town would have no trouble finding 200 of the 20 negroes who did it.
It's a terrible thing, I'm sure, to live in fear. I'm sure because I was robbed at gunpoint in Herring Run Park. Yes, at gunpoint. It was pretty scary, but it doesn't keep me away from the park. A year later, the DC snipers murdered their first victim. I was afraid to pump my gas until they were caught; I even suffered a bit of post-traumatic stress relating to the robbery.
I know who robbed me. And I admit that I will walk the other way if two teens with a similar look head in my direction. It's only natural.
So my heart goes out to New Yorkers, who must deal with the terrorist alerts daily, who may easily suffer PTS when seeing machine-gun militia and large alerts. And I can certainly understand wanting to steer clear of terrorists.
Who, though, are they? If we're speaking of the 9/11 murderers, it's pretty obvious: they were mostly Saudis (with some Egyptians and UAEs). So who are the so-called terrorist huggers hugging? The Iraqis?
Seems like the only ones doing any terrorist hugging are members of our own government, like the ones who quietly ushered the binLadens out of the country and the ones who are still kissing Saudi Arabian ass—instead of kicking it.
posted by fuquinay at 9:02 AM
speak!
26 Comments:
But...we HAVE to kiss the Saudi's asses. If we don't, our enonomy will be completely devastated.
8/09/2004 10:48 AM
Not devastated... restructured. We've had the technology to mass-produce alternative fuels forever. Fuels that burn cleaner, go further, and are kinder to the economy. It's the Powers-That-Be (read: Big Oil Bush and his cronies) that keep us dependent on fossil fuels. If we turned to corn oil for energy (very viable), then those who grow corn will be king. There would be a VERY uncomfortable period of time while the US restructured, but the whole world would be better off if we fought against our government-enforced reliance on oil.
8/09/2004 6:44 PM
Whoops. I meant to say, "Kinder to the ENVIRONMENT", not economy. Long day.
8/09/2004 6:45 PM
But don't fool yourself into thinking it would be any different with the Democrats. Everyone's got his hands in the pants of big oil. Welcome, Erik!
8/09/2004 8:25 PM
Well, we'd certainly be much better off burning corn for fuel than tranmogrifying it into high fructose corn syrup and drinking it by the gallon. If we let that happen gradually, as it is now, it will be a lot less painful than if the government just imposes it on us. Think about converting every car, truck, SUV, van... every fueling station... every oil-burning home furnace. Eeesh.
8/09/2004 9:50 PM
The problem with this, Joan, is we've had motive, opportunity, time, and technology for the past twenty years. Our government should have begun "imposing" on corporations (we're talking about major multi-billion dollar car companies, remember) to make these changes then. But everyone knows that a shovel costs more in a snowstorm than it does in the summer.
As Rabbi Hillel said, "If not now, when?"
8/10/2004 5:29 AM
Discussions like this only strengthen my belief that both micro and macroeconomics, along with system dynamics, should be required courses of anyone who wants to vote.
8/10/2004 11:47 AM
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8/10/2004 1:10 PM
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8/10/2004 6:23 PM
This is my blog. There is no freedom of speech here. Feel free to make your articulate, civil comments in your own.
doggy
8/10/2004 8:55 PM
My previous comment, which was deleted accidentally while trying to remove Joan's.
Joan, that's an elitist thing to say. Were voting a privilege like driving, that might be a valid point. But it's a right. And even the poor blacks in the South in the 1940s knew which candidate was going to slit their throats, literally.
I'm sure you think you know much more about economics—micro, macro, home, whatever—that the rest of us poor, dumb democrats. I think you're naive.
8/10/2004 8:59 PM
Message received.
8/10/2004 9:17 PM
I don't have the comment, but I will re-iterate the points I was trying to make:
1) I did not mean my comment about required courses to be taken literally. I was using hyperbole. We don't even require a high school diploma to vote, how could we possibly require economics or anything else, for that matter? We don't even have a literacy requirement.
2) What I did mean in that comment: I think it would be great if EVERYONE understood how the economy really works.
3) A government mandate to convert to biofuel would wreak havoc on the economy. We'll move to a sustainable, renewable resource when market forces make it feasible. The government continues to fund r&d for alternative fuel sources, but imposing a wholesale change isn't the way to go IMO. [This part of my original comment, I remembered] Along with everything else, I'm a capitalist. I am sure that makes me worse than naive in some people's eyes, but I can live with that.
I can understand your ban on discussing abortion in your writing classes, but I find it bizarre that you won't discuss it at all. For a position you're so wedded to, you'd think you'd be able to defend it up, down, and sideways. Saying the arguments are "too ugly" is a cop out. Still: your blog, your rules.
8/10/2004 10:17 PM
Without the cute little winky faces, Joan, it's hard to tell when you're using hyperbole, irony, or your own truth. My response to your comment was based on your actual comment. How was I to know you didn't mean it?
After all, reproductive freedom is a right, too. It's amazing how many people actually want to put some qualifications on it. You can't have babies until you've got a savings account (that will eliminate the Welfare mothers). You have to have drug and alcohol tests during your pregnancy (eliminate crack babies). Et cetera.
Someone says: we have the power to mass produce alternative fuels, and your retort is that discussions like these strengthen your belief that we should have rocket science degrees before we vote. It SOUNDS like you're insulting people. (Hence my comment about elitism and naiveté.)
As for market forces making biofuel sustainable, renewable, etc.: are they not simply because you said it? We've had this technology for years; it's been the topic of major network news programs and dozens of books over the last two decades. But it's not as if we're talking about waking up one morning to find barrels of oil floating out to sea because we no longer need them. We're talking about waking up tomorrow and taking an actual step toward self-reliance. We're talking about taking steps every single day, seeing some move toward alternative fuel sources.
Case in point: the hybrid vehicles. These are so popular that car companies can't seem to make them fast enough. (Seem. Can't SEEM to make them fast enough.) I have a friend who was on Toyota's waiting list for nearly a year.
But here's the thing, Joan. My blog post was a comment about terrorism. I was responding to someone else's blog, but rather than start an argument with her by using the comments section to disagree with her, I figured I'd come over here and say what was on my mind. And although I don't discourage good discourse, I don't like wholesale dismissal of others' comments, as if yours are somehow more learned. And your response about micro- and macro- economics just seemed (SEEMED) to slap some folks in the face.
But since you didn't actually mean it, then, in the words of Emily Litella, "Never mind."
doggy
8/11/2004 5:42 AM
I don't like wholesale dismissal of others' comments... just mine?
Economics isn't "rocket science." Government manipulations of the economy affect everyone everyday, and I do think it would be enormously helpful if economic literacy were taught in high school. Does that belief make me elitist, and naive? I don't see how wanting everyone to get a good working education makes me elitist. I guess it's my belief that it would be helpful that makes me naive?
You've thrown a lot of different issues up here, and displayed confused thinking in many of them. For example, your comments about voting rights and knowing which candidates were going to slit black throats: I assume you're talking about stalwarts like former KKK bigwig, Democratic senator Robert Byrd? You do realize that it was the Republicans that passed the Civil Rights Act, yes? Another example: withholding government funding is not the same as censorship. Nor is a private publication deciding which advertising to accept or which content to publish. Hybrid cars don't reduce our burden on fossil fuels (although I'm not sure if that's the point you were trying to make) -- all they do is shift the point at which the fuels are converted to energy from the car itself to the power plant.
But perhaps your comment about hybrid cars was to point out that Toyota just can't seem to make enough of them -- you infer that demand exceeds supply because the cars are so great, everyone wants one. I contend that Toyota purposefully undersupplies to keep the prices up so they can make profits on limited production runs, which are inherently more expensive. If demand increases to a point where it makes financial sense to produce enough hybrid cars to meet the demand without a waiting list, that's what Toyota will do. Right now, the demand just isn't there. I experienced exactly this phenomenon when I bought my Honda Odyssey back in 2000. (The Odyssey is not a hybrid vehicle, just to be clear. It's a gasoline-fueled, very nice minivan.) Today, you can walk in off the street and drive out with an Odyssey. Back in 2000, we had to call around to the dealerships and make an appointment with one just to arrange a test drive.
Just as these examples reveal a fundamental disagreement between your view of reality and mine, so do your comments advocating a government imposition of technological change. My comment about making economics a required course wasn't in response to the fact that biofuel technology exists and is useful, it was in response to the notion that it would be great if the government dictated that we have to use biofuel.
If you go upthread to my very first comment, you'll see that I actually support the use of biofuel. I am just adamantly opposed to having the government -- or anyone -- telling me I must.
I regret using sarcasm in an attempt to make my point. It's sole advantage is its brevity, which is far outweighed by the disadvantages of misinterpretation and escalation of attacks. I didn't think about whether or not anyone would be offended when I posted it. I've already spent way too much time on this response and it still doesn't say everything that I want it to, in a way that I hope will be understood. But this is going to have to do for now.
8/11/2004 2:17 PM
No one dismissed your comments, Joan. No one. We only said that the technology is available and sustainable. That's not a dismissal. It's a direct address.
Your belief that economics should be taught in high school doesn't make you an elitist; your requiring fluency in return for voting rights does. We've already established that you were being ironic, which means my elitist comment doesn't apply anymore. (Ironic is the proper term, as it means using words to convey the opposite of what you actually say. Sarcasm can be ironic but doesn't have to be.)
But it is still naive. As a teacher married to a teacher and friend to other middle- and high-school teachers, I can tell you that schools have enough on their plates trying to fit in citizenship classes. Art and physical education, which I find to be slightly higher on the list than world economics for a grade school student, are almost obsolete in most schools. And expecting students to have enough of a grasp of economics when they can't even name the Secretary of State is unrealistic (hence naive).
I have displayed no confused thinking at all. You make assumptions and call me confused. Don't. I am not talking about Robert Byrd. I have not thrown up that many issues, either. If you'll read the original post, you'll see that it's about knowing your enemies. I used the book to discuss how difficult it is to know them, even when they are obvious. Black voters in Georgia had finally earned the right to vote in the primary, and political platforms came down to, essentially, keeping the black man from getting to the polls and including him in the democratic process. Everyone knew which candidate was going to slit the black man's throat (keep lynching unpunishable). No one needed a working knowlege of macro- or micro- economics for that.
As for the fossil fuels and the fact that Toyota can't SEEM to make the cars fast enough (dear, you really must pay attention to those larger words; it's obvious that Toyota can make the cars faster, and it's also obvious that they want to), the point is that the technology is controlled by the industry and by the government.
As for my censorship comments, they are not part of this discussion. That was a separate post. Your confusion; certainly not mine.
Finally, on government imposition of technological change, I don't recall whether you or I am on the mailing list. No one asked us if I wanted oil to be the primary fuel source. No one asks us how we want our tax money spent. They sure as hell don't need our permission to make technological changes.
But go ahead; be adamantly opposed to the government telling you that YOU MUST change fuels. But be all for the government telling all women what to do with their own bodies.
You are the one who is confused, Joan.
And now, as you are sucking up the fuel in this here fossil that I call a body, I hope that you will find yourself a nice blog somewhere to respond to this. Because I'm tired. I really am.
doggy
8/11/2004 3:17 PM
I can understand your ban on discussing abortion in your writing classes, but I find it bizarre that you won't discuss it at all.I pointed out her inconsistency in supporting abortion when she literally weeps over tv programs that involve children being harmed in any way.Willingness to discuss abortion and deleting a personal attack in one's own journal strike me as two very different things.
So, because Doggy (as do most people that are in support of a woman's right to choose, by the way) are horrified by the thought of someone inflicting pain upon a child -- any child. Your correlation is completely out in the ozone. Your attack was vicious and mean-spirited.
8/11/2004 4:22 PM
I realize my comment makes little to no sense. It's a heck of an argument for getting a good night's sleep, I guess.
8/11/2004 4:52 PM
It might've had an extra period and a subject/verb error, but it still made sense. Stopping a pregnancy has no relation to hurting a living, breathing child. But let's put the government in our pants and keep them away from our gas tanks! Rah, rah, rah!
doggy
8/11/2004 4:59 PM
One more time, for the record: Doggy can do whatever she likes in her blog, including deleting comments she doesn't like, for whatever reason she wants. It's her space. I have no problem with that.
Of course being willing to discuss abortion and deleting personal attacks are two different things. Kathy is the one who strung those two sentences together, which is why they make no sense.
So, if you're going to pull quotes, please put them in context. The first sentence is from up thread, anyone can see it is the opening of a paragraph wherein I agree: Doggy's blog, Doggy's rules. The second sentence Kathy quoted is from my own blog where I talk about this sequence of events. (http://www.farscapeweekly.com/weblog/blogger.html)
Had I been aware of Doggy's unwillingness to discuss abortion, I would never have brought up the issue as an example of the conflicting values she has expressed. (Note: it is only my opinion that she has expressed conflicting values. She herself feels she is entirely consistent.)
8/11/2004 5:40 PM
Joan, I pulled from your blog because your original comment is no longer here. But you clearly stated in your own blog that what was deleted was what I chose to quote you on. Or the "gist" of it, anyway.
8/11/2004 5:45 PM
Joan, you're right; it's only your opinion that those two things conflict. Thank you.
8/11/2004 5:52 PM
For what it's worth, since my degree is in Sociology, I actually have taken both macro- and micro- economics. I obviously missed the majority of the battle, but I'd lke to say that I never advocated the sudden change of fuel sources... simply pointed out that at the rate we are going, that's probably how it will happen. Oil is a fossil fuel, and fossil fuels are, by definition, finite in supply. As the primary consumers of oil, we are now forced to either a.) plunder our wilderness and destroy our environment, or b.) conquer foreign countries so we can plunder THEIR environment. As oil gets scarcer and scarcer, we will do both. If we don't start shifting fuels SOON, we are not going to have the luxury of shifting slowly. We're just gonna run out. And once that happens, Adam Smith be damned. Economic laws fly out the window. And THAT'S what we need to be thinking about now, before our backs are against the wall. If I may use corn as an example once again, the advantage would be a renewable form of energy. That makes it not only environmentally friendly, but politically friendly as well. We already own Iowa. :)
PS: It's ARCLinda. My husband has an account, and I don't and I'm too darned lazy to create one.
8/11/2004 7:56 PM
Liberating? I wonder if the Iraqi children feel safer today, what with random car-bombings and neighborhood shoot-outs now a regular part of the daily news. And weren't we "liberating" them from a vicious dictator who routinely arrested innocent Iraqis, imprisoned them without due process, and tortured them while in custody? But then WE get in there and what do we do? If that's liberation, I'd hate to see the alternative.
Last time I did the taxes, I did note that there were tax breaks for people who owned vehicles fueled by alternative fuels. Great.... if you can a.) find one, and b.) afford to buy it. And I do feel that things would be better under the Democrats. I realize that this is over-simplified, but I think the major difference between the elephants and the donkeys is this: Republicans want less constraints on big business, and more of a hold on individuals, while Democrats want to tighten the leash on big business and get government out of individual lives. I'm all for that. I'm not much of a capitalist, either. Of course, I'm an Army brat/wife. I always found it amusing that the US military attracts defenders of capitalist democracy by offering them socialism. :) Think about it... "Join the Army/Navy/Marines and we'll give you free housing, pay for your education, provide free healthcare, and find you a job. In return, we'll tell you where to live and what to do." Hehehe....
8/12/2004 8:49 AM
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8/12/2004 11:30 AM
Somehow I deleted my post so; I'll do my best to repeat it.
On the issue of abortion: I have PCOS. Some of you may not know what that is, but in the simplest of terms its "female problems." I've been told by several doctors that it will be extremely difficult for me to conceive a child, if it's possible at all. The thought of not being able to have a child both terrifies and depresses me.
When I was married, my husband and I tried to get pregnant using fertility drugs (Clomid) for nearly a year. The drugs made me violently ill and not pregnant. Unless you've been through it, you have no idea the level of stress this experience can cause. It's a roller coaster ride of emotions from hope and desperation to depression and disappointment. It takes its toll on one's mind and body rather quickly.
Anyway, I've pretty much accepted the fact that the only way I'm going to have a child is by either artificial means, which is extraordinarily expensive and comes with no guarantees, or by adoption.
Most people would therefore assume that I'd be anti-abortion, relying on others to have babies for me. Guess what? I'm not.
I do not condone anyone, especially our government, telling women what they can and cannot do with their bodies. If a woman does not want to carry a child, who has the right to tell her that she MUST carry that child, go through labor and the birth of that child, and then, if she decides she doesn't want the child, she can simply give it up for adoption.
It's ludicrous to make someone go through that. Her body is her body, she can make whatever decision is best for her, and that she can live with. No one has the right to interfere with that.
I have wept uncontrollably while watching news stories of women who've smothered, or in some other way, killed their child(ren). I've watched news stories of young girls giving birth to a child in a public restroom, only to throw the child away in a dumpster. These stories horrified me. They made me question God, and fairness. Why are these women given children and I'm not?
Regardless of all of this, I still firmly remain pro-choice. I'm anti-abortion for myself (that's MY decision) and pro-choice for every other woman in the world.
I'm also confused by Joan's statements and believe them to be contradictory. Why is it OK for the government to tell us what to do with our own bodies, but not with our vehicles? I don't get it.
8/13/2004 11:24 AM
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