Newsweek

On the Brink of Going Nuclear

Going against my "better judgment" regarding the basement, I decided to set up camp down there yesterday morning. At the same time I watched part of the opening statements for the whole hyped up Judge-Filibuster conflict in the Senate by the party leaders. But I have no firm position on the matter, I see equal validity in both sides of the argument(s) presented as the issue on the surface.

I'd call it a "debate" but it's just a bunch of monologues by various Senators on either side of the issue, whose positions are conveniently based on party affiliation when it comes to who's for "X" and who's against "X". Not to mention Senators don't necessarily need to be present except for when it's time for their breif speach or party policy advertisement or for a floor vote and whatnot, so they need not listen to nor bother considering points in others' arguments presented in the "debate".

Below the surface it's also about party power, about appearances to the electorate; about personal objectives of a given Senator and his/her political party. Which also means hypocricy is coming onto the scene by both sides, such as the overt role reversal from the Clinton years when it was the Republican minority keeping Democratic nominees from getting the now sacred up or down vote that Democrats wished for since they had the majority. Obviously that's indicative of how positions on methods such as filibusters or simple majority votes are relative to whether a party is in the minority or majority in a given Congress.

Reiterating my neutrality, I can't help but wonder though how far a potential ban on filibusters could or would go if the conveniently codenamed "Nuclear Option" is implimented. Theoretically it could progress from a ban on filibusters of just judicial nominees to include cabinet level nominees and perhaps even legislation if the majority party really desired to go to such lengths to get around having to deal with the minority.

If they do just the ban on judicial nominees at the least, however, they need to consider just in case they lose the majority in the next congressional elections to reinstate the filibuster in one of the last days of the 109th Congress for them to be able to use in the 110th Congress. Otherwise they could be screwing themselves.

Granted, in that hypothetical circumstace the new majority could just follow the former majority party's example as justification for the reinstitution of the ban on filibusters. Leaving the former-majority perhaps to be damned either way.

Fun Park Death

The manager of a park that had a ride malfunction, causing a thrill seeker to plummet to her death, was convicted of reckless homicide.

District Attorney Al Schmutzer said the verdict shows the community has no tolerance for "jeopardizing people's lives when they innocently get on these rides expecting to have just a thrill, not a death."
>> News Article [FOX NEWS]

They found a scape goat to investigate and persecute. Not wrongfully. He and pertinent subordinates should be held responsible for possible maintenance errors that caused said problem. Even if the Manager did not keep the machinery in top notch condition despite the possible consequences to thrill-seekers, the woman made the choice to go on such a ride. Hopefully she had at least a sub-conconscious understanding of the potential dangers if something just happened to go wrong. Maybe she was just flagrantly naive. Who knows. But she's still at least partially responsible because of her choice. Being dead doesn't change that.

Made False "Heroes" for Propoganda Purposes

As sharp-eyed readers learned a few months ago from single-paragraph articles buried deep inside their newspapers, Pat Tillman died pointlessly, a hapless victim of "friendly fire" who never got the chance to choose between bravery and cowardice. As if that wasn't bad enough, the Washington Post now reports that Pentagon and White House officials knew the truth "within days" after his April 22, 2004 shooting by fellow Army Rangers but "decided not to inform Tillman's family or the public until weeks after" the nationally televised martyr-a-thon.

So desperate were the military brass to carry off their propaganda coup that they lied to Tillman's brother, a fellow soldier who arrived on the scene shortly after the incident, about how he died. Writing in an army report, Brigadier General Gary Jones admits that the official cover-up even included "the destruction of evidence": the army burned Tillman's Ranger uniform and body armor to hide the fact that he had died in a hail of American bullets, fired by troops who had "lost situational awareness to the point they had no idea where they were."

...

Case study: the Washington Post's dutiful transcription of the Jessica Lynch hoax. Played up on page one and running on for thousands of words, the fanciful Pentagon version had the pilot from West Virginia emptying her clip before finally succumbing to a gunshot wound (and possible rape) by evil Iraqi ambushers, then freed from her tormentors at a heavily-guarded POW hospital.

Like the Pat Tillman story, it was pure fiction. Private Lynch, neither shot nor sexually violated, said she was injured when her vehicle crashed. She never got off a shot because her gun jammed.

...

Readers of the American press and viewers of American radio and television are likelier to see and believe loudly repeated lies over occasionally whispered truths told once or twice. As a result of the reverse imbalance between fact and fiction, the propaganda versions of the Tillman and Lynch stories ... are all believed by a misled citizenry
>> Column [Ted Rall]

The Easily Manipulated

FOX News asked Turkouman whether he was glad the [martyrs'] brigade convinced him not to carry out a homicide bombing. He didn’t understand the question, but replied “yes” after some members whispered to him.

Turkouman didn’t seem able to think for himself. He barely understood FOX’s questions, even in his native Arabic, and the brigade commanders told him what to say. He appeared extremely vulnerable to peer pressure.
>> News Article [FOX NEWS]

There are plenty of people like that on either side of a given conflict, whether the cause be perceived as "good" or "bad" by us.

Fairness not Desired

I came across this trinket. I thought it was a very insightful piece about the difficulties of trying to report the side of "the enemy".

Home from Iraq
Journalist urges Americans to search for truth, freedom'

We spent 10 months in Iraq, working on a story, understanding who the people are who are fighting, why they fight, what their fundamental beliefs are, when they started, what kinds of backgrounds they come from, what education, jobs they have. Were they former military, are they Iraqi or foreign? Are they part of al-Qaida? What we came up with is a story in itself, and one that Vanity Fair ran in July 2004 with my text and pictures. [My colleague Steve Connors] shot a documentary film that is still waiting to find a home. But the basic point for this discussion is that we both thought it was really journalistically important to understand who it was who was resisting the presence of the foreign troops. If you didn't understand that, how could you report what was clearly becoming an "ongoing conflict?" And if you were reading the news in America, or Europe, how could you understand the full context of what was unfolding if what motivates the "other side" of the conflict is not understood, or even discussed?

...

Our behavior as journalists has taught us very little. Just as in the lead up to the war in Iraq, questioning our government's decisions and claims and what it seeks to achieve is criticized as unpatriotic.

Along these lines, the other thing I found difficult was the realization that, while I was out doing what I believe is solid journalism, there were many (journalists and normal folks alike) who would question my patriotism, or wonder how I could even think hearing and relating the perspective "from the other side" was important..

...

Lesson Three: To seek to understand and represent to an American audience the reasons behind the Iraqi opposition is practically treasonous.

...

What if the American military or intelligence found out what we were working on? Would they tail us and round up the people we met? Would they kick down our door late one night, rifle through all our stuff and arrest us for "collaborating with the enemy?" Bear in mind that there are no real laws in Iraq. At the time that we were working, the American military was the law, and it seemed to me that they were pretty much making it up as they went along. I was pretty sure that if they wanted to "disappear" us, rough us up or even send us for an all expenses paid vacation in Guantánamo for suspected al-Qaida connections, they could do so with very little, or even no recourse on our part.

...

The intimidation to not work on this story was evident. Dexter Filkins, who writes for The New York Times, related a conversation he had in Iraq with an American military commander just before we left. Dexter and the commander had gotten quite friendly, meeting up sporadically for a beer and a chat. Towards the end of one of their conversations, Dexter declined an invitation for the next day by explaining that he'd lined up a meeting with a "resistance guy." The commander's face went stony cold and he said, "We have a position on that." For Dexter the message was clear. He cancelled the appointment. And, again, this is not meant as any criticism of the military; they have a war to win, and dominating the "message," or the news is an integral part of that war. The military has a name for it, "information operations," and the aim is to achieve information superiority in the same way they would seek to achieve air superiority. If you look closely, you will notice there is very little, maybe even no direct reporting on the resistance in Iraq. We do, however, as journalists report what the Americans say about the resistance. Is this really anything more than stenography?
>> adapted from speech by Molly Bingham [Courier-Journal]

The Plight of Others

Came across this piece on "World Net Daily":

A new United Nations campaign designed to get the public involved in the global fight against landmines is apparently too explosive for American television, as it depicts children being blown apart on a soccer field.

The 60-second public-service announcement titled "Kickoff" shows a match in progress before a buried mine on the playing field is detonated.

WND went on to add a few comments found as "chatter on Internet messageboards" (though there is no mention of what message boards and who authored the comments), the most relevant "quote" to me was the one that didn't involve the shallow U.N. bashing but about the deeper message that the commercial would have tried to convey:

"Unfortunately, in the world we live in now shock tactics like those are needed because so many people in the world are apathetic or ignorant of the plight of others."

The ending in the commercial apparently reads:

"If there were landmines here, would you stand for them anywhere?"

In other words, we can not comprehend the danger of landmines to our everyday life because our country hasn't had a conflict on it's soil to necessitate seeding areas with hidden landmines. Unlike others in different parts of the globe, who gamble with their lives everytime they venture about outside.

But we aren't concerned with the plight of others. Not unless there's some advantage for "us". Instead it's deflected away with petty concerns:

Valari Staab, president and general manager at KGO-TV, the ABC-owned affiliate in San Francisco, has viewed the PSA, but says her station has not been asked to broadcast it.

"I think it could be pretty upsetting to a child who plays soccer." Staab said.

I am all for sensitivity, but what's more important? The American child who gets upset by the commercial or the children in [insert landmine riddled country here] who can or do haplessly wander onto one of these deadly explosives?

We already know the answer is certainly not the latter just by the apathy towards the hundreds of Iraqi civilians being blown apart daily by the various factions battling the new U.S.-backed government: A letter to the editor in the main local newspaper after one of the major bombings that killed dozens of Iraqi civilians:

Who decided to put the horrific "pools of blood" photo on the front page Thursday? Outrageous! I have two small children, and they got a glimpse and were very disturbed. What's the point? Sensationalism? Very bad judgment in my view.

Please ask your editors to be more sensitive (sensible?) when it comes to the front page of the newspaper. We don't want or need that type of thing on our kitchen table.
>> Letter to the Editor, 5-9-05 [St. Louis Post Dispatch]

The concern and outrage is not that such a violent act, the slaughter of civilians, occured, but that they had to see it. And that wasn't the even the sight of badly burnt, shrapnel filled, limb missing , insides exposed corpses/victims. Just a lot of blood.

Part of that quote from an anonymous source for the WND piece comes back to mind:

"...shock tactics like those are needed because so many people in the world are apathetic or ignorant of the plight of others."

We are more concerned with how it makes us feel, than with those who live in areas plagued with such violent realities.

Why? It's hard to be sympathetic if you don't know what it's like. Plain and simple. Unless you are more empathetic than others tend to be. Granted the application or feeling of sympathy or empathy is very subjective.

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