The Written Peace:
Open Forum of March 29, 2005
With regard to the comments that have been registered since publication of the article yesterday, recognition should be given to all: Joseph, Lindi Bee, OddJob, Paradigm Shifter, and Wise Guy make good and great observations, counter-arguments, and/or insightful notations. To those voices, we should welcome elf, who will find that the commentators here at The Dark Wraith Forums are not the typical breed that hits the "Comment" button in the Blogosphere. If there is any doubt about that, read for the first time or once again, as the case may be, the thread following The 21st Century: Opus 1. The words written there are the narrative that arises of high thought, the kind that is the reach of mindful contemplation woefully lacking not just in the homes of the American citizenry, but also in the cloistered rooms where the architects of our grim future lay waste to it through their brutish and thoughtless vision.
The Dark Wraith Forums began publication one hundred five days ago. Today or tonight, as can be seen at the very bottom of this site, the blog will have been opened by its ten thousandth unique visitor. Curiously, it will also have been visited a total of twenty-five thousand times.
The Dark Wraith is grateful.
Published 3/29/2005 11:05:00 AM
<< 40 Comments Total
As indicated in the article, more must be written about the Project for the New American Century and the operationalization now underway at the Pentagon.
For those less familar with PNAC I'd suggest starting with the following resources:
REBUILDING AMERICA’S DEFENSES Strategy, Forces and Resources For a New Century (in PDF)
and
How We Got Into This Imperial Pickle: A PNAC Primer
---------------
Congrats on the vistor count. I wonder how many more might comment if bucking flogger wasn't so constipated?
Good afternoon, Mr. Goat.
I am now working on getting rid of Blogger entirely. I have had it up to my muzzle with this incompetence. This morning, I nearly popped a blood vessel in my neck.
Thank you for providing the links. It occurs to me, now that I think about it, many people have never read the seminal document of the Project for the New American Century, nor have many people followed the writings of the neo-con "luminaries" that show up in their loopy magazines.
I suppose it's not something even I should do very much, considering I'm already on the verge of a stroke as it is.
The Dark Wraith clutches the handrail.
(For the 2nd time) Indeed! It appears Blogger has decided to get high on barbiturates again! (Anyone know of a virtual 12-step program for Blogger's barb. addiction?)
Comics links:
Yesterday's Zippy makes terrific sense to me in a way I can't explain.
I think I've found the Wraith's epitaph.
And while I realize it's shooting ducks in a barrel, Tom Toles has had four brilliant diamonds over the last week!
#1
#2
#3
#4
- oddjob
Apologies for double post. Please remove one! I was under the impression that Blogger had lost the 1st one, so I decided to post it again!
- oddjob
Bringing over a hot cup of java to your Dark Wraith, in celebration of your 10K milestone! Many more for you. :)
DW, PeterofLoneTree has a post I've just read on BlondSense which prompts me to ask you about the nature of the scandal bomb you anticipate being set off sometime later this year or next year.
Would it have anything to do with the purported Reagan/Bush child sex ring the Wash. Times asserted existed in the 80's?
- oddjob
Good evening, OddJob.
That's a minor sidenote to what will come out; but yes, that story will feed a fire and tease out one of the weirder mysteries in what is already one of the weirder mysteries of our time.
And by the way, keep your eye on the Reverend Moon: he has a score to settle.
The Dark Wraith stays about one light-year away from the fuse that is slowing burning.
Good morning, Pam.
Thank you for the congratulations. I was a bit miffed that I had been watching that counter march toward ten thousand today, and the thing made it from 9,988 to 10,001 while I was in a 30-minute meeting.
The good news is that I can now stop staring at it in something approaching utter fascination. I mean, who are all the people who come here to read the ramblings of a big-nosed old teacher?
Ah, that's right: it's all of the great comments the regulars put up, here. And Mr. Goat's right: if Blogger actually worked once in a while, I'd probably have about ten times as many good comments on the threads, here.
Oh, well. Maybe I'll catch the 100,000 mark... if I live that long.
The Dark Wraith swills some formaldehyde.
Good evening Darkwraith...
I wanted to post this link earlier for everyone but bucking flogger was acting up for what seems most of the day. I finally gave up and decided to wait until late at night...
Any way the link is
http://oldamericancentury.org/
Project For The Old American Century...
It's the polar opposite of
http://www.newamericancentury.org/
Project For the New American Century
Thought you might find it interesting if you had not seen it before.
Well DW, just wanted to congratulate you and to say thanks for the praise you make not only to me, but also to me. The main praise should be to you, because you are the one giving us the space and motivation to participate. Right?
;)
This has GOT to be the most amazing paleontological discovery I've heard of in a very, very long while!!
(SOFT tissue???)
- oddjob
May I presume your "Moon has a score to settle" comment refers in part to the Washington Times/UPI (both owned by Moon) story recently that the "cowering in a hole" capture of Saddam Hussein was faked by the United States?
Good morning, OddJob.
Although I am still just a little bit suspicious of this discovery, if it turns out to be legitimate, I would say that just about every museum in the world is going to be pulling down the dinosaurs skeletons on display to crack open bones to see if soft tissue is in there.
The big part is that soft tissue, properly mineralized, would mean the good possibility of some DNA fragments. The knowledge so gained just boggles the mind.
The Dark Wraith wonders how much soft tissue will be left in his bones after 70 million years.
Good morning, Peter of Lone Tree.
Oh, what the good Reverend Moon has to tell might go far beyond this minor, opening shot.
Perhaps prosecuting him for tax evasion and fraud wasn't such a butch thing to do, after all.
The Dark Wraith keeps his head down.
About the bones, my thoughts exactly, DW.
I understand your skepticism (hello!), on the other hand they passed muster with the reviewers Science farmed the article out to (& you gotta know at least a few of them had to be just the slightest bit green around the gills with envy after they reviewed it, and would've crucified the authors if there was even the slightest decent way to do so). It's difficult (but hardly impossible) to believe that the peers would've made such a colossal boo-boo as to put their imprimatur on a report about something as implausible as this.
- oddjob
(Oh, forgot to add, even if no one finds gene fragments, simply having access to protein fragments is an incredible step forwards, akin to dropping a top-quality modern 'scope in Robert Hooke's lap instead of forcing him to slog through making a primitive compound one for the 1st time.
If this proves legit., it will be possible for population biology to come into play. We'll be able to get cladistic analyses based upon molecular evidence for the first time ever! That will address those nagging questions about how the dinosaurs fit into Reptilia, and whether birds indeed arose from them (or maybe should really be considered fancy flying dinosaurs with feathers and hollow bones, rather than a class of their own). It also might address phsiology questions such as whether they were endothermic or not.
- oddjob
CNN.com's Bill Mitchell gets it right again! (animated editorial cartoon)
- oddjob
Three cheers for the newest member of the Pie for New American Century (PNAC)!
Neoconservative journalist and commentator William Kristol was about 30 minutes into his speech...
Good afternoon, Mr. Goat.
This is, I believe, the Earlham College in beautiful Richmond, Indiana, the home of the largest RV sales lot on the entire planet: not only is Tom Raper RV there, but so are other huge outfits. Supposedly, the entire monstrosity can actually be spotted from low Earth orbit. The city, itself, looks as though the local industry that is supposed to be its bread and butter has actually sucked the life out of the place and left a shell of buildings and schools with little other than the legacy of being located in a company town.
How do I know this? Many were the times when I had stopovers there on Greyhound and Trailways routes through the Midwest.
For those times when I had a car, I made a beeline from Indianapolis to Dayton with my eyes closed as I passed what has to be 20 miles of signs and other garish roadside adornments encouraging me to pull off and have a look at the "RV Capitol of the World."
May God help me, I would rather wait until I hit Dayton to take an exit for something to eat. At least in Dayton, along with decayed Midwestern small city ambience, I can get some White Castle double cheeseburgers and maybe even a bucket of Fricker's chicken wings.
Oh, confound it! Now I'm getting hungry, and there's nothing much to eat here at school.
The Dark Wraith watches the hallways for slow-moving students.
Gooq Evening Dark Wraith,
The 21st century post was an excellent read, to say the least. I anticipate reading the coming follow ups, especially all about the "apocalyptic scenarios."
Also, the Weekly Poll is quite intriguing, especially for such a lowly red stater like me. Wesley Clark?...Wesley Clark?...oh sure now we pick a winning candidate.
And for those who do not know, I am sure South Park is by far the best show on television. I will not even let those with greater experience in this world convince me that there is or has ever been better social satire. Jonathan Swift, eat your heart out.
lowlyredstater
Good evening, Lowly Red Stater.
It is rather interesting to me that Clark is running neck-and-neck right now with Barbara Boxer. If you think about it, wouldn't that pair make for a weird scenario in the 2008 Presidential Election: Clark and Boxer versus...
Okay, I need to stop; next week, the poll is going to ask whom people think the Republicans are going to field in 2008.
I do have to say that, although a couple of good names were not included in this week's poll, the early field of possible candidates is truly promising. I don't see many of them being really, really divisive sorts.
And maybe I should have written above "Boxer and Clark" instead of "Clark and Boxer."
Boy, wouldn't that be wild: Boxer versus Rice.
The Dark Wraith can only imagine (and enjoy the vision of) the social changes that match-up would herald.
Good evening, Mr. Goat.
The Blogger Team (of dysfunctional misfits) swore up and down that they were piling in new servers and putting in some kind of fix to stop "single server pegging" that they claimed was the root of the problem. So, is it just me, or is everybody noticing that Blogger has suddenly become the fastest publishing platform in all of the Blogosphere?
It just drives the Dark Wraith absolutely mad.
Good evening, OddJob.
Referring to your post of earlier today about the dinosaur soft tissue being discovered inside fossilized bone, do I read your commentary correctly in that you and I are in agreement that birds did not evolve from dinosaurs, but instead evolved separately?
The Dark Wraith is curious.
You know, folks, this is really and truly strange: being able to run comments up the flagpole without any hang time whatsoever.
Is Blogger just setting me up? Is this going to go away as soon as I stop thinking about the ungodly prospect of transferring this blog to Movable Type, a move in which I might accidentally wipe out every last post and comment on this blog as well as the architectural layout I've worked so hard to perfect?
Is Blogger playing with my fragile emotional state tonight?
The Dark Wraith feels the pain of being in some twisted, Information Age equivalent of an abusive relationship.
Think stock market. Your gut says sell, but the stock posts gains for a few days. Do you ride it out thinking a new trend has been established, or is it the head fake?
Blogger (and its variants) is free isn't it? Is Movable Type?
Oh, I meant to ask you about those White Castle cheeseburgers. They don't have White Castles out my way, but I saw something on a show about them last year. Are they as good as they sound?
I'd wondered if I'd garbled that one a little too much.
Let me first say that this is NOT a special expertise of mine! Having said that, what I was getting at was that if enough protein can be found from enough dinos, even without genes it is still possible to conduct a cladistic analysis. You examine analagous proteins instead of genes, but I think the underlying principles are largely identitical. So, if you can conduct a cladistic analysis using the proteins (instead of just the fossilized bones), it gives you a hugely bigger insight into how the dinosaurs fit into the Reptilia. It's one thing to analyze only bones, but to have the proteins too? Cool!
One should be able to look at the bird question, too. Historically birds have been placed in a class of their own - Aves - but there are now those who are persuaded that they evolved out of one of the dinosaur lineages and still retain an awful lot of reptilian features.
Having the ability to conduct a more thorough cladistic analysis with something like - say - a hemoglobin protein might well make it possible to shed light on whether the birds did indeed evolve out of the dinosaurs - or not - OR are still so similar to reptiles it makes no sense to give them the standing of an independent class, but rather to instead consider them a sub-class of reptiles ----
the only dinosaurs still left on the planet.
- oddjob
The Dark Wraith feels the pain of being in some twisted, Information Age equivalent of an abusive relationship.
Indeed! At this rate we shall all soon collectively display Stockholm Syndrome symptoms!
- oddjob
I haven't read it yet, but some of you may find this Boston Globe article on Air America worth reading. Air America's one year old now.
- oddjob
(& after what seemed like weeks of Blogger being perpetually high on barbiturates, I find its cold turkey recovery unnerving)
Ah, good to see that Blogger has returned to its sedated self!
Paradigm Shifter asked about the ripples that would play out if we defaulted (an interesting question to me as well), but I have another one besides...
China has indicated a willingness to dump dollars if we mess overmuch with their designs on Taiwan. While that may just be economic saber rattling it has caused me to wonder how they would pull that off without devastating themselves? At this point whether we're their main trading partner or not, they're wrapped in a very codependent trading embrace with us. How does a challenger country in such a position successfully weather the dumping of its partner & rival's currency on the world market without getting the bloodiest nose of all in the process?
Anyone's thoughts?
- oddjob
Ah, good to see that Blogger has returned to its sedated self!
Paradigm Shifter asked about the ripples that would play out if we defaulted (an interesting question to me as well), but I have another one besides...
China has indicated a willingness to dump dollars if we mess overmuch with their designs on Taiwan. While that may just be economic saber rattling it has caused me to wonder how they would pull that off without devastating themselves? At this point whether we're their main trading partner or not, they're wrapped in a very codependent trading embrace with us. How does a challenger country in such a position successfully weather the dumping of its partner & rival's currency on the world market without getting the bloodiest nose of all in the process?
Anyone's thoughts?
- oddjob
Good morning, OddJob.
On the thread of the article above this one, I just posted a comment in response to Paradigm Shifter's questions.
The matter of removing an undesirable partner is a delicate matter. It is not to be done lightly, aggressively, or even obviously. This goes to an old saying that, if you want to once and for all remove a lion who's been sleeping in your upstairs bedroom, you don't grab him by the scruff of the neck and throw him out the front door; instead, you gently coax him down the stairs and out the back door, making sure that he finds plenty of morsels on the floor along the path that you want him to walk to his exit.
The Dark Wraith hears someone calling, "Here, kitty-kitty."
Today's piece of comic snark comes from Aaron McGruder:
Boondocks
And in the sad commentary category:
Today's Boston Globe editorial cartoon.
- oddjob
And here's one for the hypocritical category
Is it Friday yet?
Good afternoon, Mr. Goat.
Of course, the aspect of Mr. Cheney getting his annual check from Halliburton doesn't constitute a conflict of interest, either.
That is what we call incentive.
The Dark Wraith dearly loves free markets.
Yuck! And hasn't someone on one of DW's connected blogs pointed out that what Halliburton's lost track of so far is something like TWICE what the "UN food for oil" scandal amounts to?
- oddjob
Buzzflash recaps a recent lecture by Sy Hersh.
IMHO, a HIGHLY worthwhile read.
- oddjob
This
has, is, and will continue to fly too far under the radar.
lowlyredstater
DW,
Just found this nice little morsel to add to your collection of data about the possibilities between now and Nov. '06.
Given what all you've been suggesting on unrelated matters, I find it - delicious!
- oddjob
Good evening, OddJob.
I am pretty certain that if they must bring back the draft, they'll use as a pretext some military action that "necessitates a change in plans." As I had mentioned some time back, local draft boards are being brought on line, so everything will be in place for what looks like a nearly certain revisit to the good old days of forced conscription.
By the way, on a completely unrelated topic having to do with all things ancient, I thought you might be interested in this line of research and conclusions about the Pre-Cambrian world. Cool stuff... in more ways than one.
The Dark Wraith now makes the rounds for the night's news cycle.