I spent most of this weekend learning Macromedia Flash MX. I never thought I'd learn Flash and I know now why, it's a complicated and heavy duty. I just needed a motivation. For my first project I'm going to build an interface for the restaurant that I worked at last winter, Parallax.
Last night I finally saw the foreign (subtitled) film Amelie, which is a great movie. It's a story by a brillant French movie writer, Jean-Pierre Jeunet. I especially liked the character development in this movie. Jean-Pierre also wrote another one of my favorites, City of Lost Children and another one I've yet to see but have heard good things about, Delicatessen.
After being confused for a few months now about the whole situation in the Middle East, I have finally come to the conclusion that we are really going to attack even though there's still a good chance we don't belong there. Over the past few weeks we've seen and heard an increased level of fighter jet activity up here in the Eastern Sierra, which makes sense since we are so close to Edwards AFB and China Sea Naval Base. I have to admit, I like watching the dog fights above Owens Valley and the Long Valley Caldera.
The way I see it, Bush it gonna take a vote of Congress, find out we shouldn't actually be there, then go in an bomb the shit out of Iraq anyway, which will very likely cause innocent young Americans to die. This hits close to home for me since I am one. I agree Saddam is a thorn in the side of civilized Earth, but there's got to be better ways. Don't we have survelleince and special intelligence we can use to quietly take him out while he's on the toilet or something?
Posted by slugworth at October 06, 2002 09:34 PMCheck out this Press Briefing by Ari Fleischer, in which he is on the boderline of advocating assasination: "The cost of one bullet, if the Iraqi people take it on themselves, is substantially less than [the estimated $9 billion a war in Iraq would cost]."
He hedges with the "if the Iraqi people take it on themselves," but that's not surprising given his amazing powers of doublespeak.
.g
The key issue with Iraq is the clear violation of Iraqi sovereignty a US attack would represent. The focus of a US offensive in Iraq is clear: oil. When the US fails to give the UN the authority it requires to even consider a security council resolution dictating an offensive in Iraq, there can be no way of defending a US offensive as having anything to do with justice. Contract theory applies in this case since both nations in question have bought in to the UN. The US, it appears, is now buying out.
Both the UN and formal international treaties exists specifically to inform situations such as this. If Hussein commits crimes against his people, it is either a matter left to the Iraqi sovereignty, or a matter to be dealt with by an international body such as the UN. By intending to invade Iraq regardless of UN support, the US has made worthless any autonomy a UN resolution may have had. Moreover, a US invasion reeks of imperialism and sheds light on the US as an illegitimate enforcer of biased morality.
Posted by: kasei on October 7, 2002 01:39 PM