Thomas Krehbiel

I often read the “on this day” section of Wikipedia just out curiosity. It occurred to me one day that, according to the “on this day” records, not much happened before around 1500 A.D.

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This is nifty:  Indian Moon Mission Launched.  Glad to see that somebody is doing something productive for the human race.  This news surprised me because I can't remember hearing about any other space flights to the moon since, you know, the 1970s.  Wikipedia, however, says that five other lunar missions have been launched since the end of the space race -- in 1990 (Japan), 1994 (NASA), 1998 (NASA), 2003 (ESA) and 2007 (China).

I heard a microscopic blurb on the radio this morning about violence between Russia and Georgia.  The radio guy talked about missiles and fighting and troops and then went right on to discuss the opening ceremonies of the Olypmics or something, leaving me totally in the dark about news that sounded pretty freakin' serious.  Why do they even bother?

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It occurs to me that there is a serious flaw with politicians deferring to military commanders on the ground when it comes to Iraq:  It undermines the principle that the U.S. is a civilian government.  This isn't Burma, after all.  Obviously you want military commanders leading military campaigns... but foreign policy?  Five years after the end of major combat operations?  (No, I still don't believe the situation in Iraq is a "war.")

I haven't read any Virginia aggregators in a while (what my wife aptly calls "aggravators"), so I pulled one up this morning out of curiousity, and the very first post I saw annoyed me: The Warmongers on the Left: "Is it time to invade Burma?"

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A BBC headline ("US 'must suspend' Iraq withdrawal") reminded me that we have yet to hear the most important part of the surge plan: What's the plan now that the surge succeeded and the extra troops are leaving again? What have we gained if Iraq descends back into violence again? At that point, withdrawal isn't a question of surrendering to terrorists, it's a question of surrendering to incompetence in the Iraqi leadership. I realize we made the Iraqi mess and we're still responsible on some level for cleaning it up, but we obviously can't run their government for them. We've given them tons of opportunities to secure their own country and they've squandered it all. It looks like the only way to stabalize Iraq is a permanent occupying force, but the longer we stay, the more we're resented. Yet when we start pulling troops out, Iraq quickly turns back into the Wild West and oil prices go up even more. What a crappy situation.

I'm a little embarrassed to admit that I don't know why we're supposed to hate Cuba and Fidel Castro so much. Whatever caused this lingering animosity happened way before I was born, and all that's left now is a vague sense that today we're supposed to celebrate the news of the official end to Castro's regime. I realize they're godless Communists and all, but I was born too late to really appreciate the Cold War thing. My formative years were the 1980s when Russia was already declining, and the biggest Communist threat we faced was Dolph Lundgren in Rocky IV. I guess I need to read some history to get a better sense of this.

I heard about this alarming story in passing on WRVA the other day, so I did a little digging to find out what really happened. As far as I know, this story was wholly ignored by American media in the face of Super Tuesday.

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I'm weary of opining, so I'm going to fall back on throwing out some links to stories that I found informative.

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Another tough day to find anything to comment on. Muslim protesters continued to protest, and "journalists" kept trying to uncover a Cheney scandal.

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A smorgasbord of topics today as I sit here in agonizing pain from a strained neck muscle.

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No one story has jumped out at me today, so here's a link-fest of random cultural interests.

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Another in my new series of lazy blogging link-fests, otherwise known as "the things I didn't have anything to add to." Feel free to skip if you don't care what I think is informative reading.

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I actually collected these yesterday and forgot to post them.

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• Oh, lovely: Israel: Hezbollah plans to move abducted IDF soldiers to Iran. And: Hezbollah escalates the war in Lebanon, launches rocket attacks in Haifa.
• Now Bush is giving up secret wiretapping? Specter touts deal on eavesdropping review. Have aliens replaced the president?
• As Israel and Lebanon meltdown, there's progress in Iraq: Transfer of Security Responsibility in Muthanna Province.
• A general's review of Gitmo: McCaffery on Guantanamo, which summarizes McCaffery's full memo.

The preceding links have been deemed "not to completely suck" by Thomas Krehbiel's patent-pending content rating system. The system rates the relative merit of Internet content in terms of originality, non-partisanship, grammar, and educational or research value.