brainrow

Wow. It’s been four years since the start of the Iraq War. Time flies whether you’re having fun or not.

Asserting that the war in Iraq “can be won” with U.S. resolve, President Bush appealed to the American people today for patience as he pursues a plan to tamp down violence in Baghdad, and he warned that national security would suffer a “devastating” blow if U.S. troops were to withdraw from Iraq next year as demanded by congressional Democrats.

That old familiar tune.

I was against the war, though I didn’t leave much of a paper trail to prove it. I didn’t have a blog at that time, but a few friends and co-workers knew how I felt.

It felt dangerous, opposing a war that had so much popular support. One friend, usually liberal and anti-war, supported the war and told me more than once to “shut up” when I criticized it in a public place. Just before the war started, apparently in the spirit of friendly advice, he told me I was going to look pretty stupid in a couple weeks if I kept saying the war was a bad idea. I thought he was probably right about that.

Atrios sums up the line that’s served the TV talking heads so well for the last four years, and which is still in use today:

All you anti-war people sure will feel stupid in six months when things are better.

Still waiting.

But I don’t feel particularly brilliant, either. I wanted to support the war. Smart people — people I respected — were supporting it. I firmly believed that Saddam Hussein had chemical weapons, but I thought war called for evidence, not just belief. I kept hoping for some argument or some missing piece of information that would let me change my mind.

I expected Colin Powell’s appearance at the United Nations to be the turning point for my thinking. Powell was someone I respected, and he was putting his reputation on the line. But when I watched his presentation on TV that night, I couldn’t help thinking, “Am I stupid? Am I blind? Is there a case here? I’m not seeing it.”

I’m still not seeing it. But the blindness and the stupidity — I’m no longer assuming that’s my fault.

The AIDS battle in Gambia:

At the only hospital in the capital of this tiny West African nation, a 3-year-old AIDS patient named Suleiman receives his daily dose of medication — a murky brown concoction of seven herbs and spices served out of a bottle that once contained pancake syrup. …

This has become the treatment for HIV/AIDS patients here since early January, when Gambian President Yahya Jammeh announced he had discovered a cure for the disease that has wreaked havoc across Africa. He made that announcement in front of a group of foreign diplomats, telling them the treatment was revealed to him by his ancestors in a dream.

His concoction has stirred controversy and anger among health officials who say the president’s claims will bring false hope to the nation’s more than 20,000 HIV/AIDS patients. They are also afraid that it could cause patients to stop taking the anti-retroviral drugs that have been proven to prolong life and improve quality of living.

Some patients and government doctors say the dream cure is working.

CNN … sought medical reports of the HIV/AIDS patients to see whether they are indeed on the mend. The material was not provided. The government would also not release the concoction to CNN for testing.

Let me get this straight… the President gets guidance on scientific matters from dreams, and uses that to make life-and-death decisions of public policy. Meanwhile, scientists and doctors grapple with spectres.

Oh, I get it — this is all some kind of symbolism, right?

Cartoonist Mark Fiore has an animated performance review for Attorney General Gonzo.

I haven’t politicized Justice. We simply had to let Justice go for performance-related reasons.

Like truth and the American way, justice has been a thorn in the side of the Bushies right from the start.

For a limited time only, the Daily Show on Cheney’s Clout. (Warning: crude humor.)

Why does this man still have any clout at all?

Some things are easy. Some things are difficult.

Some difficult things are difficult because that’s a fundamental part of their nature. There’s no easy way to win the Tour de France. If it ever became easy, that would be the end of the Tour. Wars can be like that, too.

Some things become difficult — or even impossible — because of incompetence, ignorance and stupidity.

If you’re in the Bush Administration, when things go badly for the United States — in Iraq, in Afghanistan, in North Korea, at the United Nations — you may feel justified in saying, “Hey, war and diplomacy and stuff are hard!” You would be right. And yet…

Zbigniew Brzesinski last night on The Daily Show:

The real problem is that we have had a policy lately that has been dividing our friends and uniting our enemies and should be the other way around.

Well, Bush said he was a uniter. He never specified who he would unite.

Thrilling Wonder has some spectacular photos from a Russian commercial pilot called “Letchik Lekha.”

Via Lockergnome, we learn that there’s a British version of Apple’s PC/Mac TV ads. They’re similar to the U.S. ads, but different.

Dick Cheney’s old company, Halliburton, is on the move:

U.S. oil services firm Halliburton Co. is moving its headquarters and chief executive to Dubai in a move that immediately sparked criticism from some U.S. politicians.

Texas-based Halliburton, which was led by Vice President Dick Cheney from 1995-2000, did not specify what, if any, tax implications the move might entail. It plans to list on a Middle East [stock market] once it moves to Dubai — a booming commercial center in the Gulf. The company said it was making the moves to position itself better to gain contracts in the oil-rich Middle East.

“This is an insult to the U.S. soldiers and taxpayers who paid the tab for their no-bid contracts and endured their overcharges for all these years,” said judiciary committee chairman Sen. Patrick Leahy, a Vermont Democrat.

Rep. Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, might hold a hearing on the implications, an aide to Waxman said.

Halliburton has drawn scrutiny from auditors, congressional Democrats and the Justice Department for the quality and pricing of its KBR Inc. (KBR.N) unit’s work for the U.S. army in Iraq.

They take the big-ticket no-bid contracts; they repeatedly fail U.S. soldiers and taxpayers in Iraq; they take the money and run. They have no respect for or loyalty to the United States or the American people.

That Cheney sure is a bad influence.

Crooks and Liars has more on Fox’s bold and independent “news” coverage.

Hey, can they help it if the only way to really get to the bottom of tough news stories is to repeat and repeat and repeat Republican talking points?

Via Editor & Publisher, some good news about the New York Times online:

The New York Times is opening up access permanently to TimesSelect to all students and faculty who have .edu e-mail addresses beginning on March 13.

“It’s part of our journalistic mission to get people talking on campuses,” says Vivian Schiller, senior vice president and general manager at NYTimes.com. “We wanted to open that up so that college students and professors can have a dialogue.” …

Schiller says the company has “no regrets” putting 22 columnists at the Times and its sister newspaper The International Herald Tribune, archives and other material behind a pay wall.

…

Those students who are current subscribers will receive pro-rated funds for their paid subscriptions. Schiller explains that students and faculty will have to register for the service but that it’s self-regulatory.

Bloggers lost a great resource when the Times made its columnists and some other materials available online only to paying customers. At least now students and faculty can read folks like Thomas Friedman, David Brooks, Nicholas Kristof, Bob Herbert, Maureen Dowd, Frank Rich and Paul Krugman. They’re pretty smart sometimes.

Via Framing Science, a Gallup poll about the effect of global warming on the strength of hurricanes:

[M]ost Americans believe it will be a decade or more before the manifestations of global warming begin to wreak havoc.

The only outcome that close to half of Americans believe is likely to happen sooner concerns hurricanes becoming more powerful. Forty-nine percent say this is either already happening or will happen within 10 years.

However, there are major differences by political persuasion. A solid majority of Democrats say they are very or somewhat worried about all seven items measured. At least half of independents worry about six of the seven items. Meanwhile, no more than 49% of Republicans are worried about any of them. … [T]he average level of worry among Republicans is only 34%, compared with 59% among independents and 75% with Democrats.

What worries me about this poll is that, responding to a question that calls for considerable expertise, backed up with lots of factual data, only 1% of those polled offered no opinion.

Corpus Callosum reports that the Union of Concerned Scientists has designed a cleaner car:

Automotive engineers at the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) today unveiled a minivan design that shows automakers can build affordable vehicles with existing technology that would meet or exceed global warming pollution standards for cars and trucks adopted by California and 10 other states. Automakers are currently fighting these standards in court.

The minivan, dubbed the UCS Vanguard, features off-the-shelf engine, transmission and fueling systems and other technologies that would save consumers money, maintain vehicle safety and performance, and cut global warming pollution by more than 40 percent. All of the technologies in the Vanguard are in vehicles on the road today, but automakers have yet to combine them all in one single package.

Joseph at Corpus Callosum says:

[I]t is simply a proof-of-concept. Or more accurately, a disproof-of-concept: it disproves the notion that it is impossible to design a car that meets tougher standards.

That, of course, just makes the auto companies mad.

In the absence of federal policies to curb global warming emissions from vehicles, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont and Washington have adopted the California clean car standard. Several other states, including Arizona, Maryland, Minnesota, New Mexico, Tennessee and Texas, are considering or about to adopt the standard. Combined, these states represent nearly half the U.S population.

In response, auto industry trade groups have filed lawsuits in California, Rhode Island and Vermont to block implementation.

“The automakers are sticking to their traditional ‘can’t do’ philosophy,” said David Friedman, clean vehicles research director at UCS. “Years ago they cried the sky was falling when they were required to install seat belts and airbags. Now, instead of building cleaner vehicles like the Vanguard, they’re fighting global warming pollution laws in the courts. To get the job done, they should bench their lawyers and call in the engineers.”

Nah. Lawyers take orders. The engineers mostly seem to have a chip on their shoulders. Something about “reality,” whatever that is.

Via Atrios, let’s examine just how fair and balanced Fox News really is.

Ann Coulter got all the attention at the Conservative Political Action Conference:

Ann Coulter used an anti-gay slur to describe John Edwards (the line drew applause) and asked: “Did Al Gore actually swallow Michael Moore?” When a questioner asked Coulter why she praises marriage but broke off so many engagements, she responded by calling the questioner ugly.

Classy lady. But you know, she’s not the only right-wing superstar:

Rep. Sam Johnson (R-Tex.) said of Cindy Sheehan, whose son died in Iraq: “She’s an idiot.”

Class, class, class.

Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) got the crowd cheering early in the day. “I have been called — my kids are all aware of this — dumb, crazy man, science abuser, Holocaust denier, villain of the month, hate-filled, warmonger, Neanderthal, Genghis Khan and Attila the Hun,” he announced. “And I can just tell you that I wear some of those titles proudly.”

Which ones, huh? C’mon, tell us — which ones?

Talk about class warfare — the Democrats just don’t play in the same league as these class acts.

What a coincidence — exactly 2000 days — not quite five and a half years — after George W. Bush promised to get him, “dead or alive,” Osama bin Laden observed his 50th birthday.

I think that’s enough birthdays for this guy, don’t you?

Update: via Hetty Litjens, CNN reports Bush success — bin Laden is, in fact, “dead or alive.”