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20. august 2005
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It is weekend and time to present some lighter news than the usual stories about war and terrorism, and today a few odd animal tales have stood out. I am getting back to the cow in a moment.
In Los Angeles, a big alligator has surfaced in a murky lake, and authorities are understandably concerned about what its dinner plans may be. So far, the alligator has outwitted the animal catchers, and the residents have started to increasingly cheer on the reptile.
"We're pretty confident we'll be able to catch him," park ranger Albert Jedinak said as he stared at the calm surface of the lake. "He was actually in the net once but unfortunately we didn't have the boat ready."
Meanwhile one woman deployed her two young sons to work the crowd, hawking $10 t-shirts bearing an alligator drawing and the words: "Harbor City You Will Never Catch Me."
The alligator -- who was chased around the 53-acre (21-hectare) lake for much of the week by a professional "gator wrangler" from Colorado -- did not make an appearance, having last been spotted on Wednesday night.
The wrangler and his crew returned to Colorado on Thursday morning to secure larger nets but vowed to return next week and bag his prey.
Still waiting for that moment was animal services officer Guillermo Perea, who sat in a pick-up truck designated to drive the reptile, imprisoned in a giant green box, to the Los Angeles Zoo after it was caught.
Perea said he would not take part in the capture, adding: "I'm not that kind of guy. I get paid for dogs, not alligators."
The police in Colombia take a less positive view of animals, in particular a cow blamed for a car accident.
The cow was wandering along a road in Giron when was hit by a woman on a motorcycle.
The woman was not badly hurt but police decided the cow was a danger and 'arrested' it.
Officers were unable to find out who owns the car and are keeping it in the town's prison.
A police spokesman said: "If it was a person who caused the accident, he or she would be behind bars, so why not a cow?"
You better hope that quotation will not follow you for the rest of your career!
More sympathetic news from Israel, then. The controversial Gaza evacuations appear to be on track, but some people are committed to evacuating the cats and dogs, too.
Israeli animal rescuers will enter Gaza's Jewish settlements after they have been emptied of people to round up stray dogs and cats, an animal welfare group said on Thursday.
Unarmed troops have begun forced evacuations of settlers under Israel's plan to pull out of the Gaza Strip after nearly four decades of occupation. About half the 8,500 residents had already left by themselves.
Avi Kuzi, who heads the Society to Protect Animals, said the pet catchers will move in once the 21 Gaza settlements are declared empty.
Israel is known for its many stray cats but some of the animals could be pets that got lost when owners left suddenly or were dragged away.
Tal Levy, evacuated on Thursday by Israeli troops and police from the Gaza settlement Kfar Darom, said he saw many stray animals in the area before he left.
"Horses, dogs and cats and even chickens were wandering the streets," he told Israel's NRG website, affiliated with its Maariv newspaper. "There is no one to feed or care for them."
PETA will be delighted to learn that the settlers care more for the animals than did, say, the late Yasser Arafat.
PS: If the above cow photo arouse a need to see more animal pictures, The Modulator hosts Friday Ark #48, linking to bloggers who post pictures of their cats, dogs, birds, a horse, a llama, a squirrel and even a blogger writing about baby octopi.
11:19:06 PM 
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Word is that South African president Thabo Mbeki is tired of the futile "silent diplomacy" that has done nothing to change the ways of Zimbabwe's Robert Mugabe, and is ready to get tough.
The signs from South Africa now suggest that the African leaders - who for decades have refused to criticise abuses among their number - are for the first time seriously considering breaking the taboo and taking Mr Mugabe to task for the destruction of his own country.
The South African leader has sacrificed much of his international reputation by declining to criticise President Mugabe's excesses. Instead, South Africa has tried to influence Zimbabwe's regime with behind-the-scenes talks.
Yet the country's descent into economic collapse and political repression has continued unabated, leading Mr Mbeki to think again. "Our President has eventually agreed that the quiet diplomatic approach has not yielded the results that were expected," said Devikarani Jana, a diplomat who received a briefing on Zimbabwe from South African officials on Wednesday.
Let's just say I believe it when I see it.
What has happened so far is not even about "silent diplomacy." It is about the African Union members circling the wagons when one of their own, no matter how thuggish, is criticised by the west, even if those criticisms are supported by the thug's own people.
If Mbeki finally breaks ranks, so much the better.
9:26:09 PM
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The SC Monitor's Amelia Newcomb asks an important question, that has been discussed in this blog earlier: Is China today like Japan in the 1980s? There are similarities, surely, but also notable differences.
As concerns grow that a new Asian giant is intent on challenging the US in everything from sedans to software, the Japan experience of the '80s may provide insights on how the US and China might compete - and coexist - in the global economy of the 21st century.
On one level, say analysts, China is not as much of a threat as it is often portrayed to be. It has decades to go to match the high-tech and management prowess of the US - unlike Japan 20 years ago. Another critical difference is that Beijing has welcomed foreign investment and companies. That's something that Tokyo was (and still is) loath to do. China's total exports and imports accounted for 75 percent of GDP in 2004, for example; the figure for Japan is about 25 percent. [...]
"China, with its supply of cheap labor and high levels of education, will continue to be a very big challenge, one that's unlikely to level off as quickly as Japan," says Ezra Vogel, a professor at Harvard University and an expert on China and Japan. But he adds, "While there will be a lot of Americans frightened at a growing China, if we have skillful political managers, there's no reason we can't get along."
Fair enough, but I'd also worry about their political managers. I am not entirely convinced China's tough talk about Taiwan can't transform into something very serious.
China's rise certainly bears similarities to that of Japan. It's easy to forget that Japan once battled with the US over textile exports. Both Asian nations have pursued export-driven growth and focused on developing "strategic industries" like autos and electronics. Like China now, Japan once faced pressure to strengthen its currency to help reduce a monumental trade deficit with the US.
But while there are trade barriers that contribute to that deficit, there's no question the Chinese economy is more open to outsiders than Japan's. China has set up joint ventures as a way to leapfrog development in cars, for example. Foreign direct investment hit nearly $55 billion last year, compared with Japan's $8 billion.
As a result, corporate America today is solidly behind China.
More worrying for western businesses, however, is that there is hardly a level playing field between China and the west. Read on.
I still think the biggest Asian power a decade or two down the line will be India, not China.
7:44:05 PM
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Evidence that early hominids drove SUVs:
Complex variation of the East African climate may have played a key role in the development of our human ancestors.
Scientists have identified extensive lake systems which formed and disappeared in East Africa between 1 and 3 million years ago.
The lakes could be evidence that global climate changes occured throughout this pivotal period in human evolution.
The findings, reported in the journal Science, suggest that humans evolved in response to a variable climate.
Climate change without fossil fuel emissions, and with a positive outcome. What heresy.
7:30:51 PM
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Supreme Court nominee John Roberts was quite prescient, objecting to Michael Jackson at the height of the eccentric star's career:
Roberts wrote: "If one wants the youth of America and the world sashaying around in garish sequined costumes, hair dripping with pomade, body shot full of female hormones to prevent voice change, mono-gloved, well, then, I suppose 'Michael,' as he is affectionately known in the trade, is in fact a good example. Quite apart from the problem of appearing to endorse Jackson's androgynous life style, a Presidential award would be perceived as a shallow effort by the President to share in the constant publicity surrounding Jackson. . . . The whole episode would, in my view, be demeaning to the President."
Or maybe not, as Milibank notes, since Roberts also objected to other celebrities, even John Wayne.
"I am . . . somewhat troubled by the absence of a consistent policy governing our willingness to permit the President to participate in these private, commercial tributes. . . . I think we are seeing evidence of what we often say will happen when we deny requests for Presidential endorsements of charitable efforts: once you do one it becomes impossible to turn down countless others. I know there's only one John Wayne -- but there's only one Bob Hope, James Bond, Bing Crosby, etc. etc. etc."
Only one James Bond?
Only one at the time, presumably.
I don't think it's only me, and I have the distinct impression the WaPo is desperately looking for something to sink John Roberts.
7:18:09 PM
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It is conventional wisdom that the Iraq war has been badly executed. Armed Liberal has undoubtedly read far more military history than I have (and I have read a lot) and he makes this very strong point:
The litany of error - bad planning, prisoner abuse, military arrogance, political timidity - wraps much of the opposition to the war. It is to say that "It's not that I'm against the war; I'm just against this war, because it's being so badly prosecuted."
But as I've asked before, compared to what?
I've read moderately deeply in history, including the history of wars from the Peloponnesian through Vietnam.
Lincoln's leading general (McClellan) wanted to settle the war, and undermined his strategic direction in the hope that he could make room for negotiation.
The first American battle with the German army in World War II (Kasserine Pass) was a rout - we were routed.
War is, above all, the providence of error. People seem to make a lot of mistakes in war, and because these mistakes are written in blood, they are more visible than the mistakes we inevitably make as city council members setting policies for side yard variances.
Let's make it simple - we've all read Catch-22 with it's deadly accurate descriptions of the lunacy, folly, and avarice that were part of the U.S. military in World War II. Most veterans of the war that I knew found a core of truth in that book.
Does that mean we were fated to lose? Obviously not.
Does that mean we shouldn't have fought the war? Obviously not.
Many on the left - and quite a few on the right - describe the Iraq war as a, excuse the expression, clusterfuck. If that is true, it is also a quite apt description of warfare generally. It is a mess, not only in the most gory literal sense, but it is extremely difficult. The obvious fact is that you go out to destroy someone who will, even if his resources are far fewer than yours, employ all his skill and energy to twarting your goals. Every ruse has a counter-ruse, every tactic an answer.
Quality is experience relative to expectations. Obviously some leaders sold the war as a walk in the park, and they were naive and wrong. This, and the surprise absense of significant WMD stocks in Iraq, have resulted in loss of confidence among many who previously supported the war. The most optimistic expectations were never realistic (like the most pessimistic, like all the pundits who expected Baghdad to be a Stalingrad). As wars go, in cost, losses and gains and setbacks, I would say the current Iraq war ranks as one with near-unprecedented low losses, but where the objectives, wins and losses are dangerously unclear. In World War II's European theatre, the distance to the end of the war could be measured more or less as the distance from the frontlines to Berlin. In Iraq, and the global war on terror generally, it is not precisely clear how we measure success along the way, or how we achieve it.
4:10:53 AM
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Was the whole 'Able Danger knew Atta' claim based on hearsay?
The former intelligence officer who says that a Defense Department program identified Mohamed Atta and three other hijackers before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks said yesterday that many of his allegations are not based on his memory but on the recollections of others.
Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, who has been on paid administrative leave from the Defense Intelligence Agency since his security clearance was suspended in March 2004, said in a telephone interview that a Navy officer and a civilian official affiliated with the Able Danger program told him after the attacks that Atta and other hijackers had been included on a chart more than a year earlier.
Apparently the charts allegedly showing Atta and others have now disappeared. Why? I thought excessive record-keeping was essential to intelligence work, since you never know which tiny piece of date proves crucial years later.
Shaffer said that Able Danger, by analyzing publicly available databases, produced charts in "the late spring or summer of 2000" showing ties between suspected terrorists. Shaffer said that after the Sept. 11 attacks, the civilian employee showed him a chart allegedly from 2000 that purportedly identified Atta and three other hijackers.
Shaffer, who briefed the Senate Judiciary Committee on his allegations yesterday, said he recognized the charts from his work as a liaison between the DIA and Able Danger. But he said he is relying on the word of Phillpott and the civilian employee, who pointed to one of the charts and said, "We had them."
This story is getting a bit weird.
Link: Able Danger disclosure.
3:08:42 AM
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Bill Frist joins the opportunistic attack on science.
Echoing similar comments from President Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said "intelligent design" should be taught in public schools alongside evolution.
Frist, a Republican from Tennessee, spoke to a Rotary Club meeting Friday and told reporters afterward that students need to be exposed to different ideas, including intelligent design.
"I think today a pluralistic society should have access to a broad range of fact, of science, including faith," Frist said.
Silly. It's not as if excluding religious mythology from the science classroom means nobody will have access to it. What do you have churches for?
Link: My previous writings on creationism aka intelligent design.
3:00:33 AM
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© Copyright 2005 Jan Haugland.
Last update: 26.08.2005; 13:09:04.
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