Marching

Posted on September 16, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

The Iraq war protest on Saturday was much smaller than in January, and there were more counterprotesters lining a section of the route to engage in colloquy (ahem) with the antiwar folk. The most common preprinted prowar signs said “PEACE THRU STRENGTH” and “BETTER THERE THAN HERE.” But one hand-drawn sign said it all, really, representing the epitome of rational discourse and bringing closure to the whole war debate: “HIPPIES SMELL.” Where on earth this guy found a hippie to sniff is beyond me.

So, despite the gorgeous weather, it was pretty depressing. But now, with a day of rumination (and a good night’s sleep) behind me, I figure it’s not as bad as it seems. Anyone can see that the “debate” about the war is essentially over. The public is fed up with it, and has been for some time. We’re starting to detect movement among the Republicans—you need a microscope to see it, unfortunately. And also unfortunately, the vast majority seems content to hunker down and suffer for another—let me check my countdown clock—492 days, 12 hours, 38 minutes, and 19 seconds. Some antiwar groups are planning more aggressive protests in the weeks to come. I’m guessing they’ll succeed in pissing Washingtonians off—boy, do they hate having their commute (or their sprint to the nearest Starbucks) disrupted.

On the plus side, I ran into a friend who was there with his college-age son, and we had a nice time catching up. I also took a few photos. Here’s one for my friend Thomas, Tub Thumper Extraordinaire for the Big I:

Impeachment Pie sign at Iraq war protest

In a recent post, Thomas says, “Progress is just another word for nothing left to kill,” and analyzes why killing in Baghdad may be down slightly (as reported by Gen. Petraeus): most of the Sunni–Shia ethnic cleansing has been accomplished. Baghdad is well on its way to becoming a fully segregated city. Not a pacified city—a city with “neighborhoods” separated by walls (and worse). Continue reading →

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Truth

Posted on September 4, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

Yes, a moment of truth.

(Sheesh. What some people will do for a shot at a free iPod. And I don’t even like iPods. I’m perfectly happy with my crummy old Zen Xtra, “with Its Large, Blue Backlit LCD Screen.” Really, I am.)

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Tormentee

Posted on September 4, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

The association where I work has just published a book for those who wish to be “mentors” in science education. That’s all well and good. The problem is that the persons at the receiving end of this guidance are called “mentees.” This is so grating to my eyes and ears that I came here to vent a bit. I find it barbaric, frankly. When you honor someone, that person is an honoree. If you’re nominated for something, you’re a nominee. There is no verb “to ment.” Nor is there a verb “to mentate.” You don’t get mentated. Someone isn’t mented. Demented, yes. Mented, no.

The idea of “mentoring” came, of course, from the mythic Greek figure Mentor. I grew up in a town called Mentor, so I suppose I have a personal interest in this matter. But even if I didn’t, I’d be nauseated by the back-formation mentee. Mentoree is awkward, but it’s English. Mentee is … crap. (I think James A. Garfield, scholar and president, pride of Mentor, would have agreed.)

Months before this book went into production, I was tangentially involved in a website devoted to so-called e-mentoring. The education professionals behind this were talking about mentors and mentees, and I tried to get them to accept an alternative: the mentored, or mentorees, or beginners, or simply new teachers.* I would have loved to have them introduce the term tyro, because a mentor–tyro relationship is exactly what they’re talking about, but that was hoping for too much. I lost. And, I fear, the English language has lost. Mentee is worse than crap. It is poison. It teaches you that you can do whatever you want to English and no one will care.

“Oh, but there’s a logic to it,” someone will say. Of course there’s a logic to it! It was coined by “science types.” It’s not a matter of logic. The lunatic asylums are full of impeccable logic. It’s a matter of history. It has to do with remembering where things came from and where we came from. Some of the smartest people I work with don’t care much for history—don’t care much about history. They are obsessed with novelty, and so with neologisms. Just like the rankest marketer. Sad, but true. I hope you’re accustomed to being a marketee by now.

To help me keep my sanity when I’m at the office, I hereby resolve to refer to recipients of sage guidance as manatees.

Manatee

Manatees being mentored at the bottom of the ocean.

__________
*Or how about “protege”? Today (2007.09.15) I discovered a thread at the Volokh Conspiracy, predating mine by a fortnight or so, that revolved around using this word in pairings with “mentor” (as a viable, at-hand alternative to “mentee”).

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Август

Posted on September 1, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

Well, we made it through the doldrums of August. In an apparent attempt to inject some drama into this perennially languid month, a Russian journalist, Roman Trunov, tried to paint August in Russia as fraught with history-altering events. Four of his five examples occurred in the 1990s—admittedly a tumultuous time in that country. Two of them stand out:

August 19, 1991: Mikhail Gorbachev is ousted as President of the USSR and a short-lived State Emergency Committee is put in charge.

August 9, 1999: Boris Yeltsin appoints Vladimir Putin acting prime minister (the appointment is confirmed seven days later by the legislature); the significance of this becomes clearer later in the year, when Yeltsin resigns (on December 31) and Putin becomes the acting president.

Seeking support for his hypothesis, Trunov posed two questions to three Russian political scientists in early August 2007:

  1. Might something happen this August that will fundamentally change the direction of politics in Russia?
  2. Is it a historical law or merely a coincidence that many pivotal moments in Russian history have occurred in August?

Short answers:

  1. Unlikely.
  2. August is an slow month, politically and generally. Those who try to take advantage of it fail, by and large.

That said, August 2007 brought a pleasant surprise: the Prosecutor General of Russia, Yuri Chaika, announced that ten persons were arrested in connection with the murder of journalist Anna Politkovskaya and will soon be charged. (That number changed slightly a few days later.) Among those implicated are a Chechen crime boss and current or former employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MVD) and the Federal Security Service (FSB), who allegedly tracked the journalist and provided other intelligence to whoever ordered and perpetrated the murder. In this regard, Chaika cast suspicion on “people and structures that aim to destabilize the situation in the country, change the constitutional order [and] create a crisis in Russia” (as quoted in the New York Times). Commentators assume Chaika is referring to exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky. Alexei Simonov of the Glasnost Defense Foundation said the staff of Novaya Gazeta (Politkovskaya’s newspaper) feared the authorities would try “to steer the case in the direction of London” and blame Politkovskaya’s killing on Berezovsky.

Simonov is apparently a bona fide home-grown gadfly, and I tip my hat to him. But am I the only person west of Pskov who does not find it implausible that Berezovsky was behind not only this murder but others as well? And who continues to believe it is not in Vladimir Putin’s political interest (and certainly not worth the risk) to bump off noisy opponents? Those who are suspicious of Putin will point to the participation of MVD and FSB personnel and say, “Aha!” But for anyone conversant in US history, the phrase “rogue elements” will not sound foreign. And the bottom line is, the Putin government is prosecuting these people. Maybe, just maybe, Putin’s hands are clean in this matter. Or is it probably?

Certain elements in the US have a lot to fear in the person of Vladimir Putin. But their handwringing over how he treats his own people strikes one as disingenuous. Their real worry is that Putin is starting to rebuild a Russian counterpoise to US power—that their dream of a unipolar world is being disturbed.

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Gynekalomorphology

Posted on August 18, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

I’ve been sitting on my copy of photo morphing software* for over a year now. Thankfully someone has actually done something interesting with theirs:

A YouTube user has supplied a helpful guide to the art used in the video.

[h/t to Laureeg]
__________
*There are undoubtedly better ones out there. This one was quite free and therefore very appealing.

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Zinger

Posted on August 15, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

Joe Conason is not only a well-informed and savvy guy, he’s also a stylish writer who can be wickedly funny at times. Along with the rest of the world, he wrote about Karl Rove’s “retirement.” (If you think that conniving SOB is leaving politics for good, I’ve got a surge I’d like to sell you.) In the course of his dissection, Joe recalls the memorable speech Rove gave to one of his red-meat audiences:

Emboldened by the electoral triumphs of 2002 and 2004, Mr. Rove grew still more aggressive and vituperative. In June 2005, while addressing the New York Conservative Party’s annual dinner, he fabricated a fraudulent narrative of the war to justify his divisive strategies. With savage sarcasm, he described how conservatives supposedly differ from liberals on the issue of national security:

“Conservatives saw the savagery of 9/11 and the attacks and prepared for war; liberals saw the savagery of the 9/11 attacks and wanted to prepare indictments and offer therapy and understanding for our attackers. In the wake of 9/11, conservatives believed it was time to unleash the might and power of the United States military against the Taliban; in the wake of 9/11, liberals believed it was time to … submit a petition. …

“Conservatives saw what happened to us on 9/11 and said: We will defeat our enemies. Liberals saw what happened to us and said: We must understand our enemies.

“It was a moment to summon our national will,” he thundered, “and to brandish steel.”

The only steel Mr. Rove ever brandished was a fork, but that didn’t slow him down. Of course he knew that no Democrat or liberal had urged therapy and understanding for the hijackers. He knew that liberals and Democrats had stood squarely behind President Bush to extirpate the Taliban and destroy Al Qaeda. (Their only disappointment is that the Bush administration has prosecuted this war so ineptly, while sinking our military into the Iraqi quicksand.)

“The only steel Mr. Rove ever brandished was a fork.” A perfect encapsulation of Rove (and his boss (and his boss’s boss—i.e., Cheney)).

I must object, however, to Joe’s apparent acceptance of the typically Rovian false choice of “defeating” the enemy or “understanding” the enemy. One would think the latter would be a prerequisite for the former. Then again, Jesus instructed us to love our enemies. No choice at all—how about that! I guess when George W. Bush gets his daily dose of advice from his Father (the one in Heaven, not the one in Houston), the last thing he hears is: “… And pay no attention to my lunatic Son. Love, schmove. Stick a fork in their eye!”

Meanwhile, the venerable Juan Cole had a bit of mordant fun with Rove, Wikipedia, and that beloved digital time saver, Search-and-Replace.

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Assume

Posted on August 15, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

Happy Feast of the Assumption! We all make ’em, so let’s celebrate ’em (even if they sometimes make an ass of you and me).

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Blackguard

Posted on July 17, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

Since November 21, 2006, I have unknowingly borne the epithet (above) bestowed on me by the recently cited Thomas Nephew. And maybe I’ll be able to retain it even after I succumb to his initially polite but soon more importunate request that I share with the world five examples of how weird I am.

I was amused by the assumption involved, until I realized it was more likely a conclusion, since he actually knows me. But “five examples”? Had I displayed that much weirdness? Or is it, in fact, an assumption about everyone—that they are at least that weird, fivefold weird, every man jack of them? What to do, what to think …

Naturally I parried, but Thomas stuck me good. Then I forgot about the whole thing.

Until today, when I saw something in the restricted area of the Basement, where the dials and knobs are, and levers marked “Humor Level” and buttons labeled “LAUNCH” and “DELETE”: a link to a link on Thomas’s site that links to mine. Yes, I got dizzy. And as a result, I typed up five things.

Now, I still think this particular edition of “blog tag” will be less enlightening than some others I’ve seen. Does a weirdo ever think he’s weird (really)? Or take so-called normal people: do they know they’re doing something weird? Right—they do when someone tells them it’s weird. But do they end up agreeing it’s weird, or do they just think the other person is the weird one?

Who’s to say what’s weird, anyway? Haven’t you ever said, “Boy, that’s weird!” and had others respond in unison: “No, it isn’t!” You haven’t? Boy, that’s weird.

Weirdness is clearly in the eye of the beholder. (In fact, the word weird looks weirder and weirder the more you look at it.) The list I produce will almost certainly not be the list my family would draw up, or my coworkers, or my friends, or that person at the Safeway today who was looking at me funny.

But enough temporizing. Herewith, Five (random) Examples of How Weird I (possibly) Am (you be the judge):

  1. I refuse to drink cheap beer, but will cheerfully drink cheap wine.
  2. I never wear sunglasses. (Well, almost never. Very, very, very, very rarely.)
  3. Every single T-shirt I have owned for the last 30 years has been given to me. (Not counting softball jerseys.) I think the last T-shirt I bought was from the Armadillo World Headquarters in Austin, Texas.
  4. I have not gotten rid of my LPs (hundreds of them, many of them duplicated on CDs I own [some triplicated as mp3 files]).
  5. I cut my own hair.

There! That was fun.

Behold the haggard blackguard,
Of bleary mien and weirdly green,
Lost at sea, tempest-toss’d,
Leaning o’er the watery deep,
Perhaps to sleep—his final nap,
Or maybe … maybe just to …
You know … toss his toast …

Now that’s weird!

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Impeachment

Posted on July 16, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

I’m for it. (Just thought I’d get that out there.) Actually, impeachment × 2.

I’m not alone, of course. I’ve resisted the urge to talk about it, though, because I felt it was a dead issue. In a chat with Thomas Nephew the other evening, I mentioned that I didn’t see impeachment going anywhere until a good number of Republicans get behind it—most likely in a late, desperate attempt to save their party, not out of any deep concern for the republic and the rule of law. He correctly pointed out that this would merely be a requirement for successful prosecution (i.e., conviction by the Senate). Pressing for impeachment proceedings, even if they fail to remove Cheney and Bush from office, remains the appropriate response of anyone who seeks to reverse the systematic, illegal aggrandizement of the executive branch, marginalization of the legislature, suspension of basic rights and legal protections of ordinary citizens—that is to say, the wholesale subversion of the Constitution.

In addition to Thomas’s coverage of the issue and his valuable ruminations, take a look at the Bill Moyers conversation with Reaganaut Bruce Fein and Nationite John Nichols, who have found common ground in calling for the impeachment of one (Fein) or both (Nichols) of the dangerous rogues at the head of our government.

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BZ

Posted on June 5, 2007 by WorldWideWeber

What keeps a guy off his blog? Well, these kind of things:

  1. Launching a redesigned website at his day job. The really fun part is cleaning up afterwards. It’s not just that things don’t always work as planned. It’s the old links. Once you let a link loose in the world, it takes on a life of its own. Thankfully there’s a neato utility called ISAPI_Rewrite for us saps using IIS that allows us to capture invalid incoming links and convert them on the fly to perfectly good new ones, with users none the wiser and not discomfited in the least. (Apache admins just use mod_Rewrite—or so I hear.)
  2. Applying for a job … while launching a redesigned website. As the latter took precedence, the former may have suffered. Oh, let’s be honest: it suffered. In the event, the prospective job seemed less attractive after the second interview, so it was probably all for the best. But it would have been nice if I had spent more time reviewing my own résumé—that question about the “web policies” I’ve created and enforced really did have a good answer, I swear.
  3. Driving up to Boston for our kid’s graduation from college. Visited Walden again—this time watching intrepid, or slightly insane, locals in wetsuits swimming the length of the pond at full tilt, and others doing likewise but at a leisurely pace with many pauses for sky-facing flotation. (According to Thoreau, the pond is 0.55 mi long and 102 ft deep at its deepest point. That’s a long way down if you get a cramp!) Also kids wading in the lifeguarded part and small groups, or couples, or loners sitting in the many small alcoves, on the stone slabs leading to the water, some reading, some writing, some drying off after a dip. Quite a contrast with our October visit.
  4. Let’s leave out all the petty but compelling details of modern life, like a car that won’t start (or, more precisely, will start but won’t stay started), or neighborhood yardsales-cum-potlucks, or concerted efforts to divest ourselves of stuff on eBay …

Now, these would sound like excuses, and probably lame ones, if I had actually committed myself to entertaining you. But I haven’t, so it’s just an explanation, that’s all, and an excuse for me to stretch my fingers.

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