20070205

Red blogule to London calling... for trouble

Two days ago, 135 people were killed in a terror attack in Baghdad's Sadriya market. That one did make the headlines, unlike the other days, when terror claims only the equivalent of the 7/7 London bombings.
About the same day, many people were arrested in London in what appeared to be a plot to abduct and behead a muslim soldier. A great victory for counter terrorism being often followed by the revelation of a not so glorious news for the Government, I just sat and waited for it to pop up.
It didn't take long for UK's army to confess 15 minor soldiers had been sent to Iraq. Actually, underaged combattants happened to be one of the few disgraces lacking to Tony Blair's impressive collection. We'll have to scratch our heads to find the next one...

According to Saint Tony, 7/7 had nothing to do with Iraq and the invasion of Iraq had something to do with the war on terror.
According to me, Ruppert Murdoch had something to do with the election of Tony Blair and Fox News' broadcasting of the invasion of Iraq as "War On Terror".

Tony will leave power soon ; the next guy, either Gordon Brown or David Cameron, will also have to sign a pact with the Devil to get elected ; and the "Winner" will face a new kind of terror : a wave of youngsters trained in Iraq and ready to spread chaos across the United Kingdom and Europe.
They have the European citizenship and they are from all origins, not necessary "foreign". They won't need to strike with a bomb in a major touristic area to get their point. Any small IED (Improvised Explosing Device) or any single shot in any neighborhood will do. Random abductions and killings will make anyone feel insecure. Terror at its simplest, purest and scariest level.
Chirac and Blair gone, Merkel taking her marks, let's see what kind of leadership emerges in Europe. The fundamentalists may want to play a role in the coming elections : Europeans would be inspired not to put a Dubya look alike in front of them.

20070202

Department Of Climate Defense - 2007, ground zero of environment - Red blogule to Philip Cooney - White blogule to the IPCC

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its 4th Assessment Report* today in Paris. Yet another set of scenarios, and certainly not the worst case we've heard of so far. But considering the compromizes needed to produce it, this new finger pointing in our direction looks definitely frightening.

Philip Cooney resigned today. The White House Council on Environmental Quality's chief of staff had been on a hot seat for a couple of days and yes, global warming had something to do with it and yes again, human behavior too.The New York Times revealed how this former oil lobbyist edited many reports confirming both global warming and the impact of man. We can now measure the impact of one man, George W. Bush.

2007 is the ground zero of environment, where everybody gapes at the horror and starts to react. We certainly don't want the same leaders to take the same kind of decisions.
I'm sure the former next president of the United States would have done a better job. By joining the Kyoto community and putting more pressure on developping countries, Al Gore would have led the world to a slightly better trend at a decisive moment.

Gore wouldn't have prevented global warming, which is bound to rule for the next millenium at least. Besides, at the geological level, both Philip Cooney and the IPCC are insignificant. But we are enjoying global warming right now and what we are doing now is significant. At the personal, collective, national and international levels.


The IPCC does have a WMO / UNEP / UNO label, but the United Nations Environment Programme itself has no power. China and Russia are not likely to empower it that soon. Ditto at the WTO, even if Davos exposed interesting concerns across the entrepreneurial elite.

At the national level, I'd like the US to stand a little bit more sanely on this ground zero. Because this is also a matter of national security and defense. We are at war, we are defending our land, and the intervention of military is already often required. I'm not talking about financing federal environmental policies with the budget of defense : I mean defense should have its own environmental agenda, money to build natural fences, to fight the very causes of climate change. The budget of defense already contributes to R&D with civil applications, why not devote one fifth of it to the war on climate change ? For a change.


* download it at
ipcc.ch

20070124

White blogule to the NYT - The State of the Union in Words

Dear compassionate reader,

Last year, I would release a scoop for your eyes only : the State of the Union speech as initially written by George W. Bush. A few days later, you could measure the gap between his fundamentalist way of thinking and the official propaganda*.

This year, a new face joined the sitcom for Season VII : behind the Kommander in Thief sitted Lobby Dick Cheney, as usual and with his trademark snarl, but also Nancy Pelosi, completing a perfect Good vs Evil picture.

And the New York Times offered an exciting gimmick to fully enjoy the show : an online search engine comparing the usage of keywords during all SotU speeches since 2001**. For example, the words Iraq/Iraqi(s) were never used in 2001, twice in 2002, and respectively 21, 24, 27, 16 and 34 times the following years. There is even a graphic showing the positions of all occurences in all speeches.

If you compare "Security" with "Social Security", you can notice all 15 occurences of the former were actually associated with the latter in 2001. One year later, only 2 of 19 occurences of Security had something to do with health.

Bush bats a steady 5,000 words and 53.5 "America" per speech, plus 5.7 for "United States". "China" is not exactly at the top of his mind : he uttered it once this year, tying the humble record of years 2002, 2003 and 2006. The "World" ? Dubya didn't care for it when he took office (2 mentions), gave it some consideration after 9/11 (19-26-13-15-27 between 2002 and 2006), and put it back to the bottom drawer in front of a semi-hostile audience yesterday (10).

The word "peace" has never been so unpopular in his mouth : 3 miserable appearances in 2007 after a solid 6- 5- 10- 5- 12- 8 streak. On the other hand, "war" is back to its peak levels : 11 vs 2-13-13-12-5-2.

Don't be fooled by this overall rather balanced 46-58 "peace-war" ratio : from 2001 to 2007, the POTUS mentioned only 19 "liberty" and 20 "democracy" vs 44 (non-social) "security" and 145 "terror".

Another propaganda favorite looks almost abandoned this year : the "Freedom" agenda knocked only 3 times at our door (vs 8-14-5-8-21-17). W seems to have some trouble selling values this season, so he sticks to less vague concepts and pitches below the waist, where Joe Sixpack can catch a neither fast- nor knuckle- ball. Significantly, the part of "freedom" in the overall occurences of "free" is also at its lowest point : 27% vs an average 65%, after last year's staggering peak (94.4%!).

Anyway... what George W. Bush said is one thing, how he looked another and what he'll do yet another. The actual State of the Union remains that of the Divided States of Amerika.

* "White blogule to the State of the Union speech - complete and uncut edition" (20060126), followed by "Red blogule to Demokracy - professor Bush's vision" (20060204)
** see nytimes.com/ref/washington/20070123_STATEOFUNION.htmlx

20070122

"Jesus vs Mahdi" Prophecy - Red blogule to Bush-Cheney's war on Iran

Lobby Dick has decided : the US must bomb Iran's nuclear facilities. W is almost ready, just making sure he doesn't need any agreement from the Congress, that ugly and totally unnecessary offspring of democracy.
Make no mistake : just like the invasion of Iraq, this attack has nothing to do with the official agenda. Preventing WMD proliferation, getting rid of a dictatorship, and even securing juicy contracts for big corporations... all these are mere alibis, the Bush Administration's usual sales pitch*.
The aim of the game is to accelerate the final showdown between Iran and Israel before the World's most important regime change : Lord Dubya's rule is bound to end by 2008, and this mad crusader has yet to fulfill his most important task ; the so called Bible Prophecy.
If you missed the previous episodes, here's the story : Bush believes Jesus Christ's Second Coming will be provoqued by the ultimate war between Israel and Iran. Crazy enough ? There's more : the Shiite sect to which Mahmoud Ahmadinejad belongs believes the Mahdi is coming this spring... which means Dubya's favorite philosopher will face another heavyweight messianic figure somewhere between the begining of the MLB season and the NBA finals. This definitely beats Rocky Balboa's return, Jason vs Freddy and even Alien vs Predator !

Both sides consider it The Clash between Good and Evil... without noticing they're talking about the same God. So make that "Good vs Good", or better : "dimwit vs dimwit".

It would be laughable if human lives and nuclear powers weren't involved.

If God does exist, I guess the time has actually come to pay us a visit and wipe all this crap out of the surface of the Earth.



* Don't get me wrong : Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is a bad guy and potentially as dangerous as Saddam, and the Iranian theocracy is as dangerous for World peace as the US theocracy. I'm only warning you like I did four years ago : if you follow Bush on his crusade, you are doomed. And this time, we all could be doomed.

20070117

White blogule to Barack Obama's run for Presidency

What do we know about Senator Barack Hussein Obama of Illinois ?
Unlike Hillary, he wasn't born in Chicago from a Welsh lineage but in Hawaii, from a Kansas - Kenya combo.
Unlike Hillary, he still needs to gain the favors of the Afro-American minority.
Unlike Hillary, he wasn't raised a Methodist but decided to become a member of the Trinity United Church of Christ.
Unlike Hillary, he seems happily married. Anyway, Michelle Obama would be as great a First Lady as Bill Clinton a First Male First Lady.
Unlike Hillary, he said "no" to the war in Iraq, but so did Joe Biden.
Unlike Hillary, he looks cool, but so does Bill Clinton.
Unlike Hillary, he looks kind and good, but so did John Edwards.
He has already won (some hearts in) New Hampshire, but so did Wesley Clark.
Barack Obama looks too good to be true.
Up to now, he was overprotected. A candidate at the Federal level, he must face the ugliest side of politics and media. If he survives the attacks, a nice spot on the Democratic ticket seems guaranteed. The top spot won't be easy : Hillary Rodham Clinton has been claiming for eight years the role of Commander in Chief for the two terms to come.

20070116

Bush : Cultural Learnings of Iraq for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of America

Saddam may not be hanging around anymore, Osama may or may not be dead, justice remains to be truly rendered.
The US have a great opportunity to clean the whole mess and restore their status of a great democracy. Actually, impeaching Dubya is its only way out of Iraq.
Don't get me wrong : the US can't abandon what's left of Iraq that soon. It's just that they cannot signify a change in their approach any other way. This country badly needs a regime change and I don't want Dubya to survive 2007 as the oldest G8 leader.
Both George W. Bush and Richard B. Cheney must and can be impeached. Treason could be a good start : 2006 was the year a wider audience than this lousy blog's came to understand this Administration's blunders were actually strategical successes for the true W.
George W. Bush didn't act in the interest of his country as a President of the United States.
George W. Bush didn't act in the interest of his party as a Republican.
George W. Bush did act in the interest of fundamentalism as a fundamentalist.
Once again, the war in Iraq was not masterminded by neocons for the benefit of oilcos : the war in Iraq was sold by neocons to SIGs which sold it to the Congress, but it was masterminded by a bunch of crazy theocons who planned from the start the collapse of Iraq and a final showdown between Israel and Iran.

Reelecting Bush-Cheney was an Historical blunder, not impeaching them would be criminal.

20070105

Red blogule to AdSense, no sensibility

This site hosts a few ads as a part of its grand borghesian design. The aim of the game is not to raise funds (the few cents harvested will certainly not make for the time I spend / you waste on it), but to study how beings, things, places and times can get both freed and stuck in the net, the coopetition between reality and fiction, not to mention the interactions of my troubled mind and its environment (to which you now belong since you're reading these silly lines).
Anyway. Here is Google, grand provider of free traps, proposing its AdSense advertising programs and Google Coop Custom Search Engines. After resisting the urge, I decided to give both of them a try.
The custom search engine happens to be, as the name suggests, an engine that searches and can be customized. This one is supposed to browse my site but when I type "bush", a word that occurs about 3,850,926,712 times in it*, Google tells me sorry, there is no such expression to be found in this place. On the other hand, "Dubya" brings 6 pages of results, without even including the pages omitted. What when Google says "custom", do they mean "intimate" ?

AdSense is supposed to provide ads related to the content. I can specify where French is spoken and where English is broken, but it doesn't deter these kings of marketing from splashing banners in German for people visiting from Korea.
Worse : when AdSense decides to become accurate, it grows dangerous ! The other day, the Restored Church Of God was selling its crazy fundamentalist prophecies on the very pages where I was denouncing them ! I could stop the flow by adding their website to the list of advertisers banned on my site but I'm starting to wake up in the middle of the night.
Some day, when I type "bush" on my custom search engine, I will be proposed Dubya's autobiotheography.


* a little bit less according to Blogger's integrated search engine (Blogger being both the platform used by this excuse for a blog and a Google outfit !) : see "bush". By the way : still waiting for the new and improved version with tags.

20070103

White blogule to OH Se-hoon - swift boats across the Hangang

LEE Myung-bak may or may not become South Korea's next president. Like Sarkozy, he could be leading in the polls too clearly too early. Actually, the man who changed the face of the Capital city (Bus Rapid Transit system, restored Cheonggyecheon, Seoul Sup...) always seems in a hurry and doesn't like to waste time. For a start, he never took the time to change his own face. Plus he was twice convicted for starting an election campaign too early.
But swiftness is certainly not a handicap in Korea. After all, LEE's predecessor did become Korea's head of state in a hurry : GOH Gun assumed ROH Moo-hyun's interim during his short 2004 impeachment transition.
Still, LEE's successor could very well become the "next-former-mayor-of-Seoul president". It's just that 2007 looks a little bit too early for OH Se-hoon, who isn't even of the "former" kind since he only took the mayoral charge last summer. At least, this good looking politician won't have to change his face to seduce the voters.
Yesterday, OH decided to stop the pre-electoral stalemate on real estate issues, the most important topic in a country that doesn't seem to realize North Korea is about to collapse in a meltdown if not nuclear, at least economically ten times more destructive than Albania's*.

Anyway... ROH Moo-hyun's Government cannot go as far as it would like against real estate speculation because the opposition doesn't want it to succeed before this year's elections... the said opposition including many members of the "ruling" Uri party. OH Se-hoon is a member of the Grand National Party but wants to be remembered as a man who reaches for the good of the majority : he didn't wait for national guidelines to set tougher rules on new developments. A small move but a wise and a timely one.
Nowadays, some short sighted Gangnam investors see LEE Myung-bak as their only hope of postponing the inevitable burst of Seoul's real estate bubble. The wisest and swiftest among them are becoming OH Se-hoon's best supporters... with the hope of making in Gangbuk for their future losses in Gangnam : they have already moved their assets north of the Han river, flocking to such areas as Nowon-gu like rats before the shipwreck.



* once again : instead of benchmarking Germany for their reunification scenarios, Koreans would be inspired to remember what happened to Albania after the collapse of Enver Hoxha's regime.

20061230

Smokescreened him out - Saddam 1-1 Slobodan - Red blogule to justice in 2006

Red blogule to justice in 2006. Slobodan Milosevic died unconvinced and Saddam Hussein unconvincingly. The former in the middle of a fair trial that took too long, the latter after the caricature of a trial that took too much away from the relevant issues.

At least historians will be able to browse through the unedited tapes of Solbo's show on ICTY TV (International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia). Less frustrating than the almost comical tragedy narrowcasted by Baghdad TV, not to mention the lousy tapes of Nicolae Ceaucescu's execution.

By the way : Romania is joining the European Union. Along with Bulgaria.

And oh : 2006 is about to be executed soon, too. Quite a serial killer of bad guys*, this one.

Happy new year folks.


* Let's not forget Augusto Pinochet, Pieter Wilhem Botha, Kenneth Lay, James Brown (who used to beat his wife - wives ?), Paik Nam-june (who used to short circuit our brainwaves), or Gerald Ford (for not publishing his critical views on war in Iraq beyond the ears of Bob "The Vault" Woodward). My ennemies could add both my grandmothers, also claimed by this nasty serial killer : DNA tests proved their responsibility for my birth.

20061223

Red blogule to Condi Rice - is war "worth the investment" ?

Each war has its purpose and the War in Iraq was sold as a war on terror. It proved to be a war in favor of it... and sold through bold lies.

Democracy ? Bush replaced a cruel dictatorship with an even more lethal chaos. Not to mention such collateral damages as the failure in Afghanistan, or the repeated insults to America's values.

I do hope democracy will prevail in Iraq but it will cost much more in time, money and lives than through the constructive ways of the international community, also crushed by this excuse for an Administration.

Let us consider the "investment" in American lives and dollars mentioned by USA's top "diplomat" (and not consider the losses in Iraqi lives, which Condoleeza Rice must consider yet another "wonderful opportunity") : "I don't think it's a matter of money - along the way there have been plenty of markers that show that this is a country that is worth the investment, because once it emerges as a country, that is a stabilizing factor you will have a very different kind of Middle East".

We'll have a very different kind of Middle East, all right. For a start, Iraq will not emerge as a country (as it used to do) but as several countries. Iran will emerge as the dominant player in the region, which could be considered "a stabilizing factor"... but for the nerves of some neocons / theocons.

Fundamentalism will emerge in Israel, Palestine and Turkey, new herds of terrorists will emerge in Jordan. As planned from the start, Christian fundamentalism will strengthen its base in the US and overseas.

I've been telling the same for years on these pages, Condi : this war in Iraq was definitely worth the investment for the fundamentalists who sold it to such a gullible audience.
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