Wednesday Morning Bullshit

So I'm sitting here, with the news on, and some star-wearing flack says that "the next six to eight months are critical for the war in Iraq" or something like that.

Yeah. How many times have we heard this before? We always seem to be "about to turn the corner" and every other platitude other than "we can see the light at the end of the tunnel."

And them some other (or maybe the same guy) flack says that "attacks are at their lowest level" but then refused to provide any data to back up that assertion.

The Five O'Clock Follies. Different war, same shit.

One thing the "the attacks are down in Baghdad" crowd fail (or refuse) to acknowledge is that for years now, there has been a brutal form of ethnic cleansing going on in Baghdad. As a neighborhood is "cleansed", primarily of Sunnis, the violence in that neighborhood is going to go down once the local militia cements its grip on the neighborhood. That should be relatively evident to anyone with a quarter of a functioning cerebellum and one foot in the real world.

Then the next story was about how the Germans arrested some people for plotting terrorist attacks. For a story that was reporting an imminent threat, there sure seemed to be a lot of "coulds" in the story. They could have done this, they could have done that. Could, could, could.

At least the reporter noted that high-profile charges like this often don't hold up when they proceed to trial.

I am not going to go on, at least now, about Bush's little bit of cock-teasing of "we might be able to bring some troops home soon." First off, it's not the first time he has done this, for when his back is being pressed against the wall about the troop levels, he says 'we can bring some home soon, maybe" and the puppies in the press back off.

Second, Keith Olbermann slammed Bush on this harder than I could. It's worth watching.

And now I'm hearing a story about how the Chinese are pooh-poohing the issue of shoddy quality and poisonous products by dismissing the charges as a salvo in a trade war. Except we know that the Bush Administration fought any move to crack down on the use of lead-based paint on toys.

"Never Mind"

First Sen. Craig pleads guilty and then he says he's not guilty.

Then he resigns his senate seat and now he wants to change his mind.

Talk about your flip-flopper.

Lies and Spin of the Aviation Kind

Don Brown, a retired air traffic controller, points out in his blog that n 2006, the FAA (aka the "Feds Against Aviating") claimed that their new changes to the ATC system were reducing delays and saving fuel for the airlines.

Then, this year, the same folks say that 2006 was one of the worst for delays.

They must not think anybody is paying attention to them, for they change their story and then lie about doing so almost as well as Bush's Iraq War team.

If you're interested in how the ATC system works (and doesn't), Don's blog is worth perusing.

Expect Nothing But Spin

Anyone who thinks that we are going to get an honest assessment from General Petraeus in the next few days may want to re-think that opinion.

This is why: Three years ago, he published an opinion piece in the Washington Post saying that the war was winnable and that good things were happening and that there was reason for optimism.

Two points: First off, he clearly was mistaken. There are few constants in this, Chimpy's Clusterfuck of a War, but one of them is this: Things can always get worse and they usually do.

Second: Take a look at the date of the op-ed. it was published on September 26, 2004. That was about six weeks before the presidential election. Six weeks before an election and a supposedly non-partisan general officer takes to one of the pre-eminent newspapers in the country to argue, in essence, that Bush is doing the right thing and that Bush is absolutely right to stay the course.

So much for the general staff being non-political.

It is no secret that Bush cast a pretty wide net to find a general who would support the AEI Surge Strategy. One should not be surprised if the general he hand-picked to implement it says anything other than "yup, things are going well, indeed, gawrsh, ayup."

Petraeus got his fourth star in order to be given this command. Does anyone really expect him now to bite the hand that fed him?

3:10 to Yuma

The ads say it is "the best western since `Unforgiven'."

Quick. Name another one.

(crickets chirping)

I didn't think so.

Ego-centric Religion

I earned my private pilot's license a long time ago. The cross-country phase of the training is when you learn how to navigate an airplane and back then, it was all by using a chart and comparing the chart to what you saw on the ground.

I was on a cross-country flight with my instructor. We were in a Cessna 150.


Something registered in my peripheral vision, I looked up to see a Piper Cherokee pass overhead and it was very close. I was pretty sure it was a Cherokee Six, I could clearly see the longitudinal stiffeners that were riveted along the belly of the Cherokee. (At the time, I'd not flown any Piper aircraft or even looked closely at one, I didn't know those stiffeners were there.)

We watched as the Cherokee passed us and it passed through our altitude, as it was descending towards an airport about fifteen miles away. If it was descending at 500'/min, we were about three seconds away from getting killed.

I told this story to a family friend who was visiting not long afterwards. She said that my "guardian angel" was looking out for me.

First off, in the religious tradition I was raised in, the only angel I remember hearing of was the Angel of Death.

Second, assuming that there are such things as guardian angels, there could have been six people in that Cherokee. Counting my instructor, there were a maximum of seven other people there, all of whom presumably would have a guardian angel. They all probably weren't asleep on the job.

One time, I was waiting out a severe storm at a rest stop on the eastern shore of Virginia, as the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel was closed. A lot of people were there. The line into the snack bar was horrendously long. As I hung around in the lobby area, a young woman came out of the snack bar with a bunch of chips and other stuff. As she passed them around to her family, an older woman took a bag of chips and said: "Praise God. Praise God."

Maybe my mind is too small, but it occurred to me that there were roughly six billion people on this planet and that at any particular time, a lot of really bad shit is happening to a lot of them. War. Famine. Disease. Being a refugee. Being homeless. It's not hard to find stories about families that earn the pittance they need to survive by scavenging in junkyards. That same tropical storm we were waiting out probably trashed some people's houses and killed some folks. I just find it hard to conceive that God would then reach down and make sure that one woman has a bag of chips and a can of tonic.

You see and hear this stuff all the time. An airliner crashes on approach or takeoff; there are some survivors and, as sure as crap flows from a goose, you are going to hear one of them say "God was looking out for me." What sort of ego, what level of self-importance does it take to assume that the Creator reached down and saved that one individual from death and, if so, what was the reason why all of those other people were allowed to die? Why does God save one person from dying in a automobile collision but the rape, pillaging, ethnic cleansing and whole scale slaughter goes on Darfur?

What sort of ego does it take to believe that you are so important to the scheme of things that God saved you?

The Triangle of Death

So it seems that I am a paid-up member of the "Triangle of Death."

Well, isn't that special!

Maybe we can form an orchestra with the Sousaphone of Slaughter, the Drum of Disease, the Trombone of Terror, and the (wait for it) Violin of Violence. (You knew that one was coming.)

Or maybe this is a geometric thing, with the Dodecahedron of Disaster and the Parallelogram of Poison?

The Good Cat

He knows where he is supposed to be lying down.

More "Jr. Birdmen"

When you see puffy cumulus clouds like this above you on a summer's day, you know the ride underneath them is going to to a bit bouncy.


The airplane was bouncing around pretty good when I shot this next photo, as you may be able to tell by looking at the turn coordinator.


Notice the positions of the throttle, mixture and carburetor heat controls. Carb heat is on, the throttle is all the way in and the mixture control is pulled back quite a bit. This is a way to run slightly lean of peak EGT, which is a very efficient way to fly. It also helps reduce the incidence of spark plug leading, which is a problem when burning 100LL aviation gasoline in engines designed for 80/87 gasoline.

Varmint

This varmint knows that he is not allowed to lie on the sheets of my bed.

Doesn't faze him one bit. He complained when I chased him off the bed.

My fault for not making it.