Tuesday, March 16, 2004
Following on from yesterday's post, it now appears the Norwegians (and presumably others) were aware of the likelihood of an attack preceding elections in one of Coalition countries. But this information appeared on an internet message board [thus implying the suggestion was not entirely serious, as publicly advertising the attacks before they happen tends to get the attack prevented], and was considered to only apply to troops inside Iraq.
Strange that CNN is still running with "Spain threatens Iraq pull-out", when most other news services have decided that Spain is pulling out of Iraq. Yes, there is a clause about "unless control passes to the UN by the end of June", but given that Iraqi self-government or UN action are both apparently some way off, it seems inevitable that Spanish troops will leave Iraq.
Much of the media struggles to remain civil in its descriptions of Zapatero's decisions and actions (quite frankly I don't really blame them, though I wonder what the Spanish press make of it all). Why make that statement, and why make it as soon has he comes into office? Much of his current rhetoric seems to be for peace at any price. Terrorism happens, either you pander to every terrorist's whim or you shrug and deal with it. Yes, countries take precautions, yes, they seek to minimise risk, but that doesn't mean it won't happen. Trying to accede responsibility, to step away from the implied source of the terrorism, doesn't buy immunity (and possibly signals a weakness that can be exploited).
As you can tell this subject annoys me. I need to go and find some random quirk of the internet, expect the current leader in other people's blogs is finding out if you can pass third grade. Which consists of being able to identify the contiguous American states. Which is pretty easy, and I'm not even American (never even been there), and have no idea how old 3rd graders are. Ok, so I'd be screwed if I had to do the same for Canada (but how many Americans can do that?).
And aren't pile drivers fun? Especially when they're using the brute force and ignorance approach rather than screwing them in. It doesn't help it's got the same rhythm as some hippy dance shite [that's the technical term] that my next door neighbour plays a lot.
Anyhoo,
PS. last line of this report on locusts sweeping down through Australia: "If only we could chocolate coat them and send them off somewhere to sell," she said. Mmm, crunchy. Actually what they really need are lots of biology undergraduates, who will sit there plucking off different bits of the locusts depending on which experiment they've just been told to do. Measuring the energy retention through the elasticity of the thorax, that was fun.
Strange that CNN is still running with "Spain threatens Iraq pull-out", when most other news services have decided that Spain is pulling out of Iraq. Yes, there is a clause about "unless control passes to the UN by the end of June", but given that Iraqi self-government or UN action are both apparently some way off, it seems inevitable that Spanish troops will leave Iraq.
Much of the media struggles to remain civil in its descriptions of Zapatero's decisions and actions (quite frankly I don't really blame them, though I wonder what the Spanish press make of it all). Why make that statement, and why make it as soon has he comes into office? Much of his current rhetoric seems to be for peace at any price. Terrorism happens, either you pander to every terrorist's whim or you shrug and deal with it. Yes, countries take precautions, yes, they seek to minimise risk, but that doesn't mean it won't happen. Trying to accede responsibility, to step away from the implied source of the terrorism, doesn't buy immunity (and possibly signals a weakness that can be exploited).
As you can tell this subject annoys me. I need to go and find some random quirk of the internet, expect the current leader in other people's blogs is finding out if you can pass third grade. Which consists of being able to identify the contiguous American states. Which is pretty easy, and I'm not even American (never even been there), and have no idea how old 3rd graders are. Ok, so I'd be screwed if I had to do the same for Canada (but how many Americans can do that?).
And aren't pile drivers fun? Especially when they're using the brute force and ignorance approach rather than screwing them in. It doesn't help it's got the same rhythm as some hippy dance shite [that's the technical term] that my next door neighbour plays a lot.
Anyhoo,
PS. last line of this report on locusts sweeping down through Australia: "If only we could chocolate coat them and send them off somewhere to sell," she said. Mmm, crunchy. Actually what they really need are lots of biology undergraduates, who will sit there plucking off different bits of the locusts depending on which experiment they've just been told to do. Measuring the energy retention through the elasticity of the thorax, that was fun.
