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31. mars 2003
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Matthew Good
My mate George at Duly Noted has just introduced me to some more great music: Matthew Good.
I just listen to the song Weapon now (again!); pretty tough rock with great instrumentals and vocals.
I try to think up something to compare him to.
Definately recommeneded!
9:33:43 PM 
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Bolivian landslide tragedy
A landslide in northern Bolivia has reportedly buried 400 homes. Casualties may be very high, probably in the hundreds.
8:54:15 PM
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Arnett's sacking
 Veteran reporter Peter Arnett was fired from NBC for giving an interview on Iraqi television where he said that the US war plan had failed in face of Iraqi strength.
NBC first defended Arnett's decision to give the interview, and what he said in it (essentially what everybody says) but once his words had drawn sharp criticism from US lawmakers and many others, NBC turned around and fired him.
I doubt Americans are aware how this story looks like in the rest of the world now. Arnett is "Mr CNN" from Gulf War I to the rest of the world. Him being fired over anti-American statements is making headlines all across the world at this moment, and the coverage is extremely critical towards the US media. The story is being portrayed (not incorrectly, IMO) as a witch-hunt, where a man is fired for telling what everybody already knows to be the truth, even if they will not admit it.
It is obvious that the newsmedia isn't even pretending to give an objective view when a top reporter is fired for failing to toe the party line.
Update: I have tried to understand this statement, as reported on Fox:
A Republican congresswoman, Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, told Fox News Channel on Sunday that Arnett's remarks were "Kafkaesque" and "just crazy."
I really cannot see how the word "Kafkaesque" can apply to anything Arnett said. It could, perhaps, apply to how Arnett is being treated. Something tells me Ms Ros-Lehtinen may not be very well read, and probably skipped all that boring literature from Europe.
8:15:41 PM
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New Kenyan MPs give themselves a Mercedes
The new Kenyan parliament, dominated by the opposition brought to power by public outrage over former president Daniel Arap Moi's corruption, has already managed to alienate many of those that voted for them. In times of serious recession, they started by giving themselves a substantial pay rise and a Mercedes each.
7:32:17 PM
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Nuke-safe bunker with a view
"House hunters are to be offered properties which boast rural locations, spectacular views - and protection from nuclear attack. Three decommissioned Cold War bunkers in the East Midlands are now on the market priced at £2,000 each." (Ananova)
I think they have a potential customer from Baghdad.
5:12:42 PM
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Powell borrows Rumsfeld's clothes
 Colin Powell (picture) has issued some very stern warnings to Syria and Iran about sponsoring terrorism. Following Rumsfeld's statements warning the same countries against getting involved in the Iraq war, it adds up to rather strong rhetoric against the two states.
You could be tempted to think the US already has its hands full in Iraq.
One thing that crossed my mind, is that in warning Syria about it sponsoring "terrorists," Powell exercises the same double standards that has the whole Middle East and at least half of Europe annoyed at the United States. Right, Syria has for a long time openly supported Hezbollah, who aren't what you'd normally call nice guys. But this group was dedicated to fight the illegal Israeli occupation of Lebanon (and, in fact, had a lot of "credit" for Israel finally withdrawing). And guess what? Israel has its own bunch of armed thugs in Lebanon, that would have been called "terrorists" if their weren't Israel's friends.
Powell made the comment in a speech to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel lobby in the US. In this context, I can't help thinking that this was very insensitive timing, at least if the US administration does not want to enrage the Arab public too much. I fear they don't care about winning "hearts and minds" anymore.
3:22:16 PM
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Time traveller urban legend
Ok, now I've learned it. Check out the urban legends archive first.
The story about Andrew Carlssin, the 'inside trader' who claimed to be a time traveller from 2256, was originally written by the Weekly World News, obviously an American tabloid never intended to be taken seriously.
I, and many other bloggers, wrote about the story when I first read about it on Yahoo! News. It's good to see, in hindsight, that I expressed strong skepticism about it. But kudos to WWN for spinning an entertaining little tale.
Thanks to Throatwobbler who gave me the link to Snopes in a comment.
2:41:30 PM
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The Russian take on the Iraq war
A group of Russian journalists and military experts has formed an analytical center to provide "accurate and up-to-date news and analysis" on the Iraq war, based on intelligence from the Russian military intelligence (GRU). The English language versions of the reports are posted on www.aeronautics.ru. You can read the currently latest report here, in this case from Saturday.
To nobody's surprise, this report is much gloomer reading for the coalition forces than the reports, mostly based on coalition sources and embedded (aka in-bed-ed) journalists, we find in western news sources. How accurate this is, I have no idea. First, I have no idea how good Russian signal and human intelligence about Iraq currently is. Second, it is difficult to know to what degree this analytical center has access to real intelligence from the traditionally extremely secretive GRU. And it's worth noting that Russians are likely to be very negative to the US-led coalition, and spin it accordingly.
2:17:36 PM
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Srebrenica buries massacre victims
 Thousands of people will attend the mass funeral for nearly 600 people killed in Europe's worst massacre since World War II, Muslims killed by Bosnian serbs when they overran the town of Srebrenica in the summer of 1995.
It is estimated that at least 8,000 men and boys were exterminated when the town, which had been made a safe area by the United Nations and inadequately protected by Dutch UN peacekeepers, was overran by the Serbs. What followed was a systematic ethnic cleansing. Mass graves are still being found in the area. The 600 being buried now are just the first to be identified by DNA testing.
The massacre marked a total shameful failure of the European powers and the United Nations in protecting the Muslim population against the Serb aggression. The French general Bernard Janvier was in charge of the UN troops in the region. When the Serb forces overran the 200 lightly armed Dutch peacekeepers, Janvier refused to call in airstrikes to stop the attack.
Former Yoguslav president Slobodan Milosevic is currently on trial for this and other war crimes in the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in Der Hague.
1:23:18 PM
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Andrew Carlssin
I see I am receiving massive amounts of google hits on the inside-trader claiming he was a time traveller. To read my entry about him go to this entry.
While you're here, I hope you enjoy some of the other things I've written about. Welcome!
PS: I haven't found any follow-up on this story, and I only ever found three media comments about the alleged time traveller. I still have a theory it was an April 1st story that was published a bit too early...
11:57:32 AM
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War games, or a scripted exercise?
I remember I read about this well before the war started, and I wished I had written about it as I intended to, but a lot of blog entries never make it to the screen. In July and August, the US armed services conducted a massive war game, called Millennium Challenge 02, in effect simulating a war against Iraq. It was intended to test out their plans, and if it went well, validate them. The commander of the enemy red forces was Paul Van Riper, a retired three-star U.S. Marine Corps general.
Officially, the war game went very well for the blue (US) forces. Van Riper himself, however, had a different idea. He wrote an email that was subsequently leaked to the Army Times, alleging that the game was scripted. He did a large number of unexpected moves, at one time obtaining almost complete red victory by sinking the blue fleet with suicide speed boats. He offset the electronic surveilance of the US forces by using low technology motorbike couriers to bring around orders. At every point, the war game managers disallowed his moves and changed to rules to make sure that the blue forces won. Van Riper quit the game in protest.
Perhaps the US commanders really took some lessons from this; after all they seem to have been very wary of speedboats in the Gulf, but surely it seems some of Van Riper's ideas have been mirrored in the real war. If the war really is going badly (and, to be sure, we really don't know to what degree it is), Van Riper can sit back and say "told you so."
Fred Kaplan in Slate is part of a growing chorus of pundits who think the war planners have not been paying enough attention to early, constructive criticism, Van Riper's lesson in unconventional warfare being a case in point. But, of course, like all of us, he has not seen the great master plan.
So far, it appears that Saddam Hussein, for one, is not playing according to the script for an easy allied victory.
9:08:11 AM
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US court: Press is allowed to lie
A Flordia appeals court has reversed a $425,000 verdict in favour of journalist Jane Akre, who successfully proved that she had been pressured by Fox Television (of course!) to lie to the public.
Fox argued that they were indeed permitted to lie, and this court, unlike previous courts, agreed that FCC's rules against news distortion was a "policy" not a law, rule or regulation. As such, Fox Television successfully defended its right to lie, and will no doubt continue doing so as a matter of policy.
Nothing will change, then.
Thanks to the Marprelate Tracts for this gem.
7:10:37 AM
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Not ready to marry yet, at 94
"Most people need to sow their wild oats before they settle down to a quiet married life. For some, that needed single period can take a while. For example, one man in China, identified as Mr. Zhang by the Nanguo City News, is using a dating agency to seek a lover, saying he's not yet ready for marriage. Mr. Zhang is 94 years old." (Divorce Magazine; yes there is such a thing!)
6:20:27 AM
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Cowboy Yank!
British forces attacked by an American pilot who killed one serviceman and destroyed two armoured vehicles are not holding back from criticising an alleged ally:
The Yank opened up. He had absolutely no regard for human life. He was a cowboy out on a jolly
The A10 pilot were apparently blind to the clear British markings on the vehicles, despite flying right over their heads.
Lance Corporal of Horse Steven Gerrard, who suffered shrapnel wounds and burns and were flown home for treatment, has more kind words for the American cowboy pilot:
We can identify a friendly vehicle from 1,500 metres, yet you’ve got an A10 with advanced technology and he can’t use a thermal sight to identify whether a tank is a friend or foe. It’s ridiculous.
Combat is what I’ve been trained for. I can command my vehicle. I can keep it from being attacked. What I have not been trained to do is look over my shoulder to see whether an American is shooting at me.
Lieutenant MacEwen concurred:
Don’t worry about the Iraqis, it’s the Americans you want to watch.
Apparently, the US command has "apologised" for the incident. Oops! Sorry about that.
5:42:29 AM
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Fast-moving SARS cause for alarm
A fast-growing cluster of the killer pneumonia infections in Hong Kong makes experts worry that SARS, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, may be more contagious than first believed.
As many as 76 cases are reported from a housing estate known as Amoy Gardens, and health authorities are investigating to find out how a disease they thought only spread by close human relations could spread so fast. The real fear is that SARS has gone airborne.
5:13:21 AM
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New Virtual Occoquan
Mark has put together a new issue of the Occoquan Inquirer, the 'zine with at least two names and a hell of a lot of writers. Check out the best in the past week of Salon blogging.
PS: I'm gonna get you for that, Mark. Heh!
4:35:32 AM
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© Copyright 2003 Jan Haugland.
Last update: 01.04.2003; 01:34:54.
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