|
|
 |
|
|
Monday, July 01, 2002
Housecleaning Can you tell I've got a little free time this afternoon, for a change? (Waiting for some copy corrections from the New Yorker. Actually, more accurately, waiting to see if I win the latest round with the copy editor--a little routine I go through every time I do a piece for any large magazine. I have this stubborn fixation with the idea that words which appear under my name should sound like I wrote them.) Anyhoo. In answer to a frequent question about the animations: as Lou Reed once said of Americans vis-a-vis the environment, stick a fork in their ass and turn 'em over, they're done. The project has run its course, the magic internet money has turned back into pumpkins and mice. I'll keep the link up until Mondo stops running re-runs, but there won't be any new ones. At some point, we may put some of them on a CD or DVD and offer them up for sale, but my animation partner and I both have about five thousand other things to do, so I'm not going to promise that we'll get around to it any time soon. Also: I'm going away for most of the week, so probably best not to send any email after tomorrow afternoon. If I come back to an inbox with a thousand messages, chances are I'll scan them for familiar names and trash the rest. So go out, watch some fireworks, eat some apple pie. Writing the cartoonist can wait.
Rorschach test When you read this, is your first thought, my god, those poor people--or is your first thought, the lefties are sure going to whine about this! If the latter--well, you presumably have mirrors in your house. No need for me to editorialize.
Terror alert level: fuscia A former CIA station cheif in Pakistan raises some questions about the sources of the various terror threats : But getting the truth out of the current crop of detainees in U.S. custody presents another, in some ways more troublesome, challenge. Few of the men we hold in Afghanistan or at Guantanamo Bay are known quantities, genuine insiders with the crucial information we need to prevent another outrage. Yet they all have been exposed to enough of the Al Qaeda lore to keep us at an elevated state of alert. The detainees' common "cover story" is a composite based on their rote memorization of the Islamic Jihad encyclopedia and training manual, liberally sprinkled with scuttlebutt from Al Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan. The training manual, it seems, is the likely source of most of the threat alerts keeping the nation on edge. A 5,000-page handbook that runs from dangerous (cut-and-pasted U.S. Army training manuals) to silly (wildly errant instructions on how to make a nuclear fusion device), the training manual has been found on compact discs and in printouts in dozens of Al Qaeda safe houses in Afghanistan. It was apparently left lying about as sort of a Gideon's Bible of terror. It contains most of the target information central to the alerts of the last several months, including nuclear, gas and electric power plants, bridges, dams, airports, railroads, skyscrapers, the U.S. Capitol, football stadiums, apartment buildings and banks. U.S. intelligence has had the manual for about five years and has known it recommends skyscrapers, nuclear plants and crowded football stadiums as the best targets for spreading fear. The handbook also lists targets of "sentimental value"--the Statue of Liberty, Big Ben in London and the Eiffel Tower in Paris, for example--as well as advising attacks on major public gatherings such as Christmas and Fourth of July celebrations. * * * Norman Solomon wonders why that report by "senior government officials" which concluded that the war in Afghanistan did not make Americans any safer, and may have actually made things worse (as noted in this space a couple of weeks ago) got so little media attention. * * * Columnist Eric Margolis is an exception, but hey--he's Canadian. And everyone knows they're practically Communists, with their guaranteed health care and all. Al-Qaida's numbers were grossly exaggerated by the Bush administration and U.S. media. Hardcore al-Qaida members never numbered more than 200-300. Claims that there were 5,000-20,000 al-Qaida fighters in Afghanistan were nonsense. These wild exaggerations came from lumping Taliban tribal warriors with some 5,000 Islamic resistance fighters from Kashmir, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, the Philippines and Chinese-ruled Eastern Turkistan, none of whom were part of al-Qaida. The reason 12,000 U.S., British and Canadian troops operating in Afghanistan can't find al-Qaida - a campaign that has so far cost over US$10 billion - is that there were few to begin with; by now, most have slipped away through Pakistan. Instead, the U.S. is getting mired in Afghan tribal politics by trying to maintain a regime in Kabul that will take orders from Washington. Last week's much ballyhooed grand tribal council, or loya jirga, that "elected" CIA "asset" Hamid Karzai as national leader was a wildly expensive charade conducted under the guns of U.S. and British troops. Karzai's "election" has cost Washington $5 billion in bribes and payoffs to Afghan warlords. As soon as U.S. and British occupation troops decamp, Afghanistan will again dissolve into tribal chaos or fall under the control of Russia, which continues to arm and direct the Northern Alliance. * * * All links via Cursor, of course.
Monday mailbag More of the same. I find these things endlessly entertaining, but I find Ed Wood and Harvey Sid Fisher endlessly entertaining as well, so my taste is clearly suspect. Dear Johnny Tree Hugger, Maybe all the Dead concerts are finally catching up with you. Liberal theory is certainly more attractive....it is not that fun to talk about defense spending and tax cuts. But, you have taken liberalism to another level. Too bad none of your shit works....it sounds nice on paper though. Unfortunately good intentions mean shit. I hope you can recognize a liberal bias that is certainly transparent in the media too. It is not as prevalent as libertarians make it out to be....but you would have to be stupid or on a head full of acid not to see it. But you are independent....being left of left wing is cool. You sit around and complain (about every form authority and bureaucracy) but soon you'll realize your life was meaningless. You certainly have the right to complain and I'm not denying that but you are ridiculous. Thank God you have no lobbying power or say in public policy. Hey guys I have a great idea, let's redistribute income, it'll be fun...let's take money away from people who have worked hard for it. We can treat citizens who make more $ differently but we have to give terrorists due process. I agree that the Constitution is here to protect U.S. citizens, not treasonous dirty bombers. I think Padilla deserves a trail but he is being detained for immediate questioning so the FBI can quickly gather information that may prevent your hippie ass from blowing up. I do not consider terrorists as American citizens....people attempting to destroy the foundation of our country and possibly create a perpetual national state of chaos in a matter of minutes should be detained. Paul B. P.S. Your woman left her allman bros. CD in my discman and her mescaline all over my sheets. (Ellipses are all his, by the way. I didn't edit him. How can one edit perfection?) -------------------- Sunday, June 30, 2002
The good news and the less good news The good news is, I made it into the Times' Week in Review section again this morning. I used to make it in maybe twice a year, but I've really been on a roll with them lately. The bad news is, there's a typo in the cartoon. Literally a typo--like a lot of cartoonists, I use a computer font made up from samples of my hand lettering, so the text you see has been typed in (hope I'm not destroying anyone's illusions here). And so this morning, "deity" is spelled "diety." I need to lose some weight, I'm going on a diety. I caught this one last night, in time to send a corrected version out to most papers (I hope), but not in time for the Times, alas. To quote the wisdom of that classic xerox poster, handed down from one generation of office workers to the next since time immemorial, or at least since 1978 or so, We all make misteaks. But given this space's sharp-eyed and ever-vigilant audience, I just thought I'd save us all a little time and get the mea culpa out of the way. Now go, have a nice day. --------------------
 |
|
|
 |