As always, . . .
Monday, October 22, 2001 Interesting Items 10/22 - Howdy all, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy - In this issue: 1. Coalition 2. Pinging 3. Decision Cycle 4. NPR 5. Census Count 6. War 7. Goldin Retires 8. St. Hilly 1. Coalition. President Bush is in the process of putting together a spectacular coalition for the conduct of the war against terrorists. Fox News reported late last week that the administration was close to sealing a deal with President Putin and the Russians to assist in development of Russian oil fields in southern Russia. The agreement will also lead to Russian agreement on American development of a ballistic missile defense system. During his visit to China, the administration also announced an agreement with the ChiComs to exchange intelligence information. Any agreement with the Chinese must be followed up on a "trust but verify" mindset, however. NewsMax and WorldnetDaily both ran stories last weekend about Chinese bodies being found alongside the Taliban after bombing raids. Finally, the Turkish government went to their legislature early in the week and asked for permission to deploy Turkish military forces outside the borders of Turkey. This permission was given and reported on Fox News Monday. This is significant, in that it sets the stage for Turkish participation in a partition of Iraq following whatever happens next in the war. 2. Pinging. The Anthrax scare continues to reverberate through the nation, fueled in equal parts by breathless media scaremongering and wanton acts of terror by copycat vermin sending various powders through the mails. As of today, the death toll is up to 3 Americans, with the latest victims dying after inhaling airborne Anthrax at their DC Post Office workplace. The speculation is that they cleaned mail-sorting machines with compressed air (their normal procedure) after letters filled with anthrax spores passed through the facility. They unfortunately inhaled the spores. Lunacy by the airlines and idiotic security directives from the FAA continues unabated. The latest examples are a USA Today article Wednesday noting that knitters who used to knit while flying were getting their needles taken away. Those of us that use pens, pencils and other implements of destruction (the pen still being mightier than the sword) ought to start being concerned. Northwest Airlines has followed along in the game with a ban of all powdered coffee creamers, sugar and other sweeteners from their flights. Alaska Airlines has been grabbing 10-15 nefarious passengers boarding their flights at ANC and LAX and using a hand scanner on them to detect metals. They have also been doing a complete unpacking and hand inspection of handcarried baggage from these unfortunates. I do not know if their new procedure was directed by their corporate headquarters or by the bozos at the FAA. 3. Decision Cycle. When fighting a war, one of the first things you need to do is get inside the decision cycle of the enemy. This means that you do something awful to the enemy and then go on to something else before the enemy can figure out what was done to them first and do something about it. We were well inside the decision cycle of the Iraqi government in the Gulf War. Bin Laden and Al Qaida appears to be well inside OUR decision cycle so far during this war. The use of airplanes and Anthrax were both unexpected, and the use of Anthrax happened before we figured out what to do with aviation security. They certainly have something up their sleeves to follow Anthrax. In order to win this war, and eventually get inside their skulls, we must get inside their decision cycle and force them to start reacting to our actions. 4. NPR. In another example of why defunding NPR is an excellent idea, one of their pompous, self-important reporters gave an unbelievable answer to a question over the weekend. In an interview on Fox News, the reporter was asked if he would report that US troops were on the ground in Afghanistan even if that report would put the troops and the success of the mission at risk. This fool declared that he does not work for the government (oh yes, he does), he works for History. I wonder how "History" signs paychecks these days ? Perhaps it is time to demonstrate who is paying the salary. Limbaugh, Tues. 5. Census Count. The Bush administration announced last week that they would be using the actual raw count of Americans by the Census as their basis for allocation of federal monies between the states and cities. They rejected completely the democrat attempt to allocate via statistical sampling, and opted to follow both the spirit and intent of the Constitution. Atlanta is considering a taxpayer-funded lawsuit to fight this decision, putting Atlanta in the interesting position of using tax dollars to force the federal government to perform an unconstitutional act. LA Times, Thurs. 6. War. We finally started seeing media references to the Bush War Room last week. Contrast this war room with the Clinton War Room. The Bush war room has been set up to fight a war against enemies of the United States. The Clinton war room was set up to fight enemies of Bill Clinton. Limbaugh, Tues. 7. Goldin Retires. NASA Administrator Dan Goldin announced his retirement last Wednesday. His term in office has been ragged, with early successes in "faster, better, cheaper" space probe construction and flight offset by the ongoing financial disaster of the International Space Station and the public relations disaster of NASA fighting the passenger flight of Dennis Tito. We hope that the Bush administration will select someone as NASA Administrator who understands that he is in office to follow the law and congressional direction, rather than simply defending NASA's budgetary rice bowl. 8. St. Hilly. The carpetbagging junior senator from New York demonstrated last weekend just what she thinks about the "little people." Her motorcade blasted through a mandatory security checkpoint at Westchester NY, on their way to a flight to an undisclosed location, injuring a security policeman on duty. The story in a NY paper Monday reported the incident, noting that the carpetbagging junior senator was not injured. The security cop, on the other hand, was sent to the hospital with an unreported injury. New security rules apparently don't apply to Important People. After the story was reported on Limbaugh, Monday, the NY paper changed the byline, reporting that a security cop was injured. More later - - AG "If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams, speech at the Philadelphia State House, August 1, 1776. Note: Interesting Items can now be found at: www.alaska.net/~agimarc Additional archives are located at Rod Martin's The Vanguard: www.theVanguard.org/gimarc _______________________________________________________ Send a cool gift with your E-Card http://www.bluemountain.com/giftcenter/ ==^================================================================ EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?bUrCn8.bUNmfL Or send an email To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] This email was sent to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
