September 2002 Archives

A couple of articles you may want to check out from Stratfor -- this one on the destabilizing effects on various regimes within the Middle East; and this one focusing on Jordan. Will the invasion cause the downfall of those governments who support the US intervention?

...with a Java SpiroGraph! (Found on atelophobia.)

I've been looking high and low for great art in my adopted city, Washington, DC. Notwithstanding the Smithsonian's fabulous collections I have seen little in Washington's galleries and theaters that is new, exciting, or provocative. New York has a monopoly on all that. But there is art here. Indeed, there is art so great that it reveals the high art of the New York scene for what it really is: narcissistic and irrelevant child's play for the decadent and self-absorbed. The art that goes on in Washington, DC, the art that this city produces countless times every single day, is an art of power. More specifically, it is a representation and affirmation of American hegemony. In function it is akin to monumental government architecture everywhere, or to David's tableaux of the Revolution and Napoléon, or, better still, the court ritual of Louis XIV. Yet in form it is distinctly modern and eminently American. It is the government press conference.

Read more at Zeek.

Matt F-B suggested I check out his friend Judith's blog, calamondin. I do, too.

I have a pic up at The Mirror Project.

So I've posted a number of readings and essays about Iraq -- both pro- and anti-invasion -- but have not as of yet written anything myself. So here goes:

* It's illogical to assume that invasion and appeasement are the only options.

For 50 years, we've permitted the continued existence of various despots and dictators. We've permitted other countries to possess nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction. We've been able to do this because of our military superiority, and our nuclear arsenal. Generally put, most nations would not think of attacking us (or our formal allies) for fear that we would lay waste to their country. To do so would be suicide for a non-nuclear state, and mutually assured destruction for a nuclear state.

This is why, although North Korea is also part of the "Axis of Evil" club, we're not going to be invading them any time soon: they've got the bomb. See this article in Stratfor: Rumsfeld Indicates Nuclear Status Key to Pre-Emption Policy.

Rather than decry any non-invasion option as "appeasement", we should take a hard look at our policy of containment and deterrence. Why, in the case of Iraq, won't it work? And, if we want to force Iraq to disarm, is invasion the only option?

* "But the September 11th attacks change everything."

Well, no they don't. In the case of an attack by a foreign state, the response is quite simple: we go to war. We attack their military, bomb their capitol, etc. A terrorist attack is different because there's no target for us to hit. After 9/11, attacking the Taliban, as the sponsor of bin Laden, was our best military option. (That's leaving aside intelligence/police options and diplomatic options.) But we were not attacked by Iraq. Nor is there any evidence that they were behind the September 11th attacks. (Other than a hatred of the United States, bin Laden and Saddam Hussein have very different goals. I'm sure bin Laden (if he's still alive, that is) would like very much to see Hussein overthrown and a fundamentalist regime put in his place.)

* A war on Iraq is not a war against terrorism.

Let me be clear: Iraq has supported terrorists -- SH gives money to the families of Palestinian terrorists after they've murdered Israeli civilians. But attacking Iraq won't help us in our fight against Al Qaeda. If we were really going to fight a war on terrorism with conventional warfare, we would invade that fundamentalist, despotic regime that we actually know supported Al Qaeda. No, I don't mean Iran, I'm talking about our "ally" Saudi Arabia.

Again and again, the Bush Administration has tried to link Iraq to 9/11. Take what Dick Cheney said on "Meet the Press":

You know, this will take some time, but it's important for us, as I mentioned earlier, to remember that the world has changed. . . . What we found on September 11 is that the danger now is an attack that's launched from within the United States itself, not from some foreign territory, as happened with respect to the hijackers on 9/11. Also that, in this particular case, it was backed up by a cell, terrorist cell, operating in Hamburg, Germany. You have to completely recalibrate your thinking in terms of how you deal with that. Now, if you start with that as background, then you deal with Saddam Hussein and his 11 years, now, since 1991, since the end of the war, his refusal to comply with the U.N. Security Council resolutions. If you look at the extent to which he has aggressively sought to acquire chemical, biological and nuclear weapons, over the years, the fact that he has previously used them-he used chemical weapons both against the Kurds and against the Iranians during the 1980s-the fact that he has twice invaded his neighbors. He's launched ballistic missiles against four of his neighbors over the years. There's a pattern and a track record there that one has to be concerned about.

If you read the whole of it, you'll see that Cheney juxtaposes "9/11", "WMD," and "Iraq", without saying there's a causal link. It plays on our fears pretty effectively. "We're at risk of terrorist attack -- a chemical / biological attack would be awful -- Iraq has chemical weapons -- therefore Iraq will launch a terrorist attack against us using WMD." It's that last step that doesn't make sense. Because SH knows that if he attacks us, we'll level Bagdahd. Thos. Friedman recently argued in the Times that Hussein is deterrable because he loves life more than he hates us, but that Friedman really fears those who hate us more than they love life. A fanatic is undeterrable.

* "But Saddam is a despot and a menace to his own people."

Forgive me if I sound like an isolationist. I'm not a Kurd, or a Kuwaiti, or an Iraqi. Saddam Hussein doesn't make me lose sleep at night. Terrorists do. Perhaps it's different for those of us who lived through the attacks, who live with the very real possibility that it could happen, here, again. Frankly, if war on Iraq somehow keeps us from catching these guys -- because we're focused on toppling Hussein instead of uncovering the terrorist threat -- or worse, if an invasion encourages more fanatics to attack us, then I'm dead set against it.

Quite simply, I believe that Bush's people have planned to hit Iraq from the day he took office. Here's an article from CBS News:

[On 9/11/01], with the intelligence all pointing toward bin Laden, Rumsfeld ordered the military to begin working on strike plans. And at 2:40 p.m., the notes quote Rumsfeld as saying he wanted "best info fast. Judge whether good enough hit S.H." - meaning Saddam Hussein - "at same time. Not only UBL" - the initials used to identify Osama bin Laden.

Now, nearly one year later, there is still very little evidence Iraq was involved in the Sept. 11 attacks. But if these notes are accurate, that didn't matter to Rumsfeld.

"Go massive," the notes quote him as saying. "Sweep it all up. Things related and not."

Now we are faced with a war we don't know how to fight, the war against terrorism. How much easier it is for W and Co. to focus on a good old-fashioned war.

* Why it's stupid to announce "regime change" as your policy.

We may seriously wish for Saddam to go away. We may want a moderate goverment, or one we control, in place. But to announce "regime change" as our policy is strategically dumb. Why? Because it means that Saddam has nothing to lose. If he believes that we're going after him personally, then why the hell not attack us, or Israel or Turkey or any of our allies? Even if we take him down, well, he was going down anyway.

(I think we made the same mistake with Arafat, as ruthless and untrustworthy as he is, but that's another topic.)

That's why a UN resolution makes sense. In effect, we are saying, "Do X, Y, and Z, or you're going into the dustbin of history." A policy of regime change says, "We don't care what you do; we're going to kill you no matter what." Under sufficent threat, Saddam will toe the line. Which would we rather have: a cowed dictator who disarms under the threat of our military, or a dictator who thinks he's got nothing to lose and wants to be seen as a hero to the Arab world? The only way "regime change" makes sense as an announced policy is if we use it as a signal to anti-Hussein factions within Iraq. This is wishful thinking. (Read the following piece from Stratfor: Iraqi Overthrow of Hussein Attractive for U.S., but Unrealistic.)

So do we really want a disarmed Iraq? Then I repeat what Prof. Watkins wrote:

Why doesn't it make sense to run with Iraq's capitulation to unconditional inspections and put them to the test? Precisely why is it necessary to get a new resolution? If the inspectors go in and are blocked in any way, what more justification for international action could possibly be required?

* If Bush is smart, he won't have to invade.

I'm half-hoping that Bush & Co. are engaging in some clever gunboat diplomacy; that the buildup of armies, the war rhetoric and saber rattling, are really there to convince Saddam that we mean business, this time. For this to work, though, we'd need the UN to play "good cop" to our "bad cop". ("You really don't want to mess with my buddy George over there -- he's had it in for you ever since your fight with his pappy. Why not co-operate with me and make it easy on yourself?") I'm not sure if this will come to pass. The question is, are we boxed into a corner where the only option is to invade? And is Iraq boxed into a corner where their only option is to attack?

I suggest you read this post over at William Burton's blog, which is far more thought out than mine (found on Objectionable Content; see also Jim's response there). Also of note, this piece over at the Libertarian Samizdata, which doesn't really bolster my position, but which sums up the strategic conundrum rather nicely:

"Wait and the threat will grow; strike and the threat may be used."

Nietszche and The Simpsons.

Park Slope, Brooklyn. Taken with pencam.

He's The Homeless Guy, and he's got a blog.

I'm a good New York Jew... I know from gefilte fish, bar mitzvahs, and getting good grades. But not a whole Gehenna of a lot about Christian fundamentalism. So I was a bit surprised when I did a little Google search on "No Child Left Behind," our esteemed President's education initiative. Seems the term "Left Behind" refers to "those poor souls who don't go to Heaven when Jesus returns."

Can Bush really guarantee that teaching kids to read will save their souls? If so, maybe he has a Jewish mother after all.

Think this fetish map will show up in any of Edward Tufte's books? Found on Ben Hammersley.

Some time ago, I raised the possibility of importing my Netflix queue directly to my blog. Trip, my amigo, webmaster, and code mentor, went and wrote the script to do it. So now, if you're so inclined, you can see the latest 10 movies in our queue. If you're really interested, the next 100 are over in the new movie section of the site, which also features archived posts and film-related links. (Link suggestions welcome). The script is in beta release, but if you're interested in using this on your own blog, get in touch with Trip and I'm sure he'd be happy to oblige.

Rec'd this from my negotiations prof. at Harvard, Mike Watkins. Worth reprinting in full. Updated 10/8/02:

Is the Bush Administration sensibly committed to reining in Iraq's weapons of mass destruction or is it over-committed to the destruction of Saddam Hussein's regime regardless of the cost? As machinations continue at the UN and preparations for a Is the Bush administration willing to take "yes" for an answer on inspections? Or is this all window dressing on the rocky road to regime change?

Well, no, not really. But almost. "FX announced yesterday it has bought a TV series in which it gets to select a candidate for the 2004 presidential election." Yup. Reality TV, meet Presidential Politics.

I'm speechless.

Thanks to Ennis for the story.

Three new freebies over at Chank Fonts.

Detroit zoo shark credited with 'virgin births'. Thanks to Colin for the story.

Check out this cool article by Sarah, chronicling our recent canoe trip and the glories of New Hampshire's waterways. And don't miss the photo of the handsome devil in the PFD.

BY JOHN MOE
- - - -

How Are We Going to Get These Dogs Back In?

Bust an Additional Move

Seriously, Eileen, Come On

(Won't You Give Me A Ride Home From) Funkytown?

Remember When You Lit up My Life? That Was Great

I Will Now Pass the Dutchie Back to You and Thank You for Passing It to Me Originally Because I Really Enjoyed the Dutchie

The Morning That the Lights Came Back on in Georgia

Everybody Was Kung Fu Making Up

Achier Breakier Heart

Whoomp! There It Continues to Be

867-5309 extension 2

We Never Took It and Persist in Our Refusal to Take It

From McSweeney's, found on Two Blocks From The River.

Tagline. Check out their 25-word reviews, which are as long as this entry.

Who says you can’t get free music any more? Ladytron, a throwback to (or ripoff of, if you prefer) the good old days of analog synthesizers has put out their new album and their label is letting the whole thing stream to you, the listener. Of course, it’s in MP4, so you have to have Apple’s QuickTime 6 to listen. And I am quite sure there's some way to download it or to rip it as you listen. (big ups to the fabulous K10K)

Arrrr!

(Yo ho ho and some pieces of eight to Liz for telling me.)

I just made my first Ish post via my Palm, thanks to the excellent AvantBlog. All you need is AvantGo. Cool!

Hurrying through the subway at rush hour is hard enough without having to dodge the religious types. At Times Square, on my way to the shuttle, a man looked at me and asked, "Excuse me, do you speak English?" It's a classic con tactic: appear to be asking for help, and someone might stop. I'd fallen for the same line right outside my house, so I knew this guy was a Hare Krishna. His hair was a dead giveaway. Soon he'd be asking me if I'd ever met a monk before, pressing some texts into my hands, and then asking for a substantial donation for same. No thanks, bub. I sidestepped him, only to walk through an argument about God. I couldn't tell which was the commuter and which was the proselytizer, but I was glad I was neither.

Grand Central was no more secular. The tunnel from the shuttle was filled with born-agains. There seems to be more of these eager young Christians, handing out cookies and ads for their C-rock concerts, since 9/11. There were several huddled in an intense-looking prayer circle. They had babies with them, crawling around on blankets. They unsuccessfully tried to give me a leaflet.

At the end of running that gauntlet were three folks dressed in white, handing out pamphlets. Clearly I was not the first commuter to lump them in with the religious marketeers. With a weary voice, one of them announced: "U.S. Open schedules. That's all it is, just U.S. Open schedules..."

How very odd. If you'll excuse me, I'll abuse my posting priveleges to engage in some traditional blogging. Apparently, monday night somebody left me a voicemail message. A very strange and wonderful voicemail message. It's a woman, singing the Nat King Cole song that goes "L is for the way you look at me, O is for ... "; (the song proceeds to spell out "LOVE"). It's really a wonderful movie moment, much better than the one of John Cusak playing Lloyd Dobbler holding up the boombox playing "In your eyes" in Say Anything EXCEPT ....

I'm really quite sure that this was a wrong number. She didn't leave a callback number, or a name. I don't recognize the voice, and there's nobody who I'm involved with right now. If I have a secret admirer, she's very very secret. It's very strange - to have what would be for me a perfect romantic moment, but it's entirely misplaced. It's like the fortune cookie I received the other day, which said "Your lover will never leave you" (insert joke about amputation here). Why can't I get such fortunes when I'm not SINGLE ! As for the mysterious message, now that BreakupGirl has retired, I don't know who to call. Maybe that psychic from Crossing Over ? Or the Jamaican woman who used to do the psychic ads, but who has mysteriously vanished.

Any ideas ? This is almost a sub-plot from Sex in the City (When Charlotte, feeling very very alone receives a romantic gesture from a mysterious stranger only to find out it wasn't intended for her) or a plot device for a horrible 80s movie (in which I think I figure out who it is, and fall in love with that person only to find out that she didn't send it in the first place, but that doesn't matter any more).

[Lyrics follow -- she sang the entire song. I'm tempted to take out an ad on the back of the Voice or the Boston Pheonix just b/c it fits perfectly. Imagine somebody belting this out in classic musical theater, brassy, Ethel Merman style:]

[L] is for the way you look at me
[O] is for the only one I see
[V] is very, very extraordinary
[E] is even more than anyone that you adore

Love is all
That I can give to you
Love is more
Than just a game for two
Two in love can make it
Take my heart
And please don't break it
Love was made
For me and you

First, let's dispense with calling it anything but a war. For people who are planning to kill thousands, to have (possibly) thousands of our soldiers, sailors, pilots, and Marines killed, regime change* is an awfully namby-pamby phrase.
Two quick items, one funny, the other much less so.

• The Iraq pseudo-Evite (via Netwert)
• How Iraq could win the war without even using biological, chemical, or radioactive weapons, an assessment with which my father, a former Marine with combat experience tentatively agrees. (via Rebecca’s Pocket)

*OK, fine, it’s an appropriate phrase when we’re talking about the general concept (though I still think in that case overthrowing [insert name here] is better, if less politic), but what is being talked about these days is not the general concept but rather specific military steps. It’s not a police action, not a conflict, but a war.

Clint wrote the following and asked me to post it:

Saddam's history of aggression and mass murder indicate that he WILL repeat himself if given the opportunity to arm himself with CBR weapons and if the world community, especially the US, permits his doing so by inaction and bleatings of appeasement. Eliminating him will demonstrate to the rest of the Middle East that there are limits to our tolerance for credible threat, and can only lead to long range stability in the whole region.

I wonder how many realize that regime change has been OFFICIAL US POLICY since 1998 when the Congress (Senate unanimously) voted for the Iraq Liberation Act. The idea was to do it through exiles, not US military, but they acknowledged the severe threat and the need to get rid of Saddam.

So, 4 years later, that method has failed (partly because of infiltration and assassinations by Saddam's people) and Saddam has continued to build his weapons of mass destruction including progress toward nuclear weapons. The UN has regularly passed resolutions declaring Iraq to be a growing threat, but has failed to enforce those resolutions.

Appeasement and other "intellectual" rationalizations to avoid reality exist among some. What will overcome, in fact IS overcoming, the quite natural desire to settle all things without violence, is leadership by the President. He, too, would like to have Iraq disarm peacefully and prove it has done so -- Bush has said that. A history of Iraq's violations of 16 mandatory Security Council Resolutions does lead realistic people to be ready to take military action, even while giving Saddam yet another chance to disarm.

This is not "warmongering" or "beating the war drums." It is the totally realistic conclusion that SOMETHING has to be done with this outlaw nation and that what's already been attempted is a colossal failure.

The whining, sniveling critics are pulling out all stops, even as their numbers dwindle in the face of the facts. First, they said that Bush (who had not said he would take unilateral action) had to go to the UN and to Congress. Bush happily agreed to do so.

Now, the dems are whining about a vote before the elections and saying Bush is playing politics. THEY asked for the great debate and demanded Bush go to Congress. They underestimated Bush and now they grumble, mutter and whine.

"Intellectuals" on the left are floating the objection that Iran is more dangerous and we are after the wrong target in Iraq. Does anyone believe that these same people would support Bush if he decided to go after Iran instead??? Then we hear the really stupid argument that it's OK for Iraq to have nukes because other countries have nukes (sorta like saying in the 30s that it was OK for Hitler to rebuild an army because other countries have armies).

One of the latest inanities is "Why now?" The answer lies in an estimate of how far along Saddam is in his weapons programs and the military necessity of fighting a war (if we must) during the Nov-Feb time period. If we won't act now, it'll be at least another year. Another part of the answer to that question is "Why not now?" Saddam has had all these years and all these UN resolutions wherein he agreed to disarm -- and he's done everything he can to INCREASE his mass destruction capability. Too much time has been wasted already.

Then, we have the same old screeches about casualties that we heard before the Gulf War and before Afghanistan and even before Serbia/Kosovo. Yes, there will be casualties, but there will be greater ones if someone doesn't stop Saddam. We, compared to 1991, are much stronger and Iraq is much weaker. For example, then we were only able to use smart bombs in about 8% (or less) of our attacks. Today, we've upped that 9 or 10 fold. We've had all these years to target Iraq and many flying hours above Iraq. In fact, much of Iraq is not under Saddam's control.

The arguments against forcing Iraq to disarm -- which requires the meaningful threat of military action -- are typically fatuous and emanate from the politically motivated, the true (always) anti-war people, the faint hearted, the anti-Americans and the treasonous.

At the risk of turning some sacred cows into prime rib, what are the chances that this year on the day before Yom Kippur, the day of atonement, that Ariel Sharon turned to Arafat and said “You know, we’re both really being assholes about this whole thing. Let’s be men of courage, men of real principle, men whom History will be proud to show the Future, and say, ‘These are my people.’ ” ?

I’d say just about nil, but maybe next year I will be proven wrong.

An Ishbadiddler (ok, it’s me) is one of the Honourable Mentions in ConsolationChamps’ CSS haiku contest!

According to this news article, the three medical students in Florida who were the focus of the recent terrorism scare, have just been turned away from the hospital they were going to. The head of the hospital said that he'd find somewhere else for them to train. He also talks about the 200+ threatening emails, but said that's not a factor in his decision, rather that undue media attention would make it hard for his hospital to function. Meanwhile, the major muslim civil-liberties group is threatening to sue if this isn't settled easily.

Now I have no idea what was said amongst themselves on the drive down, and what was (mis) heard, but I really worry for myself. I'm not sure whether to cop an attitude and demand respect when I go outside of the safe zone, or whether I should adopt a stepin' fetchin demeanor. I do a bit of both - I smile broadly, and make sure people hear my accent, and act very very friendly. I'm thinking of adopting a white buddy to travel with when I get out and about, somebody to vouch for me. Or perhaps travelling with a placard around my neck as a bit of political theater. I'm really not sure any more. I just don't think this makes us any safer -- the bad guys are multi-racial, and concentrating on brown people will bring up more false positives than true ones, so is this really a good use of our resources or are we merely trying to make people feel better while avoiding real substantive changes in how we do things ?

It's funny - I've never had any fear of flying. Being in the air doesn't feel unstable to me. Nor am I afraid of accidents; I feel far more unsafe on the road than I do in a plane. 9/11 did little to change this. I think I was actually on one of the planes the night before -- I flew into Boston From SF on American Airlines the night before and arrived in Boston at 1 AM on the morning of the 11th.

No - what I'm afraid of is my fellow passengers and their ability to act out their paranoid fantasies upon me. For 4 months after 9/11 I basically dropped all of my dissertation work to focus on political activism and make sure that the new security regime would be one that would keep me safe from terrorism and still allow me to fly. And the few times I have flown since 9/11 I've been basically OK. I received unprofessional treatment while being searched, but I wasn't denied permission to board. But with the drum of war being beaten relentlessly, I think alot of the work that we did is beginning to unravel.

Two men of indian origin were arrested for `suspicious' behavior while flying recently . The authorities have openly stated that they have no connection to Al-Queda or any terrorist cells in the US; ironically they are non-observant (clean-shaven, non-turban wearing) Sikhs.

Since they didn't do anything criminal, and they aren't connected to terrorism, why aren't they being released ? Would their behavior have been considered odd coming from somebody who was not brown, but white ? What's the other side of the story ? Passenger accounts make clear that they were suspicious of these men from the beginning -- so perhaps their behavior had nothing to do with their arrest. Similarly, why were two other men arrested when the plane landed - including one Latino man. And why is there so little coverage of this incident ?

I understand the need for vigilance, but am concerned that now people can be jailed for a long time for simply `appearing suspicious' to others. Perhaps they should have responded to the flight attendent's request with greater alacrity - without hearing the whole story I can't tell. But I worry that our civil-liberties have been completely discarded when people who have done nothing, and who have no ties whatsoever to enemies of the state, can be detained, tried and jailed for a long time.

I also research, interview, and produce audio and digital video for the trees. Specifically, I just made an audiovisual program about people's relationship with trees in Prospect Park for the Prospect Park Alliance, and I'm taking this self-promotional moment to invite all the New Yorkers out there to walk, bike, or subway over to the Grand Army Plaza Arch in Brooklyn to see it. The program is part of an art exhibit inside the Arch, called In the Spirit of the Trees. See tough city trees struggle with power lines and baseball bats! Get the inside info on Prospect Park's arboreal beauty spots! Hear from a guy who's always going out on a limb--literally! The show's on every weekend through October 27th, with an opening reception TONIGHT from 6 to 8 pm. (Bonus for you roof access fiends: You'll also get to take in the majestic view of central Brooklyn from the roof of the Arch, which you can almost never do since the inside is usually closed!) See prospectpark.org for gallery hours and directions.

Tales of the Plush Cthulhu

Quite a while ago, I posted about some naughty habits that Windows Media Player had w/r/t reporting your audiophilic behavior back to the folks in Redmond.
Now it seems that there’s a new issue with WMP, this time with the latest version of the ultimate sticky product: On Windows ME and XP, you canna uninstall WMP 9 without rolling back your entire OS to the state it was in before you installed it. Any other software that you install after it would therefore be wiped out also. “We tried to make this clear on the download page, ” said Microsoft’s flack. Read all about it at News.com.

This is completely insane. Why do we wonder why NATO's having a tough time with the war against Iraq? Or is that one of the unknown unknowns? Read on...

"It's like he's so far right, he's turned into Michel Foucault. Operation Containment of the Other."

(speaking at a news conference re speech to nato about iraq)

There are no knowns.

There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns - that is to say, there are things that we now know we don't know but there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don't know.

So when we do the best we can and we pull all this information together, and we then say well that's basically what we see as the situation, that is really only the known knowns and the known unknowns.

And each year we discover a few more of those unknown unknowns.

50 Reasons Lord of the Rings Sucks. Found on Angela Gunn's blog.

Lileks writes a letter to himself of a year ago.

September 11, 2002

Dear Ben:

You're only just over a year old now, and can't read this. But someday you will. And someday you'll understand what I'm trying to tell you, about last year, about September 11th.

It all happened so soon after you were born -- the day before you turned one month old. None of us will forget that day, although you were too little then to remember it now.

I had taken that first month off from work, while we all got to know each other, your mom and me and you. You were very small then and I would sing and dance around the living room with you until you fell asleep on my shoulder. You liked Paul Simon (the "mamma pajamma" song) and the Red Clay Ramblers (the "Queen of Skye"). You liked looking out the window at the traffic and the birds and the sky. You slept and ate a lot.

So September 11th was going to be my first day back at work, after spending all that time being with you and watching you sleep and holding you. I got on the subway like I usually do. But the train stopped between Brooklyn and Manhattan. The train stopped, everything stopped, because something terrible had happened at the World Trade Center.

When I was a boy (younger than you are now), and your grandpa lived in New York City, he and I and your Aunt Susie visited the World Trade Center towers together. We were so high up we were looking down on the Statue of Liberty. At that time they were the tallest buildings in the world. They were so tall that you could see them from anywhere in the city. When your mom and I came to live in New York ourselves, we could always find our way by looking to see where the towers were. They were huge, they were beautiful, and they were so much part of the skyline that we usually forgot about them.

But on that morning, while I was going back to work, some very bad men, some evil men, took control of two planes. They flew these planes into the two towers of the World Trade Center. The planes blew up. The towers fell down. Many people made it out, but a lot of people died that day.

I don't need to tell you everything that happened. You probably study it in history class now. But I want to tell you what I learned, because I lived through it.

It's not easy to explain. There are bad people in the world, Ben. There are people who believe that God wants them to kill other people. Some of them are sick and don't know what they are doing. And some of them know what they're doing, but they've convinced themselves that doing terrible things is somehow good.

They're wrong, Ben. There's no good reason for what those men did. God doesn't want us to kill each other. Maybe by the time you're reading this, everyone will have figured that out, and people won't kill each other over religion or land or oil. I hope so.

But I don't want you to be afraid. That's what they wanted, for us to be afraid, to feel alone and vulnerable. But instead of being afraid and alone, we helped each other. Let me tell you what I did, and what I tried to do.

When we were stuck on the train, some smoke started coming into the subway car. Some people got very nervous and upset, but I was very calm. I knew that I was going to see you and Mom again. I knew that I had to keep a clear head, to be ready for whatever was going to come. I took off my tie and wrapped it around my head so I wouldn't breathe so much smoke. And in a calm but loud voice, I suggested that everyone sit down, because smoke rises, and put something over their mouth if they could. And some of them did.

When they finally got the train into Manhattan, the station was full of smoke. Everyone was trying to get out at the same time. I saw that one of the stairwells was empty. "There's more stairs over here!" I shouted. So some people took those stairs, which was safer than if we had all tried to use the same stairway.

When we finally got outside, the air was full of smoke and ashes. It wasn't easy to breathe, even with my tie around my face. I saw a bagel cart, abandoned on the street, and stopped to look inside. Maybe there were some napkins, and I could give them to people to breathe through. I couldn't find any, so I moved on. (Later, they were giving out masks at a hospital on the way to the bridge, so that was all right.)

I don't mean to brag about this stuff; I haven't even told anyone before now. Your dad is not a hero. I didn't rush into any burning buildings to save people. I didn't labor at Ground Zero with the rescue workers. I just tried to do the right thing, and help other people out as best I could. That's what we all did. When I got off the bridge, there were postal workers handing out water. When I got home to you and Mom, we put up a friend who was stranded. In the days after September 11th, we worked to collect and sort relief supplies at the Community Book Store on our block, which turned itself into a volunteer center.

Everyone has stories like this -- 8 million of us New Yorkers -- about how we helped someone, or someone helped us. After we'd been shown what terrible things a few people could do, it was wonderful to see that a lot of people could do a lot of good things, too.

I guess that's what I want to tell you about what happened last year. I can't make sense of why people do evil things. I can't tell you that there was a reason why all those people had to die that morning, and it's hard to accept that there was no reason at all. But what I can tell you is this: in life, you'll face a lot of crises. Some of them small, some of them big, and hopefully none as catastrophic as the attacks of 2001. But there will be times when you're not sure of what to do. My advice is this: Stay calm -- whatever is going to happen, is going to happen. And try to do the right thing. If you're not sure what the right thing is, try helping someone out.

There's so much more I want to tell you, and I hope when you're ready you'll ask me about it, and I hope that I have answers. And I hope you'll remember my story, and my advice, when there's confusion all around you. I know you'll do the right thing, son.

-- Dad

Dave Barry on Flight 93. Via LGF.

''We figure everyone will be watching anniversary events on TV, and we don't want to disturb that.'' They'd better not.

Jill sent me this letter:

Dear Friends,

This email is not like emails I have sent in the past. Like most people, my thoughts usually center on the small details, annoyances and joys in my immediate life. I am writing now, however, because I am sincerely concerned about actions our country may soon take and I want to share my thoughts with you.

Our president wants to go to war with Iraq. He wants to remove a leader who poses a potential threat to his neighbors and our country and who is no doubt one of the world's cruelest dictators. This is a noble intention, and I am willing to take our president at his word - that he truly believes invading Iraq is the only possible course to protect our and the world's security.

But I think the President is misguided. There is a route to stability and security, but not the route Bush proposes. Leaving aside how an invasion would affect the Iraqi people and our soldiers, an attack on Iraq will far from improve security in the world or for the U.S. Instead, the mood in the Middle East and our new understanding of terrorism point to the other extreme - that an attack on Iraq would have a tremendously destabilizing effect on both the Middle East and on our future safety.

lazylokovax: from the NY Times online front page (file under "like I need this today"): U.S. Expected to Elevate Terror Alert Level (12:00 p.m.)

ishbadiddle: yeah did you see the article about new yorkers stockpiling gas masks etc

lazylokovax: No, but why am I not surprised? And I must say, this color-coded warning system we have looks rather, well, GAY PRIDE.

ishbadiddle:

lazylokovax: maybe our alert system should look more like:

ishbadiddle: high alert: complete submission to the whims of the authorities

lazylokovax: assume the national security position

ishbadiddle: [grin]

lazylokovax: why do I feel like we're auditioning for Get Your War On?

ishbadiddle: should i blog this? that would make it complete.

lazylokovax: sure, why not?

So last week I wrote about the upcoming anniversary of September 11th, and how I was feeling about it, and how I felt that the non-stop television coverage would be inadequate, at best, and shlocky, at worse. As a symbol of just how wrong things could get, I cited the fact that Kelly Clarkson, winner of American Idol, would be singing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. The National Anthem. At the place where MLK delivered his "I have a dream speech," where Marian Anderson sang in defiance of the DAR. On our national day of mourning. Here's what Colin wrote (I'm bringing this up out of the comments section):

Dichotomy

Patrick writes:

"I am slogging my way through War and Peace and have just read this chapter. It describes countries and people hurling into war seemingly inevitably. Not only is this appropriate because of the current saber rattling of our Government, but it also addresses all so called "world changing" events.

High speed condom!

There's this haunting little song, "September," that opens David Sylvian's Secrets of the Beehive. In less than a minute and a half, it sets the tone for this album of melancholy and beautiful songs. I don't remember buying the LP, but I played it a lot in college, when I had a hunger for melancholy and beauty. The vinyl has been untouched for years now. I put it on the turntable again last night, and listened.

"September's here again..."

Yesterday I watched a plane fly over my head. Coming out of JFK, still low enough for me to see its size, its heft, a huge metal machine. "It looks like a missile with wings," I thought. And then: "Oh, damn." Because I thought that was all over with. Being anxious about low-flying planes. Or when the subway stops between stations.

Your Legal Rights at a Glance. Via This Modern World.

I almost ran into Steve Buscemi yesterday morning. With my car. I was making a left onto Carroll Street; he and his son were crossing the street; I gave him the sign motorists give to pedestrians that says "go on ahead, I won't kill you;" he gave the pedestrain nod that says "thanks for not running me over even though I have the right of way." And then I was like, oh, that's Steve Buscemi. Hey.

After a particularly party-riffic EFNY this year, several of us were standing on the train platform, sun-addled and boozy. For some reason, we were talking about a site Mike blogged back in October of '01 that purported to scientifically track the global "Oh, shit" that took place last September 11th (via devices these scientists call "eggs"). The site seems to have a Princeton URL, so as far as I know, this could all be part of their scheme to steal students from Yale. With everything else 9/11 coming back in style, I thought this might be fun to look at again.

"Introduction

It is one of humanity's most enduring spiritual traditions: the idea that all life or all consciousness is interconnected. Human groups, whether ethnic, religious, or racial; as various as the Iroquois, the Sufis, and Western European Freemasons, all incorporate it into their belief structures. References to it can be found in ancient documents of the classical world, both East and West. It is a very compelling idea, spanning both millennia and the vast complexity of human cultures. Yet, as compelling as the concept is emotionally, only in recent decades has any objective evidence emerged that such a construct might be valid. Even this work, in fields as various as physics, parapsychology, and biology, has provided only suggestions, largely because the research was not conceived in global terms but, instead, focused on more limited vistas.

Indeed, much of the relevant research has regarded only individual performances in experiments on anomalies such as telepathy, mind/matter interactions, and distant healing. Somewhat broader vistas are opened in studies of group resonance and morphogenetic fields...."

"The following material shows the behavior of the Global Consciousness Project's network of 37 REG devices called "eggs" placed around the world as they responded during various periods of time surrounding September 11. These eggs generate random data continuously and send it for archiving and analysis to a dedicated server in Princeton, New Jersey, USA. We analyse the data to determine whether the normally random array of values shows structure correlated with global events. This page shows a wide range of exploratory analyses that provide context for the formal hypothesis testing related to the events on September 11."

Emily was nice enough to translate the article from Der Spiegel for me; it's certainly clearer than reading the babelfish version:

The Bloggers of Times Square

Blogging is in: so many people have begun keeping online journals that the scene has become too complex. Three New Yorkers have found an elegant, if old-fashioned, way to help navigate: the subway map.

Pat weighs 207 pounds. His birthday is on July 29th, and he just turned 30. Since January he has lost 40 pounds. On May 29th he had a protein bar for breakfast, a protein bar for lunch, and spaghetti with turkey sauce for dinner. His main goal in life is to kick a certain Matt Johnson in the balls.

Welcome to the world of bloggers. Here there is no observation too banal, no information too superfluous, no thought too embarrassing. It is a space for obsessions, and Pat is a master of them. "Letters from Pat" is the name of his blog, short for weblog (a combination of a journal and homepage). For months he's let the public know daily what he eats, how much he weighs - and that Matt's balls are not safe, even in Spain.

People like Pat deserve to be found and read, says Mike Everett-Lane, a 32-year-old New York and occasional blogger. But with an estimated half million blogs, it's not easy to get noticed. That's why, in April, Mike and two acquaintances started nycbloggers.com - the first website on which blogs are arranged according to the subway map.

High concentration of bloggers in Chelsea

"The subway map offers an ideal reduction of information," says Mike. "It's not so intimate that you feel like you're being pursued on the street, but also not so vague that your curiosity lapses."

Pat's subway station is 23rd St., C train in Chelsea. There are 14 other blogs listed here, one of the most active blogger neighborhoods on the map. In Times Square there are 8 blogs registered. Here a certain "Mr. Swill" muses, "why does every attractive woman in New York have a tattoo?"

The idea of nycbloggers.com came in March, when Mike began talking - or rather emailing - another enthusiastic blogger, Liz. "We both live in New York and thought, 'Wouldn't it be cool if you could glance at a map and see all the blogs in your neighborhood?'"

Liz is a web-designer and her boyfriend Matt is a computer programmer. In three weeks they had finished the site. "We did everything on email - we didn't talk on the phone for the first time until a week after the launch," explains Mike.

Five new bloggers every day

To publicize nycbloggers.com, Mike found about a hundred blogs on Google and emailed each an invitation to register. As soon as these bloggers had linked to the site, it popped up on popularity rankings like Blogdex. From then on it was a fast seller. "We received 50 applications a day," says Mike. Now there are 1345 bloggers in all five boroughs on the list, and five are added each day.

Bloggers who want to include themselves must fill out a form which requests the URL of their journal, subway station and a short description. Matt, Liz and Mike check every application. The criteria are broad: not only people who live here at the moment count as New Yorkers, but also former residents. "We recognize true New Yorkers by their blogs," says Mike.

Eventually there were smaller imitators in London and Washington. There are already several blogger maps by country, including Germany as well. For the whole country there are only 197 blogs listed, though.

Bonus section with posts form 9-11

It's hardly surprising that legions of bloggers live in self-absorbed New York. But after 9/11, says Mike, blogging took on a whole new meaning. "That day showed that blogging has a purpose that goes beyond relating breakfast habits." Blogs are the ideal medium, according to him, to express emotions. On nycbloggers.com there is now a bonus section with posts about 9/11.

The three creators don't earn any money from the site. "I do it because I find New Yorkers interesting," says Mike. He works for a community organization that helps the homeless. Liz and Matt are both freelancers. Liz is just now looking for a job. They pay $50 a month for the server.

For their next project they'd like to offer visitors to the site a "daily commuter journal." Subway riders could enter their route and receive a text daily on their email or Palm Pilot that is composed of current blogs on that route. Mike doesn't really care if the world needs this. "We do it because it's cool."

Copyright of the original remains with Carsten Volkery and Der Spiegel.

I'm not one to follow the intracacies of top level domains, registrars and their interNICene conflicts too closely, but I was suprised to see in today's paper that Bloomberg & Pataki had announced the launch of a site www.lowermanhattan.info to keep the public updated on developments in that area. I had thought that these alternatives (like .name and .biz) to the old stalwart domains would be the purview of scams, spam, and the like.



Looking into the .info TLD a little more, I found that it had already been used for a WTC Relief site and the MTA. In fact, these are the only prominent .info users highlighted on the Afilias global registrar site that seem to doing something beyond staking out the .info turf to protect their brands. I don't know if the usage of .info by New York City governmental organizations is a harbinger of the future importance of this domain or just some quirk of bureaucracy (e.g. the MTA said cited as a motivation for its choice the fact that its old URL, www.mta.nyc.ny.us, was too hard to remember). But I did find it a little too eerily appropriate that .info's open registration and start-up period began on September 12th.

Pub Fight: Who wins?

When I read about this email that was making the rounds designating the first subway car of every train as the "singles" car I thought: this is asking to be spoofed. I was going to write one. But someone beat me to the punch:

Riding the MTA's Love Train

From Tallahassee.com, the online partner of the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper:

Question: Who actually received the most votes in Florida's 2000 presidential election?

Answer: Al Gore. State election officials ultimately declared George W. Bush the winner by a margin of 537 votes, but during and after the election dispute, questions remained about the uncounted ballots of 175,010 voters.... In 2001 every uncounted ballot was carefully examined in a scientific study by the University of Chicago, which concluded that when all the votes were counted, more votes had been cast for Gore than for Bush.

Check out this Harry Potter broom toy that vibrates when you put it between your legs! Rich over at robot filter asks: "Why do i think that in the future there will be a whole generation of young women who will secretly giggle when the Nimbus 2000 is mentioned?"

From those folks over at the Cato Institute.

Bloggen ist in: So viele Leute führen inzwischen ein Online-Tagebuch, dass die Szene reichlich unübersichtlich geworden ist. Drei New Yorker haben eine elegante, wenn auch altmodische Navigationshilfe gefunden: Die U-Bahn-Karte.

NYCbloggers is in Der Spiegel; you can read a sort-of-translated version here. It seems that I am "ein 32-jähriger New Yorker und Gelegenheits-Blogger." Still trying to figure out what that means.