Aces Wired, Sheriff Bush Calls Hand

"You've got to know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em
Know when to walk away, know when to run.
You never count your money when you're sittin' at the table.
There'll be time enough for countin' when the dealin's done.
Kenny Rogers, "The Gambler"

Sheriff Bush, much like Wyatt Earp, just itchin' to disarm Ike Clanton and his boys, told the world last night that "it's time for people to show their cards, let the world know where they stand when it comes to Saddam."

Very boldly, perhaps the only unpredictable moment of the entire press conference, was Bush's announcement that he's ready to re-live the gunfight at OK Corral, that regardless of the vote on a UN resolution, he is doing whatever he wants, which is clearly, chosing the path of maximum confrontation.

I'm confident the American people understand that when it comes to our security, if we need to act, we will act, and we really don't need United Nations approval to do so.

(That's right George! You don't need no stinkin' international bodies committed to preserving peace through international cooperation and collective security if they aren't going to do your bidding! )

As Bush succinctly pointed out last night:

"They could have showed up at a parking lot and he could have brought his weapons and destroyed them." A parking lot? What is this, West Side Story? Bernardo and Riff, the Sharks and the Jets meeting up in the parking lot at midnight for a rumble?

Last night's spectacle was billed as a "press conference". True enough, it had all the frippery of a press conference: it was, in essence, an interview held for news reporters by a political figure, but like much in the Bush Administration, it followed the letter but not the spirit of a press conference. The fact that the reporters who got to ask the questions were selected in advance underscores once again, for those not paying attention, the desperate need of Bush handlers for message management.

"In this case, we know what the questions are going to be, and those are the ones we want to answer," Communications director Dan Bartlett said.

Bush was given a memo consisting of about 50 possible topics with suggested answers. Then his most senior aides gathered around his desk in the Oval Office and fired practice questions at him.

There were an assortment of uneasy moments as Bush fumbled with how to put even his simplest, most repetetive phrases in order for the public. There were frequent gaps of speech, a groping for even familiar slogans which was not at all like the intellectual pauses of someone paging through a vast repertoire of ideas but rather someone attempting to recall memorized passages in the middle of an oral exam. And there were also moments when, after a particularly rough effort, you could see a wave of relief flooding over his face, as though he'd succeeded at putting another one over on everyone.

This is not to imply that he isn't sincere. Just that he's sincere in a very simplistic way, like the sincerity of a dog. He has no trouble reminding us that liberty is "God's gift to each and every person". He has no trouble sincerely expressing his belief, however unsubstantiated and misguided, that Saddam presents a threat to the safety of Americans. He revels in expressing his belief that he's given Saddam enough time. And he appears to sincerely believe he is doing all Americans a favor by presenting us with this war, even though the majority of America and the world, especially without the UN stamp of approval, is against it.

"My job is to protect America, and that's exactly what I'm going to do. People can ascribe all kinds of intentions. I swore to protect and defend the Constitution. That's what I swore to do. I put my hand on the Bible and took that oath. And that's exactly what I am going to do."

This the kind of disingenuous rhetoric Bush and his Administration excel at. Meaningless palaver designed to persuade a torporific population of somnambulists, with a combination of old-school religious piety and moral righteousness.

"I pray for peace. I pray for peace." he said. Did he have to repeat it because even to him, the first time sounded too ridiculous to fathom? These are the kind of follow-up questions a real press conference would have had. Could you elaborate on this theory of Peaceful Violence of yours, Mister President?

One thing I'm beginning to understand is why the members of the Bush Administration keep saying the same things over and over again. It's because those pesky reporters keep asking the same damned questions over and over again! Questions like: "Why do you continue to try and link Saddam Hussein to 9/11 when there is no evidence of it?" and "Why don't you care that the majority of the world population disagrees with your gut assessment of the threat level of Saddam Hussein?" and "How much is this war going to cost Americans?"

These questions are just an impediment to the real issue at hand which is war with Saddam. As Our Fearless Leader said last night, from the very beginning, that the primary issue for attacking Iraq is:

(Please turn your hymn books to UN Resolution 1441 and join me in song):

"Has the Iraqi regime fully and unconditionally disarmed, as required by Resolution 1441, or has it not?"

And if you don't like that one, there's always the multiple choice menu to choose from:

Saddam Hussein:
A.) Has a long history of reckless aggression and terrible crimes.
B.) Possesses weapons of mass destruction
C.) Refuses to disarm
D.) Tortures and gasses his own people.

There you have it.

This is in essence, the highlight of the disingenuous sort of Luke Skywalker/Darth Vader Zoroastrianism that Bush engages us with. You are with us or you are against us. You will disarm or we will disarm you. The UN Security Council will obey our desires or the UN Security Council will cease to have any useful function for us. Saddam is Evil, the Bush Administration is Good.

In some ways, this disconnected logic seems so simple even President Bush seems to understand it. I'm shocked the rest of the world doesn't yet.

Bulgaria, The Forgotton Ally?

"Diplomacy is the art of saying 'Nice doggie' until you can find a rock." --Will Rogers

With the foreign ministers of France, Russia and Germany issuing a joint statement yesterday stating they would not "let a proposed resolution pass that would authorize the use of force.", the meretricious and splenetic Bush Administration has become increasingly isolated in the world over its determination to topple the Iraqi government.

Administration officials have said they expect a Security Council vote on a new United Nations resolution authorizing an invasion of Iraq by the end of next week but to date, only the resolution's sponsors (The U.S., England and Spain) and Bulgaria currently are committed to vote yes.

You might wonder, as Desultory Turgescence did, what possible motive could Bulgaria have in voting for war? Maureen Dowd of the New York Times has already had her fun at the expense of the Bulgarians, opining that the United States "dragoon Bulgaria to offset France dragooning Cameroon," so we have an idea of why the Bush Administration is so suddenly infatuated, but Bulgarians must also be asking themselves, as they like to in the Red Mafia, "What's in it for me?"

Are they still pissed off about the rule of the Ottoman Empire? Are they looking to jeopardize their chances at EU membership or bolster their pending 2004 NATO membership? Are they still angry they didn't qualify for the 2002 World Cup? Or, hmmm, could it have something to do with the United States granting Bulgaria the coveted economic status of "market economy" which will protect Bulgarian companies from charges that they are selling products in the United States at an unfairly low price, a practice known as dumping? Even without the UN resolution vote, Bulgaria has received more than $420 million from the U.S. government in the last decade.

Any number of reasons are possible. Besides increasing aid to Bulgaria, the Bush Administration has already pledged to see to it that Iraq pays its outstanding debts to Bulgaria in the post-Saddam period which amount to $1.7 billion.

According to Bulgarian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lyubomir Todorov, upon membership in NATO, the moving of US military bases to Bulgaria would be a natural result of NATO enlargement. Bulgarian Defense Minister Nikolai Svinarov said that if US military bases were established in Bulgaria, the redeployment of US troops from Germany to Bulgaria would be very likely.

In addition, Bulgarian support of the United States could potentially come at a price for the Black Sea port of Bourgas. Iraqi charge d'affaires in Sofia Yahia Salih Mahdi said in Bourgas on Wednesday. "All US bases across the world will be targets of our strikes. The true Muslim has to choose between victory and death," He added that seven million people have been armed and prepared to defend Iraq. In his opinion, the probable strikes against Iraq might begin from Burgas where US troops are being stationed.

The Bulgarian Foreign Minister Solomon Passy harshly criticized Mahdi, saying "I think that all ambassadors who are accredited in Bulgaria have to carefully measure their words and to limit them to the diplomatic tone," Passy commented before the regular weekly meeting of the Council of Ministers on Thursday.

So yes, there are plenty of incentives for Bulgaria to side with the Bush Administration. However, before Americans start memorizing the poetry of Ivan Vazov or learn the words to the Bulgarian national anthem, it should be remembered that this isn't the first time Bulgaria has sided with a country in its efforts of war.

In 1941, in return for promises from the Third Reich of gaining back the ever-desirable Macedonian lands, Bulgaria sided with the Nazi and Axis powers. However, much to their credit, Bulgaria's wartime government refused to hand over its 50,000 Jewish citizens to the Nazis in 1943 despite its military alliance with Germany. In fact, tomorrow, the Bulgarian National Bank will issue 2000 silver coins to mark the occasion of 60th anniversary of the rescue of 48,000 Bulgarian Jews.

The next thing the Bulgarian government may need to rescue is themselves. A February 11 Gallup International poll found that only 28% of Bulgarians support a war against Iraq, even if endorsed by the UN Security Council and unless the financial appreciation of the Bush Administration starts pouring in soon, Bulgarians may not be too interested in what their government has to say much longer.

Don't Worry, Be Happy

The latest EU figures from the European Commission's biannual Eurobarometer survey, released on Tuesday, show that 47% of Swedes and 43% of Brits believe their lives will improve in 2003.

Portugal and Greece are the most miserable countries, with 39% and 26% of their respective populations believing that their life will only get worse in the coming year.

Desultory Turgescence reports that ironically, those countries with the most miserable and gloomy outlooks of their future also happen to be the favorite vacation spots of the Brits and the Swedes.

And, as Charles Dickens wrote in David Copperfield regarding the best barometer of happiness and misery: "Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure nineteen six, result happiness. Annual income twenty pounds, annual expenditure twenty pound ought and six, result misery."

In a nod toward the recuperative powers of Gouda kaas and tulips, according to the Eurobarometer, 56% of the Dutch people think that the quality of life will remain near the same, 29% think that it will get better and 9% believe that it will worsen.

On a brighter note, while 69% of the Dutch are afraid of international terrorism, 75% of the Dutch do not fear a conventional or nuclear war in Europe.

48% of the Dutch has the opinion that it is a good thing that the Euro replaced the national currency, 34% finds this a bad thing. Luxembourg, Belgium and Ireland are still the euro's biggest fans, with 89%, 81% and 80% of the respective populations in support.

No word yet on the percentage of Europeans who fear that a tyrannical, flesh-eating Bush War Machine will spell their ultimate demise and doom the planet to a veritable Dante's Inferno for eternity.

Godless Communists and Pledging Allegiance

"America is a nation ... that values our relationship with the Almighty. We need commonsense judges who understand that our rights were derived from God." -- George Bush, Head Theurgist and current President of the United States of America

Amid deafening squeals of protest from a conflux of conservative politicians, their knee-jerk sycophants, a teeming troupe of false patriots and the ever-maladroit Bush Misadministration, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has decided to let stand its controversial ruling that the schoolhouse ritual of reciting the Pledge of Allegiance is unconstitutional. The decision will take effect Monday in nine lucky Western states: Alaska, Arizona, California, Hawaii, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, Oregon and Washington.

"A profession that we are a nation 'under God' is identical, for Establishment Clause purposes, to a profession that we are a nation 'under Jesus,' a nation 'under Vishnu,' a nation 'under Zeus,' or a nation 'under no god,' because none of these professions can be neutral with respect to religion," Senior Judge Alfred Goodwin wrote.

"The government should not link religion and patriotism," said the Rev. Barry W. Lynn, Americans United Executive Director. "An individual can express love of country regardless of his or her religious or philosophical outlook."

And if you don't believe them, you could always consult Thomas Jefferson, the third President of the United States of America, who wrote:

"Believing with you that religion is a matter which lies solely between man and his God; that he owes account to none other for his faith or his worship; that the legislative powers of the government reach actions only, and not opinions, I contemplate with sovereign reverence that act of the whole American people which declared that their legislature should `make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof," thus building a wall of separation between church and State."

Sacramento, California physician Michael Newdow, an avowed atheist, had filed the case on behalf of his elementary school-aged daughter arguing that she should not have to hear the words "under God" in her teacher's daily recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance required by state law.

The original pledge was written by a Baptist socialist minister, Francis Bellamy, in 1892, and was first published in a magazine called the Youth's Companion.

It was only more than 60 years later, in 1954, that Congress, at the height of a paranoid anti-communist McCarthy period, added the words "under God". The move followed a campaign by the Knights of Columbus, a rightwing Catholic organisation which wanted to distinguish the US from the Soviet Union and its "Godless communism."

Not surprisingly, the increasingly paranoid "everybody is a potential terrorist" Bush Administration immediately condemned the decision:

"The Justice Department will spare no effort to preserve the rights of all our citizens to pledge allegiance to the American flag." declared a deeply disturbed Attorney General John Ashcroft, taking time out from his industrious crusade against domestic terrorism which recently arrested 55 menacing terrorists across the United States for selling bongs, pipes and other paraphernalia. "We will defend the ability of Americans to declare their patriotism through the time-honored tradition of voluntarily reciting the Pledge."

The increasingly hysterical business news rag posing as a chronicle of political thought, the Wall Street Journal, noted: "We can hope the Supreme Court eventually reverses this judicial invention, but until then schoolkids in the nine states covered by the Circuit will be barred from reciting the Pledge after March 10. This is a splendid message to send just as U.S. troops are about to go to war to defend the principles the Pledge extols,"

Michael Gulden, principal at Barbara Comstock Morse Elementary School, said teachers haven't explained to the students yet what the ruling means.

"I don't think a lot of kids would understand,'' he said. ''For older kids, it's something they've done every day since they started school.''

Indeed. Just imagine how emotionally scarred these poor kids are going to be when we let on that Santa Claus doesn't grade their term papers and the Easter Bunny will no longer be running their gym class.

As The World Turns

"When I woke up this morning my girlfriend asked me, 'Did you sleep good?' I said 'No, I made a few mistakes."
--Steven Wright

Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was captured Saturday while sleeping in an apartment near the Pakistani capital of Islamabad. It's unclear how how anyone recognized him given that the FBI photos showed Mohammed as thin, bearded and balding while the photograph taken after his capture shows a middle-aged, fat and apishly hairy man.

In fact, the more I looked at the front page photographs of the captured man the FBI claims is Mohammed, the more I began to believe that the FBI hadn't captured Khalid Shaikh Mohammed at all, they'd just busted Ron Jeremy, the star of Porn Star, a feature film that explores the life of the world’s most unlikely sex star. If you rousted Ron Jeremy out of bed in the middle of the night, bleary-eyed and hung over after yet another drug and alchohol plagued premiere party and dressed in giant open-necked nightshirt, I'm pretty sure he'd look just as that guy does on the cover of the Daily News this morning.

In fact, lending perhaps even a sliver more doubt to this raucous claim of an arrest histrionically billed by Florida Congressman Porter Gross as "the equivalent of the liberation of Paris in the Second World War", is the notice by The Memory Hole that the same guy they claimed to have captured Saturday was also claimed to have been killed last year.

Perhaps more interesting was the report by Newsweek that an al Qaeda operative now in custody told investigators that at one point Mohammed had planned to blow up bridges and gas stations in New York and Washington with operatives stealing or hijacking tanker trucks and crashing them into fuel pumps at gas-stations while other terrorists would slash the suspension cables on bridges. I hate to downplay the kind of chaos, death and destruction that crashing tanker trucks into gas stations would cause but after reading this I immediately and naturally wondered a few things:

1. What ever happened to all these Weapons of Mass Destruction that every terrorist allegedly carries with them like condoms in the backpocket wallets of teenagers? Aren't we all supposed to be slinking around in our gas masks and chemical suits with every orafice duct-taped and sealed every time we step outside to avoid these chemical and biological attacks? If they've got all these WMDs, why would they resort to driving trucks into gas stations like some B movie stunt?

2. What the hell kind of cutting device would they need to slash suspension cables on bridges? It's not like these are simple nylon ropes and it's not like they can stand there on a bridge with a big butcher knife and start chopping away at the cables without attracting a little attention.

*****Look At Me! Look At Me!*****

Did anyone else notice, in all the excitement about al-Qaeda captures and missile destructions and Turkish Parliament, that back in North Korea, Kim Jong Il was sounding a little too much like Marvin the Martian warning Bugs Bunny to "brace yourself for immediate disintegration" as he threatened on Saturday that nuclear war could break out on the peninsula at ''any moment,'' and warned of ''nuclear disasters'' around the world?

What does this poor bastard have to do to get some attention? He has thumbed his nose at the Bush Administration, kicked out UN inspectors, started up his Yongbyon reactor, tested equipment that reprocesses spent-fuel rods and now threatens the world with nuclear war and still he can't get anyone to take him seriously. I guess he'll have to start passing out weapons-grade plutonium to terrorists like candy to trick or treaters on Halloween before he can distract those cagey visionaries in the White House.

*****Good Night Iraq*****

Over the weekend, Iraq destroyed 10 Al-Samoud II missiles, continued to destroy more today and said it would hand over a report about its unilateral destruction of anthrax and VX nerve agent. To the average human, this might indicate a modicum of cooperation in the effort to make them disarm but not to the Bush Administration.

"I think when you summarise Iraq's statement, that in principle they will destroy their missiles, the Iraqi actions are propaganda wrapped in a lie, inside a falsehood," DT's favorite White House comedian Ari Fleischer responded.

Apparently running out of original quips and slogans, Fleischer is now resorting to ripping off Winston Churchill to elucidate his indefatigably recurrent points. For those of you whose memories aren't as finely tuned as Ari's, Winston Churchill's famous 1939 description of Russia was "a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma."

Not surprisingly, Baghdad is warning that the process of destroying their missiles and cooperating with the UN may stop if it becomes clear the United States intends to attack Iraq regardless of whether it gets backing from the U.N. Security Council. IF it becomes clear? I don't know how much clearer it could be that the Bush Administration intends on attacking Iraq regardless of anything Iraq does. Hussein could destroy all his weapons, convert all his palaces into McDonalds drive-thrus, teach the Iraqi people the Pledge of Allegiance, and offer to do the chicken dance for everyone at the next White House Christmas Party and the Bush Administration would still invade Iraq.

*****The Arab Street*****

There's so much talk about "The Arab Street" these days you'd think it was the premiere of another reality TV show. Everytime these political talking heads begin immoderately declaiming The Arab Street in hallowed and reverential terms, I wonder why, if The Arab Street is so powerful and influential, they're the ones in the street while the others are still sitting around getting rich in their glass palaces and floating on billion dollar yachts.

Finally, if Turkey is any example, The Arab Street can claim a little success. As the Turkish parliament debated a government motion to allow some 62,000 U.S. troops to deploy into Turkey, more than 50,000 protesters chanted ``No to war'' and sang anti-war songs less than a mile away in an Ankara square, in one of the largest protests yet against a conflict in Iraq. The Turkish parliament rejected the motion and this morning, Turkey's stock exchange dropped by 11.3 percent within the first minutes of opening and its currency, the lira, dipped by about 5 percent to 1,670,000 to the dollar.

If this is any corollary of what street protest does to a stock exchange, given the performance of the Dow Jones over the last two and a half years, you'd think the American Street was already so choked with beatniks, flower children and protesters there wouldn't be room left for any SUVs to pass.

I'm Sorry Ari But We Need A Little More

"But think about the implications of what you're saying. You're saying that the leaders of other nations are buyable. And that is not an acceptable proposition." Ari Fleischer, February 25, 2003 White House press briefing.

It would be quite possible for Desultory Turgescence to devote itself solely to the insidious sophistry of its favorite White House houseboy, the philistine contagion of deceit and circumvention of Ari Fleischer. A daily comb through the text of his press briefings alone could produce a virtual encyclopedia of malicious revilement of the principles of democratic openness too voluminous to register by mere humans.

His lack of candor, whether by Presidential dictate or sheer obstinance, is, as Russell Mokhiber and Robert Weissman point out, too much to take any more. If you read the daily text of the White House press briefings, you see an expanding hostility in the questioning, a perpetuating pugnacity in the reporters themselves, many of whom appear to have grown weary of this thimblerigging of the truth.

But perhaps it is all a haute comédie the average peasant is to unsophisticated to understand. By example, from yesterday's press conference:

QUESTION: "Ari, how much is this war going to cost?"

MR. FLEISCHER: "That will depend on a number of factors, many of them up to Saddam Hussein and to Saddam Hussein's henchmen. If Saddam Hussein and his henchmen do not follow orders, if they don't follow their orders from Saddam Hussein, that can lead to one scenario. And so it is too soon to say with precision how much this war will cost."

What? Listening to Ari Fleischer's responses is like pulling the cord of a Mrs. Beasley doll. I think she had a gamut of about 10 different prerecorded phrases that were repeated over and over no matter how many times you pulled her cord. Ari Fleischer is very similar. No matter how many times and how many different ways a specific question is asked, he delivers the same, patented reply:

Ari, what's the weather going to be like today?
That depends on Saddam Hussein and his henchmen.

Ari, what color are your eyes?
It all depends on whether or not Saddam Hussein fully complies with UN resolutions.

Ari, do you love your mother?
I think this question is best addressed to Saddam Hussein because he has failed to disarm and I cannot be responsible for what happens should he continue to violate the terms of the UN resolutions and fails to disarm.

Ari, do you believe in God?
That all depends on whether Saddam Hussein follows exactly what the Security Council has mandated in the 17 different resolutions.

Actually, it's quite possible that Mrs. Beasley has more response options at her disposal than Ari Fleischer.

*****
The question I would really like to see addressed these days is where is my payoff?

I see that countries like Turkey, Jordan, Israel, Kuwait are demanding payoffs to support this war against Iraq. The cost of buying a coalition is getting exorbitant. Even countries like Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea, Mexico and Pakistan are getting in on the act, not to mention what that timely show of support from the "New Europe" is going to cost in the end. The United States is sending billions of taxpayer dollars to countries like Spain and Turkey, where more than 90 percent of the people oppose the war. We bribe their governments to turn against the will of their own people.

Doesn't the Bush Administration want Desultory Turgescence's support for the war? If so, they'd better prepare themselves because it's going to cost them. If a country of slackers like Turkey can get a multi-billion dollar aid package just to consider helping the United States, imagine the kind of aid package Desultory Turgescence has coming to it for its unwavering editorial support for such a haphazard and jumbled war effort as the one currently being birthed out of the Bush Administration.

And while we're calculating all of that, I'm going to work on some new phrases for Ari Fleischer to repeat, attempt to expand his vocabulary beyond the simple parroting he has already clearly mastered. In addition, I'm going to teach him how to take his concentration a step further than simply repeating a mantra by showing him how to concentrate on his breathing. With time and practice I'm sure we can increase the amount of time Ari can exist in this peaceful state of meditation and get his mind off of his unhealthy obsession with Saddam Hussein.

It's A Wonderful Life (for everyone but Saddam)

Well, you can't say ole Dubya isn't full of surprises. Last night, settling in for his hastily announced speech, I expected the same bromidic screed as always. You know: the whole WMD thing, the Saddam tortures and gasses his own people thing, the Saddam is ignoring our bellicose warnings and has to be punished thing, how Georgie is normally a peaceful sort of frat boy who doesn't like killing but in this case, there just isn't a choice because he is on a mission from God thing, etc.

Instead, I found myself listening to some sort of wide-eyed hippy idealist. Could this be the same Bushmaster we've grown to fear and admire? I almost expected him to have a flower tucked behind his ear and psychodelic strobe lights playing behind him as he spoke about how knocking off Saddam was going to liberate the Iraqi people into this new Magic Kingdom of Democracy and peace and love and happiness, and how knocking off Saddam would bring a spellbinding potion of political reform in the Middle East and how knocking off Saddam could even bring peace to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict!.

By George, after listening to that delicious parable of Pollyannaism, I was almost convinced there isn't anything within the imagination that couldn't be rectified by the elimination of Saddam Hussein.

Of course, before we start spreading this oleo of peace and democracy, it should be remembered there's always the possibility that despite their billions of dollars of bombs, Saddam might escape, run out on his check without paying like bin-Laden did. In fact, ABC reports on the possibility that if an attack appears likely, Saddam Hussein might actually head for the desert using camels for transport and surrounded only by a handful of his most-trusted confidants.

And no one should find it surprising that the powder keg of the Middle East the Bush Administration is so eager to light, could just as easily lead to disaster, heightened regional pressure could trigger escalating violence on both sides, a new wave of terrorism, and increased instability throughout the region. Groovy George reminded us instead that the United States had a moral responsibility to liberate people ensnared by Hussein's "nightmare world" of tyranny, and said it was in the nation's self-interest to depose him.

I for one, am thoroughly convinced. I can't wait to get to Baghdad and have my first freedom-loving Starbucks Frapuccino and deliciously democratic McDonalds Big Mac on old Rashid Street. And gee whiz Uncle George, if we kill Saddam, can we really have peace, love and happiness in the Middle East? Hoo boy! I can hardly wait!

And I know those liberal types have been venting their splenetic sagas about how only the big shot oil barons are going to make money like water gushing out of a bidet, but frankly, I see no reason why the rest of us shouldn't try to get in on the profits of democracy.

For those smart enough not to bet on Saddam's survival, it was noted in the Sydney Morning Herald today that alarm clocks, fountain pens, cigarette lighters, watches, plates and golden medallions, all bearing Saddam's unmistakable features, are up for grabs - while stocks last and of course, the buyers and sellers of Baghdad are collectively betting on the memorabilia becoming collectors' items soon.

The SMH reported that "Mohammed Mardan, 34, sold his last two Saddam watches on Wednesday. One bore the President's beaming features beside a red heart, another beside a blue one. Last year he sold these watches for $16. Now his asking price is £47. He has sold an average of three Saddam watches every day this year, about twice the rate of last year."

Sadly, few on eBay seem to have taken adventage of this potential boon in Saddam memorabilia. There are a few "Butcher of Baghdad" watches and some dinar notes for sale but nothing in the way of Saddam cigarette lighters.

And listen, as most of us already know, a piece of memorabilia has alot more value when it is personally autographed. So if any of you out there know how to get ahold of Saddam before he is removed, let me know. I've got a few Saddam alarm clocks and cigarette lighters I'd like him to sign.

Another Page In The Novel Of CNN's Irrelevance

No, it wasn't enough for the suits at CNN to encourage their news anchors to pepper their news reports with hip-hop slang in order to gain a wider mass appeal. Now, of their own volition, they will also cater to the lap dogs of censorship.

CNN has come out with a new document entitled "Reminder of Script Approval Policy".

What this new policy outlines is that CNN's system of "script approval" – the iniquitous instruction to reporters that they have to send all their copy to anonymous officials in Atlanta to ensure it is suitably sanitized– does the Pentagon's job of censorship for them and to reassure the Pentagon that there is no cause for concern about the news coming from the battlefield.

What it means is that no scripts or reports for CNN will be done without explicit approval from the Dogs of Censorship at CNN headquarters in Atlanta. All reporters preparing package scripts must submit the scripts and any editing they've performed for approval by the "script editors" in Atlanta who can insist on changes or "balances" in the reporter's dispatch. Note also that CNN revealed after the 1991 Gulf War that it had allowed Pentagon "trainees" into the CNN newsroom in Atlanta.

So before you get all hopped up on the potential of honest coverage of the war while reading these sentimental accolades of how journalists are being trained and imbedded with troops in order to give us first hand coverage, remember that, if you are getting your news on CNN anyway, the yes men in Atlanta have final script approval, not the poor bastards actually "in" the war with a first-hand account.

*****

Yesterday, the NRC Handelsblad newspaper out of Rotterdam published a "War Sonnet" by Gerrit Komrij, the Dutch Poet Laureate. Below is the text in Dutch and, for the purpose of clarity, a Desultory Turgescence exclusive English translation, uncensored by CNN.

Oorlogssonnetje

Loert daar geen terrorist achter het raam?
Ik hoorde het in de keuken ook al tikken.
Ik droom van mullah, mohammed, imam
En van de minste windstoot moet ik schrikken -

Een losse dakpan of een arabier?
Ik slorp het nieuws op. De tv staat warm.
Ik ben nerveus. Ik heb niet echt plezier -
Ik ben de gijzelaar van vals alarm.

De heren worden stichtelijk bedankt.
Ze stampvoeten en zijn alleen nog zoet
Als er ten minste één sirene jankt.

Wie speelt het in zo'n kleuterklasje klaar
Een oorlog af te wenden die al woedt?
Doe nu je oorlog maar, papkind, doe maar.

War Sonnet

Is a terrorist peering from behind the window?
I also heard him tapping in the kitchen.
I dream of mullahs, mohammed, imam
And am frightened by the slightest gust of wind.

A loose roof tile or an Arab?
I absorb the news. The tv is warm.
I am nervous. I have no true pleasure.
I am a hostage to false alarms.

The men shall be devoutly thanked.
They stamp their feet but are as gentle
as at least one siren howling.

Who does the job, in such a little child's class,
to evade a war that already rages?
Have your war now daddy's boy, have your war.

Let's Debate the Debate Idea

So, Saddam Hussein says he is “ready to conduct a direct dialogue — a debate" — with our president. “I will say what I want and he will say what he wants.” Hussein told CBS News during a three-hour interview Monday in Baghdad. Hussein, in issuing the challenge for an international television and radio debate via satellite, said: "As leaders, why don't we use this opportunity?"

Indeed, why not? It would certainly be more entertaining than the last several presidential debates, the rope-a-dope tactics of two candidates bucking for public approval without sticking their proverbial feet in their mouths.

I don't know why not, but for some reason, CBS News anchor Dan Rather, the hornswoggler who interviewed Saddam, never advised him that for all intents and purposes, he's already heard everything George Bush wants to say. The 296 or so word vocabulary of the President of the United States has been exhausted and in the midst of preparing for war, there just isn't time at the moment for vocabulary building flashcards. It is possible however, that if he is allowed to string lexigrams together, he might be able to muster a more imaginative debate.

For Saddam's part, I have to wonder does he even speak English? Yes, we know he likes to watch TV, monitoring the Iraqi stations he controls and also CNN, Sky, al Jazeera, and the BBC. We also know that in recent years he appears to have written and published two romantic fables, Zabibah and the King and The Fortified Castle as well as a book of Saddamisms. But I think for Bush's sake, there should be a linguistic handicap for Saddam. No translators allowed for Hussein.

And so, if it were to come to pass, I don't think it should be done by satellite hook-up. I want to see both of these guys, Saddam and Dubya standing side by side. I want to see whether or not they shake hands as they meet at center stage, whether Bush lets one of his little smirks loose and whether or not Hussein insists that Bush, for the purposes of personal hygiene, greet him by smelling his armpits, as we learned in Uncle Saddam.

In order for neither man to have an advantage due to jet lag and for the purposes of finding a non-partisan venue, the debate should be held in Reykjavik.

Of course, a debate is not half as appealing as the duel Bush was challenged to before. But just as in the case of the suggested duel, the White House's pestiferous and presumptuous little dachshund of a press secretary, Ari Fleischer, rejected the notion of a debate, saying it was “not a serious statement.”

Personally, I think they're just "misunderestimating" Saddam's sincerity.

Nevertheless, I couldn't help but imagine the opening scene in the 300 seat conference hall of the Grand Hotel in Reykjavik:

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN: In this corner, standing 6'2 and weighing in at 225 pounds, dressed in a fedora and a dark custom-tailored suit behind a desk spread with white lilies, the rifle-toting and blood-thirsty Butcher of Baghdad, Saddam Hussein!

And in this corner, standing 6 feet even and weighing in at 192 pounds, dressed in the robes of compassionate conservatism; a dark suit, white shirt, and red tie, the peace-seeking, bible-thumping President of the U-nited States of America, George Walker Bush.

Imagine, if you can, that scene in Beneath the Planet of the Apes when General Ursus gives his big speech to his fellow gorilla soldiers calling for an invasion of the Forbidden Zone, on the theory that since humans sometimes come from there, there must be a green, fertile region beyond the desert. Recall the wildly enthusiastic applause of his fellow gorilla soldiers and you can imagine the scene inside the conference room housing Mssrs. Bush and Hussein following their introductions. For lack of a bias or "homefield" advantage, the debate audience should be made up of Jerry Springer show participants, none of whom, because of their remarkably low IQs and their blinding ignorance, will recognize either debater and will keep still the entire time unless fisticuffs break out between Saddam and Dubya.

Rather than having a moderator who displays his/her own personal bias in the line of questioning, the questions should be selected in advance by a mixed panel of Baath Party and Republican Party members in order to ensure that the questions will not be too difficult or too blasphemous for either debator to respond to.

To ensure clarity, each debator will have the choice of a select number of their own quotations to choose from in answering each question. For example, if Bush is asked why America should invade Iraq, he could reply from a multiple choice series of possible responses like" "Time is Running Out" or "Freedom Will Be Defended" or "Our Quarrel Is Not With the Iraqi People", etc. Hussein, when asked about his hidden Weapons of Mass Destruction could choose from favorite phrases like, "Allah Is On Our Side", or "Keep your eyes on your enemy and be faster than him", etc. Each debator's ability to match the correct political buzzphrase for each question will have won that round of the debate.

If, at the end of the round of questioning, the debate points are deemed equal, there will be a "lightening round" of questions based upon the verses of the Koran and the Bible. The person who knows his preferred religious text the best, will be deemed the winner. Hopefully, this ensures an advantage for Bush, considering Saddam is an infidel in his own religion, but just to be on the safe side, perhaps all American networks should begin broadcasting a 24 hour a day Bible study class in part, so Dubya doesn't forget his lines and also so we can finally find all those juicy quotes where God says we should bomb Iraq into pre-history and "liberate" the Iraqi people from the current despot so they can suffer under somebody different for a change.

The only question then is, what does the winner receive?

We'll let the debators decide that one. They can choose between:

Door Number One: The rights to Iraqi oil
Door Number Two: The rights to Iraqi oil OR
Door Number Three: The rights to Iraqi oil

As leaders, why don't they use the opportunity?

On A Mission From God

Der Spiegel, a German weekly news magazine, had a captivating cover for last week's issue: George Bush lecturing, microphone in hand, with the image of a cross behind him and surrounded by images of war and patriotism. The title on the cover read: "On a Divine Mission, The Crusade of George Bush".

The opening paragraph of the article opines:

By attacking Baghdad, US president George W. Bush wants to fulfill a divine order. In the highly religious United States, there has rarely been such a deep connection between national power interests and fundamentalist false piety. Christian fanatics are calling for a crusade against Islam.

The article doesn't bash Bush so much as it does examine the strange phenomenon of the Christian Right and its influence in the current administration.

It traces, for example, Bush's historical "growth" from pathetic alcoholic who "one day, at the end of a week-long drinking binge, woke up and looked at his vomit-covered face in the mirror" to a man who "fell to his knees and prayed for God's help.". It is an absurd little story when you think about it though Bush himself, the story alleges, admits that if hadn't "found" the missing God, he'd still be sitting at home guzzling bottles of Lone Star instead of running the country into ruination.

"You know, of course, that I had a problem with alcohol. If things had stayed the way they were, right now I'd be sitting in a bar in Texas instead of in the Oval Office. There is only one reason why I'm in the Oval Office now and not in that bar: I found faith. I found God."

Yeah, thanks alot "God".

The article further delves into the motivations of the Christian Right as it pertains to the terrorist attacks of September 11th, underscoring the fact that the simple-minded exegetes of the last book of the New Testament do not shy away from even the most uninspired attempts to connect the puzzling pieces of scripture to present-day events.

"Simply laughing off such garbage underestimates the influence of the militant Christian Right. Many are firmly convinced that the attacks on New York and Washington have started the process that will lead to the end of the world, the return of Jesus Christ, and the dawning of the promised thousand-year reign of God. When these faithful hear their president talk about the "Axis of Evil," they are convinced that he is speaking their own language, that he, like they, is a holy warrior."

A holy warrior indeed. What a great religion wherein some magician can turns the "vomit-covered face" of a failed man of the elite into the President of the United States and a holy warrior to boot. Image all the holy warriors and devout G.I. Joes they can churn out if they start hitting the A.A. meeting halls.

Frankly, I've been a little dissatisfied with my own production of late. I had such dreams, such high hopes, such Fitzgeraldesque aspirations. By all rights, I too should be a millionaire by now. I too should be in charge of my own army of holy warriors, my own brigade of bible-toting thugs wreaking havoc on the unredeemed and the faithless!

I'm going to fix that right away. Tonight, I'm going to go out and get drunk. Really drunk. So drunk that I too wake up with a "vomit-covered face", run over to the nearest Born Again Christian Meeting House and start praying long and hard so that I too can become President of the United States and a holy warrior.

Those of you with kids out there, let this be a lesson. You needn't bother worrying about what sort of schools you send them to, or what kind of friends they hang out with, or if they smoke a little pot or partake in a little underage drinking now and then. So long as you get them praying and braying and asking the good and generous almighty God to accept their gratitude, you're going to be the parents of someone famous. Someone like the President. A true holy warrior.

Today's steady downpour, the mini floods in the streets of Manhattan, put me in mind of this:

Willow, Weep for Me

Same idea as "Cry Me a River,"
really: because nobody gives a fig
for your parochial pain, you enlist
nature to lament for you. All outdoors
commands attention. Of course, the other half
of the planet lies swaddled in sleep
and darkness, but all the outdoors you can

see from where you stand means to most people
all the outdoors worth mention. A window
box bristling with herbs isn't nature. God
made nature and humans ruined it. Thus
nature might lament its own demise
in its time free from hymning human grief.
The rushes would sway and stones dance in place

and the willow trail its mournful tresses.
There was always a twinkle in nature's
eye when it sang of Cindy's perfidy --
who'd lean an ounce of trust on Cindy? --
but to sing not as a subcontractor
but in one's own sad stead would set the whole
broken heart of nature to music.

William Matthews from: _After All_

Jaap's Poem on Today's Propaganda

THE REAL EXCEPTION

Not being yours,
being theirs deserves consideration.
In the end,
they say they'll think about it.

When eyes hunt around a room
for familiars, coordinates
dialate, sounding like the valid words
only fingertips can discern.

Later, when no one is listening,
station by station, even in the dense vocabulary
of somnambulists, there will be that quick
so quick no one will see it:

If truth wasn't scary,
it would be a lie.

II.

When I'm sitting lovely, no. Bathing,
I can call on their faucets of love:
Be Me! Be Me!
Over and over until time is running out.

Disconnected, the standards
stand on their own two feet:
I won't have to say anything.

Careful planning is vital.
No one dies without an era to cling to.
And when the grip slips you hope
to land in a room full of holes.

III.

An advertisement that for dying becomes
dying regardless of its heroes
and packs it up neat
in simple cardboard boxes and bones,
is still dying.

I was almost fooled.

Then came the hips of sunset's hula dances
dying
just to become the hips
of sunset's hula dancers for another day.

Turkish Land For Rent

''I am not responsible for geography."
- Josef Stalin to Finland in 1938, when World War II was looming and Russia wanted territorial concessions.


Man, the price of real estate is skyrocketing. Not long after Liechtenstein offered itself up for rent like a harlot in a redlight district window, Turkey has announced that it too is for rent.

Whereas the Ruritanian statelet of Liechtenstein offered herself up at an estimated £1.2 million for a four-day conference of 900 delegates, Turkey's demands are a little bit higher; a reported $92 billion in economic assistance - aid and loan guarantees - as its price for co-operation in letting the U.S. base tens of thousands of soldiers in Turkey to open a possible northern front against Iraq.

Granted, when compared to allowing U.S. soldiers to deploy and possibly launch an invasion against a chemical and biological weapons despot posing as your neighbor, renting out your country for a four-day conference of 900 business delegates is roughly equivilent to renting it out to a Girl Scout Troop and should be much cheaper, but even to a spendthrift like Uncle Sam, $92 billion seemed a little too extortionary.

The original offer of the U.S. was around $30 billion but hey, even Turkey has some bills to pay. Turkish columnist Ferai Tinc reports that the last time Uncle Sam came was tossing around dollar bills like used kleenex back in 1990 for Gulf War One support, urgent aid to Turkey amounted to $82 billion. That seems like alot but according to Tinc, the "damage that Turkey suffered in the decade since ’91 amounted to $100 billion."

Naturally, at that rate, supporting the U.S. seems like a money losing proposition to say the least. Tinc goes on to cite a Turkish economy hit so hard following the last Gulf War that they were never able to recover. In 1990, Turkey’s growth rate was 9.5%, but just one year later it had plummeted to 0.5%. In addition, according to Tinc, contrary to Turkish expectations, the US didn’t overthrow Saddam Hussein, so Turkey had to continue its relations with Saddam’s administration, which remained its neighbor.

In this light, $92 billion seems like a bargain. So why is America so reticent about anteing up? Well, for one, they claim Ankara is seeking to exploit the Iraq crisis to address its financial needs. Those unconscionable bastards! Clearly they don't understand the altruistic and humanitarian nature of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Clearly they don't see how much the Bush Administration is willing to continue to hold its own economy hostage to its war efforts. Otherwise, the Turkish would act like good citizens of the world and put their economic self-interests behind the interests of the Bush Administration like every other nation of the world that isn't evil.

Rest assured though, America is not going to stand for this kind of self-centered cheekiness from Turkey much longer. The contemptuous little demagogue who continues to pose as White House Press Secretary, Ari Fleischer, said as much when he postulated, in typically clear and concise Fleischerian English that "I think either an agreement will be reached, or no agreement will be reached," he said. "There comes a moment when plans must be made, decisions must be made, and cannot stretch on indefinitely." To emphasize those decisions needing to be made, in the typically diplomatic fashion of the Bush Administration, they then warned Turkey it would cancel a multi-billion-dollar aid package if Ankara did not immediately allow the US army to deploy troops intended for a military strike against northern Iraq.

And then, the Administration trotted out it's favorite little phrase, it's Administrative motto, so to speak, when it noted that "time is running out" for Ankara to make a decision, suggesting Washington was pressing for an agreement by the weekend.

In Turkey, Foreign Minister Yasar Yakis brushed aside U.S. warnings that time was running out. He said a vote in parliament to base tens of thousands of U.S. troops was unlikely before early next week.

By this afternoon, Secretary of State Colin Powell jumped into the act, saying "there may be some creative things we can do" to gain acceptance of a proposed U.S. aid package meant to pave the way for Turkey to help in a war against Iraq. Of course Powell did not elaborate on those refinements but said he expected to hear from Turkey by day's end. As for the United States, "Our position is firm," Powell said.

In the end, it seems highly unlikely that Turkey will buck a substantial financial package just because it isn't sufficient to meet their economic needs. Nevertheless, as Justice and Development Party (AK Party) leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan emphasized, "If Turkey makes a sacrifice, then its demands should not be considered as a simple bargain. We are not a country and nation who can make the issue of war an issue of bargain." 90% of Turkey's predominantly Muslim population, for example, is naturally against the war on Iraq. It isn't easy convincing 10% of the population that they can buy off 90% of the population with a bunch of empty economic aid promises.

Then again, if the Bush Administration would like to make a leeetle trade, perhaps the oil fields of Northern Iraq might be a more persuasive bargaining chip.

Andy Flower and Protests

Admittedly, when I first saw Andy Flower's name in the news this morning, I had no idea who he was. I didn't know if it was the name of yet another hip new band of espresso-sipping, Sartre-obsessed nihilistists whose pyrotechnics set off a fire in the club they were playing, or an evil spinoff of the Andy Dick Show.

Turns out, Andy Flower plays cricket. I don't know much about cricket other than that England, a bunch of her old colonies and a few other stray commonwealth nations get together to play it in tournaments. I confess that even when in far-away lands where the fare of sport television is minimal to non-existent, even in this sports vacuum, I don't watch cricket matches and never will.

But Andy Flower isn't in the news simply because he plays cricket. He is in the news because he is from Zimbabwe, one of the priliminary round venues of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2003 and a country notorious for its President, Robert Mugabe, whose regime has endorsed human rights abuses and rigging of elections. Andy Flower is also in the news because he expressed displeasure over the state of affairs in his strife-torn country and said he would wear a black armband throughout the World Cup tournament to "mourn the death of democracy in the country.".

In fact, both he and teammate Henry Olonga said "we cannot in good conscience take to the field and ignore the fact that millions of our compatriots are starving, unemployed and oppressed.".

Many years ago, in the 1968 Mexico Olympics, US sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos gave a black power salute from the 200 metres medal podium to protest at the treatment of blacks in their country. The incident caused outrage and they were suspended and ordered to leave the Olympic village. Both found it difficult to get jobs for years to come.

Thus far, there has been no official reaction from the Mugabe administration other than to say it was "considering" its response. Although it seems clear that both players have jeopardized their international careers, given Mugabe's record as a ruler with a chilling history of torturing and murdering opponents, the personal safety of the two players might be more of a concern at this point than their future as cricket players.

You wouldn't think cricket could generate such a sensation. England recently decided to boycott what would have been their cup opener in Zimbabwe. Not, as one might hope, because of Mugabe's human rights record but because they didn't think it would be "safe" to play there.

Mugabe himself casts a rather large shadow over events as he will be allowed to visit Paris next week for an African leaders’ summit despite an EU travel ban on him, his wife and more than 70 members of his political circle and their families in protest at human rights abuses by his regime. There are even rumors that Mugabe will be arrested upon his arrival in Paris. It was demanded by human rights advocates that the French authorities detain Mr Mugabe under the country's anti-torture legislation as soon as he arrives to attend a Franco-Africa summit.

Once again, a tale is woven between factions of all sorts; diverse self-interests, politics, sports and of course, athletes. This time, instead of an athlete's name soiled in the news for drug violations, assaults, and the usual narratives of woe and self-indulgence, it is for a change, associated with dignity and bravery.

So while cricket still sparks no flicker of passion for me, at least I've come to respect Andy Flower and Henry Olonga. Even if before this morning, I'd never heard of them.

Finalement, La Neige Est Arrivée!
The Cowardice Revealed Behind Nature's Terrorist Attack

Well, we can't say Homeland Security didn't warn us. A little more than a week after they raised the national terror alert from yellow to orange, the entire Eastern Seaboard was buried by a blizzard which caused the closing of airports, paralyzed highways and dumping nearly two feet of snow or more on cities from Washington to Boston.

The Bush Administration is right. Saddam Hussein just can't be trusted.

I know we've been told about how Hussein and Al Qaeda were plotting imminent, "spectacular" attacks that could include the use of radiological, chemical or biological weapons in the United States but never once did I consider those crafty little terrorists could gain control of Nature and use it to dump paralyzing amounts of snow upon us.

No wonder the Bush administration abandoned its Allies and denounced the Kyoto Protocol on global warming. If the terrorists already have control of the weather patterns on Earth, why worry about reducing actual greenhouse gas emissions? If this keeps up, they'll have to defend the homeland on skis and dressed in white camouflage like the Finnish.

Even as we continue to dig out from this cowardly attack of snow and high winds, we can hoist our shovels with the secure knowledge that for now, the worst is over. Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge said Sunday that the government soon may reduce its threat level from orange, a high probability of terrorist attack, to yellow, an elevated risk.

Responding to critics who belittled some of the suggestions of how to safeguard against terrorist attacks, Ridge said his department had worked for the last eight months, even using focus groups, to find the best ways to prepare the public in the event of terrorist attacks.

I have to admit, at first, I too was skeptical about the effectiveness of duct tape and plastic sheeting. Of course, operating under the belief that the attacks were to be chemical or biological in nature, I never considered the effectiveness of sealing my windows against a massive attack of snow and blowing cold. Those boys in Homeland Security sure are are clever. They didn't want us to know the "true" nature of the attack we would be experiencing, hoping to allay or at least reduce our fears. Well, it worked for me. If I'd have known the attack would be a crippling blizzard, I don't know what I would have done in response. I probably would have just fled the country and given up.

In an appearance this weekend at FBI headquarters to announce details of a new terrorist threat analysis center, President Bush said, "We're working overtime to protect you. We're doing everything in our power to make sure the homeland is secure."

If you don't think it's enough, or you would like to do your part as a patriot, it might be good to know that The Sanitation Department is looking for a few good shovelers, hiring temporary workers to help clear the mounds of snow from the city. The pay is $8.24 an hour for removing snow and ice from crosswalks, bus shelters, street corners and catch basins.

So you see? Even after sustaining a cowardly attack of snow, our superiors are looking for ways to stimulate economic growth.

The Inside Dope on Valentines

I was going to wait until tomorrow but, in order to beat the holiday rush and especially because I want to get off the war/terrorism/saddam exercise wheel for a day or two, here is Desultory Turgescence's list of Valentine's Day resources:

First of all, just so you have a little historical context, here is where you can find that Valentine's Day started in the time of the Roman Empire.

Under the rule of Emperor Claudius II Rome was involved in many bloody and unpopular campaigns. Claudius the Cruel was having a difficult time getting soldiers to join his military leagues. He believed that the reason was that roman men did not want to leave their loves or families. As a result, Claudius cancelled all marriages and engagements in Rome. The good Saint Valentine was a priest at Rome in the days of Claudius II. He and Saint Marius aided the Christian martyrs and secretly married couples, and for this kind deed Saint Valentine was apprehended and dragged before the Prefect of Rome, who condemned him to be beaten to death with clubs and to have his head cut off. He suffered martyrdom on the 14th day of February, about the year 270. At that time it was the custom in Rome, a very ancient custom, indeed, to celebrate in the month of February the Lupercalia, feasts in honor of a heathen god. On these occasions, amidst a variety of pagan ceremonies, the names of young women were placed in a box, from which they were drawn by the men as chance directed.

If you'd like to know a little bit about the person responsible for the advent of Valentine's Day turning into a disgusting, capitalist exercise in insincerity here in America, look no further than Esther Allen Howland who began the first American Valentine's out of paper lace and floral decorations.

For the more practical-minded among you, perhaps you could try a constructing a Valentine out of duct tape and plastic sheeting.

For those of you sick and tired, cynical and resentful, or just plain lazy and looking for a cheap way out, try the anti-Valentine to send via email to an insignificant other.

More in tune with heartbreak and loss? Try to read through your sorrows in this anthology.

In some countries, like Iran, for example, where police ordered shops to remove heart-and-flower decorations and have confiscated other symbols of what religious authorities consider a decadent, Western event, you needn't bother worrying about what to get your loved one for Valentine's Day.

If you really hate the idea of Valentine's Day, you could always join up with the Shiv Sainiks, who today made a bonfire of Valentine cards and threaten to disrupt the celebrations on the Valentine's Day which they claimed was being used by multi-nationals to corrupt Indian youth.

If all else fails, try Uncle Ozzy's advice, found in today's NY Post:

"I hate fucking holidays like Valentine's Day. It's all bullshit. Don't send cards or any of that fucking nonsense. Treat your mate special every day of the year and get her gifts for no special occasion. That's the fucking best."

In the days before Ozzy's sort of eloquence and passion, people often had to rely upon things like poems to express such thoughts of meaningful emotions. You may not find it on a Valentine's card, but for those of you who want to cheat a little, you can probably write it in on the margins...

Habitation
by Margaret Atwood

Marriage is not
a house or even a tent

it is before that, and colder:

the edge of the forest, the edge
of the desert
the unpainted stairs
at the back where we squat
outside, eating popcorn

the edge of the receding glacier

where painfully and with wonder
at having survived even
this far

we are learning to make fire.

"Pull Up Your Pant Legs For Jihad"

Having just read the entire transcipt of bin-Laden's taped broadcast, I thought I'd leave you with a few of the more salacious quotes along with some additional comments:

"We need to reassure while we are close to the unjust war, the war of the bawds, America is leading with its allies and agents on a number of important lessons"

I couldn't tell if this "war of the bawds" was some sort of hip-hop translating neologism or an accurate bending of words. As it turns out, a bawd is either a prostitute or a brothel owner, from the Old French baude-strote, or "procurer of prostitutes". I wonder if he had in mind Miss Mona Stangley from The Best Little Whorehouse In Texas or if he was speaking more generally. Frankly, I wouldn't mind seeing a war of bawds. Bawds in bikinis, wrestling in mud, like in those Miller Light commercials.

"Second, remember that victory comes only from God. We have to exert all efforts with preparations, stimulation, and jihad. God said, 'O believers, if you fight for the sake of God, God will grant you victory and make your standing firm."

When I read this, I realized that in many ways, Osama is little more than a cheap plagiarist. He must have seen President Bush's State of the Union speech which closed with:

"We Americans have faith in ourselves, but not in ourselves alone. We do not claim to know all the ways of Providence, yet we can trust in them, placing our confidence in the loving god behind all of life and all of history. May he guide us now, and may God continue to bless the United States of America."

With everyone resting their fate in gods and higher powers and Providence, why are we even bothering with a military campaign against each other? God could just be sitting up there, rolling the dice in a cosmic game of Risk with St. Peter. Which reminds me of a great St. Peter joke I read the other day courtesy of Just Joking:

A guy arrives at the pearly gates, waiting to be admitted. St. Peter is leafing through the Big Book to see if the guy is worthy of entering. After several minutes, St. Peter closes the book, furrows his brow, and says, "I don''t really see that you ever really did anything great in your life, but I don''t see anything really bad either. Tell you what," St. Peter says. "If you can tell me of one REALLY good deed that you did in your life, I''ll let you in."

The guy thinks for a moment and says, "OK, well there was this one time when I was driving down the highway and I saw a gang assaulting this poor girl. I slowed down, and sure enough, there they were, about 50 of 'em torturing this woman. Infuriated, I got out my car, grabbed a tire iron out of my trunk, as the gang members formed a circle around me. One of the first guys in the gang was a huge guy with a studded leather jacket and a chain running from his nose to his ear. So, I ripped his chain out of his face and smashed him and then walked straight up to the leader of the gang. As I walked up to the leader, I hit him over the head with the tire iron. Then I turned around and yelled to the rest of them, ''Leave this poor, innocent girl alone! You're all a bunch of sick, deranged animals! Go home before I really teach you all a lesson in pain!"

St. Peter, duly impressed, says "Wow! When did this happen?"

"About ten minutes ago."

(We now return to the Osama speech, already in progress...)

"The Prophet said, 'Avoid falling in the seven great sins, which are: believing in any but God, magic, murder, usury, stealing orphans' money, fleeing from battle, slandering believing women ... besides, drinking alcohol, adultery, not obeying the parents, and false testimony.' You should be obedient in general."

I've got a few questions about these seven great sins. First of all, what is this business about stealing orphans' money? Orphans don't have money. If they did, they wouldn't be orphans, would they? And while these seven great sins he lists do indeed add up to seven sins, what's this business about tossing in the "drinking alchohol, adultery, not obeying parents and false testimony?" Are these sins too? If so, then wouldn't that be 11 sins, not 7? Or perhaps they are sub-clauses or appendices to the original sins. It just isn't clear. And I'm also not clear about "not obeying the parents". Does this mean EVER or just between certain impressionable ages? What if you are an orphan? Are you exempt, since you don't have any parents to disobey?

"They (American soldiers) are fighting only to serve the interest of those who have the capital, arms dealers, oil owners, including the criminal gang in the White House. Adding to that, those who keep their personal envoys, Bush the father."

More plagiarism from Osama. This sounds distinctly like the sort of No Blood For Oil arguments everyone else excluding the Bush Administration and its drooling pack of rabid sycophants is making. Can't Osama come up with some sort of original depictions of the motivations of the Bush Administration, something of his own authorship? Whatever happened to that simple war against the Great Satan? Speaking of which, to veer slightly off track for a moment, in case you hadn't heard, the Hajj pilgrims have just said no to Satan AND America. How did they find time to pray? Where does this leave The Great Satan Quarterly for Hajj pilgrim subscribers?

Osama also settles into the grandpa-by-the-fire story-telling mode when he goes into his tale of surviving the bombing in Afghanistan and asks that great rhetorical question:

"If all the evil global powers were not capable of defeating one simple mile occupied by mujahedeen using very poor equipment, how can such evil powers triumph over the Islamic world?"

I'll defer that question to Captain Fantastic, Donald Rumsfeld, who held a press conference of his own today:

"There have been people on the FBI's "10 Most Wanted" for decades. There have been people all over the globe that -- a manhunt is a manhunt. It's a big world. People can hide. And the question isn't, do you find him immediately? The question is, are you putting sufficient pressure that it makes it difficult for the terrorist acts to occur?"

Hmmm. Sounds like he doesn't know either.

And in what should be a blow to the al Qaeda-Saddam connection theorists for any rational thinking people left in the Administration, Osama says clearly:

"You know that such a crusade war concerns the Muslim nation mainly, regardless of whether the socialist party and Saddam remain or go."

Sounds like Osama cares about Saddam about as much as old Rummy does about the French and Germans.

Lastly, I'll leave you with my favorite line from Osama's broadcast, the one that finally shows some originality:

"So Muslims in general and Iraq in particular must pull up your pant legs for jihad against this unjust campaign."

I just can't help but wonder if this isn't just a plug for his brother Yeslam Binladin's Bin Ladin fashion line, which was to be moderately priced and designed to compete with the likes of Italian retailer Benetton SpA. It's getting so you can't tell the shills from the real jihadists anymore.

In the Land of Terror and Code Orange

Ever since last Friday afternoon, when the flunkies in Homeland Security announced the decision to increase the threat condition designation from elevated to high (yellow to orange for those of you interested in color perception theories), I've been slinking around my apartment, ferreting out odd smells, odd people, unusual weather patterns and of course, odd "chatter".

Chatter, you see, is a euphemism for terrorists talking among themselves about blowing us up or poisoning us, etc. Well, they don't actually say they're going to blow us up or pour poison in our water supplies or rip out the eyes of our kitty cats with rusty pliers. They're too clever for that. That's why we have the Department of Homeland Security: to interpret their chatter and give us a rough idea when we're going to be blown to bits or at the very least, to give us plenty of time to be able to worry about being blown to bits.

In fact, not only do they interpret chatter and give us a rough idea of when we're going to be blown into little teeny, tiny pieces, but they also are nice enough to give us advice about how to prepare for these kinds of terrorist events. For example, they advise us to buy duct tape and plastic sheeting to seal up windows and doors. Thank you Homeland Security. Without this advice, I might have been trying to seal up my windows and doors with papier-mache or silk scarves. I might have used glue or masking tape instead of duct tape to seal it and then where would I have been? Dead, that's where. This sort of advise is invaluable. Life-saving.

Yes, I know that the total US military spending next year will head well over $400 billion, not including the billions it will cost for a war with Iraq. And I know that it seems a little insane that the best advise and protection we get for that $400 billion is duct tape and plastic sheeting but let's be real folks. How many of YOU would have thought up that duct tape and plastic sheeting all by yourselves? Can't you see how indispensible Homeland Security is?

As if we weren't already rich with information and advice, they even advise us to stockpile "disaster supply kits" with enough food, water and medicine to last for three days. Sounds more like we're preparing for the Super Bowl Weekend than a terrorist attack. If we're being attacked by terrorists and its a disaster, wouldn't I want some sort of firearms or other weapons to protect myself with? I doubt they're sending troops off to combat with just enough food and water and medicine to keep them going while they slaughter the infidels. No, I'll bet they get all sorts of neat, million dollar weapons to protect themselves with.

By the way, one question I have for Homeland Security is whether or not my "disaster supply kit" left over from the last hysterical, Chicken Little warnings of our impending doom are still good. Remember Y2K? Six months of canned beans and bottled water all for naught.

As part of its Orange Alert, the feds have also sent an advisory to utility operators to warn them how to sniff out terrorists making weapons of mass destruction. Part of a government information bulletin sent nationwide Friday cited unexplained and unusual odors on a list of potential indicators of weapons of mass destruction threats or incidents.

"Smells may range from fruity/flowery to sharp/pungent, garlic/horseradishlike, bitter almonds, peach kernels and new mown grass/hay," the joint FBI-Homeland Security Department bulletin advised.

This doesn't really narrow it down as far as the scope of smells goes. NYC is filled with millions of immigrants who have brought all sorts of funny smelling ethnic cooking over with them. The hallways of everyone's apartment buildings are filled with them. And what about the everyday sort of body odor people carry with them in crowded, closed places like the subway, for example? How do I tell the difference between some bastard who hasn't had a shower in three days and a real, live terrorist attack? And what the hell do peach kernels smell like? How the hell am I supposed to know peach kernals when I smell them? Run around to fruit markets ripping open peaches and sticking my nose in them, inhaling deeply? What about egg salad smells and gastro-intestinal emissions from people who stayed up late eating goulash and sauerkraut all night? What do they count for?

The memo, billed as a homeland security update with a section on potential indicators of weapons of mass destruction, did not say what the odors could indicate. Just that they're indicative of something. And there's probably alot of chattering going on. These terrorists are full of chatter. You'd think they were all off somewhere playing pepper, giving each other that kind of unintelligible encouragement you hear from shortstops and third basemen as the pitcher is winding up to throw a strike. Maybe terrorists are all closet baseball fans. Chatterboxes. Terrorist baseball chatterboxes: Is this the kind of chatter they're overhearing? If so, we'd all better don our protective chemical suits because that sure SOUNDS like people plotting to blow us up and gas us into the 22nd century. "Swingbattahbattahswing!"

And believe me, most of all, I'm learning quickly from the Bush Administration and Homeland Security that if I don't know someone and they're chattering, or if a smell is out of place, or if the weather is not to my liking or if even people I know just SEEM to act suspicious then by God, chances are, they are terrorists or they are plotting secretly to be terrorists and I'd better kill them now before they have a chance to kill me.

NATO's Irrelevence Affirmed

After France, Belgium and Germany refused once again to give NATO the go-ahead to start military planning to boost Turkey's defences in case of war with Iraq, Turkey invoked article IV of NATO's founding treaty, which the North Atlantic Council - NATO's highest decision-making body will debate this afternoon in Brussels. Article IV states "The Parties will consult together whenever, in the opinion of any of them, the territorial integrity, political independence or security of any of the Parties is threatened".

Is this an example of more political gamesmanship? Turkey, it seems clear, has been pushed by the US to invoke this article even though neither their "territorial integrity, political independence or security" is being threatened.

Or is this just another indication that the levels of paranoics supporting the war on Iraq have increased as the Bush Administration gets increasingly desperate to counter the war-busting efforts of Germany, France and now Belgium?

This latest move by Belgium followed the original US request on January 15 that the Alliance play a peace-keeping role in a post-conflict Iraq. This request was narrowed down to the protection of Turkey after France, Germany and Belgium last week showed strong reluctance towards the idea.

The original article of NATO puts forth that those members are united "to settle any international dispute in which they may be involved by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security and justice are not endangered, and to refrain in their international relations from the threat or use of force in any manner inconsistent with the purposes of the United Nations."

As the UN has not yet authorized any use of force toward a war with Iraq, it would seem that sending weapons to Turkey through NATO members for a threat that wouldn't arise until AFTER a war against Iraq began, would be "inconsistent with the purposes of the UN". In fact, the infamous Article V, which calls for an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America to be considered an attack against them all, doesn't even apply. An "armed attack" is defined as:

1) on the territory of any of the Parties in Europe or North America, on the Algerian Departments of France
(2), on the territory of or on the Islands under the jurisdiction of any of the Parties in the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer; on the forces, vessels, or aircraft of any of the Parties, when in or over these territories or any other area in Europe in which occupation forces of any of the Parties were stationed on the date when the Treaty entered into force or the Mediterranean Sea or the North Atlantic area north of the Tropic of Cancer.

Not even the most vivid, irrational minds of the Bush War Collective can construe evidence of the violation of Iraq's noncompliance with Resolution 1441 as an actual "attack". Not unless the Bush War Collective, a lá Minority Report are being aided by PreCogs, those perceptive individuals with psychic powers, who can "see" a killing in advance. In Minority Report, those PreCogs, having deciphered the exact location from clues within their "dream", allow the cops to rush to the scene and arrest the perpetrator in the act of thinking about doing the deed.

According to Stanley R. Sloan, director of the Atlantic Community Initiative For NATO, not doing enough risks losing US interest in the Alliance. US attempts to push the Alliance beyond the political consensus concerning NATO's mission could create splits among the Allies and even domestic unrest in some Allied countries.

In the interests of continuing to try and resolve the Iraq issue without war, France and Germany, according to the German weekly Der Spiegel, offered proposals which would include sending United Nations peacekeepers into Iraq, tripling the number of UN weapons inspectors there and turning the whole of the Gulf state into a no-fly zone.

In what has become the typically dismissive reaction to anything which does not support the Bush Administration insistence of war with Iraq, US Secretary of State Colin Powell said on Sunday that such a plan dealt with the "wrong issues" and would serve only as a "diversion."

NATO, along with UN, in the face of an increasingly unilateral Bush Administration, are indeed becoming irrelevent. They are not necessarily irrelevent because the times or the political landscape or the threats have changed but because the United States itself, under the Bush Administration, has changed.

America, who once represented democratic debate, democratic ideals and above all, freedom, continues to spin deeper and deeper into a form of distasteful imperialism bred by the sort of colossal power and colossal arrogance the Bush Administration thrives on.

The Bush Administration now claims the right to intervene militarily anywhere it chooses, to interfere in the internal affairs of any state and to overthrow any government that is not to its liking. In such a world, there isn't a use for the UN or NATO other than for use as a propaganda tool and when such a propaganda tool can no longer be used because of internal dissent or because one large, distasteful idea cannot be forced down the collective throats of its members, such an organization or alliance becomes irrelevent.

So is the path of the UN and NATO, who are useful to the US only so long as they clap and nod and cheer every idea of the Bush Administration like Fox News Channel sycophants, regardless of how illogical the argument or irrational the sentiment.

Solon of Athens, once said: "The law is like a spider's web: the small are caught and the great tear it up." That web is beginning to tear and ironically, it is the Bush Administration's aversion to the freedom of other nations to disagree with it that is tearing it fastest.