I'm late to the game to comment on the Israeli / Hezbollah war. It's been going on for 8 days now and the obvious things have already been said:
- Hezbollah in the North, and Hamas in the South, provoked the war with their illegal kidnappings of soldiers and with sustained rocket attacks into Israel
- Israel has a right to defend itself
- Isreal's defense does not have to be a "proportional response" to just the kidnappings, anymore than the U.S.'s response to 9/11 was just going after the small group of al Qaida that planned the attack. You have to keep going until the group that threatens you is crushed and can't attack again
All that's been said.
My worry, beyond whether this war will escalate and drag us all in, is this:
If Iraq had WMD's before our invasion, which I believe they did
and if Iraq moved those WMD's before we arrived, which I believe they did
and if Iraq moved those WMD's into Syria, or worse as some evidence indicates through Syria into Lebanon, which I believe they did
how soon until those WMD's get unburied from the Bekaa Valley and used against Israel?
That would not be good.
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Thursday, July 13, 2006
As I Feared - It's War
Last week, when my co-workers and I were talking current events at the lunch table, it was N. Korea launching missles that had people buzzing.
I piped in to say that I was more worried about the Israeli hostage situation that worried me more. It looked likely to me that this would be the crisis most likely to escalate.
It started simply. Hamas militants from the Gaza strip tunnelled under the wall that Israel built and attacked Israeli soldiers - kidnapping one and dragging him back into Gaza. It was clear to me that Hamas wouldn't release him. And it was also likely to me that Israel would not capitulate on getting him back, even if that meant going to war.
And war it is. Faced with the soldier's capture, daily rocket attacks from Gaza, and now incursions and kidnappings from Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israel has hammered the response with missile attacks from jet fighters. Make no mistake, Israel stated, it's war.
What else would you expect Israel to do? They went the extra mile by totally withdrawing from Gaza and retreating behind a wall hoping for peace with their neighbors. Their reward was continued attacks on their military and civilian population from a terrorist organization - Hamas.
The situation highlights a claim that Rush Limbaugh, among others, had made for years - there is no peace without military victory. You don't negotiate peace. You impose peace after crushing the ability of your enemy to hurt you.
I know two things:
- this is not going to be over quick
- this is not going to be contained just to Israel, Hamas in Gaza, and Hezbollah in Lebanon
The fuse is lit.
I piped in to say that I was more worried about the Israeli hostage situation that worried me more. It looked likely to me that this would be the crisis most likely to escalate.
It started simply. Hamas militants from the Gaza strip tunnelled under the wall that Israel built and attacked Israeli soldiers - kidnapping one and dragging him back into Gaza. It was clear to me that Hamas wouldn't release him. And it was also likely to me that Israel would not capitulate on getting him back, even if that meant going to war.
And war it is. Faced with the soldier's capture, daily rocket attacks from Gaza, and now incursions and kidnappings from Hezbollah in Lebanon, Israel has hammered the response with missile attacks from jet fighters. Make no mistake, Israel stated, it's war.
What else would you expect Israel to do? They went the extra mile by totally withdrawing from Gaza and retreating behind a wall hoping for peace with their neighbors. Their reward was continued attacks on their military and civilian population from a terrorist organization - Hamas.
The situation highlights a claim that Rush Limbaugh, among others, had made for years - there is no peace without military victory. You don't negotiate peace. You impose peace after crushing the ability of your enemy to hurt you.
I know two things:
- this is not going to be over quick
- this is not going to be contained just to Israel, Hamas in Gaza, and Hezbollah in Lebanon
The fuse is lit.
Enough with the Finches Already
Every so often I get a chuckle out of some science writer in the mainstream media reporting a finding that "proves" evolution. Usually it's some new pronouncement of measurements of Darwin's finches on the Galopagos Islands.
Really! It proves evolution? I can't wait to read it!
So I wasn't disappointed to read this AP story this week, posted on FreeRepublic.com, called "Finches on Galopagos Islands evolving". Go read it and then come back and tell me how this proves evolution.
Are they claiming proof? From the article:
Really? It evolved a medium beak? In just two decades? No need to read any further - hey they proved it already!
Oh, but wait a minute. Silly me. I read further, and I paid attention.
It seems that our finch in question (G. fortis), under a little competition for food in a dry season from mean ole G. magnirostris experienced a change:
So, what dear readers are we to conclude from this - helped along by Peter Grant of Princeton University, lead author of the report:
Ahh, no. It's not. In my humble opinion, it's not a "form of evolution" at all.
There's just one little hitch, and that is that the population of G. fortis had both medium beaks and large beaks all along. The finch didn't "evolve" a medium beak.
Only the ratio of those two beak sizes changed due to the environmental pressure. Give it a couple rainy seasons and the ratio will swing back to favor the large beaks.
This is just a rehash of the famous "peppered moth" story from England that has been used for so many years to demonstrate natural selection. It's bogus and proves nothing. It only proves variation in the ratio of traits within an existing population. It has nothing to do, for example, with speciation.
Bottom line: this quaint little study does not "prove" evolution. An existing trait (beak size) varies with environmental pressure - granted. However, the finch did not "evolve" a medium beak. The finch did not become anything but a finch.
It's a meaningless story.
And, it's not the last time we will hear it.
Really! It proves evolution? I can't wait to read it!
So I wasn't disappointed to read this AP story this week, posted on FreeRepublic.com, called "Finches on Galopagos Islands evolving". Go read it and then come back and tell me how this proves evolution.
Are they claiming proof? From the article:
Finches on the Galapagos Islands that inspired Charles Darwin to develop the concept of evolution are now helping confirm it — by evolving.
A medium sized species of Darwin's finch has evolved a smaller beak to take advantage of different seeds just two decades after the arrival of a larger rival for its original food source.
Really? It evolved a medium beak? In just two decades? No need to read any further - hey they proved it already!
Oh, but wait a minute. Silly me. I read further, and I paid attention.
It seems that our finch in question (G. fortis), under a little competition for food in a dry season from mean ole G. magnirostris experienced a change:
In 2003 and 2004 little rain fell, further reducing the food supply. The result was high mortality among G. fortis with larger beaks, leaving a breeding population of small-beaked G. fortis that could eat the seeds from smaller plants and didn't have to compete with the larger G. magnirostris for large seeds.
So, what dear readers are we to conclude from this - helped along by Peter Grant of Princeton University, lead author of the report:
That's a form of evolution known as character displacement, where natural selection produces an evolutionary change in the next generation, Grant explained in a recorded statement made available by Science.
Ahh, no. It's not. In my humble opinion, it's not a "form of evolution" at all.
There's just one little hitch, and that is that the population of G. fortis had both medium beaks and large beaks all along. The finch didn't "evolve" a medium beak.
Only the ratio of those two beak sizes changed due to the environmental pressure. Give it a couple rainy seasons and the ratio will swing back to favor the large beaks.
This is just a rehash of the famous "peppered moth" story from England that has been used for so many years to demonstrate natural selection. It's bogus and proves nothing. It only proves variation in the ratio of traits within an existing population. It has nothing to do, for example, with speciation.
Bottom line: this quaint little study does not "prove" evolution. An existing trait (beak size) varies with environmental pressure - granted. However, the finch did not "evolve" a medium beak. The finch did not become anything but a finch.
It's a meaningless story.
And, it's not the last time we will hear it.
Tuesday, July 04, 2006
I Heart Ann Coulter
I just finished reading Ann Coulter's new book - "Godless: the Church of Liberalism". Awesome!
Some thoughts:
1 Why is Ann Coulter so wildly popular with conservatives? Easy. She doesn't shrink from making the strongest possible case for her point - generally, for conservative values. That's rare. Conservative politicians, including President Bush, often shy away from defending the rightness of their positions. Ann doesn't. As an example, I give you the last sentence of her 1st chapter:
"Liberals can believe what they want to believe, but let us not flinch from indentifying liberalism as the opposition party to God"
2. Is she mean? Yes. Too mean? Probably. I thought that the comment about the Jersey Girls "enjoying" their husbands death went too far. I would have preferred, what others have suggested, "exploited", which would have been accurate. Sometimes when I read her columns I think that her sarcasm was so deep that it obscured her point.
But that's generally quibbling. Her main point is accurate and well reasoned.
As she said to Jay Leno when he was quizzing her about the Jersey Girls quote being too mean: "Is that all liberals are offended by? I called them Godless, for goodness sakes. That they're cool with."
3. Is the Jersey Girls quote all they they found to be offended by? You'd think so, because every interviewer focused on that. I found stuff on almost every page that liberals would be offended by. How about these gems:
- on liberal's sacrament (abortion), and it's affect:
- on liberal's priesthood (teachers - indoctrinating students in the state religion of liberalism). A whole chapter gauranteed to offend. Ann makes a point about 59% of new teacher applicants in Massachusetts in 1998 failing a test designed for eight graders. Teacher's advocates objected, stating that the test failed to demonstrate a relationshep between test scores and initial teacher competence. Ann's retort:
4. In all of the TV interviews that I saw with Ann on her publicity tour for the book, none of them conducted a decent interview with her about her thesis: that although liberals demand a separation between state and religion, liberalism is in fact the state religion.
"It has its own cosmology, its own miracles, it's own beliefs in the supernatural, its own churches, its own high priests, its own saints, its own total worldview, and its own explanation for the existence of the universe. In other words, liberalism contains all of the attributes of what is generally known as 'religion.'"
Awesome. A thesis that conservatives agree with, but that no one else has had the gumption to put forward as Ann has.
The book is entertaining and well argued. Yes, and gauranteed to make you wince every now and then. You should read it.
Some thoughts:
1 Why is Ann Coulter so wildly popular with conservatives? Easy. She doesn't shrink from making the strongest possible case for her point - generally, for conservative values. That's rare. Conservative politicians, including President Bush, often shy away from defending the rightness of their positions. Ann doesn't. As an example, I give you the last sentence of her 1st chapter:
"Liberals can believe what they want to believe, but let us not flinch from indentifying liberalism as the opposition party to God"
2. Is she mean? Yes. Too mean? Probably. I thought that the comment about the Jersey Girls "enjoying" their husbands death went too far. I would have preferred, what others have suggested, "exploited", which would have been accurate. Sometimes when I read her columns I think that her sarcasm was so deep that it obscured her point.
But that's generally quibbling. Her main point is accurate and well reasoned.
As she said to Jay Leno when he was quizzing her about the Jersey Girls quote being too mean: "Is that all liberals are offended by? I called them Godless, for goodness sakes. That they're cool with."
3. Is the Jersey Girls quote all they they found to be offended by? You'd think so, because every interviewer focused on that. I found stuff on almost every page that liberals would be offended by. How about these gems:
- on liberal's sacrament (abortion), and it's affect:
"This leads us to the astonishing spectacle of Teddy Kennedy, in full-dress sanctimony, getting all high and might with Supreme Court candidates as if the nominee had done something heinous like drown a girl and walk away from it because he had diplomatic immunity in the state of Massachusetts."
- on liberal's priesthood (teachers - indoctrinating students in the state religion of liberalism). A whole chapter gauranteed to offend. Ann makes a point about 59% of new teacher applicants in Massachusetts in 1998 failing a test designed for eight graders. Teacher's advocates objected, stating that the test failed to demonstrate a relationshep between test scores and initial teacher competence. Ann's retort:
"Genuine teacher competency is measured by how capable a teacher is at taking away a fourth-grader's Bible and passing out condoms".
4. In all of the TV interviews that I saw with Ann on her publicity tour for the book, none of them conducted a decent interview with her about her thesis: that although liberals demand a separation between state and religion, liberalism is in fact the state religion.
"It has its own cosmology, its own miracles, it's own beliefs in the supernatural, its own churches, its own high priests, its own saints, its own total worldview, and its own explanation for the existence of the universe. In other words, liberalism contains all of the attributes of what is generally known as 'religion.'"
Awesome. A thesis that conservatives agree with, but that no one else has had the gumption to put forward as Ann has.
The book is entertaining and well argued. Yes, and gauranteed to make you wince every now and then. You should read it.
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