If it seems too good to be true . . .

We have heard such wonderful stories. Ancient old Iraqi grannies carried to the polls in wheel barrels so they can vote. Families bringing the little children so they can witness this monumental event. People came to the polls in their Sunday Best. President Bush said the Iraqis "have taken rightful control of their country's destiny." 72 percent of the 14.2 million registered voted to choose this National Assembly that will write a constitution and choose a president. Et cetera, Et cetera, Et cetera.

Whoa, Nellie. Hold on there for just a wee minute, please. My momma loved all people, especially people with different cultures. She had the heart of an artist and she loved all colors -- vivid, pastel, and any hue between. She believed all people are the same in their souls. And that is what she taught me.

I know in my heart that if in 1968 the Russians had invaded the U.S. to stop our weapons of mass destruction and to save the blacks from ethnic cleansing by KKK John Birchers, and the hippies from inhumane treatment by rednecks, I would have been an insurgent. I would have fought to the last breath to keep my country my country. It gets my dander up just getting unsolicited "advice" from people. I can't imagine having my world taken over against my will. I didn't think I would survive 25 hours of our little Midwest blackout in 2003. Going without regular water and electricity and air and heat for as long as these brave Iraqis have endured would be a total breakdown of civilization in my neighborhood. What these families have survived thus far humbles me.

I am suspect of the 72 percent voting record. If true, perhaps it can be explained by what the Christian Science Monitor and some of the Iraqi bloggers themselves have said there seems to be an understanding that food ration cards will only be renewed for those who vote. True or not, intentional or not, if it is what the people were told, it was not a free election. It was not a democratic election. And I'm certainly not convinced our form of democracy is such a model of perfection by which their democracy should be imitated in the first place.

 The Clintonator

If anyone doubted that Hillary Clinton is planning to run for President in 2008, check out this masterful toeing the line on the abortion debate:

Proposing new political language about abortion rights for the Democratic Party, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton said today that friends and foes on the issue should come together on "common ground" to reduce the number of "unwanted pregnancies" and ultimately abortions, which she called a "sad, even tragic choice to many, many women."

While she acknowledged in her address today that Americans have "deeply held differences" over abortion rights, Mrs. Clinton told the annual conference of the Family Planning Advocates of New York State, "I for one respect those who believe with all their heart and conscience that there are no circumstances under which abortion should be available."

First of all, that's the nicest thing anyone on the left has said about pro-lifers in years, and she said it while strong in her conviction in defending abortion rights. Very savvy. The Democrats are finally realizing that a full half of the country still opposes abortion (according to the most recent Gallup polling), and so they have to reach across the divide if they want to win elections again. Republicans learned this in reverse, allowing and promoting strong pro-choice candidates like Giuliani and Specter and Schwarzenegger in more liberal areas of the county. The Democrats over the last 10-15 years have taken the opposite, disastrous strategy of kicking out all pro-life and conservative members of their party, and then not understanding why they can't win in 80% of the states.

Want more evidence Hillary is thinking of 2008?

Mrs. Clinton also called today for the Bush administration, religious groups, supporters and opponents of abortion rights and others to look beyond the abortion rights divide and form a broad alliance on other issues that she suggested as less incendiary: sex-education programs for teenagers that included abstinence education, emergency contraception for women who have recently had unprotected intercourse, and family planning.

Mrs. Clinton knows she's despised by the hard-line political right and Limbaugh-listening crowd. Working side by side with Bush to reduce abortions, of all things, is a masterstroke.

I've generally believed Hillary wouldn't stand a chance in a Presidential election. A few more moves like that, however, and I won't be so sure.

 VOTE OR WHINE IN

Ask Susan B Anthony or Harriet Tubman or Ed Roberts or Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr, or anyone who fought for the rights of women, blacks, disabled or just plain all people, about the whining and complaining radio and tv news journalists’ reports on the Iraqis who may have to drive a hundred miles or more to vote. First democratic elections are rough. Countries with centuries of democratic elections still find it rough.

Why are these Iraqi/Americans and Iraqi/Canadians whining and complaining?

In the first place, who decided North American born Iraqis (mind you–North American Born and never have set foot on Iraqi soil) will chose the leader of Iraq. Isn’t that like having the Vietnam draft dodgers living in Canada AND THEIR CHILDREN choosing the next American president?

They and their forefathers fled their homelands to seek shelter, economic gains and/or freedom from imprisonment. It was the decision of the Iraqi election committee in Switzerland (sure, I believe that one) to allow expatriates the vote.

And in the second place, is not the right to vote worth a drive? If my generation could come from all over the country to Woodstock, a music festival, how much more effort should be put into the vote? If people can travel to Mecca, surely they can split or quarter the difference and go to vote.

Saddam Hussein at-Takriti, a Sunni Muslim and member of the Ba’ath party, was re-elected president of Iraq on Oct 15, 2002 by 100% of the 11½ million voters who voted 100% for him. Personally, that would make me want to vote. And any employer in America that would not support a worker’s need for the day off needs to re-examine priorities.

 Quick Note

By the way, I think CNN's lead story "Bush: Better human intelligence needed" (complete with a dim-looking picture of the President) feels like a double-meaning-laced parody, especially with such lines as: "Lack of human intelligence has been blamed for the belief that stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction existed in Iraq before the war." It's hard not to read between the lines on that one. :)

 Along the Same Lines...

If you're curious about the new federal food and exercise recommendations, read the entire article "Please Pass the Cake" by Sandy Szwarc of TCS. It's fascinating, and links to all sorts of industry, news, and health data I hadn't considered before. Here's a money quote:

It goes without saying that these "guidelines" discount any pleasurable benefits of foods or their equally important and healthful emotional, social and cultural value. Nor does it teach balance and moderation. Making food something to fear and micromanage isn't nourishing or sustainable.

You may think that my admiration for this article is in conflict with my posting yesterday, but it's not: again, I feel strongly that "bad-for-you" food should still be legal (as I do with cigarettes and alcohol, for example). But I think the government could make better inroads with regards to a nation eating better by making high-fat, high-caloric foods cost a little more, which again, should result in lower prices for low-fat, low-caloric foods (something will still have to fit the 99 cent niche, natch.) Then instead of guilting people into eating better (which results in rebound and rebellion, the reason many diets which help you lose five pounds ultimately make you gain ten), you're making better eating choices naturally, out of sheer financial sense and practicality.

 McD'oh

No, I'm not a vegetarian, nor anti-business, nor even anti-McDonald's, at least not in principle. But I find it sadly ironic that shortly after all the recent studies confirming frequent red-meat-eaters are "30 to 40 percent more likely" to develop colorectal cancer, McDonald's most recent CEO Charlie Bell died yesterday -- at age 44 -- of colorectal cancer.

Though today's news stories and obituaries are careful to avoid mentioning any possible connection, most describe Bell as "a charismatic leader who said he ate a McDonald's product most days." And, lest we forget, Bell had worked for McDonalds for nearly 30 years, which I thought must be a typo given his young age but, nope: he started as a young teenager and worked his way up. McDonald's is quite literally the only company he's ever worked for. I wonder how many Big Macs that equals.

Bell replaced Jim Cantalupo as President, who died of a heart attack last April at age 60 (heart attacks, of course, being another famous side effect of increased red meat consumption.)

Jim Skinner, who took over this past November as Bell's health started to fail, has also worked at McDonald's for 33 years. If I were him, I'd start eating at Subway.

I don't mean to be callous or crass or unsympathetic. A young man who everyone liked has passed away, and I'm of course sad for his family and friends. But even though I'm generally wary of additional government regulations telling people what they can and can't put into their bodies, it does seem pretty ridiculous to tax and regulate cigarettes and alcohol while leaving processed foods cheap, unregulated and wildly accessible to everyone with 99 cents in their pocket. Hell, I'm not a supporter of pot, but I'm quite certain that marijuana is far less harmful to the body (at least from a raw health perspective) than these fatty, processed foods, and is still illegal on health grounds.

Then again, I suppose marijuana use leads to an increase in desiring those fatty, processed foods, so maybe it's a wash.

Couldn't we add a tax to any food with a certain percentage of saturated fat or caloric count, and use that money for a national health fund to combat obesity? The taxes would encourage fast food empires to come up with healthier alternatives (in order to win the pricing wars) and discourage people from eating 2-3 servings of processed meats every day (if chicken was cheaper, for example). Yes, I know this has been suggested for years, and is generally rejected by those of us with Republican leanings. But it seems to me the pro-taxers are right on this one -- everyone benefits, including the consumer. Not to mention the spectacular impact it could make on our rising and future health care crisis.

I am reminded of a portion from one of my favorite articles of all time, Dinesh D'Souza's Ten Great Things About America:

[An] acquaintance of mine from Bombay [has] been unsuccessfully trying to move to the United States. I asked him, "Why are you so eager to come to America?" He replied, "I really want to live in a country where the poor people are fat."

The reason a disproportionate number of our nation's obese are poor and lower-middle-class is because high-fat fast foods are mass-produced and cheaper than low-fat foods. But it's not like a tax on high-fat foods are going to eliminate the value meals and cheap items -- they'll just become different items, by definition healthier ones that wouldn't have to be taxed. I'm not quibbling with D'Souza's point, for of course what he's really saying is that even our poor are "well fed". Wouldn't it be ever more impressive, then, if we worked a little harder to be well fed and healthy.

 DEEETROIT DWELLING

Detroit Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick, that dilettante of civic leadership, that infamous party animal and keeper of the Manoogian Mansion, that chosen and proclaimed symbol of Detroit, removed the diamond boulders from his earlobes, both right and left, and in a crisp white shirt and dark pinstriped zoot suit, explained why Detroit workers must face layoffs, 10% pay cuts, and city tax increases to stave off deficits and a possible State takeover. Gosh. I sure am glad I don’t have to vote in Detroit.

As a suburbanite, I, fool that I am, only stand in awe and watch as the new Casinos grow and the old established businesses crumble amid a city council focused on it's own feeding frenzy. Ya gotta love these self-serving greedy politicians.

As my co-worker Anne says, "Sarcasm is the Wit of Fools."

So true. So true.

 Ludicrosity of the Day

From newscientist.com :

THE Pentagon considered developing a host of non-lethal chemical weapons that would disrupt discipline and morale among enemy troops, newly declassified documents reveal.

Most bizarre among the plans was one for the development of an "aphrodisiac" chemical weapon that would make enemy soldiers sexually irresistible to each other. Provoking widespread homosexual behaviour among troops would cause a "distasteful but completely non-lethal" blow to morale, the proposal says.

Oh. My.

 Endgame

Finally. From CNN:

NEW YORK (AP) -- Four CBS employees were fired Monday following the release of an independent investigation into a "60 Minutes Wednesday" story about President Bush's military service that relied on forged documents.

The network fired Mary Mapes, producer of the report; Josh Howard, executive producer of "60 Minutes Wednesday" and his top deputy Mary Murphy; and senior vice president Betsy West.

Dan Rather, the anchor of the "CBS Evening News" who served as the story's correspondent, announced in November he would be stepping down from his anchor position in March. Rather did not mention the controversy when he made his announcement.

According to a CBS statement, an independent panel appointed by the network concluded that CBS News failed to follow basic journalistic principles in putting together the piece, which aired September 8. That failure was compounded with a "rigid and blind" defense of the report, the statement continued.

The defeatjohnjohn blog (this site's election-time "sister blog") is proud to have been among the first four websites to help expose these obvious forgeries, and the only blog to offer a highly-publicized $50,000+ challenge to anyone who could reasonably recreate the documents from a typewriter available in 1972. (No one could.) I was flattered and shocked at the amount of national publicity the blog received, and was happy to retain tens of thousands of these new readers through the election.

It's nice to notice that even the Associated Press and all major news outlets are now definitively calling the documents "forgeries", not "alleged forgeries" or even "probable forgeries". (The report itself says one can never be 100% certain, but does prove in detail that the documents were not made in the early 70s, so the lack of a stated "100%" proof appears to be a legal, lawsuit-saving hedge, since their conclusion is clear.) It's also nice to see a criticism of the "rigid and blind" defense of the documents long after 99% of experts in the country had debunked them; the sheer arrogance that CBS displayed, the "we are Big Media and you will believe anything we tell you" crap, is really what did them in. After all, as we've seen so many times, Americans can forgive a mistake -- not a cover-up.

Many bloggers are furious at this "slap on the wrist" from the panel, notably Hugh Hewitt and others who were convinced the matter stemmed from intentional political bias and a desire to discredit the president before an election. I've always been one camp below that, believing that political bias is what led them to blindly accept anything that was anti-Bush (and blindly reject anything anti-Kerry), and that this qualified. More simply stated, some believe CBS knew the documents were fakes but thought they could get away with running them anyway (and hurt the President), whereas I tend to believe that they assumed they were genuine and just didn't bother checking them, because again they supported their pre-existing bias against the President. Either way is unforgiveable, of course, and those who were fired were fired deservedly. Did anyone really think the panel was going to implicate CBS in a massive conspiracy? Come on, now. I think this is a pretty positive move for CBS News, and a final (though waaaaay-overdue) public admission that a hell of a lot of people really, really messed up.

The full 234-page (!) report (in .pdf form) is here; exhibits and examples can be found here.

Thanks again for making the short-lived defeatjohnjohn blog a success, and I'm happy to have played a part in making media more accountable.

 Sick Pregnant Goth Kids Drowning in Armageddon

Commercial on TV: “There is such a thing as a being little bit pregnant. Now you can use First Response to check within five days of your missed period to catch the pregnancy in the early stages.” Grandma would have a fit.

My neighbor’s shocking news: “A small group of Goth kids, with black trench coats and black lipstick and eyeliner, have been vandalizing my condo parking lot and slashing tires.” Can’t help but to picture those little South Park Goth kids–you, too?

CDC: “Tens of Thousands of (flu vaccine) doses may go to waste.” Chalk another success up to the American Press–single copy paper sales went up–thanks to the news generating panic.

Pentagon spokesperson Major Gen. Stephen Speakes: “Vehicles in Iraq to get $4 Billion worth of armor.” and Brig. Gen. Jeff Sorenson says 8000 Humvees will be armored by March 2005.

Almost 150,000 people have lost their lives so far from the tsunamis. That is almost three times the number of Americans lost in Vietnam. On first glance, one might think that Nature is a more terrible force. But, of course, 1,500,000 Vietnamese lost their lives to that war so at second glance I would estimate War to still be the more terrible force. People still cause more death and suffering.

And my sister thinks Armageddon is just around the corner.

Every year, I think the new year will have to be better–how could it get worse? Every year gets worse.

Every religion, philosophy, creed and credo calls for positive actions to insure positive returns. Give and you will receive. What goes around. (He who lives by the sword.) We get what is coming to us by karma or cause and effect. But I can’t do it alone. This year, please giggle more. Find some joy in every day. And do some secret good deeds. Personally, I like to be the anonymous donor of apple pie or other such desserts to soldiers I see in restaurants. My secret identity – Super Mom, whose mission is to nurture all young people with a single act of not-so-random kindness.

What is your secret identity and how are you making the world a better place?