War Commentary

Perspective

Whenever you hear someone talk about 2500 deaths in Iraq over three years, recall (or learn about), almost ninety years ago, the Battle of the Somme:

The first day of the battle, codenamed Z-Day, was generally accepted to be the worst of them all, with some battalions suffering losses of more than 90 per cent.

The Battle of the Somme was supposed to be won by the Allies on that first day of July. It was partly thanks to this overconfidence that the generals allowed Malins access to the trenches. Instead, the battle lasted until November – long after the finished film had been screened at home. By the end of the offensive, there were more than one million casualties from both sides. After five months of bitter fighting, the Allies had advanced just five miles.

As horrific as the battle was for the British troops who suffered and died there, it cost hundreds of thousands of French and German lives as well. One German officer famously described the Somme as “the muddy grave of the German field army”.

Among those to experience the horrors of the battle from within the trenches were a young JRR Tolkien, later to write the epic Lord of the Rings, the poets Robert Graves and Siegfried Sassoon, future British Prime Minister Anthony Eden – and an Austrian corporal named Adolf Hitler.

Space

Only One Shopping Day Left

…until the registration rates at this year’s Return to the Moon conference in Las Vegas (which, at least for this year, also coincides with the annual Space Frontier Foundation conference) go up. It’s at an auspicious time of the year–it will be the week of the thirty-seventh anniversary of the first steps on earth’s moon. If you can’t attend the conference, I hope that you’ll celebrate it at home.

Popular Culture

Woohoo!

About an hour ago, Detroit was tied with Chicago for the division lead. I clicked over to Fox Sports to watch the box score of their current game against St. Louis, refreshed every thirty seconds (it’s surprising how well you can actually follow the game this way). When I started, they were down 6-4 in the bottom of the ninth. Through the miracle of the Internet (thanks, Al!) I watched them come back and tie it. Then after another scoreless inning, the Tigers won the game in the bottom of the tenth, 7-6 , with an RBI on a double.

In days of yore, they would have lost this game. But this year, they’re playing like a team that could go all the way. I may have to waste much time of my waning life actually following games this season…

Satire

The Grapes Of Ego

Byron York has some of Markos’ modest little speech the other day, but I’ve found the rest that he decided not to use:

“Yeah, they can take me down, Ma, but I’ll still be there, with Armstrong. I’m a part of something bigger–the way I figger it, I’m just a small part of one big netroots movement. I’ll be all ‘roun’ in the dark. Stumblin’ ’round in the dark. I’ll be ever’where. Ever’where you look.

Whenever there’s a brutally murdered American in Iraq to scorn, I’ll be there.

Wherever there’s a few loons milling around with misspelled protes’ signs saying ‘Bush Lied! People Died!’ and pictures of Che, and paper-mache puppets of Uncle Sam and Bushitlercheney McHalliburton, I’ll be there.

Wherever there’s a politician panderin’ to the tiny anti-American, ‘anti-war’ constituency, I’ll be there.

Wherever there’s a politician who los’ an election because he decided that he wasn’t far enough to the lef’, I’ll be there.

Wherever there’s a moonbat business associate whose political beliefs seem to shuttlecock with the financial winds, and who thinks that Osama attacked us because the Moon is in the Seventh House, and we were oppressing the Oort Cloud with our technoimperialism, I’ll be there.

I’ll be in the way that mindless minions compassionately tilt their heads in sorrow and regret over the fact that Saddam and the Taliban are no longer in power.

I’ll be in the way that leftist blogs spew spittle and obscenities at whoever has the temerity to disagree with them, or acquaint them with facts, and logic, and then delete or modify their commen’s.

I’ll be in the way that any position other than extreme lef’ is branded ‘full of hate,’ ‘racis’,’ ‘right-wing,’ ‘neocon,’ ‘fascis’,’ etc.

And wherever there’s a buck to be made, and an ego to be gratified, off the ‘progressive’ suckers that are seemingly born much more frequently than P. T. Barnum could have ever imagined, I’ll be there, too.”

[Update on Saturday night]

What, now they’re embarrassed to call Amstrong an astrologer? Why?

And doesn’t Google cache just suck? Well, at least if you’re the type who wants to toss things down the memory hole…

Political Commentary

The Shallow Roots Of The “Netroots”

It’s all about the money. And, errr…the astrology.

And this is one of the guys who’s going to lead the delusional Donkeys to the political promised land?

[Saturday morning, back in Florida, update]

But wait! There’s more:

Astrologer Jerome Armstrong notes that Ixion and Quaoar are following close in Pluto’s wake in early Sagittarius, and connects the rise of the political version of religious fundamentalism with the astronomical exploration of the Kuiper Belt in 1992. He cites incidences as disparate as the rise of Osama bin Laden onto the world stage and the Republican Revolution of 1994, fueled by Christian fundamentalist voters and culminating now with all three branches of government in Republican control. In addition, he cites the ascendance of political Hinduism in India in 1996 with the election of the BJP. One might add to this list the emergence of Conservative majorities in Israel and the UK.

As one commenter notes, this is the gift that just keeps giving. Obviously, Rove must be behind this. All part of the Republican war on science.

And yes, this does bring a whole new meaning to the term “moonbat.”

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!