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An odd piece of whitish woody debris catches my eye on the right of the trail. Probably a several-years-old, bleached bit of a dead Himilayan blackberry cane. Those damned invasive blackberries are everywhere. But the shape that snagged my peripheral vision looked strangely like the pictures I've seen of the rare phantom orchid (Cephalanthera austinae). It's probably not, of course -- I've been wanting to see one for at least a dozen years, ever since reading about it. And although Washington Park never was clear-cut (it was logged back in the days of selective harvesting of only the biggest and best trees), it's hardly the sort of pristine virgin old-growth this plant occurs in. It's probably a waste of time, but only a few seconds, to stop and investigate.
It's not woody. It's not debris.
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Wow. Haven't had a "rare plant moment" like this in quite some time.
In an article titled Germans' love of leisure worries government: Lengthy vacations may hurt economy we see the German government worrying about the injustice to its ruling class of the majority of its people having (horrors!) six weeks of vacation and about a dozen paid holidays a year:
"When we compare the calendar of our public holidays with other countries, we really have something to worry about," said Economics and Labor Minister Wolfgang Clement. "We are without doubt at our limit."But later we see Germany's economic problems described thus (emphasis my own):
For the past three years, the economy has stagnated, unemployment is approaching 5 million people (the jobless rate is 10.4 percent), the pension system is crumbling, state and federal coffers are bankrupt, and most economists predict no growth for 2003.But the history of Germany's time off is summarized in the same article thus (emphasis added, again):
"Since the 1960s, Europeans have reduced their working hours across the board," said Rolf Kroeker, who heads the Institute for German Economy, a Cologne think tank that just completed a study on global working patterns. "Americans have not."See the problem? A trend that's been in place since the 1960s, and has been fully in place for at least a decade (I've been aware of the amount of vacation time in Germany being in that ballpark for a decade or more), is being blamed for creating a problem three years old. And it's not as if the USA -- where the work week has increased and the amount of vacation time has decreased steadily -- is escaping the effects of the world-wide recession.
It's also not as if the hit to production (and, yes, there is a hit, but where is it written that "production" is the highest and only goal of a society?) from these benefits comes anywhere close to the increase in productive ability that technology has provided over the last 40 years.
Gee, could it be perhaps the world-wide recession? Could it be that the real issue is that Germany is a nation on Planet Earth, and suffering through the same recession that everyone else is? Nah, not when there's a working class to bash.
And this is a supposedly left-wing government minister that is taking part in the bashing!
Yes, direct action. For that's what I really think ignoring silly laws like this and just loving the ones you want the way you want amounts to. Really, now, if you're going to play by the "work within the system" rules, then you'd simply not have gay sex in Texas until recently, no matter how much you wanted to, because it's "wrong" to disobey the law and such acts will "just alienate others".
Get it straight: without the direct action, the Lawrence vs. Texas case wouldn't even exist! And it's most telling to read the text of the court decision and see listed as one of the reasons why sodomy laws should be struck down (quoted, I believe, from the rationale behind the model penal code that was responsible for most of the early repeals of sodomy laws, starting with Illinois in 1961):
The prohibitions undermined respect for the law by penalizing contact many people engaged in [...]That's right, simply ignoring the law was putting the ruling class on the horns of a dilemma: either admit you're wrong and give us what we want, or you'll undermine your precious little bourgeois state even more. Which, of course, is just what direct action is supposed to do.
Yes, the Supreme Court (finally!) did the right thing. But it didn't happen in a vacuum.
Even Eric Sten, the arguably the most liberal of the councilors and the darling of many progressives, opined "It's important to me that the parking garages can be built. Sometimes you need to build fast when the financing is there."
Quick! Where's the barf bag?
The only dissenting voice was the mayor's. No doubt having to actually live in the neighborhood the council is proposing to rape like this made the normally New Democrat and pro-business Mayor Katz get queasy about the prospect. One wonders how many of the other councilors who thought it was okey-dokey would be willing to take a taste of their own medicine.
Thankfully, it doesn't appear that this is going to go down quietly. The formerly "let's be nice and reasonable and compromise" NWDA President Frank Dixon is now saying things like "We're going to have to go to the streets." and "It's much easier to stop things. NWDA has done that, from the freeway to the hospital to the good old houses."
That latter phrase is a reference to a struggle in which neighborhood members blockaded bulldozers and got arrested to prevent the demolition of historic homes in the neighborhood. Let's hope I'm not being excessively optimistic about the level of opposition that arises.
And you can spare me the arguments about needing to keep the neighborhood business-friendly with lots of parking. It's a dandy place to do business right now, judging by how many businesses are already here. Don't bother with sob stories about businesses folding or moving into the Pearl, either: first, there's a recession going on, and in recessions businesses fail; second, the same issue of the Examiner lists three businesses departing the Uptown Shopping Center, a postwar strip-mall with plenty of free parking, for the Pearl District; third, maybe if there's fewer yuppie-scum businesses on NW 23rd there'll be room for businesses catering to the lower and middle income groups who live in the nearby apartments instead of the wealthy hill-dwellers.
The latter has already started to happen, in fact. I lost the reference, but one of the new business owners has publically stated that parking is a non-issue for her, as most of her customers don't own cars and either walk or take mass transit.
NEVER again did families in Baghdad imagine that they need fear the midnight knock at the door.Full story here.But in recent weeks there have been increasing reports of Iraqi men, women and even children being dragged from their homes at night by American patrols, or snatched off the streets and taken, hooded and manacled, to prison camps around the capital.
Children as young as 11 are claimed to be among those locked up for 24 hours a day in rooms with no light, or held in overcrowded tents in temperatures approaching 50C (122F).
But Dr. Richard Schumacher, executive director of the California VMA, rejects the arguments against declawing. "We will never accept that a veterinarian doing a procedure is animal abuse," he said.Oh, yeah, sure. Just because you have this piece of paper saying you have a degree in veterinary medicine magically makes it impossible for you to commit animal abuse. It also magically makes you immune to the emotion of greed (declawing is a very profitable operation).
I can almost hear Dr. Science's voice in the background: "I have a master's degree... in science. I know more than you do."
And, yes, declawing is a form of animal abuse, and is banned as such in Australia and a number of European countries.
I'm only 77, and I'll stop driving when they pry my cold, dead fingers off the steering wheel.Full story here, background here.
Which begs two comments:
That said, neither was in any way implicated in the 9-11 attacks. And I rather suspect that those who expect the attacks against US troops will wind down now are in for a rude surprise.
Not to mention the ongoing failure to find any WMD's. And what about Afghanistan (you know, that other country under US occupation)?
At last, Baghdad had something to celebrate.Machine gun fire? At night? Gee, it's kind of hard to tell just who is firing those guns in the dark, isn't it? Could it be fire from US forces eager to stage another celebration like the statue-toppling? Or is it just evidence that the Iraqis are far from disarmed? Take your choice.Within minutes of the news breaking on the Arabic-language satellite Al- Jazeera television that two of Iraq's most hated men were dead, the capital erupted in bursts of machine-gun fire hailing the demise of Odai and Qusai Hussein, whose life and crimes have been etched into Iraqis' collective consciousness almost as deeply as their father's.
The shooting continued almost incessantly for more than an hour, long after the curfew time of 11 p.m., when Baghdad normally falls silent. The gunfire echoed against the tall buildings downtown, sending cars speeding through the streets to avoid the falling ammunition.Either the US forces are incapable of enforcing curfew regulations, or some kinds of curfew violation are more equal than others. Again, take your choice.
With U.S. soldiers increasingly being the targets of lethal attacks by Hussein loyalists, American officials in Iraq have stated that capturing the father and two sons had become essential in ending the resistance. Until then, the attackers would remain emboldened -- and ordinary Iraqis anxious -- by the idea that the hated former regime might in time be able to launch a comeback.Reiterating the myth that it's just Saddam loyalists. Heaven knows it couldn't be nationalism at play. There's magic American fairy dust in the air that makes sure Iraqis don't experience the most common and powerful of political motivators, don't ya know.
They're already squirming away from that line, as the attacks on the occupiers continue. ¡Que una supresa!
Perhaps because capturing the Husseins had become such a crucial and pressing task, U.S. forces are accused by many Iraqis and international organizations of raiding homes across the country with excessive force, killing civilians in the process.Demonstrating conclusively their moral superiority over the 9/11 terrorists who killed civilians for political ends.
Full article here.
In other words, I wonder if a desire for revenge in the form of a good Old West style shoot-em-up got in the way of a more tactically useful live capture. Only time will tell.
"We fooled ourselves into thinking we would have a liberation over an occupation. Why did we do that?"Full story here.
The first whisperings that the shoot-out might not have been necessary are already being heard. See for example here.
"The pervasive fear of the old regime is still there," Wolfowitz said. "There's enormous gratitude to us and the British for bringing an end to a brutal regime. The Iraqi people want to build a free society. The events yesterday will help. The Iraqis are like prisoners who have emerged from years of solitary confinement."(Full story here.)
And if resistance increases, it's proof that the resistance is nothing but Baathist diehards:
The men, who claimed to be from Saddam Fedayeen militia, were shown standing in a room whose walls were covered in photographs of Mr. Hussein and his sons.(Full story here.)"The killing of Uday and Qusay will not decrease the attacks against the Americans but rather increase them," the speaker said, according to the news agency.
Unfalsifiable beliefs are so much fun.
Col. David Hogg, commander of the 2nd Brigade of the 4th Infantry Division, said tougher methods are being used to gather the intelligence. On Wednesday night, he said, his troops picked up the wife and daughter of an Iraqi lieutenant general. They left a note: "If you want your family released, turn yourself in." Such tactics are justified, he said, because, "It's an intelligence operation with detainees, and these people have info." They would have been released in due course, he added later.Full story here.
At the checkpoint, the Americans found a handgun, ordered the 56-year-old man out of his car and proceeded to bash his head with a rifle butt.Full story here.Rahim Nasser Mohammed points to his right temple, the side of his mouth and lifts his shirt, to show the spots where the soldier cudgeled him again and again nearly a month ago.
His story -- that of a government employee pulled over in his car by the US army -- seems one in a thousand as reports mount of beatings and sometimes deaths of Iraqi civilians at the hands of US soldiers.
The Bush Administration wants to cut the number of Air Marshalls at the same time intelligence indicates an increased hijacking threat.
Not to mention that all the while they seem to have no trouble shoveling all kinds of money at attacking and occupying foreign nations.
Full story here.
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