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Monday, January 19, 2004 |
 Edwards wins the most in Iowa. It puts him on the national stage (Kerry was already there). Edwards "looks" like a new Kennedy. His wife played a big role too.
10:43:30 PM 
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I am thinking about my book. Should I divide it into two parts: how to fight next gen terroism and how to fight against next gen terrorism (released in two different books)?
9:02:03 PM
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One point. I have gotten some really nasty e-mail in regards to some of my writing on the war. Not a problem though. Most of my critics haven't served (and almost all of the corporate and governmental leadership -- and their kids -- haven't served). They haven't put their lives on the line. In contrast, I have served in special ops. My two brothers serve. My sister and my brother in law (F-16 pilot) served. My uncle served and was a fighter pilot shot down over Vietnam. My cousin is an Marine F-18 pilot. My father and father in law (in Vietnam on B-52s) served . We served. Armchair hawks are the worst sort (like necon Richard Perle). Bad strategy is bad strategy. Recognize it and correct it.
7:34:03 PM
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Question: With casualties in Iraq now over 500, are we about to prove my point about the demonstrations against Vietnam: that they were motivated more by the fear of the draft than anything else.
7:23:12 PM
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No link. Don't you think that the Bush administration's urgent demand that the UN return to Iraq to mediate conflicts is powered by more than a little hypocricy? I do. The US is acting in so unilateral a way now (from Iraq to space policy), it is mind bending to think that the US can now turn to an international organization for help. As a US citizen, you can either conclude that the UN should help us regardless of our ongoing policies (and the claims from Bush that the UN is irrelevant), or you can conclude that we need to change our positions to get international support when we run into trouble. If you conclude the former, you should expect more isolation and more trouble (this will fall into Karl Rove's target demographic). If you conclude the latter, your are welcome to the sanity of a strategy that may work to get us the results we need to leave.
7:17:00 PM
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Has anyone else noticed how NBC has started to show programs at 9:59 instead of 10:00? The only reason I can pont to is that NBC wants to screw with TiVo since the program recording options don't let you accomodate "early" programming. That means it is impossible to record a program on Fox, CBS, or ABC in the hour block before an NBC program you want to record. C'mon guys. :-<
6:57:16 PM
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Reuters (here is more data on after 1965 from VFW magazine). US troop casualties far exceed the first three years of Vietnam.
A Reuters analysis of US Defense Department statistics showed... that the Vietnam War, which the Army says officially began on Dec. 11, 1961, produced a combined 392 fatal casualties from 1962 through 1964, when American troop levels in Indochina stood at just over 17,000.
6:46:37 PM
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Dave likes the movie Grand Hotel. Both Dave and I found it at about the same time. We both loved it. As a movie, it is as good as the best movies you can see today, even though it is in black and white. It depicts how tough the world is without money.
It is true that in the US, we have a meat grinder assembly line approach to life. If you fall behind, the machine chews you up and turns you into a hotdog. If you get far enough ahead, you can leap off the conveyer belt and stand in safety -- and stay there unless you are dumb enough to spend enough to get close to the belt again.
However, the safety net for many of us is our family. They can support you through the most difficult of moments. They can pull you off the conveyer belt for a while -- the moment it takes for you to gain the strength for another run. The price is that family isn't free. It takes an investment of years. It takes an ability to forgive and forget, and more comprimise than you think you think you can stand.
Maybe the ability to build and maintain a strong family is a mindset. It is a mindset people haven't talked much about. It requires that people know how to keep connections alive. How to throw insults and humiliations away as so much transient garbage -- that were generated in the heat of the moment. How to give up what you want to do what is right for your family, even when every fiber of your being demand that you drive it up to the edge.
And finally: to forget. Most importently, the ability to forget the negative is the best way to build a strong family.
6:10:56 PM
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Unfortunately, this is the only weblog I can find on the situation in Haiti. With pro government thugs roaming the streets to shoot demonstrators, some pictures/news/insight would be welcome. It would help to make it real for the rest of the world. If you want to really understand where weblogs can make a difference, watch those parts of the world in crisis.
5:36:21 PM
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© Copyright 2004 John Robb.
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