While I am very skeptical of conspiracy theories, the fact is that occasionally, there are unexplained conspiracies. By definition, unexplained conspiracies (until they are explained) logically demand the utilization of (for lack of a better phrase) conspiracy theories as a tool of examination. There is no question that terrorism -- whether domestic or international -- always involves a conspiracy. In attempting to analyze unsettled and vexing stories, I try to avoid the following common pitfalls:

With that in mind, I want to briefly examine (and provide a roundup of stories on) topic which Glenn Reynolds called the "potential for cooperation between Arab terrorists and domestic extremists."

It touches on a very troubling story which has not gone away, and won't go away until it is thoroughly investigated: possible connections between Iraq and the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing. There are numerous conspiracy theories floating around, and some of them are simply nuts. But what I have noticed is that there are too many reports from ordinary, non-conspiracy-minded citizens. Too many to be ignored (even though the conventional wisdom seems to be to ignore them).

Like this one in the Ether Zone (which I seriously suggest reading in its entirety):

We, as American citizens, had a right to know that the Iraqi regime was directly implicated in a second terrorist act upon American soil, the first occurring two years prior at the Twin Towers, NYC (1993). With that pivotal knowledge, the American people could have geared up for the "war on terrorism" much sooner, and possibly even averted the 9/11 disaster. Clearly, the Justice Department, under the direct auspices of Bill Clinton and his lackeys Janet Reno and Eric Holder, chose to represent the Oklahoma City bombing as a solely domestic conspiracy, eschewing all indications of Iraqi involvement. It’s bad enough that Clinton patently ignored overseas terrorist assaults on American assets in the 1990’s (Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, our Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, USS Cole in Aden, Yemen, etc.). But to deep-six evidence of an Iraqi connection to the Oklahoma City bombing is no less than mind-boggling, totally egregious. Moreover, if the entire plot had been exposed, the American public would have pressured Bill Clinton to take appropriate military action against Iraq, whether he liked it or not. And I’m not talking about hitting another camel in the rear with an expensive cruise missile. There would have been calls for all-out war against Saddam Hussein’s regime. I really don’t think that was part of Bill Clinton’s agenda while in office. Remember, he had his eye on that Nobel Peace Prize for brokering an Israeli-Palestinian accord that never materialized.

There seems to be compelling evidence of an "Iraqi link" developed by several individuals including McVeigh defense attorney Stephen Jones, Larry Klayman of the Judicial Watch organization, and Oklahoma City attorney Mike Johnson. Apparently, neither Timothy McVeigh nor his accomplice Terry Nichols knew how to make a powerful bomb capable of bringing down the Murrah building. Nichols, who had been married to a Filipino, traveled on many occasions to the Philippines, a nation known to harbor elements of Islamic fanaticism. Based on the testimony of a variety of witnesses, it’s believed that Nichols allied himself with a group of Islamic militants located in Cebu City in the Philippines, where he was instructed in the art of bomb-making by Ramzi Youssef, an Iraqi agent. Nichols, in turn, passed on this know-how to his buddy and crime partner, Timothy McVeigh. Moreover, Ramzi Youssef is the same individual who was subsequently convicted of participation in the 1993 Twin Towers bombing. In the referenced Insight magazine piece, Stephen Jones stated, "We went to the Philippines four times to investigate Terry Nichols’ meetings with Ramzi Youssef and other known terrorists". And Jones believes that there is a "prima facie" case for Iraqi involvement in the terrorist assault upon the Murrah Building. There are also reports that McVeigh had Iraqi telephone numbers on his person when he was arrested.

Extensive information is presented in the federal lawsuit filed by Judicial Watch against the nation of Iraq on behalf of those victimized by the Oklahoma City attack (Judicial Watch website). According to the legal complaint, "Plaintiffs assert that the entire plot was, in whole or part, orchestrated, assisted technically and/or financially, and directly aided by agents of the Republic of Iraq". Noteworthy, the attacks upon both the Murrah Building and the Twin Towers (1993) involved the use of fertilizer bombs, reflecting the expertise of Ramzi Youssef. Judicial Watch also indicates that Interpol had linked Ramzi Youssef to the Oklahoma City bombing, as well.

Certainly, Timothy McVeigh was one of the guilty parties in a truly horrific episode in American history, of that I have no doubt. But the Oklahoma City bombing case should be thoroughly re-evaluated by the Bush Justice Department in light of the suppressed materials, and the emerging information under development.

Then there's Oklahoma City journalist Jayna Davis -- whose reporting had to be vindicated in court! (Getting sued is quite a deterrent for most journalists, no matter how interested they are in a story....) But hey, some of those stubborn Oklahoma journalists just won't stop digging!

And what did happen to Senator Arlen Specter's investigation? Does anyone know?

Of course, there are also articles denying the allegations in these reports: here's one by a member of McVeigh's "federal appellate team". Indymedia scoffs at any McVeigh Iraq connection too!

Then there's this intriguing comment by McVeigh himself:

Remember Dresden? How about Hanoi? Tripoli? Baghdad? What about the big ones -- Hiroshima and Nagasaki? (At these two locations, the U.S. killed at least 150,000 non-combatants -- mostly women and children -- in the blink of an eye. Thousands more took hours, days, weeks, or months to die.)

If Saddam is such a demon, and people are calling for war crimes charges and trials against him and his nation, why do we not hear the same cry for blood directed at those responsible for even greater amounts of "mass destruction" -- like those responsible and involved in dropping bombs on the cities mentioned above?

The truth is, the U.S. has set the standard when it comes to the stockpiling and use of weapons of mass destruction.

Hypocrisy when it comes to death of children? In Oklahoma City, it was family convenience that explained the presence of a day-care center placed between street level and the law enforcement agencies which occupied the upper floors of the building. Yet when discussion shifts to Iraq, any day-care center in a government building instantly becomes "a shield." Think about that.

(Actually, there is a difference here. The administration has admitted to knowledge of the presence of children in or near Iraqi government buildings, yet they still proceed with their plans to bomb -- saying that they cannot be held responsible if children die. There is no such proof, however, that knowledge of the presence of children existed in relation to the Oklahoma City bombing.)

When considering morality and mens rea [criminal intent] in light of these facts, I ask: Who are the true barbarians?

[NOTE: The above comes from a site which claims to have been regularly in touch with McVeigh. While McVeigh was a known Iraqi sympathizer, I have no way of verifying the authenticity of the above. Nor time.... Besides, I haven't had time to analyze the owl wars in my backyard!]

Had Timmy lived, he could now be writing for Indymedia -- or MoveOn.org!

Well why not? Besides, the McVeigh execution always seemed a bit hurried to me. (Allegations that his conviction was aided by false testimony emerged in May. Too late for a stay of execution now, eh?)

The most common reason given for hurrying the execution was "closure" -- said to be synonymous with the needs of McVeigh's victims. McVeigh's lawyer, Steven Jones, is someone I can't just ignore, and he simply, steadfastly, refuses to shut up:

The execution of Timothy McVeigh helped bring a feeling of closure to the family and friends of the 168 people killed in 1995 in the Oklahoma City bombing. But McVeigh's lawyer, Stephen Jones, cautions that if the government thinks it convicted the chief suspect in the Oklahoma City bombing, it got the wrong man.

"I believe Timothy McVeigh's role in the Oklahoma City bombing was a very minor one," Jones said. "A member of the conspiracy? Yes. The leader? No. The financier? No. The organizer? No. Timothy McVeigh saw his role as the cover for everybody else, to be the person to fall on the sword. It served deep-seated emotional needs that he had, and it furthered the role of the conspiracy."

Ever since the McVeigh trial, Jones has accused the federal government of a cover-up, and indeed, the government was found to have withheld 4,000 pages of evidence during the McVeigh trial.

UPDATE: Walter in Denver emailed to say that Jeralyn Merritt (the 'we' at TalkLeft) was part of McVeigh's defense team.

Fascinating stuff -- and very, very hard to ignore.

Will the BBC ever quit sexing up stories? I mean, it's one thing to report a death, but it just strikes me as degrading to get into gory, gooey details about exploding body gases and decomposition and stuff. But for the BBC, nothing is too personal. Will they never learn?

Whale explodes in Taiwanese city

A dead sperm whale has exploded while being delivered to a research centre near the southwestern city of Tainan.

Passers-by and cars were soaked in blood and body parts were sprayed over a road after the bursting of the whale, which was being carried on a trailer.

The whale had died earlier on a beach and had been collected so its remains could be used for educational purposes.

A marine biologist blamed the explosion on pressure from gases building up in the mammal as it began to decompose.

The whale attracted a lot of onlookers both before and after it exploded.

Several parked cars and pedestrians got covered in blood when it exploded.

Residents and shop owners wore masks while trying to clean up the spilt blood and entrails.

"What a stinking mess. This blood and other stuff that blew out on the road is disgusting, and the smell is really awful," said one resident.

Do we really need to see this?

I remember when only tabloids engaged in such cheap journalism. In the interests of decency and modesty, I refuse to fisk the BBC story.

Hat tip to Justin Case for pointing out this atrocity, which I would just as soon have missed. This blog does try to offer a classical perspective on the news, and occasionally I will analyze omens and portents the way a Roman soothsayer, an augur, or a haruspex might.

What about the entrails? Did they show "favourable indications"?

Lest you think I am kidding, it has been argued that the reading of entrails is at least as effective in determining truth as the modern polygraph!

Entrails reading was a very complex procedure for predicting important future outcomes (like battles), and no self-respecting Roman general made military decisions without consulting the entrails-reading augurs. Nor did other leaders in Roman society hesitate to refer to entrails reading as a way to predict the future. Similarly, in North America, the polygraph is all too readily referred to whether the truth concerns some specific act (like the identity of a killer or rapist) or even some much less clear-cut issue (like whether Clarence Thomas sexually harassed Anita Hill over a decade before the date of the Senate investigation).

Is the BBC now engaged in entrail reading as a search for truth? Or is this report a distraction?

As noted by the Romans, the British have a long history of entrail reading.

The Britons perished in the flames, which they themselves had kindled. The island fell, and a garrison was established to retain it in subjection. The religious groves, dedicated to superstition and barbarous rites, were leveled to the ground. In those recesses, the natives [stained] their altars with the blood of their prisoners, and in the entrails of men explored the will of the gods. While Suetonius was employed in making his arrangements to secure the island, he received intelligence that Britain had revolted, and that the whole province was up in arms.

Yeccchhh!

The story is not over!

At least one blogger has already shared his thoughts on this story, and points out that exploding whales are nothing new. He links to this actual whale explosion on video.

The best pictures I could find of the Taiwanese incident are here and here. (Via Metafilter.)

Here's a blogger who argues the exploding whale is proof that "those who fail to learn from history being destined to repeat it." Another commented that the whale had a huge penis.

OK, OK! So it's a sperm whale!

Now for the REAL thing....

Let's get serious.

Last night two owls -- a barn owl and a barred owl (I know them by their calls) -- were fighting quite loudly in my yard. I am deadly serious.

More work is needed.

Whether in ancient or modern times, few animals are as loaded with supernatural significance as the owl.

Details of how to interpret such omens are tough to come by; this discussion by Cicero and others is the best I could find. Nothing on owls fighting, although two owls would have to mean two omens. Both were at night and to my left, which is good.

The owl is associated with Minerva, goddess of wisdom.

Here's a more modern fix on owls:

The Owl has a dual symbolism of wisdom and darkness, the latter meaning evil and death. They are symbolically associated with clairvoyance, astral projection and magick, and is oftentimes the medicine of sorcerers and witches, you are drawn to magickal practices. Those who have owl medicine will find that these night birds will tend to collect around you, even in daytime, because they recognise a kinship with you.

The two main symbolic characteristics of the Owl, its wisdom and its nocturnal activity-- have made it represent perception. Considering perception in a spiritual context, Owl medicine is related to psychism, occult matters, instincts, and clairvoyance-- the true ability to see what is happening around you.

The owl can see that which others cannot, which is the essence of true wisdom. Where others are deceived, Owl sees and knows what is there.

Use your power of keen, silent observation to intuit some life situation, Owl is befriending you and aiding you in seeing the whole truth. The Owl also brings its messages in the night through dreams or meditation. Pay attention to the signals and omens. The truth always brings further enlightenment.

The Owl, symbol of the Goddess, represents perfect wisdom. Owls have the ability to see in the dark and fly noiselessly through the skies. They bring messages through dreams. The Owl is the bird of mystical wisdom and ancient knowledge of the powers of the moon. With wide-open, all-seeing eyes, Owl looks upon reality without distortion and acknowledges it, yet is aware that with ancient magickal and spiritual knowledge, he or she can make changes.

Try as I might, I can find nothing!

Anyone out there?

UPDATE: Lest anyone think that divining (or predicting the future based on animal behavior) died with the Romans, it was alive and well yesterday.

This is a special day at Classical Values. World Blogosphere Peace has finally been achieved!

PEACE IN OUR TIME!

Therefore today's online tests are offered in the spirit of Globalism, maybe even Universalism!

It's a relief that the Blog War is over and I can devote my efforts to World Peace, because this first test indicated that I might be a lover of war!

You Belong in Pearl Harbor. You are a strong person
who fights what you believe in. Although you
will ultimately win, your life may be full of
tragedy.


Which movie do you belong in? clh
brought to you by Quizilla

Via etonline.com.)

Phew! What a relief that war was averted!

Obviously, to achieve a lasting world peace, one must first rule the world. And from Dave Tepper I discovered how I am going to do that via a wonderful test -- "How Would YOU Take Over the World?"

PEACE THROUGH FIRE!

How Would YOU Take Over the World?

Hey, all I can say is "BURN BABY BURN!"

Thanks to bilious young fogey, I also have a clear picture of my strategy so far. The following countries are all mapped out as MINE:

create your own visited country map
or write about it on the open travel guide

As Churchill said when a group of angry temperance advocates protested that the amount of booze he consumed would fill most of the room, "So much to do; So little done."

NOTE: Readers not interested in globalism can also create their own map of the United States. Here's mine:

create your own visited states map
or write about it on the open travel guide

Via Sasha Volokh and Ghost of a flea -- whose maps do not match. And please note that in real life, the Flea is way ahead of most of us in terms of world domination. Check out his Hall of Power.

But what about the Universe?

Might science be able to help me?

According to an astrological test, I need to start by finding Pisces:

You should be dating Pisces.
19 February - 20 March
Your mate is loving and caring, trusting and
hospitable, and romantic. Though he/she can be
self-pitying, temperamental or dependent, the
fishes are quite romantic in bed.


What Zodiac Sign Are You Attracted To?
brought to you by Quizilla

(Via Empress)

But where is Pisces? According to this site, it's way up above some cactus somewhere. Now if I could just find that darned cactus I'd be all set to go out on a date!

Well, if that picture is accurate, Pisces looks pretty far away. Maybe I should get closer to the earth. This final test -- "Which Fairy are you?" -- says I am a "Moon Fairy"! That's not fair, really, because I just made fun of gay moonies in a comment to my last post, and I don't like Reverend Moon (who I think oughta be nuked!). But it's getting late so I guess I'm stuck with this silly result:

Moon Fairy
Please rate my quiz thanks for taking my quiz


Which Fairy are you?(for anyone many out comes)
brought to you by Quizilla

Via etonline.com.)

There are two views on how best to utilize the moon. But both sides agree: the moon is the key to world peace!

A recent post by my blogfather highlights an issue which, unfortunately, is not being addressed as it should by the so-called "gay movment":

...[I]n Germany, Islamists (you know, followers of the religion of peace) are attacking gays. And since it's "taboo" to ever say anything critical of Islam, the events go mostly unreported and discussed.

Well, why isn't the mainstream "gay movement" giving these things the attention they should?

Why is there so much silence about Islamic sodomy Laws and homosexuality?

Let's start by taking a look at the map of world sodomy laws.

In many Islamic countries (especially those under Shariah Law), the penalty for homosexuality is death. This should not surprise anyone who does the most minimal research into so-called "Islamic Law" -- especially as promulgated by "traditionalists." This, a translation from Ibn Taymiya, is typical:

The Companions of the prophet did not vary in opinion as to putting the sodomite to deathm, but they did differ about the form of death he was to suffer. It is related from Abu Bakr as-Siddiq, may Allah bless him, that he should be burned, others said that he should simply be put to death. Some others said that a wall should be caused to fall on him so that he might die under the falling stones. Others said that both the active and the passive sodomites should be shut up in the most rotten place until they died. Some said that he should be lifted to the highest wall in the neighbourhood and then thrown down and stones thrown at him, as Allah did to the people of Lot. This is one (saying) related by Ibn 'Abbas. Another, related also by him, is that the sodomite is to be stoned. This latter view is agreed upon by most of the early jurists from the pure analogy of the stoning of the people of Lot (with stones from Heaven).

Jeff linked to this German story, which gives the following reason for the official silence about anti-gay attacks by Muslims:

the nearness of Islam to violence and oppression against minorities remains a taboo topic in Germany.

What is surprising is that American gay rights leaders downplay Islam's uniquely pathological, genocidal hatred towards homosexuals.

Here's Michelangelo Signorile, who, right after admitting that homosexuals are routinely put to death by Islamic governments, compares their struggle to that of gay Christians in the United States:

Like gay and lesbian Christians in this country who are embroiled in their own war with the religious right, Sulayman X and other gay Muslims maintain that Islam is being misused. “Islam is an elegant, simple religion that values humankind and places much emphasis on the here and now—creating just societies,” he says. “Islam has been hijacked by extremists, and when you read about Muslims in the newspaper, invariably it’s about Muslims who are killing people or resorting to violence to get what they want. But that’s not Islam. That’s people using Islam as a political tool to achieve political ends.”

Is it really fair to compare the fate of being stoned or burned to death, or being crushed by walls, to the struggle over things like gay marriage?

Another group of gay activists against Israel compares the murderous Palestinian Authority to the City of San Francisco:

Palestine is by no means unique in being a place where gay people are threatened, abused or tortured by the police. It happens in every western society, including in San Francisco. Palestinian queers are also not alone in being in danger in the small conservative towns and villages where their families live, or in being threatened with violence from their own families.

The group selected Starbucks for the location of their first settlement in Berkeley because Starbucks founder and CEO, Howard Shultz, is a major supporter of the Israeli state and the corporation has become the prime target of an international boycott of corporations with ties to Israel (http://www.inminds.co.uk/boycott-israel.html). “Since Mr. Shultz clearly believes it is okay for one group of people to grab land belonging to another and say they have a right to it, we figure he won’t mind if we take some of his,” a QUIT leaflet explains.

Workers in the café were surprisingly unruffled as the Queer Defense Forces entered the café and announced over a loudspeaker that the land had been confiscated by the Queer National Fund and curfew for straights would begin in five minutes.

Several “patrons” were forcibly ejected from the café by means of SuperSoakers (which were especially popular with a three-year-old settler). Many coffee drinkers quickly cleared out, but one group of chess players steadfastly ignored the group, who vow to set up more settlements in the coming months.

fights for the rights of those who want to execute lesbians and gays by stoning.

According to Halevi, one young man discovered to be gay was forced by Palestinian Authority police "to stand in sewage water up to his neck, his head covered by a sack filled with feces, and then he was thrown into a dark cell infested with insects." During one interrogation Palestinian police stripped him and forced him to sit on a Coke bottle.

When he was released he fled to Israel. If he were forced to return to Gaza, he said, "The police would kill me."

An American who foolishly moved into the West Bank to live with his Palestinian lover said they told everyone they were just friends, but one day they "found a letter under our door from the Islamic court. It listed the five forms of death prescribed by Islam for homosexuality, including stoning and burning. We fled to Israel that same day," he said.

The head of a Tel Aviv gay organization told Halevi, "The persecution of gays in the Palestinian Authority doesn't just come from the families or the Islamic groups, but from the P.A. itself."

Palestinian police have increasingly enforced Islamic religion law, he said: "It's now impossible to be an open gay in the P.A." He recalled that one gay man in the Palestinian police went to Israel for a short time. When he returned to the West Bank, Palestinian Authority police confined him to a pit without food or water until he died.

A 17-year-old gay youth recalled that he spent months in a Palestinian Authority prison "where interrogators cut him with glass and poured toilet cleaner into his wounds."

Why the silence by gay activists? Is there a lesson to be learned from the fate of openly gay Pim Fortuyn?

Just as musical silences can be as eloquent as any note struck, political silences can speak volumes. The silence of America's national gay organizations after the assassination of gay Dutch politician Pim Fortuyn is revealing. Let me summarize it this way: If you are gay and perceived to be on the political right, do not send to know for whom the bell tolls. It does not toll for thee.

Fortuyn, an outspoken defender of the rights of gays and women against intolerant Muslims who enjoy his country's public benefits while attacking its values, was widely and falsely characterized by news reports as a racist, right-wing extremist -- despite the racial diversity in his own party. Responding to media distortions is normally the stock in trade of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation, yet in this prominent case GLAAD has had nothing to say.

The Human Rights Campaign has been quick to issue press releases and organize vigils when it connected the killings of gay people to a climate of hate. Yet now, when an openly gay candidate is murdered after being demonized by establishment politicians and journalists, HRC is silent. And the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, which considered the Persian Gulf War a vital gay issue, sees no relevance when a man who stood a good chance of becoming the world's first openly gay head of government is savagely cut down.

Whatever happened to the slogan "SILENCE = DEATH"?

At least I can trust that gay gun nuts like my blogfather will refuse to live under this deadly veil of silence.

Lastly, I have an idea. An old idea, really. But I think it's right for the times. I don't want the Islamic bigots and their supporters to imagine that the Pink Triangle can ever be used the way the Nazis used it.

So I offer a modest revision.

Thanks Jeff! (Sorry for the poor quality; I wish I knew how to use PhotoShop!)

UPDATE: A talented PhotoShopper just came to my rescue! Sol at Solomonia sent me this note along with a gif:

Was a bit bored so I made you a graphic. I'm not that great with Photoshop, either, but I thought what the hell. One's a .gif with a transparent background, the other is a .jpg. The AK says terrorist to me, so I did more of a "good guy" weapon. ;)

Wish I could do that! Thank you Sol! As to the "good guy" issue, well, even though many of the good guys traded their Colts for Kalashnikovs, what I think would really be a "good guy" weapon would be the Galil!)

Readers should check out Sol's blog; one of the most fascinating things I have ever seen is there right now: a very realistic baby dragon in formaldehyde.

Here's what the poor thing must have looked like when it was alive:

MORE: Sol just outdid himself by supplying a Galil!

I declare Sol the winner of this contest! And CHECK OUT SOL'S LINK!

Wow!

UPDATE: Wow is right! My sincerest thanks to Roger L. Simon for kindly linking to this post, and adding his own invaluable insight:

...[W]e are engaged in a War on Islamofascism (or Islamism--call it what you will). The real question is--is this war (honestly named) worth fighting? To believe that, which I do, you have to believe that we are engaged on some level in a War of Civilizations against a dangerous ideology. Scheie's post, which is about the violent discrimination against gays under Sharia where homosexuality is punishable by death, speaks directly to this question. A vast proportion of the Islamic world does not share our view of basic human rights (women's equality, separation of church and state, etc.) and, to make matters worse, does not wish to coexist with us on this subject. I think these rights are worth fighting to preserve and, yes, to extend.

Thank you Roger!

Didn't Howard Dean perform a remarkable imitation of the classic Confederate "rebel yell"? That last link (a blog called "Rebel Yell") links to an intriguing musical rendition of Dean's "Rebel Yell" by Lileks. Here's another blogger (from Vermont), who spoke of "Southern disComfort."

But to be fair, Joshua Micah Marshall gave Ashcroft credit for the term a few years ago.

Beats me; I am only trying to be fair. And balanced.

Many bloggers (as well as innumerable commenters) have called Dean's "Eaaggh" the Rebel Yell. I can't possibly list them all, but I tend to agree with a sentiment repeated in that last blog:

As Dave Winer said to me earlier today on the phone, the media is trying to "delete" the Dean campaign.

Much as I personally enjoyed the Rebel Yell fun, I think Dean got a bum rap -- and there was a good explanation (called "worth reading" by Glenn Reynolds) for the yell itself.

The contrarian in me (as well as the lover of lost causes) likes Howard Dean more and more. I particularly hated that sleazy New York Times smear against his wife. While not much of a Howard Dean supporter, I know a hit piece when I see it. And the Times article was a classic hit piece. Author Judi Wilgoren, by the way, is a past expert at hit pieces.... They had the bad camera angle, the nasty personal innuendo, and they made Dr. Steinberg (about whom I've heard nothing but good things) appear glum and aloof, if not weird. (You have to pay for the article now, unfortunately.)

What was she supposed to do? Abandon her practice and go to Iowa to smile at the cameras?

That the attack comes from the left made it far more hypocritical. I mean, I could have imagined certain Republicans complaining that Dr. Steinberg is not living up to someone's idea of a "role model," but this?

I doubt Abraham Lincoln could be elected president today -- not if they decided to smear his wife. On top of that, there was also the cleverly timed, phony domestic abuse report about one of Dean's state troopers. Why, they even used Watergate language to sex up the piece -- "What Did He Know About Abuse Allegations; When Did He Know It?" (Via Andrew Sullivan.) Couldn't they have used "Troopergate"? Or was that taken? And why did so many pundits keep making the Freudian slip (well, it is a form of sexual innuendo) of calling him John Dean? (Now there's a real smear for you!)

This whole thing has been a lesson in the fickleness of voters. It shows how easily manipulated people can be.

That's democracy, sometimes.

I think I'm gonna crash..... But before I do, here is something that I can identify with as a Californian "stuck" on the East Coast. (It's worth streaming, most fun when opened in a new window to see it all.... and reminds me of close calls around here, and my frustration when cars fail to behave in a logical manner because of frozen water.)

The streaming link was sent to me in an email along with a caption titled "Union Civil Engineers should never impersonate mechanical engineers..."

Well, so much for the North, and for Union Civil Engineers. But what about impersonating Confederate Civil Engineers?

I think some of them may be on thin ice down there....

I'll thaw, chill out, and take a "break" while I read up on the latest Carnival of the Vanities.

And anyone who wants to hear an actual rebel yell (recorded in 1935 by a 90 year old Confederate vet) can stream it at this link.

Time for a change in pace! Besides, I have been steeped in online research, so I might as well share the results. Hope I don't bore my regular readers (nor any of the valued newcomers), because after all, this is not a veterinary blog!

Last week, my dog Puff (the 14 year old pit bull) had what seemed to be two strokes. One day, he was out in the yard, and suddenly dropped on his side and went into convulsions, kicking and shaking, then lying still in the snow. I ran out and he was limp, glassy-eyed, but breathing. I honestly thought he was in the throes of dying, but I wouldn't allow him to lie there in the snow, so I picked him up to carry him in. The lifting and walking seemed to awaken his equilibrium, and suddenly he stopped being limp, focused his eyes, and came to. I bundled him in a blanket, and after a couple of hours, it was as if nothing had happened. But then a couple of days later, he was just sitting on his favorite chair, and without warning had another seizure. Same deal; I thought he was going to die, then he came out of it.

Naturally, I took him to the vet on Monday. The vet said he had something in his lungs, and had me listen to the the rales in his chest. Blood tests revealed low platelets, and mild anemia.

The pattern is consistent with lung cancer, and a veterinary internist advised my vet that X-rays would probably reveal growths.

I felt sick. But I decided to put off "dealing with it" until I absolutely knew that there was something to deal with.

Well, the X-rays were inconclusive, revealing no obvious growths. The films have been forwarded to a consulting radiologist. Meanwhile, Puff was started on Amoxicillin, and now, on his second day, I have noticed improvement in his health. Less coughing, more relaxed sleep.

Today I was told that Puff's titer for Lyme Disease is elevated. Yet his symptoms are not a match for Lyme Disease (which he has had before).

"There are a million things it could be," my vet stated.

Intrigued by all of this, I decided to use the Internet, and discovered a disease which is a match-up for Puff's three symptoms (and more): low platelets, neurological symptoms, and cough.

It's called Ehrlichiosis. While symptoms vary, according to this site,

A decrease in the number of platelets (platelets help the blood clot) in the blood is the most common laboratory finding in all phases of the disease.

I know you're just dying to read more geeky stuff about Ehrlichiosis! So, here's an excellent description of its pathogenesis:

Pathogenesis of Ehrlichiosis

The pathogenesis of infection with E. canis is the most extensively studied; therefore this discussion will focus on this particular species.

Infection occurs through salivary secretions of the tick at the attachment site during ingestion of a blood meal or through blood transfusions. If the adult Rhipicephalus sanguineus engorges on the dog during the acute stage, it can transmit the disease to other dogs for at least 155 days following detachment.1 Transmission by Rhipicephalus sanguineus is transstadial: the tick acquires the bacteria by feeding on an infected dog in either the larvae or nymph form and the tick transmits the disease to another dog as either the nymph or adult form. The life cycle of Ehrlichia is not yet completely understood but it is thought that it occurs in three intracellular forms. The initial bodies are small spherical structures (1-2 micrometers in diameter) which are believed to develop into larger multiple membrane-bound units known as morulae. The morulae are inclusions within the cytoplasm of the leukocyte as seen in Figure 1. This morula is thought to then dissociate into small granules called elementary bodies.

Figure 1 (click here to see). Ehrlichia canis seen in a membrane-bound inclusions (morulae) within the cytoplasm of a monocyte (buffy coat smear, Wright stain).

After an incubation period of 8-20 days, the acute phase of infection occurs which lasts 2-4 weeks. At this time, the organism multiplies within circulating mononuclear cells and the mononuclear phagocytes within the liver, spleen, and lymph nodes. The infected cells are then transported in circulation to the rest of the body, with a predilection for the the lungs, kidneys and meninges. Cells infected with ehrlichia adhere to the vascular endothelium and induce a vasculitis and subendothelial tissue infection. This subsequently leads to platelet consumption, sequestration, and destruction that results in the thrombocytopenia seen during this acute phase. Variable leukocyte counts and anemia may also develop progressively during this stage.1 After 6-9 weeks, dogs will either eliminate the parasite (if immunocompetent) or develop a parasitemia in which clinical signs absent to mild to severe. This stage is also characterized by variable persistence of thrombocytopenia, leukopenia, and anemia. Dogs that cannot mount an effective immune response will become chronically infected.1

Because of its origin in military dogs in Vietnam, it has also been called "tracker dog disease" and "tropical canine pancytopenia.

Puff felt good enough today to charge out in the snow in search of his "Kong" toy, which he had to dig from the vast pile of snowflakes in which it landed.

In light of some of the comments to my post on the Iraq/al Qaida connection, I guess I should provide actual evidence supporting my claim that Puff has improved.

So here's proof for all doubting Thomases -- two photos taken within the last half hour!

Has the country evolved to the point where there is seething mutual contempt between party activists (said to be the "base" of each major party) and the great, soft-"l"-libertarian majority?

While it may be premature to say this, it now appears that Democratic party activists are driving their party into a hopeless "Iraq = Vietnam" quagmire. Ironically, this was a major objection to the Dean candidacy.

Republican activists, on the other hand, strike me as hell bent on ignoring Arnold Schwarzenegger's victory -- because they fear what it represents. They are spearheading a sour-grapes, show-of-strength, movement to unseat Arlen Specter, which, if it is successful, will replace a Republican with a Democrat. They would rather have Democrats win than sacrifice their "principles." They do not want Bush reelected. Some of them are now actively promoting an insurgency movement which states that explicitly:

A conservative activist who has worked to help the Bush-Cheney campaign but asked not to be identified said many people with whom he talks are beginning to justify in their minds a one-term Bush presidency.

"As long as Republicans and conservatives keep the Congress, we can lose the White House," the activist said. "Let Karl Rove put that in his pipe and smoke it, because we can use the Congress to block a Democratic president's judges and initiatives." (Via Parapundit)

"Needlessly provocative!" said Justin Case, when I ran this latest news past him. "Stinks of ideological purity!" (Sorry, Justin, but I had to insert the exclamation points, for effect!)

Is Mikhail Suslov their spiritual advisor? (Whoops, I take that back; Suslov was godless!)

Speaking of ideological purity, one of the big, respectable bloggers has delivered the following threat:

If you link to "Wonkette" through your blogroll you cannot and will not enjoy, for what that might be worth, a link from The Rittenhouse Review. (Via Glenn Reynolds.)

Sorry, but that's too much for me. I am often slower than I should be, which is one of my problems. I write long-winded essays, and it takes me time to catch up on doing things like placing links to deserving blogs. I just discovered (and linked to) Wonkette the other day, but I hadn't thought to add her to my blogroll. Just too busy, I guess. But if there's one thing I understand, it's a threat. Intimidation is something I saw for years -- before, during, and after my squalid little career as a low level political appointee, and I don't like it. I consider it unworthy of the Blogosphere, so I am linking to Wonkette right now!

Hear me Rittenhouse Review! Wonkette is good! An excellent, amusing, refreshingly new blogger.

As to what she said about Media Whores Online, well, I couldn't help but notice that they link to Ted Rall.

I'll take an honest whore over Ted Rall any day.

And I will strive to keep this blog as ideologically impure as practically possible.

UPDATE: Larry Purpuro's characterization of bloggers as "armchair analysts in their bathrobes (with) no serious interest in leaving their living rooms to actually help with the campaigns" (via Glenn Reynolds) reminds me of the obnoxious smear of "chickenhawk" popular in the last year. Another ad hominem attack; logically, whether someone helps in a campaign has nothing to do with the truth of what he says. (And to the extent that it might, the effect of working for a campaign would be detrimental to the blogger's credibility -- even more than would his wearing of bathroom attire. And besides, not all bloggers wear bathrobes!)

The assumptions made by Mr. Purpuro are remarkable. In my short life as a blogger, I've seen bloggers criticized and condemned for many things, but their alleged failure to help with campaigns takes the cake. Start with the most common complaint -- that bloggers aren't "real" journalists. Would Mr. Purpuro slam real journalists for failing to help with campaigns? I suspect that if any of them did so, Mr. Purpuro would claim that they had lost "journalistic objectivity." Certainly, one could launch a similar attack on any blogger who worked for a campaign.

Is blogging a damned-if-you-do, damned-if-you-don't deal?

Supposedly discredited reports about the connections between Al Qaida and Saddam Hussein just won't die.

Last month, Glenn Reynolds linked to (while taking care to express healthy caution about) a Telegraph story about a possible Abu Nidal connection to Al Qaida, and I added my two cents worth. Shortly thereafter, Glenn Reynolds reported Michael Isikoff's claim that the story was based on a forgery. As a blogger without access to Isikoff's inside sources, I figured that the big guys like Isikoff knew more than I did.

But now there's more -- "on the growing dossier of evidence linking the Iraqi dictator to the 9/11 attacks."

Though the Bush administration has strenuously looked the other way on one blockbuster development after another, the 9/11 file on Baghdad has grown to include:

A memo from Iraqi intelligence uncovered by the London Sunday Telegraph last month stating that lead 9/11 hijacker Mohamed Atta had completed his training regimen in Baghdad under the tutelage of notorious Palestinian terrorist Abu Nidal. The memo was dated just two months before the World Trade Center attacks.

In one passage, the Iraqi intelligence chief reportedly informs Saddam that Atta had demonstrated his capability as leader of the team "responsible for attacking the targets that we have agreed to destroy."

A Defense Department memo detailing over 50 contacts between senior officials in Iraq and Osama bin Laden's minions going back to the 1980s. According to a November 2003 report in the Weekly Standard, the memo cites evidence that Ahmed al Ani, the Iraqi intelligence chief in Czechoslovakia, "ordered the [Iraqi Intelligence Service] finance officer to issue [Mohamed] Atta funds from IIS financial holdings in the Prague office."

A Wall Street Journal report linking Flight 93 hijacker Ziad Jarrah to Abu Nidal, who had reportedly helped train his 9/11 partner Mohamed Atta. "A constant figure in Jarrah's life in Germany was his great-uncle, Assem Omar Jarrah," the Journal said. "According to the German magazine, Der Spiegel, Assem Jarrah worked for a long time as an informer for the Stasi, the East German secret service, while maintaining connections to [Abu] Nidal's terror group."

Eleven months after the 9/11 attacks, Nidal was executed in Baghdad by Saddam's secret police in what many believe was an attempted cover-up of Iraq's 9/11 complicity.

A Nov. 11, 2001, report in the London Observer citing the accounts of two Iraqi defectors who say they helped train radical Islamists to overcome U.S. flight crews using only small knives - a technique never used before 9/11 - at Iraq's Salman Pak terrorist training facility.

Sabah Khodada, one of the defectors, told PBS's "Frontline" that he believed the 9/11 attacks had been executed "by graduates of Salman Pak."

While the defectors' accounts were widely reported at the time, the media later dropped the story as the Bush administration built its WMD case against Iraq.

U.S. satellite photos confirming the existence of a Boeing 707 fuselage that Khodada and his partner say was used as a hijacking classroom. U.N. weapons inspector Charles Duelfer, who was tapped on Friday to succeed David Kay, corroborated their account.

"We reported [the Salman Pak hijacking drills] at the time, but they've obviously taken on new significance" after the 9/11 attacks, Duelfer told USA Today at the time.

A May 7, 2003, decision by Manhattan U.S. District Judge Harold Baer, who awarded $104 million to two families of 9/11 victims based on the testimony of Khodada, Duelfer and former CIA Director James Woolsey, as well as other evidence presented to his court.

In his opinion Judge Baer wrote that the case was "sufficient to meet plaintiffs' burden that Iraq collaborated in or supported bin Laden/al Qaeda's terrorist acts of September 11."

The account of former CIA Director Woolsey, whose testimony was summarized by Judge Baer thusly:

"Director Woolsey described the existence of a highly secure military facility in Iraq where non-Iraqi fundamentalists [e.g., Egyptians and Saudis] are trained in airplane hijacking and other forms of terrorism. Through satellite imagery and the testimony of three Iraqi defectors, plaintiffs demonstrated the existence of this facility, called Salman Pak, which has an airplane but no runway."

Judge Baer continued: "The defectors also stated that these fundamentalists were taught methods of hijacking using utensils or short knives. Plaintiffs contend it is farfetched to believe that Iraqi agents trained fundamentalists in a top-secret facility for any purpose other than to promote terrorism."

The failure to turn up Saddam's weapons of mass destruction is being called a stunning intelligence failure. But the far more startling intelligence blunder may turn out to be the Bush administration's decision not to spotlight reams of compelling evidence tying Iraq to 9/11.

(Hat tip to the G. Gordon Liddy Show for disclosing the above link.)

Obviously, I cannot state that I know there was a connection. But when I see this stuff being ignored by the major media, I refuse to remain silent.

If it turns out there's a big media or government coverup going on, I would not be surprised.

It wouldn't be the first time.

UPDATE: My thanks to Glenn Reynolds for linking to this post!

Newcomers, thank you for coming, and I hope you enjoy the blog.

A commenter below has just pointed out Stephen F. Hayes' detailed report -- "Case Closed: The U.S. government's secret memo detailing cooperation between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden" -- in the Weekly Standard. Hayes concludes:

[T]here can no longer be any serious argument about whether Saddam Hussein's Iraq worked with Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda to plot against Americans.

The case is "closed"? Is that why there's such a deafening silence in the major media?

I know this will sound stupid, but at the risk of that (and at the risk of being repetitive) I am going to say it anyway: Wesley Clark is a better candidate than John Kerry.

The theme -- of an anti-war warrior -- makes Clark and Kerry roughly the equivalent of each other. But let's look at which man carries more baggage.

Kerry, an antiwar leftist of the Vietnam school, is a Vietnam veteran with an exemplary combat record. But that seems to be his only song. Vietnam is old already, and by the time the election runs around, the Iraq-is-another-Vietnam harangue will be pretty tired, and pretty hollow. (It may be already.)

Clark has committed some of stupidest gaffes in the race, and as I stated before he may already be finished. What this proves is he is not a slick politician, and that he needs better handlers. But his anti-war message is much more up-to-date than Kerry's. He should not have belittled Kerry's war record as he did, but that should not obscure a simple fact: the masses of voters would have far more respect for a four star general than a lieutenant on military matters. And if this election is going to be about the war in Iraq (itself a possibly mistaken strategy), then I think that the common sense of the voters would consider more carefully -- and take more seriously in the heart -- an antiwar message from a general than from a lieutenant.

This may sound unfair, but I am afraid it is reality.

The flaws of either man may be argued to death, and it may well be that neither can beat Bush. But I think Clark would have a better chance. Once the dust settles, if the theme is along the lines of "I'm a military man and I'm against the war!" Clark's rank will count for more with the voters.

I think it boils down to simple math.

Attacks on Clark for alleged "war crimes", while they may help Kerry now, only illustrate the shortsightedness of the Kerry strategy.

I hate to sound overly Machiavellian (or overly Roman) and I don't wish to be seen as a Clark supporter, because I am not. But the stuff I pointed out before (Kerry's vintage anti-war activism) is, in 2004, a losing strategy.

Clark is of course the hand-picked candidate of Bill Clinton or his wife, which is seen as a liability.

Should it be? Is it thinking the unthinkable to ask whether Bill and Hill might be a little better at thinking ahead?

I previously said,

My money is still on Clark, because the anti-war general theme still seems like the best triangulation strategy.

I know I've already lost my "money."

(The election, however, is not mine to lose!)

UPDATE: It's official now! Clark is history. (Via Glenn Reynolds.) Now it's time for me to make good on my bet, I guess....

It's the end of a slow day in which I posted nothing because I was gone all day. So, rather than have a topic, it struck me that I might just ramble on about nothing in particular (a "safe" thing to do on a Sunday evening when people do not read blogs).

Well, as I thought it over, I remembered some old business. I started a post a while back about one of the pressingly delicious issues of the day: Is it OK to kill and eat someone simply because you and the victim both agree?

Cannibalism and murder by mutual consent?

As the recent German cannibal case makes its way through the courts, some have opined that there is no difference between cannibalism, homosexuality and murder, and that when one is allowed, all are implicitly condoned (on some theory of "act according to your desires") -- and hence Western Civilization is doomed.

Sasha Volokh links to this interesting challenge from Theodore Dalrymple:

The case is a reductio ad absurdum of the philosophy according to which individual desire is the only thing that counts in deciding what is permissible in society. Brandes wanted to be killed and eaten; Meiwes wanted to kill and eat. Thanks to one of the wonders of modern technology, the Internet, they both could avoid that most debilitating of all human conditions, frustrated desire. What is wrong with that? Please answer from first principles only.

So this is not intended for him to read.

But I will try to address his central premise (that homosexuality is cannibalism is murder is the end of the Western world....)

Yeah -- and a rat is a pig is a dog is a boy!

Since when has absolutism become equivalency? If homosexuality is not immoral, how does that make murder not immoral? And, from where comes the idea that the only argument in favor of homosexuality is based on individual desire?

From where comes the argument that the prohibition of homosexuality is the glue that holds together all other prohibitions? That if homosexuality is tolerated, that it becomes OK to murder, rob or rape people? No one has yet been able to explain it to me. It simply defies logic, yet I hear it over and over.

If we assume for the sake of argument that homosexuality is immoral, how does that make it as immoral as murder? If it does not, then how does legalizing homosexuality render murder acceptable any more than lowering of criminal penalties would?

Might the argument depend on "sodomy" once having been considered a malum in se crime? The distinction between malum in se and malum prohibitum is often invoked to distinguish between crimes which harm others and what are known as "victimless crimes." Consensual sex between adults being inherently without a victim, the modern view is that laws against it would be malum prohibitum only. But in the old days, "sodomy" was considered inherently malum in se. (Some would argue that it still is.)

I don't think that settles the question, though, because a variety of things are considered immoral, yet few would seriously maintain that they should be illegal. Lying, adultery, breaking the Sabbath, even coveting are a few examples.

Certainly, there are plenty of other things generally considered to be immoral (cannibalism being one example), but does it necessarily follow from that that all who taste human flesh must be imprisoned?

From where do people get the idea that whether something is immoral (or just bad for you) must determine whether it is illegal? Plenty of things are bad or immoral, but we don't put people in jail for them. Often left out of the abortion argument (by both sides) is the stubborn possibility that abortion might just be one of those inherently immoral things which society elects not to punish criminally. In any event, the legality of abortion is no argument for its morality, and more than the legalization of heroin (which I support) would render taking that drug a good thing to do.

Might the fundamental disagreement be over whether morality should be internal, or imposed from above? Dalrymple cites Edmund Burke with approval for the latter proposition:

"Men are qualified for freedom in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains upon their own appetites. Society cannot exist unless a controlling power upon will and appetite be placed somewhere, and the less of it there is within, the more there is without. It is ordained in the eternal constitution of things that men of intemperate minds cannot be free."

Naturally, Dalrymple (and, doubtless, other fans of Burke) frame the cannibal-and-murder case as a reductio ad absurdum indictment of mutual consent. I don't think it is that simple. While I can understand that consent might apply to cannibalism alone, murder is entirely different. In my view, consent cannot be allowed to a murder charge, for a very good public policy reason: the victim is dead! If a defense of consent were allowed, then almost any murderer could swear that the victim asked to be killed -- and then the burden would be on the prosecution to prove a negative. John Wayne Gacy could have argued that his "victims" came to his house willingly, and asked to be tied up and strangled to death, as the best sexual high they could ever have experienced in their sordid lives as male prostitutes.

No way. It is not in society's interest to allow a defense of consent to a murder charge. Doubtless, Mr. Dalrymple would dismiss this argument as "utilitarian" or "pragmatic" -- but much of the law is precisely that. So, I have no problem with charging and convicting the German cannibal of murder.

As to cannibalism, it gets more complicated. Personally, I find cannibalism morally abhorrent, but I could envision limited situations where the government might not have any legitimate business enforcing criminal sanctions against it. Drinking placental soup under a doctor's orders would technically constitute cannibalism, and I doubt anyone would maintain that people should be imprisoned for it.

How about a "cannibal club" which you could join, and agree to donate your body to the club -- to be eaten by the other members after your natural death? This might be immoral, but how does it benefit society to make it illegal? No harm is done to anyone, save the moral calluses which might result from partaking in human flesh.

Furthermore, while I am no Biblical scholar, try as I might I am unable to come up with any condemnation of cannibalism in either the Old or New Testaments. However, some have argued that the Bible condones cannibalism. (Can anyone help me?)

I have long been puzzled by the fact that moralists -- while often quick to condemn homosexuals for "harming" themselves (even though this is by no means associated with homosexuality per se) -- refuse to condemn mutual combat between two males. This despite the fact that boxing causes serious injuries, brain damage and occasional death. It is not harmless.

Boxing, a recently revived sport of ancient Greece and Rome, was illegal for thirteen centuries -- as well as in the United States until the early 20th Century. It is still illegal in some countries, such as Sweden. In England there is a serious movement to make it illegal.

Why no outcry from the American moralists about boxing being "a slippery moral slope"?

Beats me! (Although I guess if there ever is such an outcry, I'll have to defend boxing as another "Classical Value".)

What about bodily mutilation (now called "body modification")? Increasingly, people enjoy doing things like punching large holes through various bodily parts, even through cartilage, and amputation is not unheard of. This sounds decadent to most of us, although circumcision is still quite common.

There is an interesting libertarian-type discussion of body modification here, and at this site, there is extensive discussion of the arrest of a well-known body mod artist on charges of violating new laws against female circumcision. Here is a site dedicated to eradicating the practice, while here, incredibly, is a web site for eunuchs!

(I should warn you that some of those web sites contain some pretty gruesome, pretty disgusting stuff.)

I haven't heard of any movement to prohibit cutting of body parts or castration, and the prohibition on female genital mutilation appears to be directed against parents who do that to their girls. Male circumcision remains legal, and as to laws pertaining to castration, I think all the authorities have are laws against practicing medicine without a license. Last April, a Detroit man was sentenced to four years in prison for performing unlicensed castrations on his kitchen table.

Here's one site offering castration services for parents.

Hey folks, even some of the Romans worried about cutting off parts of the sexual anatomy. Hadrian's attempts to prohibit castration (interpreted by authorities to prohibit Jewish circumcision) started a war over this stuff -- echoes of which resonate to this day.

And what about circumcision? While mechanically similar to modern "body modification", it was originally intended to uphold the same Biblical morality that Dalrymple wants to uphold. Dalrymple even condemns tattooing (and would probably prohibit body modification), yet I can find no condemnation by him of male circumcision.

In view of the decline in circumcision rates coupled with the apparent decline in standards of sexual "morality", couldn't Dalrymple and others argue that there is a statistical correlation between the decline in male circumcision and the decline of public morality?

Did people in the old days know something?

Let's see....

How would the argument go?

1. Masturbation causes homosexuality.

2. Masturbation can be prevented through circumcision.

3. As circumcision decreased, homosexuality and immorality increased!

Right?

Wrong, actually.

It may sound counterintuitive, but according to this study, circumcision was associated with a higher incidence of masturbation, a higher incidence of oral sex, and even a higher incidence of homosexuality! (Of course, these statistical associations can be seen as running afoul of the post hoc ergo propter hoc fallacy. One would have to isolate other factors, such as income, race, culture, etc.)

Obviously, analyzing this stuff could also get very Freudian. (Freud believed that circumcision was "the symbolic substitute of castration" -- and a feminizing influence on a boy.) Bear in mind that it was Freud (not Kinsey) who said,

The only unnatural sexual behavior is none at all.

I haven't finished digesting my Sunday night indigestibles, but I can't wait to read Freud's last book, Moses and Monotheism -- which touches on circumcision, and much more. Written at the end of his life, when the Nazis were closing in on him in Vienna, he grapples with Jewish history. A very controversial book, it has been interpreted as saying things like this:

The catastrophe which befell on the feminine object of lust reinforced at the collective level the homosexual libido of the Jewish people, as a child who loses his mother redirects his libido towards the father.

Jewish monotheism may be interpreted, at this level, as the strengthening of homosexual libido after the loss of the heterosexual object.

And what about the relationship between magic and "cruel military cultures"?:

What Freud admires most about the effect of the Mosaic faith upon Jews is how it “formed their character for good through the disdaining of magic and mysticism by encouraging them to progress in spirituality and sublimations.” [ii] Why? It “signified subordinating sense perception to an abstract idea; it was a triumph of spirituality over the senses; more precisely an instinctual renunciation accompanied by its psychologically necessary consequences.” [iii] The “athletic virtues,” Freud says, are associated historically with cruel, military cultures. I agree that intellectual regulation of socially developed instincts forms one dimension of ethics. But Freud’s syncretic urge hesitates just when it might have drawn more sustenance from practices endorsed by generous, nonmilitary, nontheistic pagans such as Epicurus and Lucretius. Freud’s depreciation of paganism may have encouraged him, first, to invest too much therapeutic efficacy in the talking cure (even though lying on the couch is a corporeal tactic), second, to draw the line of distinction between therapy and ethico-political life at the wrong place, and, third, to depreciate the profound significance of multimedia arts to political and ethical life.

As usual, I have settled nothing, raised more questions than I've answered, and reviewed a book I haven't even read.

(But nobody reads these Sunday evening posts....)

ADDITIONAL TIDBITS: Andrew Ian Dodge seems about as impressed with Dalrymple's arguments as I am.

And, speaking of cannibalism, here's the learned Noam Chomsky -- chomping on the corpse of Michel Foucault:

Foucault is an interesting case because I'm sure he honestly wants to undermine power but I think with his writings he reinforced it. The only way to understand Foucault is if you are a graduate student or you are attending a university and have been trained in this particular style of discourse. That's a way of guaranteeing, it might not be his purpose, but that's a way of guaranteeing that intellectuals will have power, prestige and influence. If something can be said simply say it simply, so that the carpenter next door can understand you. Anything that is at all well understood about human affairs is pretty simple. I find Foucault really interesting but I remain skeptical of his mode of expression. I find that I have to decode him, and after I have decoded him maybe I'm missing something. I don't get the significance of what I am left with. I have never effectively understood what he was talking about. I mean, when I try to take the big words he uses and put them into words that I can understand and use, it is difficult for me to accomplish this task It all strikes me as overly convoluted and very abstract. But -what happens when you try to skip down to real cases? The trouble with Foucault and with this certain kind of theory arises when it tries to come down to earth. Really, nobody was able to explain to me the importance of his work...

Now that's cannibalism!

UPDATE: The above post was linked by Southern Musings in this week's Bonfire of the Vanities. Go read them all!

A very creative blog (which features some very cool graphics) reports the latest twist on an old theme -- the bashing of "homocons" for not conforming to the cultural diktats of the gay cultural Stalinists. This time, Michelangelo Signorile is calling Andrew Sullivan an "Auntie Tom" for daring to write for the "homophobic" Washington Times:

Last week, NY Press columnist Michelangelo Signorile wrote that Sullivan (and Matt Drudge) were big gay hypocrites for their associations with DC's looney Moonie rag, The Washington Times. Turns out that despite his ultra-faggy outfits, Rev. Moon hates the gays.

....[W]e do love the way Rev. Moon put it:
"If you misuse your love organ, you destroy your life, your nation, your world." "Love organ"! We're totally stealing that.

Therefore, any homo who's published in his paper is an "Auntie Tom"!

Now, I could see the logic of a charge of hypocrisy were Andrew Sullivan (or any other accused "homocon" or "Auntie Tom") to actually say something hypocritical.

But here, the hypocrisy is said to be found not in the views or opinions of the writer himself, but rather, hypocrisy by association: the writer is responsible for the views of his publisher.

If that is the standard, then it would seem to me that any gay writer whose writing is published by Communist or Islamist publishers would also have to be a hypocrite. Because after all, Communist and Islamist countries do not tolerate homosexuality. It's also a pretty high standard in general, because it's tough to get published anywhere, and if writers are to be judged for the thoughts of their publishers, well, where does it end? Should conservative writers refuse to write for liberal journals and vice versa? Am I allowed to write a letter to the editor of the Washington Times?

Here's what Signorile said about Sullivan (and Matt Drudge):

It’s sleazy enough that a conservative would work for Moon and ignore his dark and dangerous agenda. But how on earth could a gay writer take a check from a man who can’t wait to see him thrown into an oven? Andrew Sullivan has reveled in his own idiotic claim that after 9/11 certain liberals, because they didn’t agree with George W. Bush’s policies, represented a "fifth column" supporting Osama bin Laden. Meanwhile, here he is, on the payroll of a guy who would like to see the mass extinction of his own people. Sullivan likes to think of himself as a gay rights activist–that’s actually how New York magazine described him recently–but he only seems to activate when the targets are liberals. Bill Clinton gets the Sullivan hatchet treatment for signing the Defense of Marriage Act, while the grossly homophobic Unification Church’s leader gets a weekly column from him in return for a few bucks to keep Sullivan’s increasingly lackluster and predictable web page afloat.

Apparently not the latter, for here's what Signorile says about Drudge:

Equally duplicitous is the sexually circumspect Drudge, who draws credibility from the Washington Times’ numerous references and vice versa. He spent the better part of last week trying to frame liberals as belittling the Nazis and the Holocaust. For days he stoked a bogus story pushed by the Republican National Committee and the Wall Street Journal that claimed that the group MoveOn.org had created tv ads comparing Bush to Hitler. When the ads were gone from the group’s web site, the right-wingers claimed they had scored another victory, as when they got cowardly CBS to ban The Reagans.

I don't think anyone abhors Moon's views on homosexuality more than I do. I have condemned them before in this blog. His latest psychotic gibberish is more of the same. But I'd sure as hell let him -- or the WorldNetDaily, or any other website -- print anything I write. Maybe someone would read it and change his mind about killing all the homos.

I wish to state for the record that Reverend Moon and I go way back. At UC Berkeley in 1974 (possibly '73; the dates are dim) Reverend Moon gave a speech which I attended with a friend. When Moon launched into an attack on immorality and homosexuality (translated for him by his interpreter, Colonel Park Bo Hi), my friend and I felt compelled to put on a demonstration of live guerilla theater by getting as close to the stage as we could, French-kissing (is that Freedom-kissing now?) in front of everyone, and being thrown out by Moon's gray-suited goons. We spent the rest of the evening pulling down his posters, and shrieking obscenities at "Moonies" -- and I think the word was invented that night. (I was young then, OK? In case any of you are wondering, I don't do things like that these days....)

So you're not going to get one peep from me in defense of Moon. I think the man is a walking loony tune.

With all of this in mind, let us examine closely the hiring of Andrew Sullivan to write a column for "his" newspaper. There are only a few possibilities:

1. Moon exercises no editorial control over the Washington Times;
2. Moon is a complete hypocrite himself, because he promotes the views of someone he wants to burn to death;
3. Moon does not mean what he says;
4. Moon is completely nuts, and out of touch with reality.

I can't but wonder where Signorile has been published, and I feel like doing some research to discover the thoughts of his publishers, but I don't think it's really worth my time. I wonder whether this latest attack isn't motivated by a little professional jealously though. Because, even if Sullivan obeys Signorile's demands and quits writing for the Times, the relentless Signorile is not about to stop there; when Sullivan writes for Salon.com (an online 'zine definitely not owned by Moon), then Signorile attacks Salon -- for the crime of publishing Sullivan!

[O]ne of the newest incarnations of the left’s media—Salon—has showcased gay columnists such as Camille Paglia, Norah Vincent and Andrew Sullivan, all of whom are vociferously hostile toward the gay rights movement and have championed conservative causes. The online publication has also run columnists such as David Horowitz, who has attacked gays and AIDS activists in bitter, offensive tirades. It’s akin to having three Clarence Thomases and a David Duke writing on racial issues, without having any well-known black liberal columnist—and this is supposed to be the actual liberal media!

One thing is clear: Signorile's standards are as elastic as his definition of hypocrisy.

While I don't think such obvious bias is worth taking too seriously, I do have one additional beef with Signorile, and this is as good a place as any to state it.

While Andrew Sullivan and Matt Drudge stand on their own feet and make it in a hostile, often anti-gay world, Signorile champions and perpetuates victimization, and has the unmitigated gall to condemn guns, gun nuts and even gay self defense. Rejecting Ann Coulter's attempt to link Islam to DC sniper John Muhammad, Signorile blames (who else) the "gun nuts":

Timothy McVeigh was a screwed-up Gulf War veteran. John Muhammad is a screwed-up Gulf War veteran. Robert Flores Jr., who shot three people and himself at the University of Arizona last week, was a screwed-up Gulf War veteran. And they were all gun nuts who were able to get weapons of destruction pretty damn easily.

[ANGRY EDITORIAL NOTE: Hey there Signorile, when you talk about gun nuts, you're talking about me. And you're talking about my blogfather! To insiders, "gun nut" may a term of endearment, but the way you use it, it comes close to being hate speech!]

Oh, but once you bring up the gun issue—as I did a few weeks ago regarding the sniper case—the NRA types start sounding like every crude stereotype they’ve thrown out there about the whining and whinging, politically correct, ACLU-loving left. I received a slew of mail telling me how "ignorant" and "intolerant" I was of the poor, downtrodden "shooting community." (I’m sorry for the insensitivity, really I am. And I’ll make sure to tell that to the families of the snipers’ victims as well.)

Some hate speech is more equal than others, I suppose....

I saved the worst for last! Recalling anti-gay abuse he suffered as a child, Signorile condemns his own self defense (he rightly fought back) -- and then makes that into an argument against guns!

If I'd had access to a gun, if I knew I could get one from my father's top drawer perhaps, I might have shot someone.

I don't believe I was a coward. I believe I was doing whatever I had to do in desperate moments, when parents and teachers were not there for me, to preserve whatever sanity I had left and to guard against physical and verbal attack.

Did I do something hurtful and awful? Absolutely -- so did Andy Williams, but with far graver consequences. Calling the actions of Williams or me or any other abused and traumatized kid an act of "cowardice" is not going to solve the current problem, and in fact only inflames it. Speaking out against homophobia, against bullying and against verbal and physical abuse of any kind in schools -- and demanding accountability from school authorities -- will go a lot farther toward stopping this epidemic of violence, as will curbing the availability of guns to young people.

And he dares to call Andrew Sullivan a hypocrite?

Let's assume that Sun Myung Moon is in fact the murderous, genocidal maniac Signorile makes him out to be. By writing in his newspaper, Andrew Sullivan at least serves to raise in readers' minds (and maybe in whatever remnants of a conscience Moon and his ilk may have) the possibility that homosexuals are in fact human beings and not the "dung-eating dogs" Moon calls them.

Then again, maybe not. Moon is probably a hopeless case.

That is precisely where guns come in. If Moon and his henchmen decide to wage their holy war against homosexuals, armed homosexuals are not going to sit idly by and allow this to happen. Signorile, who would take away my firearms in the face of the anti-gay genocide he complains of, is far more of a threat to me than imagined hypocrites who might actually be helping assuage it.

If the word "hypocrisy" applies at all, Signorile has by far done more to earn it.

UPDATE: Julian Sanchez (in an essay about Signorile's comrade Richard Goldstein) speculates that professional jealousy may be motivating Signorile to marginalize independent gay thinkers:

....[I]t must be less galling than confessing that, say, Paglia and Jonathan Rauch are just infinitely more original, interesting writers than Richard Goldstein and Michelangelo Signorile. Perhaps, to preserve their egos, the two of them are entitled to that belief. Nobody else should be tempted, however. Goldstein and his thought police have grown accustomed a political climate in which their marginal progressive agenda got a free ride on the need of homosexuals to defend themselves from an irrational and hostile majority. Now, they want the rest of the gay community to stay marginal, and surrender a real opportunity at expanded political influence, in order to keep free riding. In this, Goldstein may be reaching out to the right after all: I'm sure nothing would please Pat Robertson more.

Is Signorile helping the right wing by working to keep gays marginalized?

"Hypocrisy" may be too mild a word.....

UPDATE: My blogfather (who was kind enough to link to this post -- THANKS JEFF!), illustrates this week's famed "Weekly Check on the Bias" column with the ultimate gun cell phone -- a modified mini AK-47 which I hope comes in designer colors....

Jeff has gotten so proficient at PhotoShopping that I was going to ask him about doing a modified political cartoon involving Edvard Munch's "The Scream".....

But now I am worried about Jeff's remarks about "getting Dowdy...."

Am I....(gulp)..... "getting Dowdy" too, Jeff?

Is there a..... cure?

MORE: While you're at it, read Jeff's original post on the "Attack Queers" (weren't Signorile and Goldstein really projecting when they complained of "gays attacking gays"?) and Andrew Sullivan.

Shoveling snow.

More to come.

But every flake is different, right?

Via
ASCIIARTFARTS

Let's start with psychoanalysis! I'm always in need of that -- especially on Fridays, when, rain or shine, it's always online testing day at Classical Values.

By the way, I don't know what I would do without Ghost of a flea, because there is a paucity of online tests in the blogosphere these days. And I see a shortage not only of these slightly silly online tests, but of graphics, music, animation -- anything besides straight text. We may even be in a sort of Dark Ages -- and the Flea does more than almost any other blogger to keep culture and color alive in an increasingly colorless blogosphere! In this regard, I am sorrier than ever to see Rachel Lucas leave, because I loved her pictures, and I think it is very important to spice up blogs with things like pictures, videos, recipes, etc.

So much for half "baked" blog theories!

Perhaps it is appropriate that this first test promised to tell me which 20th Century Theorist I am.

The Flea and I are both incarnations of an important psychoanalyst!

You are Jacques Lacan! Arguably the most important
psychoanalyst since Freud, you never wrote
anything down, and the only works of yours are
transcriptions of your lectures. You are
notoriously difficult to understand, but at
least you didn't talk about the penis as much
as other psychoanalysts. You died in 1981.


What 20th Century Theorist are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

Well, if I am a psychoanalyst, what kind of thinker am I? While the next test did not promise to tell me anything more than when I am, my "when" is apparently deep and dark!

Midnight - You are a deep thinker, always searching
for answers and never quite at home. You are
very contemplative, and enjoy being alone with
your thoughts.


When are you?
brought to you by Quizilla

(Via ALLANLINGZ.)

The next test -- "What MST3K Villain are you?" -- brought me right back to the psychoanalysis, because I am a severed head. And female, severed head nostalgia at that!

Obviously, I am in danger of losing my head -- a head which isn't even mine, and which is kept in a pan!

What MST3K Villain are you? by Krankor.com

Via Meatriarchy.

More nostalgia! (Gotta keep losing my head, right?)

Finally, once again from the Flea, I found one last test -- to determine which video game character I am.

I am a Scorched Earth Tank:

I am a Scorched Earth Tank. When I have a mission, it consumes me; I will not be satisfied until the job is done. I have a strong