I Quit

Thanks for the nomination for President of the Universe of Blogs, but I am going to have to decline. Truth is, I had a whole slew of self-deprecating posts in my noodle, because the thought of someone declaring himself ruler over something where no one knows he even exists was funny to me, but I instantly got bored with the whole idea. Writing about blogs is forty-eight million times more boring that writing about yourself on a blog.

So I apologize to my readers for what has arguably been the worst content on this site since I started it--and that is saying something.

My general approach of falling down the stairs and trying to land of my feet ended up with me flying through the window lying in shards of glass. I'm going to be a few bandaids, then return to my regularly scheduled programming at some point when I have something interesting to say.

tick, toc...tick, toc

A Big Decision

It looks like my proposal for President of Blogs has been met with resounding silence. I understand that a decision of such magnitude must be carefully thought out, and I'm absolutely opposed to any hastily and emotionally filled endorsements influenced by the shear magnetism of my personality. You should be mulling the decision over with your friends, family, significant others and pets. Pets in particular make excellent sounding boards, unless, of course, you are a cat owner. Cats are Satan's pets, and they are known to be active opponents of any semblance of order in the world.

In fact, I hate cats and think those folks who cat-blog will be the first victims of my blog-purge. Except for this guy. He posts about things that his cat has killed, and I think that is funny. Plus his cat's name is Jeff.

Please don't be alarmed by my rhetoric when I refer to a planned blog-purge. I know that sounds all dictatorish and totalitarian, but I'm only going to target cats and Andrew Sullivan with my purge. I figure taking on the world's foremost hated animal would be a greater good that most decent folks would want. Plus I'll get rid of cats (who make me sneeze) as well.

Continue to mull over this monumental decision. Remember, if there are any substantive questions that can help you in clarifying your thoughts, like whether I wear boxers or briefs, please feel free to ask.

Blogroll Update

Ok, I haven't cleaned up the blogroll in quite sometime, so I'll be doing that this weekend. I have a few new visitors that I want to link to, and while I'm at it, would like to present the opportunity for those who come by here every once in a while and would like a link. Send me an email or post a comment if you'd like to increase your Technorati score.

My Brain

My buddy Ian says that I'm being a whiny b&^ch for complaining about my lack of attention. Well, he didn't say that exactly, but I know what his big brain was trying to convey: all that big thinking he normally does just serves to exact total confusion inside of my head.

I wish you could see my leg twitching right now as evidence. I would put up a webcam for you, but I have other associations with it, and in my confusion, it might cause me to do something that would either throw me in jail for a few months or cement my destiny of never holding a public office for as long as I live.

Slap, Slap, Slappy

Lee points out a break in logic by someone that should know better. Check it out.

Me? Well, if someone slapped my belly in a jail cell to get information out of me, I'd gladly pay him the market rate.

You Need a Leader

Did you miss me?

As I told you on Friday, I was in San Diego this weekend. My skin now reflects a perfect bronze hue, which enabled me to fend off eight knife-wielding ninjas while scoring a few phone numbers at the reception. There might have been six, or nine, or ten ninjas--I'm not quite sure, as those wiley misanthropes tend to attack in such a manner that disguises their true headcount.

All this is all completely true, but for the knife-wielding ninjas.

While I was relaxing in the sun, I had some thoughts driven by the initial success "Self-Absorbtion" week has brought. Admittedly, it did start as a joke, however, it ended up opening my eyes to the many issues, problems and potential solutions that we, the people who write on blogs, currently face. Since it is still self-absorption week, I have come up with some solutions that focus on how my staff on I can leverage my wit, intellect, organizational ability and overall talent to better this world which shall never be called "blogosphere" ever again (at least by this blog, or anyone else that has an appreciation for anything aesthetic).

One of the general definitions of entropy is the inevitable and steady deterioration of a system. While blogs have addded a generally positive dynamic to the world of discourse and dialog, it still a victim to this law. Beating a dead horse is a severe tendancy among most bloggers who have all been raised in the "awareness" culture. Ideas are not things to be embraced through comprehension of a reasoned, coherant argument; ideas are data that is pumped out at you in volume--both in amplitude and in quantity.

In accordance with this law, if you are one of these numerous bloggers who likes to beat a dead horse, your blog is a deteriment to the medium as a whole. You are, quite frankly, making the encompass where blogs reside a less attractive place for the rest of the world to visit. It's like Taco Bell: a Special Night of All-You-Can-Eat: many people come in out of curiosity, but most are running for the doors in mass after a brief participation, and the only ones left are not the people that you'd want to take to prom. This inevitable mass exodus will cause the system to be exothermic.

It isn't entirely your fault, however. While I'm usually not one to give into the shirking of personal responsibilities, the pragmatist in me wants to address the root causes of the situation. I understand more than anyone that the overall quality of output in blogs is definitely not a function of effort. Many folks spend hours upon hours to gain the double digit readership so desired, even if your blog is called Uncle Willy's Spot - Ramblings About Hedgeclipping with Your Lawnmower. Your efforts should not be in vain.

What is lacking, my friends, is strategic vision. Harnessing the indefatigablility of you folks needs someone who is looking at the broader picture, someone who can strategically place particular blogs into a context where the whole is served better. Someone who is also fearless, courageous, and of one-mind with the pure spirit of all things blog.

I'd like to ask you, my readers, to nominate me, your humble servant, as President of the Cylindrically Shaped Illustration Containing the Medium of Blogs. The universe of blogs needs to observed as endothermic, instead of exothermic.

Objections? Yes, I was getting to that.

Your reluctance to voluntarily hand your sphere over to another person is understanable, and I'll be the first to point out that not just anyone is suited for this job. If the consortium of blogs have proved anything, it's that almost no one is suited to run it. Glenn Reynolds has done a wonderful job in raising a toddler, but his laisser faire method has created a rather unruly teenager.

I would be the benevolent leader you need to bring order. My benevolence is a natural result of my intense and undying love for those who are writing yourselves down the toilet one post at a time. I love you too much to see you go the way of the Lucky the Goldfish after you wiped his tank clean with dishsoap.

Give it a think, and with the deepest reservations and humility, I would accept your willing nomination as President of Blogs.

Listen all of you. I'm going to San Diego for the weekend to mix some self-absorption with some sun. There is nothing like a bronzed blogger, who will one day have 9 toes, surfing in San Diego. I will bring you photos, love and maybe a post or two.

Until then, be good to one another, feel the love I intensely feel for all you, and write a letter to Andrew Sullivan telling him that he smells like clams.

Your hero of heros,
TF6S

Self-Importance Post #2

Self-importance week continues here at TenFingers6Strings. It is already a success, since I've continued to keep posting furiously without an Instapundit link for another day. I am the Fuel Cell/Solar generated blog to the crude oil suckers in abstract, roundish encompass that contains blogs.

Continuing with my theme this week, I will refer to myself in the third person, "Self," when I am portraying greatess while maintain a humble spirit, projecting pain and suffering in a martyrdomish-like way, or when it is convenient. I say "martyrdomish" because to the Western mind, this word actually has taken on its orginal connotation in recent years. Maybe "dramaqueen" is more apt, but I'm seriously not gay even though I'm wearing a purple shirt today.

So, my last post elicited some fantastic comments. First, there is my buddy Rick, who continues to be the Robin to my Batman, in the sense that he and I both wear our underwear on the outside of our pants when we surf the Internet. Rick, dammit, the brilliance of this blog should have inspired you so deeply, that you couldn't help but find a way to get your own blog. You could then link to this one everyday. You could be kind of like Instapundit, except you only link to me, and tell everyone to read the whole thing. You can start a blogwar with Andrew Sullivan if you want too, because I hate that guy.

I was also able to lure my good friend Anthony Perez-Miller out from his hiatus. I'm always leery of having Anthony come around because his grasp of geopolitics makes me look like the spawn of Senn Penn and Mr. Furley--and he also has a hyphenated last name. That either makes him a lesbian (I guess since he has a wife, he's kind of like a lesbian who has to shave in the morning, but I repeat myself), or one of those really smart guys whose name will look really cool on a policy article he's written.

Next, we've found another reader, increasing my readership from five people to six (20%)!

Wait a minute, my editor is telling me not to mention my traffic. Self is telling me to make myself a martyr to gain pity from kind hearted souls.

Everyone, please welcome Lynn! Lynn has a great site with lots of posts about music, which is something I thought I would be doing a lot more of by this point in my illustrious blogging career. I might be known as a "Renassiance man," but I'm not an omni-blogger. Regardless, Lynn has inspired me to write some more about a subject that I actually care about.

Loyal readers, go read Lynn, and don't forget to quote me in your comments to her. It will make you sound much smarter, funnier and if you have height issues, maybe even a little taller.

Until my next post, keep me in your thoughts and dreams. It'll will improve your confidence, your demeanor and outlook on life. Think of it as a Tony Robbins DVD on the cheap.

Self-Importance Post #1

Twenty-three months and counting without any Instapundit links, or, for that matter, any links from anyone standing on top of the sphere that contains blogs.

Has anyone gone longer without getting hit by the man who has more spawn than a welfare recipient that has a jackhammer for a boyfriend?

Has anyone else been able to sustain themselves for as long as I have on such meager allotments of redistributed love? No food for me, thank you! Others are dependant on the teet that is traffic and relevance, while I toil and spin purely from strength from within (and Kyle who built and runs this site).

Ok, you mou might think that I use Kyle as a crutch, and that might be true, but I will climb Mount Everest with my crutch and I hope my crutch's wife allows him to take a few months off for the expedition, because you can't exactly climb that thing in a weekend. As a matter of fact, there are stories of people actually dying up there, so I think he'd better think about it more carefully than a whimsical, thoughtless reaction to go thrill-seeking with the world's foremost irrelevant blogger.

You think my self-importance is bad now? Ha! Wait till I've been up to 29,000 ft and made it back with my nose, limbs, and appendages still attached.

If, perhaps, I do end up losing a toe, I'd be an even more impressive force. Do you know of any bloggers currently writing with 9 toes? Do you know of any other blogger currently writing with 9 toes because of accidental frostbite on the world's tallest mountain?

Please send money now. I can build a new, bionic toe now in anticipation of losing it later. It will be molded just like the soon-to-be missing one--except without the hairy knuckles. I don't want to have a Hobbit starter kit. Plus, with your donations, you can send me to Europe with all ten toes for one last time. I have some friends that I want to visit and I'd like to treat them to some "escorts" in Prague. The dollar doesn't exactly buy what it used to there.

Thank you, and continue missing me until my next post.

A Special Week

So, self-importance is the topic this week, and I plan on indulging in plenty of it. As a matter of fact, since people think it is "funny" to devote an entire day to talking like a pirate, I find it more interesting to brag about accomplishments, or lack there of. Of course, if accomplishments are missing, I reserve the right to write paragraph after paragraph demonstrating how I've been &@^#ed. My friends, this is why we need an entire week.

I could entertain the thought of devoting an entire year on the concept, kind of like the Chinese calendar. This will be the year of self-importance, while next year will be the year of hysterical ranting. Last year was the year of hyperbolic context.

However, I don't have a year. Man, I ain't even got a minute, but my self-sacrifice for my readers surely is something that Jesus would do.

I was thinking of acknowledging others who demonstrate this spirit with impunity this week, but I don't think you guys can compete. My rhetorical flourishes, which dance like pixilated little fairies, are one of the purest forms of narcissitic art out there.

And when I mean "out there" I'm not referring to "blogosphere." Don't start me with on this whole "blogosphere" name--the only thing more unaesthetic is Rosie O'Donnell rolling in some paste with Marget Cho on a hot and humid Arkansas night. You think you've seen moquitos and flies swarm doggie-doo?

Welcome to self-importance week---brought to you by TF6S.

YES!

Finally. Division Champs!

Heads-up

Content is going to be light around here for the next few days as demands in the workplace are putting me under some time contraints that aren't conducive to writing about things that only 5-6 people will read. However, I do have a few meetings to sit in on that I'm sure will be so devoid of relevance, that I'll be forced to utilize my wireless card to bring you the irrelevant rich content you sooooo desire.

Anyway, one item of note must be acknowledged. Ian Wood, after 115 days on the road, limped into Santa Barbara on a flat tire to complete his adventure. As you've read here, he spent a while hanging out in the city that I have called home for six-years and essentially came to the same conclusion I did back in 2000: he is going to move here through a deliberate, conscious act of the will that coincides with something he wants to do, versus something he must do.

I am looking forward to reading the content he'll be providing that reads through the lines of what all of this did for him. He had some serious ups and downs, but ultimately, this trip provided him with some clarity and a vision for his future.

Then again, he spent a lot of time out here seeing how I really behave, so you might get some dirt on the TF6S lifestyle.

Crap.

Looking out for Number Two

I was talking to a friend (let's call him Paul) the other day about the perils of walking in San Francisco after dark.

San Francisco, but for a few parts of the city, is probably one of the safest American cities you can walk around alone in at night--that is, if you take out the pit bull maulings and the random crazy driver that ran over innocent pedestrians during rush hour. Maybe I'm a bit hardened, but living in Philadelphia has clearly increased the threshold for when my fight or flight response is triggered--and when I mean fight or flight, it almost always means running like a Haitian with a lunch ticket.

One summer that I was back home in Philadelphia from college, I was asked by a good friend (let's call him Sucker) to drop him off in the Kensington district of Philadelphia to volunteer at a summer camp for inner city kids. He'd never been there before, so naturally the director of the program gave him the 11:00 pm shift that would require him to navigate through parts of Philadelphia that look more like Beirut under the cover of complete darkness.

Mr. Director gave us these directions: "Take City Line, get off at the exit with the abandoned brick building that is falling in. Don't stop at the stop-light, or you'll probably get jacked."

"Jacked?" Sucker gulped.

"Yeah, but if you drive through the light, you'll be fine. They can't run faster than your car. Anyway, take this road all the way until you hit an empty parking lot, turn right and continue along the water until you hit our building. It's gray, and next to an empty loading dock."

So, with those paint by number directinons, we drove down City Line and, once we got to North Philly, every single exit had a building that looked like it either contained squatting crackwhores or snipers. We rolled the dice and got off by some empty building, ran through the red lights, and then ended up smack dab in the middle of what looked like filming for Boyz in the Hood: Part II. There were 40-50 people on the street with Cadillac lowriders, boomin' bass, and some girls with as much junk in their trunk as a Cadillacs they were sitting on.

When my friend and I pulled up into this soiree, we increased the "white people" headcount total to two.

Probably seeing our already white faces turn pail, some young man on the street noticed, looked in the car suspiciously and yelled, "Whitey!!!"

Once his friends turned around and started walking our way, using my finely honed "get the hell out of here" flight response, I threw my car in reverse and preceeded to run three red-lights--backwards--before getting pulled over by the police.

Sitting in the front seat still breathing hard, officer Philly soothingly walked up to my window and shouted, "What the f--k do you think your doing?"

"Um, I'm lost"

"No shit."

"Um, I was afraid they were going to ask me they could dance with my date. I would have had to turn over my friend."

"What are you doing here? Selling drugs."

"Nope, I'm dropping this guy," pointing to Sucker, "off at the youth center."

"Well, you's in the wrong neighborhood."

"Your confirmation is duly noted. I usually like to play a game called 'internal GPS,' where I use my five senses to try and figure out where I am. Using my sense of sight, I noticed the raging black men that were about to rip me limb from limb, which led me to conclude that we made a wrong turn."

What I actually said was, "Oh?"

Then he gave us further directions, none which either of us were paying attention to. We'd had enough of North Philly for the night and decided against helping children to go and do what all good suburban college kids do: drink beer.

Anyway, San Francisco doesn't quite have that kind of danger. There are plenty of homeless people, but while they might be batshit crazy, they don't exactly have the capability take you out in a fight, and if they had a gun they would have sold it for drugs faster than you can say PCP.

That doesn't mean there aren't perils to be aware of while walking the streets of San Francisco. "Paul" was walking from home a bar, and while he was looking into the window of a restaurant to see if some blond girl was looking back at him, he stepping in a massive pile of shit. The worst part is that it was wet and steamy, yet he still managed to hear a crunching sound when his foot found its way to the bottom of the pile.

Someone should contact the "Adopt-a-Landmine" folks, and tell them to add San Francisco to the list.

Anyway, if you are walking through the streets of San Francisco, make sure that you keep one eye on the ground, or you could very well end up with some very special, authentic "San Francisco Chocolate Mousse" on your shoes. I hope you had enough sense not to wear sandles.

Ontology of Threats: Islamists vs. the Soviets

Not that my opinion matters in this discussion among heavyweights, but Stephen Green and Glenn Reynolds have put forward some very thought provoking posts about the nature of the Islamists we are facing today.

Stephen Green offers a substantive disagreement to Glenn Reynolds's view of the level of danger posed by our current Islamist enemies:

It’s not often I disagree with Glenn Reynolds on an issue of substance, but in this case, the Instapundit couldn’t be more wrong. Read:

(ed: Glenn writes) To read some blogs today, you'd think that this was the 9th century, with camel-riding Jihadis ready to descend on helpless American towns, swinging unstoppable scimitars. It's not that way; it's more like the Ghost Dance or similar movements borne of frustration at losing, movements that do their damage all right, but that are doomed to fail. I don't mean to understate the threat, which is real enough. But it's not on the order of the Cold War, you know, and we won that one.
With the one tiny (and farfetched) possibility of instant and total nuclear annihilation, the stakes today are much, much higher than they ever were during the Cold War.

Imagine that the US and Western Europe had succumbed to the Soviet Union, anytime between 1948 and 1989. Did the West lose the Big Battle in World War III, with Spetsnaz paratroopers guarding the streets of Bonn, Paris, London, and Washington? Or did the West lose through a loss of will – ie, adopting Soviet Communism here at home, complete with GULAGs and Five Year Plans and all the rest? Either way, the result would be the same.

The Cold War was the Great Civil War of Western Civilization -- exactly like the Thirty Years War, only greater in scope. If the Russians had won, Western Civ would have gone on as before. Only, you know, a lot more repressed and a lot less rich. As it is, the West did win, and Russia is as Russia was except for that whiff of freedom they enjoy.

Hypotheticals are very instructive and can shed light on complex problems, but let me step back a bit here to point out that the Cold War history has been written. The score on that one ended up with Democracy/Capitalism defeating Totalitarianism/Communism. Nukes were not exchanged, but several proxy wars broke out in Korea, Vietnam, Afhghanistan, Central and South America, and even Eastern Europe if you count the brief attempts at revolution that were violently supressed by the Soviets. The death toll was significant, but almost nothing compared to the two World Wars or the American Civil War.

So far, the death toll in this war hasn't reached anything close to the Cold War, let alone blood baths that I mentioned above. However, the Islamists are not finished, and I think it is fair to compare their nature more to the Japanese on Iwo Jima--we will probably have to fight to the last man. Glenn and others are correct in pointing out that the Islamists are in no ways as sophisticated (ideologically, socially or technologically) as the Soviets were, but they have proven to be very schrewd in taking our technological advances and using them against us.

Now, back to the future, if you will. The ultimate hypothetical fear, of course, is a nuclear, biological or chemical attack on our homeland. Now, I'm not of the hysterical opinion that the moment the Iranians get the bomb, we can expect LA or New York to go up in a firey inferno shortly after, however, based on my assumption above, it is not too far fetched to think that over the course of the next fifty years, there will be an Islamist group that could conceivably end up with a few WMDs.

Kennedy was able to stare down Khrushchev in a game of nuclear blackmale, but I'm not so convinced that our Islamist enemies would be so willing to do the same. Mostly likely, if they did have the capability, they wouldn't advertise it for all the world to see to demonstrate power projection of their pseudo-proxy--it would be used as an offensive weapon just as they tactically used four hijacked airplanes.

If they were able to sneak one in, the casualty count could in an instant make the Cold War look like domestic spat over the remote control. In my opinion, it is more likely that an attack would occur against either Israel, a free Iraq (where the U.S. military is still actively concentrated), or somewhere in Europe versus the American homeland. Direct attacks on United States soil presents a lot of logistical problems that can be avoided.

Regardless of where and when, it is clear that the only deterrant to this threat is to send them to their 72-virgins before they can get a shot off. The mainstream media has negatively likened this to a "whack-a-mole" strategy, however the current administration has developed a policy that attacks the Islamists strategy. A resource poor organization who is logistically challenged now has to fight in their own backyard.

Tactically, we have many challenges, and it is made even more difficult by our culture that has been trained to expect the three-week Hail Mary solution to defeating an enemy. Mythical short-term solutions are a completely absurd way of defeating an enemy who refuses to compromise or be taken alive. Over time, we have more than enough capability to finish this off, but the West has to stay committed to a long-term fight.

While the Soviets were a much more powerful enemy who could have set a war off with a much more devestating loss of life, they didn't. The Islamists, on the otherhand, are only limited by capabiity, not by desire. If they gain even a fraction of what the Soviets achieved technologically, we could see the single biggest human catastrophe in history. So, based on this, I'll echo Stephen Green's thoughts and choose a good Cold War scrap any day of the week, and twice on Sunday, over those we are facing now.

9-11-01

I will never be the same.

I cannot forget.

I will not forget, no matter how much those who claim to know better say I should contextualize this moment.

But for a month's difference in timing, I might have been one of these people jumping from one horror to another. A final act of defiance against the mass murders whose ideology has grown and festered like a cancer on humankind.

I don't need impersonal, emotionally-driven candlelight vigils completely devoid of substance, or to be anesthetized by any other means. I want to remember in the rubble and in the images of that horrible day, my innocent friends and countrymen who were intentionally and needlessly slaughtered, and that there is a very real threat that is trying to make this happen again.

God, bless those who died, those who survived, their families and ultimately all who live in this country.

Please, never again.

Iran and the Cuban Missile Crisis - Kevin Drum Misinterprets/Rewrites History

Understanding leading indicators is a skill possessed by those whose actions can nromally be described as discerning. In the proceeding example, Kevin Drum quotes Andrew Sullivan as an authority. While I won't make any attempt whatsoever to argue for any regular discernment on my part, I will however note that I immediately knew that something stinky and treacherous would be the result.

Kevin insinuates and builds a strawman argument when he decries that right-wingers are nefariously building momentum towards war against Iran. He believes negotiations are a legitimate form of deterrance, and he uses the Cuban Missle Crisis as an example:

For conservatives, liberals, and everyone in between, Iran is really the crucial touchstone. It's one thing to say, in retrospect, that the Iraq war was wrong, and then to suggest that you've learned your lesson and now believe that there are more effective ways of fighting jihadism than bluster and invasion. But the rubber hits the road when you get down to cases. If you've learned your lesson, then why not apply those lessons to Iran?

It's a funny thing. Conservatives have a peculiar habit these days of viewing the Cold War through nostalgically rose-tinted glasses. At least life was simple back then. We had one enemy, and as bad as they were, they had interests. We could talk to them.

But this is just flatly wrong. When Krushchev banged his shoe at the UN and promised to bury us, we thought he meant every word of it. And plenty of people were convinced that it was useless to negotiate with such a regime. At the time, a lot of people viewed Krushchev and the Soviets exactly the way the neocons view Ahmadinejad and the Iranians today.

But guess what? JFK proved them wrong. We now know that he didn't stare down the lunatic Soviets during the Cuban Missile Crisis. He negotiated a deal with them, and it worked. Likewise, in Vietnam, anti-communist paranoia blinded us to the essentially nationalist nature of the war we were fighting there. Today we know that negotiations and support for fair elections probably could have worked.

Here is what actually happened in the Cuban Missle Crisis.

During the 1960 election, in which Kennedy was running against Nixon, one of the main issues was the "missle gap" between the United States and the Soviet Union. Although this missile gap was largely imaginary, Kennedy built his Cold War strategy around making sure that the United States increased its lead over the Soviets in the number of intercontinental missiles that could be ready to strike the Soviet Union in the event of war. This missile gap was very public and it was something the the Unites States was tipping the scales on.

The Soviets were definitely listening. According to them, the United States had some 300 intercontinental missiles that could strike the Soviet Union at any time, compared to about four or five intercontinetal missiles and 30 medium range missiles that they had (the Soviet Union would have to heavily rely on bombers to strike the U.S. mainland in the event of war--even then they were woefully short of the amount the U.S. had). Then they discovered that the United States had delivered medium range missles to Turkey that could strike Moscow in ten minutes. This revealed the dreaded "first strike" that would leave the Soviet Union in rubble before they could retaliate, and Nikita Khrushchev was under major pressure to do something.

The Soviets were reeling against the years of war and purging from Joseph Stalin and all the resources the Soviets could muster at that time were going towards domestic programs. Khrushchev realized that a missle race with the Unites States would drive his country into the ground economically, so he needed to find another way.

Fidel Castro had survived the bungled attempt by the United States to support a revolution to overthrow him. Ever concerned by another attempt of the United States to try again, he reached out to his Soviet parent for help in defending Cuba from a U.S. invasion. For Khrushchev he could neutralize the first-strike capability of the United States, while also providing a nuclear umbrella for an ally under threat.

Unfortunately for Khrushchev, the United States snapped a couple of photographs of the missile sites from a U2 that had been constructed by the Soviets. Although the United States could not definitively prove the existence of nuclear missiles, Kennedy knew their purpose and confronted the Soviets publically. He "quarantined" Cuba (diplospeak at the time for a blockade), and stated that any nuclear attack that orginated from Cuba would be considered a strike from the Soviet Union. Tensions were rising to a boil and the United States implicitly threatened to invade Cuba.

This is the nuclear gambit that Kennedy played. In the event of a full-on invasion, the US would have face 40,000 Cubans and close to 250,000 Soviet troops. Although they didn't know the total size of the force at the time, the U.S. knew that it would be a difficult task. Secondly, and most importantly, it was assumed that the Soviet commander would be authorized to launch tactical nuclear weapons in the event of invasion. If so, a full nuclear exchange would have occurred.

Khrushchev never intended a first strike, but only to close the current U.S. advantage. Kennedy appeared willing to go to war over it, and although Kennedy was absolutely certain of the consequences of such actions, Khrushchev called an end to the madness by offering to pull the missiles out of the Cuba in exchange for the promise by the United States not to invade Cuba. Additionally, they asked the U.S. to pull the missiles out of Turkey.

Kennedy agreed to both points and war was averted. However, the last demand, where he demanded that missiles threatening Moscow from Turkey were to be pulled out, was a brilliant move by Kennedy. The United States were soon to deploy ICBMs by submarine, and thus no longer needed forward bases in Turkey to deliver them. Kennedy gave Khrushchev a false bargaining chip without actually reducing U.S. capabilities.

Drum and many on the Left argue today that there is the magical realm of "diplomacy" that can be enacted in a vaccum where geopolitical players sit down and rationally hammer out win-win situations between each other. Kevin says that the right-wing continues to view every event through 1938 as a de-facto solution to going to war everytime someone pisses us off, and that it has been proven wrong through his false understanding of what actually happen during the Cuban Missile Crisis.

That is yet another strawman argument. Kennedy negotiated with the Soviets from a position of strength. The Soviets knew that a nuclear exchange at the time would have completely destroyed them, and whether or not they believed that Kennedy would actually invade Cuba (thus setting off WWIII), they couldn't take the chance because they would have lost. Kevin is absolutely wrong when he insunuates that Kennedy negotiated without any intention of going to war. Whether Kennedy would have done so or not doesn't matter (and is something that we can never know), the point is Khrushchev knew he was serious enough to realize the effort wasn't worth it, and that is what matters.

The Lesson of Munich is not a de-facto argument for war. It is an argument that says that some actors will not be deterred from agression without a real threat or an actual act of war. Kennedy acted within this principle during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and forunately, Khrushchev blinked.

In the situation of Iran, the objectives are much different. We are trying to make sure the Iran does not become a nuclear power in the region. A nuclear armed Iran allows them to entrench their position in the Middle East, and the world, to the point where any attempt to overthrow their government through any means can be met with a nuclear deterrant. Under the nuclear umbrella, Iran can continue their proxy wars in Lebannon, Iraq, and possibly even South America.

A point I would like Kevin and the Left is to agree upon is that, bottom-line, Iran mustn't be allowed to acheive nuclear capability. If there is agreement upon that, how do we go about it ensuring it? Unlike Kennedy's position with the Soviets, the United States does not have the superior geo-political or domestic backing to demand a cessation. Iran knows that the only way they can be stopped, is through force. They are determined to become nuclear capable because the benefits ensure the survival of their regime. They believe that the United States and their European allies do not have the political will to invade (while conversely, Khrushchev wasn't so sure). Regardless of all of Iran's bluster, they know that a full invasion by the United States would be catestrophic for them, but they are heavily betting that we won't do it.

So, from this position, how do we get Iran to effectively end their pursuit of "the bomb?"

The clock is ticking.

TF6S Joins "On the Road"

History is full of them--Lewis and Clark, John Wesley Powell, the Earp family, the Donner Party--people who've tired of their current existence, packed up, and headed West without necessarily knowing what was in store for them other than the hope for a better life.

My story is somewhat similar to the above pioneers--less the bear hunting, cannibalism, saloon shoot-outs and the need to avoid close hair-cuts from hostile Indian tribes. However, I did drive my '87 Chrystler Lebaron from Connecticut all the way to San Francisco with no A/C or struts and, due to my personal finances recovering from a month in Europe, I was forced to eat at every Taco Bell along the way. Dysentery and Cholera would have been much preferred to the permanent damage that was inflicted on my body from those "Runs to the Border."

My colon was weak, but my spirit was strong. I continued West knowing that there was something out here for me that I couldn't find back East, and if I had to push my '87 Lebaron over the Rockies to get there, I'd find a way (author's note: Taco Bell Chalupas are an adequate substitute for gasoline if you need to make a few miles to the next gas station).

For those that have been following the story, Ian Wood embarked on such a journey himself. Prior to last week, I only knew Ian through his blog posts and a handful of email correspondances. To me, he was always this smart guy who'd write and say things that were ten-to-twenty times more intelligent and funny than me, and since he was sleeping in tents under the stars for the last month, I thought it would be hospitable to hosted him and his two British tag-alongs, Rich and Tom, on their way through San Francisco.

And when I mean, "on their way through San Francisco," I mean stay for ten days. And when I mean "stay for ten days," I mean try to kill me with shots of Jagermeister at 1:30 in the morning. Seriously guys, the Taco Bell days have left my innards scared, and Jagermeister triggers the Post-Tramatic Stress Disorder associated with that experience.

Making a long-story much longer, within a few hours of arrival, Ian came to the conclusion that many have come to beforehand: he is going to pick-up all his stuff, move it here and settle down on the frontier.

Ultimately, why?

I think he found the same thing I found here: a culture of people who deliberately welcome others into their "circles." People who take the extra-step to make sure that you are part of everything regardless of what you supposidly "bring to the table," materially or socially. This was perfectly demonstrated when one of my friends, who had never met any of these lads before, baked a whole loaf of banana bread to send them off with this morning (she did proceed to drink copious amounts of 9% beer all night after delivering her package--this isn't Utah baby!).

Now that Ian is going to be a permanent fixture out here, we'll have to find someway to make sure that the Brits find some women who will take them in for a couple of green cards. Don't worry ladies, these guys go down much better than Taco Bell.

Gentlemen, until next time, good luck, safe traveling and know that you'll always have a place in San Francisco to crash if you want learn how to speak the English language properly.

Cheerio!

Into the Toolshed

Bill Mahr is a comedian. When I mean comedian, I mean sef-righteous, dirtbag, monkey-f@#$er who eats babies instead of ham and cheese sandwiches.

So in the spirit of everything pro-fascist, watch this. It's sensational, but if you've heard enough Bill Mahr, you'd know that he seems to have a special place in heart for the terrorists he praised as brave after September 11th.

Listen also to how the crowd laps it up--not like a cat drinking milk, but more like a dog eating peanut butter. They think they're getting the yummies, but it only serves to prove that the one feeding them is making them look like a bigger jackass.

At least he can bring his hair gel...

Corporate Donkey Shows

Ok, I kinda lied--I'm back, but only briefly. I happen to be a passive participant in probably the most inane and positively ridiculous conference calls in the history of corporate existence (read: calling in and saying, "uh-huh, yep, possibly, maybe later and probably not" at seemingly random intervals, while everyone else marks their territories and continue with the genital measuring contest). Well, God gave mankind two things I that has saved my ass today: coffee and wireless internet, and for that I owe my eternal gratitude.

So, in this meeting, eight alpha males (of who, six have advanced degrees) have to come up with an urgent solution to a problem:

Harvard Guy: I don't believe you are qualified to make that statement.
Princeton Guy: You asked for my opinion.
Harvard: For three years I have been asking your opinion and, given your recent promotion, I figured it would count for something.
Princeton: Whoever said my opinion counted for something was operation under the same false assumptions that allowed you to get into and graduate from Havard.
Harvard: Lemme get this straight, you are saying (insert arcane reiteration of exactly what Princeton said that has no relevence to anyone who wasn't in the room ).
Princeton: Um, sure, if you want to reduce it to it's simplest form, but I believe the way I aritculated was a bit more colorful through the use of words with multiple syllables and metaphors that give dimensionality to this abstract concept of which I was trying to give understanding.
Harvard: So we agree?
Princeton: I think.
Me: Uh-huh...

The urgent problem we are trying to solve is what kind of food and booze we want have for our monthly, departmental "party." This should be a conference call that takes 5 minutes, everyone talks about how beer and margaritas are awesome and that we should buy lots of it to share with our co-workers who work so hard during the week. Instead, it has degraded into yet another contest about whose wee-wee protrudes farther from his lower abdominal region than the other Ivy League guy. After the smoke cleared, the conversation turned to me:

Harvard: You went to Indiana, you are probably better versed throwing parties within budget than we are. What can we get for $500?
Me: 25 lap dances or, since the "party" has a Mexican theme, how about 250 donkey shows?
Princeton: How about 10 donkey shows, and 24 lap dances? One time in my fraternity we...
Me: Uh-huh...yep...uh-huh...

One-hour and seven-minutes later, beer and margaritas it was.