The Big Ego

Lee Bockhorn explains why Bill Clinton remains in the news, and on the cover of Newsweek. (Hint–it isn’t because the so-called “Clinton-haters” can’t let go…).

I myself was appalled by the Newsweek piece.

First, because they let Jonathan Alter do it. How did the editors think that he could even remove his proboscis from Bill’s derriere long enough to write a credible piece?

And second, at his continuing self absorption (though I guess at this late date, I’d be stupid to be surprised). It’s always about him.

He doesn’t regret pardoning Marc Rich because it was wrong. He regrets it because it damaged his “reputation.” Methinks he misspelled “notoriety.” As usual, his only real regret is that he got caught, and actually suffered some consequences for it. Perhaps if this had happened earlier (like when he raped a woman in Arkansas as Attorney General) the country would have been spared a great deal of trauma.

But Will The Euridiots Care?

David Warren, one of our friends in the Great White North, points out that, as a result of the Israeli raid of Ramallah, Arafat’s game is up. The evidence of his perfidy is abundant to any who are interested.

A disturbing sidenote to the article is a twenty-three-year-old Canadian peacenik airhead who found Yasser “charismatic, and ‘good-hearted.'”

On The Internet, No One Can Tell You’re Nuts

I was as amused as any by Bjorn Staerk’s little April Foolery, and unlike certain clueless Globe columnists, wasn’t fooled for a nanosecond (but only because the top of the post had the date displayed prominently). But if it had occurred on some other day, I might have (seriously) asked the same question that Charles Johnson did.

“What has happened to Bjorn”?

Because weblogs are a much more personal medium than Op Ed pieces, we tend to develop opinions about the blogger’s general attitudes, state of mind, and general mental health much more than we would for a newspaper columnist, and when these things change, it’s often apparent to regular readers, even if the blogger says nothing explicit. Bjorn’s post was disturbing (or would have been if it hadn’t been an obvious prank to those of us who’ve been reading his stuff for months) because it seemed as though he’d overnight repudiated everything he believed. Such a thing could only be caused by some traumatic personal event, or some sudden change in brain chemistry.

On one of the Usenet groups that I frequent, there’s one individual who sometimes posts there who seems to be bipolar (I am only surmising this, because he’s never discussed it). He will be making posts that are reasonably lucid (with which I often disagree, but no more so than many other posters), and they will start to get weirder and weirder, often to the point of total incoherence. At that point, he posts no more for a while, often weeks or months.

So, it just made me wonder. If one of our fellow bloggers actually does go around the bend, will we know?

On The Internet, No One Can Tell You’re Nuts

I was as amused as any by Bjorn Staerk’s little April Foolery, and unlike certain clueless Globe columnists, wasn’t fooled for a nanosecond (but only because the top of the post had the date displayed prominently). But if it had occurred on some other day, I might have (seriously) asked the same question that Charles Johnson did.

“What has happened to Bjorn”?

Because weblogs are a much more personal medium than Op Ed pieces, we tend to develop opinions about the blogger’s general attitudes, state of mind, and general mental health much more than we would for a newspaper columnist, and when these things change, it’s often apparent to regular readers, even if the blogger says nothing explicit. Bjorn’s post was disturbing (or would have been if it hadn’t been an obvious prank to those of us who’ve been reading his stuff for months) because it seemed as though he’d overnight repudiated everything he believed. Such a thing could only be caused by some traumatic personal event, or some sudden change in brain chemistry.

On one of the Usenet groups that I frequent, there’s one individual who sometimes posts there who seems to be bipolar (I am only surmising this, because he’s never discussed it). He will be making posts that are reasonably lucid (with which I often disagree, but no more so than many other posters), and they will start to get weirder and weirder, often to the point of total incoherence. At that point, he posts no more for a while, often weeks or months.

So, it just made me wonder. If one of our fellow bloggers actually does go around the bend, will we know?

On The Internet, No One Can Tell You’re Nuts

I was as amused as any by Bjorn Staerk’s little April Foolery, and unlike certain clueless Globe columnists, wasn’t fooled for a nanosecond (but only because the top of the post had the date displayed prominently). But if it had occurred on some other day, I might have (seriously) asked the same question that Charles Johnson did.

“What has happened to Bjorn”?

Because weblogs are a much more personal medium than Op Ed pieces, we tend to develop opinions about the blogger’s general attitudes, state of mind, and general mental health much more than we would for a newspaper columnist, and when these things change, it’s often apparent to regular readers, even if the blogger says nothing explicit. Bjorn’s post was disturbing (or would have been if it hadn’t been an obvious prank to those of us who’ve been reading his stuff for months) because it seemed as though he’d overnight repudiated everything he believed. Such a thing could only be caused by some traumatic personal event, or some sudden change in brain chemistry.

On one of the Usenet groups that I frequent, there’s one individual who sometimes posts there who seems to be bipolar (I am only surmising this, because he’s never discussed it). He will be making posts that are reasonably lucid (with which I often disagree, but no more so than many other posters), and they will start to get weirder and weirder, often to the point of total incoherence. At that point, he posts no more for a while, often weeks or months.

So, it just made me wonder. If one of our fellow bloggers actually does go around the bend, will we know?

The Permanent Campaign

Just in case you weren’t already sufficiently disgusted with Gray Davis, Dan Walters has an article in the Bee that he’s taken a page from Bill Clinton’s book. I’m tempted to say that this indicates that he’s really worried about Simon, but I suspect he’d be doing it all regardless of who his opponent is.

You Might Be A Terrorist…

Like Reuters, The Muslim nations are having a problem coming up with a common definition for terrorism.

The countries agreed to form a 13-member committee to “work toward an internationally agreed definition of terrorism” under a U.N. convention to “formulate a joint organized response of the international community to terrorism in all its forms and manifestation.”

Well, I’m so relieved. I’ll sleep much better at night knowing that there’s a thirteen-member committee of Islamic nations working toward a definition of terrorism. Based on the following, though, one suspects that they may have some difficulty squaring the circle.

The declaration said the countries reject “any attempts to link terrorism to the struggle of the Palestinian people” to establish an independent state with Jerusalem as its capital.

“We reject any attempt to associate Islamic states or Palestinian and Lebanese resistance with terrorism,” the draft said.

They then proceed to make just such a link.

The roots of terrorism, including “foreign occupation, injustice and exclusion” should be addressed, it said.

While they’re coming up with the definition, maybe one of them can explain to me how “foreign occupation, injustice and exclusion” are roots of terrorism, but that the supposed victims of these evils aren’t engaging in terrorism.

To say that there are gray areas is not an excuse to avoid making calls on acts that are clearly black. There is a region between earth’s atmosphere and space that is neither air nor space. That doesn’t prevent us from saying that a Cessna 120 flies in the atmosphere, and that the Cassini probe to Saturn was in space.

There may be some acts that are open to interpretation by reasonable people as to whether they are terrorist acts or not, but they’re not the ones that have been dominating the news for the last half year.

Hey guys, let me help you out here–it’s clear that you’re confused.

With apologies to Jeff Foxworthy, if you strap TNT to yourself and detonate it in a crowded pizza parlor, you might be a terrorist.

If you walk into a wedding party and start spraying it with AK-47 rounds, you might be a terrorist.

If you drive a rental truck full of high explosives into the basement of a skyscraper and blow it up, you might be a terrorist.

If you purchase airplane tickets, then slit the throats of flight attendants and commandeer the aircraft, and fly it into the side of that same skyscraper, you might be a terrorist.

And if you obfuscate the definition of terrorism, use illogical and inconsistent statements to defend the above behaviors, change the subject whenever anyone calls you on it, pretend that there’s any justification whatsoever for them, ship weapons to those carrying them out, and provide large amounts of funding to the widows and family of the perps, you just might be a terrorist yourself.

In which case, you might want to at least consider recusing yourself from any committee dedicated to “defining terrorism.”

Biting Commentary about Infinity…and Beyond!