cowperthwait | lies, evasion, spin, circumspection and cleverly veiled hype

Asked if he stood by his comments in the earlier Guardian interview, [John Deady, co-chair of New Hampshire Veterans for Rudy] said:

"I most assuredly do. I've been very concerned about this Muslim thing for quite awhile. The average American does not know beans about what the Muslims are about. I am talking about the Muslims in general. I don't subscribe to the principle that there are good Muslims and bad Muslims. They're all Muslims."

In the earlier interview with The Guardian, Deady said of Muslims: "We need to keep the feet to the fire and keep pressing these people until we defeat or chase them back to their caves or in other words get rid of them."

…

When I asked Deady if this was also a reference to all Muslims, he said: "I am talking about Muslims in general."

…

Deady also said at one point: "I'm not a bigot really. I may sound like one. But I'm only quoting what's factual."

The [Giuliani] campaign didn't immediately return a request for comment.

—Rudy Surrogate: "I Don't Subscribe To The Principle That There Are Good Muslims And Bad Muslims", Talking Points Memo

Reporters Expose Airport Security Lapses By Blowing Up Plane, Onion News Network

Holy crap, dude, I'm in love.

I've found a Bulgarian hairstylist who takes absolutely no shit. Upon arrival, she told me outright that my mullet made me look "like a caveman", that the haircut I suggested was "stupid", and the digital slideshow I'd assembled of good-haircuts-I've-had-in-the-past proved I was "a vain little boy."

Also: "Don't move your head. When I tug on your hair, offer some reseestance!", and, "You need to eat more — your neck is bony and it makes my job deeficult." We didn't talk much after that.

150 minutes later (yes!), after scalp massage #2, she pronounced me done. "There. You look like a boy."

"I feel like a man!" I hazarded.

"No, you are a boy. Now get out."

I have just met my future wife.

Relatedly, if anyone has a free afternoon, gets off on verbal abuse, and wants a free haircut (retail: $150), hit me up. Just promise not to flirt with her and steal her away— the bitch is mine.


The Chicago Public Library has once again thwarted my evil attempt to invoke terrorist plots by reading their books.

After several vain attempts involving easily forged documents like old power bills and my University of Chicago ID, I thought I could pass their background check this time by arriving with two forms of picture ID and my tax return (not to mention a natty haircut...). Fortunately, a bravery award medal goes to the eagle-eyed circulation clerk who observed that the postmark on my W2 was more than 30 days old. Almost 60 days, in fact — during which time, of course, I've moved to Iran or India or France or somesuch and trained in encyclopedia-bomb-making. Good save by the librarian! A patriot and a hero! America's safe for another week!

The reports describe a female guard who detainees said handled their genitals and wiped menstrual blood on their face. Another interrogator reportedly bragged to an FBI agent about dressing as a Catholic priest and "baptizing" a prisoner.

Some military officials and contractors told FBI agents that the interrogation techniques had been approved by the Defense Department, including directly by former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.

—FBI details possible Guantanamo Bay mistreatment, th' AP.

Impeach George W. Bush. Impeach him now.

[Traffic circles] are not beloved by everyone. In the LeConte neighborhood in March, someone dug up a bald cypress that Reeh had planted in a traffic circle and left a ransom note on his front porch that read: "Your tree will not be returned until you promise not to plant another tree in this circle."

Reeh left a note in the circle agreeing not to plant the tree in the circle, but said he might plant it somewhere else.

The tree-napper wrote back, saying, "This is a swamp cypress and it needs more water."

The tree eventually turned up in a container on the sidewalk, and Reeh planted it at LeConte School. In its place, Reeh planted shrubs.

"I'm pretty sure it was a bicyclist," Reeh said. "Some of them don't like trees because they block their view."

—"Policy would codify traffic circle allocations", S'Francisco Chronicle

People ask why I'm in such a hurry to get back to the East Bay....

Her phone rang and she said, "You've got to come down here! The same thing keeps happening over and over again. No! The same exact thing. The same people keep doing the same things. I'm freaking out. It's like the Twilight Zone!"

—"The Moebius"

The Israelis apparently instituted their huge offensive (the excuse was the two kidnapped soldiers, but it is clear the invasion has been planned for some time) in the belief that the air strikes would turn the people against Hezbollah because they would blame it for their plight.

When has that ever worked? The people of Vietnam did not blame their government for the bombings, they blamed the Americans. The people of Iraq didn't blame Saddam Hussein for the bombings, they blamed the Americans. Why? Because that's who was doing the bombing. It's not a complicated reaction. What are the markings on the plane? OK, we'll hate them.

—Jon Carroll

"I don't want to go too deep into it, but we discussed the origins of existentialism," said Snow.

—Slate

How might such a conversation go? Discuss.

Quoting Brad DeLong quoting Michael Young:

Hezbollah's Other War - New York Times: One evening earlier this summer, Lebanon’s most popular satire show, ‘‘Bas Mat Watan,’’ broadcast a sketch showing an ‘‘interview’’ with Sheik Hassan Nasrallah, Hezbollah’s leader and secretary general. ‘‘Nasrallah’’ was asked whether his party would surrender its weapons. He answered that it would, but first several conditions had to be met: there was that woman in Australia, whose land was being encroached upon by Jewish neighbors; then there was the baker in the United States, whose bakery the Jews wanted to take over. The joke was obvious: there were an infinite number of reasons why Hezbollah would never agree to lay down its weapons and become one political party among others.

But it was the rapid reaction to the satiric sketch that sent the more disquieting message. That very night, angry supporters of Hezbollah closed the airport road with burning tires — a warning that they could block at will the main access point in and out of the country — and marched on mainly Sunni, Druse and Christian quarters in Beirut. In a Christian neighborhood, they clashed with the son of a former president and his comrades, and several youths were taken to hospital.

The leaders of Hezbollah defended these actions, explaining that they were the spontaneous emotional response to the mocking of a cleric. It is just as likely that they were a coordinated effort to intimidate critics. In any case, to me the event seemed an essential one, since it symbolized the duality that has defined Lebanon ever since its civil war came to an end in 1990.

—"Michael Young on The Party of 'God'" in Brad DeLong's Semi Daily Journal

Cowperthwait says, with all the sarcasm he can muster:

Right, because ... coordinated demonstration would be bad; but it's only a down-home spontaneous tire-burnin' riot! — totally defensible! Can you blame them? Really? After all, they just saw something on t.v. that made them angry!...


Last winter, I did not understand the Dutch-cartoon outrage. Well, I "understood" it — evaluated the event using the analytical toolbox of a moderately competent student of history and the social sciences; intellectually weighed my impressions and findings against my understandings of the dynamics of the Muslim world; believed the event to represent the outcome of some causal mechanism, however unknown to me in its workings, rather than the outcome of an inexplicable randomness generator ... — but I didn't understand it. There's a difference. How does a bat's sonar system work? I took biology; I "understand." What's it like to be a bat? I don't actually understand.

What good fun at the time, drunkenly trying to dream up a media event in the U.S. — portrait, painting, cartoon, declaration, teleplay — that could incite violence among Americans. Interracial lesbian wiccan abortionists burning the flag! ha ha! — and that proved the point. Maybe Americans hold nothing sacred, or maybe we're better at managing our disapproval of contrary values; either way, the same outcome: no burning cars. Excepting during race riots, we're just not rock-throwing, car-torching people. So I didn't understand.

The Bas Mat Watan tire-burnin' at hand: hardly remarkable — it wasn't the main point of the story; it just caught my eye as I skimmed the news. But it brought me back to questions of understanding. Being moved to physical violence by an SNL sketch: I completely do not understand. Furthermore, I don't think I would ever want to understand. There are plenty of things I do not understand but of which I do not disapprove (examples: string theory, the derivatives market, women). Being a militant Islamist is not among these.

It's not that I don't understand and therefore don't approve; I don't understand and I don't approve.

Does this get us any closer to meaningful resolution of violence in the Middle East? No. Does it demonstrate me at my most enlightened? No. Am I necessarily proud of this? No. But this is where I am. I read about the participants in mideast violence and I don't understand, and unconsciously I turn away from any theory of a universal human condition. There is no way I could have anything in common with such people, and I'm coming into a cleaner conscience about finding the things they do just plain stupid.

WASHINGTON (AP) -- While the British terror suspects were hatching their plot, the Bush administration was quietly seeking permission to divert $6 million that was supposed to be spent this year developing new homeland explosives detection technology.

Congressional leaders rejected the idea, the latest in a series of steps by the Homeland Security Department that has left lawmakers and some of the department's own experts questioning the commitment to create better anti-terror technologies.

—"Bush Staff Wanted Bomb - Detect Cash Moved", AP

Is this Sierra Mist ad now funny or sad?

[insert the-real-threat-to-national-security-is-Kathy-Griffin's-explosive-plastic-surgery... joke here]

---

FOLLOWUP:
The more I think about it, it's definitely funny. I mean — inadvertently brilliant!

The Ad Council should pick it up as a PSA:
Our Nation's Security Screeners: Do What We Say, Or We'll Digitally Rape You.

NEW YORK A new Gallup poll finds that many Americans -- what it calls "substantial minorities" -- harbor "negative feelings or prejudices against people of the Muslim faith" in this country. Nearly one in four Americans, 22%, say they would not like to have a Muslim as a neighbor.

While Americans tend to disagree with the notion that Muslims living in the United States are sympathetic to al-Qaeda, a significant 34% believe they do back al-Qaeda. And fewer than half -- 49% -- believe U.S. Muslims are loyal to the United States.

—"Gallup: Many Americans Harbor Strong Bias Against U.S. Muslims", E&P (hat-tip cmdroverbite)

It is the first time the red alert level in the Homeland Security warning system has been invoked, although there have been brief periods in the past when the orange level was applied. Homeland Security defines the red alert as designating a ''severe risk of terrorist attacks.'' The government said it was banning liquids including beverages, hair gels and lotions from flights, explaining only that liquids emerged as a risk from the investigation in Britain. —AP. Also NYT, WP, CNN ...

And do you know why it's happening today? Ned Lamont, that's why!:

At the same time, Republicans began a concerted effort to use Mr. Lieberman’s defeat to portray Democrats as weak on national defense, reprising a theme that they made central to the last two national campaigns.

The attacks came in searing remarks from, among others, Ken Mehlman, the chairman of the Republican National Committee and Vice President Dick Cheney, who went so far as to suggest that the ouster of Mr. Lieberman might encourage “al Qaeda types.”

—NYT