This just in...

From sem40.ru:

Сегодня утром агентство новостей Фокс Ньюз сообщило, что в Кандагаре высадился американский спецназ, получивший задание нанести удар по элитным частям талибов.

[This morning, Fox News reported that U.S. Special Forces have been deployed in Kandagar. Their mission is to strike at elite Taliban units.]

Hopefully, this is old news and not a late-breaking report.

Soldiers have a tendency to become conflicted when reporters warn the enemy of their intentions. The question naturally arises: Whom to damage first?

Criminy.

Cheers...

The role of government, and Lady Liberty...

Fellow LJer vebelfetzer created this striking piece of artwork in the wake of 9-11. In a subsequent post to her LJ, on October 10, she responded at length to someone who had commented on one of her posts. I've mentioned, in a previous post, that when I read her well-reasoned and lucidly written response, I was prompted to add her to my friends list.

But something in her response has been bugging me. I went to take another look at it, and here's the paragraph that's been bothering me:

But we didn't start it. And nobody, not even the bloated corporate monster that many of these people seem to think America is, deserves what happened. And yes, this -is- like a mother protecting her children. American civilians are, by and large, helpless, in a military sense. This was proven by how easily the terrorists were able to wrest control of the planes in the first place. Our government's job is to work for us in a similar way as parents "work" for their children. Providing for us, while also trying to "raise" us and allow us to make our own decisions. And we do expect the government to protect us. With the military, with laws, with court systems. [Emphasis mine.]

I profoundly disagree with the sentences I've italicized. Government is supposed to "work" for us by protecting our rights (as noted in the last two sentences of the excerpt), not by acting in loco parentis. Further, while government has adopted a posture as a "provider" to its citizens, we must keep in mind that if we are speaking of the material realm, the government has nothing to offer other than what has already been provided to it by the citizenry (minus a cut to pay for the cost of collecting and then dispensing the funds).

As for the rest of this excerpt (and her post in general) she is right smack on, in my opinion. The American people have in many ways become essentially helpless, often at the urging - both direct and indirect - of their government. Given the inertia of the past few decades, where both government and media readily (and repeatedly) voice the need for the government to "do something" in the face of some real or imagined difficulty, it's not surprising that people now passively sit back and expect government to solve all their problems... and quickly.

My interpretation of the drawing does not view the government playing the role of parent, teacher, or provider. The woman in the picture is not the government; she is Liberty. In my opinion, Liberty - the spirit of freedom - is very much our parent, in the spiritual sense, where "our" refers to the unum in e pluribus unum (out of many, one). And it will be Liberty that will inspire us to meet this new challenge.

Cheers...

Catch-up...

I dawdled on the way home yesterday morning, stopping at Baybrook to pick up a beard and mustache trimmer, which I will need soon to deal with my increasingly hirsute face. I also stopped by the Barnes & Noble to grab a cup of Starbucks coffee and browse among the cheap books while sipping my brew.

There was an interesting collection of Mark Twain essays, but not interesting enough for me to lay out nearly $10 for them. Most of the material is likely available on the Internet, anyhow. Another remaindered book, The Commissar Vanishes, traced how many, many middle- and high-echelon Soviet henchmen were erased (quite literally) from various official photographs after they were arrested and shot. Included is a reproduction of one of the pages of an article on the Bering Strait that was sent out to subscribers of the Great Soviet Encyclopedia, with instructions to cut out the article on Lavrenti Beria (member of the politburo and head of the NKVD under Stalin, executed in December 1953 for "conspiracy") and replace them with the enclosed new pages.

I also stopped by the Hong Kong Market on the way home and resupplied myself with udon noodles and Vietnamese beer (among other goodies). I got home around noon, cooked lunch, ate it, and went to sleep.

For the first time in several days, I got some sleep, waking up shortly after 8. A message on my cell phone informed me that tonight's shift start time had changed, from 11:30 pm to midnight. The office would have been SOL had the time shifted too far earlier, because I've learned through experience to turn off all phones and pagers if I want to get any sleep around here, and thus would not know about it. Had I been awakened at 3 pm with the news of tonight's time shift, it's doubtful I would have been able to get back to sleep.

There's one other change that I can see in the next few days. On Friday, instead of working here until 5:45 am, the end time has moved up to 4:45 am. Normally, I'd probably make some sort of sarcastic remark about that, but seeing as it comes at the end of another marathon session, I'll just say, "Thanks."

I'm finding it hard to get suitable Macintosh information on the Web. I've tried IRC, too, but the group on the openprojects net seem a bit mummified (okay, so it was 1 am... so?). Web searches provide marginal information on what I can do with my PowerMac 8100/100, but I still hold out hope that Feht will be able to shed some light on the mystery of what I can do with this box.

Cheers...

Temporary post...

Webcam32 has not crashed my laptop for two nights running (though I have been starting and stopping it). Tonight will be night three.

The cam will be up and down throughout the wee hours, as I have to share my dial-up connection with Mark. I'll be on the AIM (as AlexPGP) as circumstances permit.

Cheers...