Osama

Osama is Dead!

And a nation rejoiced.
Where as i do believe that was the best end for this man. I am somewhat disturbed at the celebrations at the death of a human being.

My feelings on the matter is one of sorrow, for the those that suffered at his hands, and for the fact that he was such a lost individual that he would be driven to such depths... there is nothing to rejoice about here... just reasons to mourn.

In light of this I marvel at the specie i belong to. We have been given much, and for all our joys and triumphs we are never far from proving our unworthiness of it all.

When will we, as the human race, ever grow up and be collectively responsible for ourselves. When? Will it ever happen?

Random Thoughts

Music:
As a Double seconds player I have found that what KGB told me is true "It's all in the chords"

Iran:
There is more going on there than meets the eye.

Barak:
Expectations too high for one who is not the second coming of Christ

Ipod Shuffle:

THE WORST THING EVER SOLD TO AN UNSUSPECTING VICTIM.... Wooooooooooohhhhhsssssaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhh.

WOMEN:
Want a man who will stick and stay in spite of them.

MEN:
Sometimes don't know what they want.

Work:
My refuge

Pan:
?

Relationships:
Are hard.

Tuff Quote:
"Not in my cabinet". For some twisted reason my ratings for my prime minister went up after that.

20\20 Cricket:
Will be the most financially lucrative form of the game.

Who is thy brothers Keeper?

"Where is the US, Where is the UK where is the United Nations?!"

This was a cry from a citizen of Somalia re the ongoing conflict there....
This cry has been echoed in Darfur and Zimbabwe and countless other nations that have been torn apart by war.
Valiantly, the almost impotent UN try to send aid... but it is either not enough or the sadistic rulers of countries such as Darfur try to block them at every turn.

Many times when I hear such pleas for help I wonder; why cant Africans save Africa? Why should the west take it upon themselves to save Africa from Africans? Why?
Of course the good book tells us why."Do unto others as you would have them do unto you".
You never know when it will be your turn to be saved from yourself.
And so it is incumbent upon us, as citizens of the world to act......

But this leads me to a BBC program titled "Death To America" , where they explore the reasons behind the hatred many countries have for the United states.
In looking at a number of conflicts I have found that America serves its own self interest.... not democracy, or liberty or freedom like they would have you believe.... the are primarily interested in their own well being.
Having said this the next question one must ask one's self is; Is this wrong. Is it wrong for a country to look out for its own self interest first? is it crime to want the best for yourself and your family?
I put it to u that there are no truly benevolent countries on this planet. And each and every single nation has its own wellbeing as the highest of it's priorities... Why then should we expect the richest and most powerful to be any different?
What right do we.. or Darfur or Palistine or Zimbabwe or anyone for that matter, have to demand anything from anyone?

Dont get me wrong... I believe it is imperative for a country in a position to help to do so.. and I believe that when in need of help... But as much as it is incumbent on one nation to help another it is equally important for the nation requesting help to know that this is a request... It is not their place to demand.

War on Iran?

The Big question on allot of peoples lips now-a-days, is whether or not the US is going to bomb IRAN if it does not comply with its demands to halt its Nuclear development plans.

I am of 2 minds on this matter... I am (as i have indicated in previous blogs) DISGUSTED with Bush's FTWDAMFS policy

(FTWDAMFS -> "F*** The World Dont Ask Me For Sh*t")

As a result, his 'macho' posturing on this issue has me feeling that a war with Iran is inevitable....
In spite of this, to think that Iran is ONLY gonna use its nuclear plants for producing power would be behaving like a very naive school girl..... Iran is a Muslim state... home to many extremists.. the Govt might not plan to start a war... but the extremists do and I don't think the govt can, or even wants to, Stop them.

So the question then becomes, What do we do? neither side is strong enough to totally annihilate the other.. Albeit America can do considerably more damage... Iran's retaliation, I expect, would be a even greater support for radicals and extremists.... something that would not bode well for US citizens anywhere in the world......

Lessons (The war on Terror)

As You can probably guess by now I am not a big fan of Bush but last night I stayed up late watching a program on National Geographic recounting the events on September 11. It was a painful reminder that we are now post 9/11 and we are not to forget the lessons the 2,973 souls on that day died to teach us.

Immediately after 9/11 president Bush acted as any leader should have.. I may not like the route he took but being fair to him.. his decisive take no prisoners attitude was Ideally what the The American public.. and I dare say.. the world needed at the time.

After the the attack in Afghanistan he made a declaration about the axis points of Evil... Effectively eliminating diplomacy as an option with many of the US's enemies. Personally I do not appreciate the way Bush is waging this war on Terror (which I now think is essential) and I believe Clinton would have found a way to best balance the use of force with Diplomacy.
What Bush has wrongfully created, is an "Us against the world" outlook. This can never work.. yes a hard line approach is needed but like the Tanqueray add says "Everything in moderation".

After watching the 9/11 events again I felt an anger and a need to lash out against those who carried out this act.. but we need to also be careful not to create more extremist in the process.

As Gen. Rupert Smith pointed out on the daily show last night, "THE ART OF WAR IN THE MODERN WORLD” cannot be based off the use of force only but it requires one to fight on all fronts, such as Diplomacy, PR, Force...... etc., simultaneously.
This is something I doubt Bush realizes.... Oh and do not think I believe he is acting as he does soley for the benefit of the American People. I still think he is also acting in his own self interest as well. For as far as the 2 can work together..... A question that comes to mind, however, is; if it comes to a choice between the 2 what will he do?

Final Report? Well I now believe Bush has generally the right Idea with regards to his war on Terror However I do believe his plans of action are not able to achieve the objective we all need to see.

In closing however I challenge us to never forget 9/11 and to be honest with ourselves... the Americans have done as much and maybe even worse atrocities in its time... they are no saints. We should apply such lessons to all that we do... the actions that we do today may haunt us tomorrow... beware of the monsters we create. And though it may be hard, try to see the big picture there is a time and place for everthing and every action and reaction must be done in moderation.

Solution?

20ooo more troops.... hmmmmm

ladies and gentlemen something must be wrong with me. I find myself agreeing with Bush for the first time ever.

Wish:
The reality of the Iraqi situation is such that America should never have invaded to begin with

Reality:
But the did and as such they have on their hands a sh*t storm to deal with

Responsibility:
It is now the responsibility of the American ppl (who elected this moron to begin with) to deal with the situation at hand. Just pulling out troops after you have screwed a country over is not the way to go.. I point you to what happened to Afghanistan. Look, if you created a monster you need to tame it or else it WILL bite you

Policy:
Now as for the US policy? I think the US should stop using diplomacy as a last resort.... oh sorry..... they dont use diplomacy at all do they.
Force is needed and soldiers need get what ever resource there is to help them do their Jobs. and so I agree with the 20 thou extra troops.. What I want to see is what they are going to do. They can either help or make the situation worse. Lets hope for the best... oh wait he's in for another 2 yrs isn't he.... DAMN! OK screw that... hush Iraq.

Talk:
You know in all of this both Syria and Iran can help the Americans greatly in returning order to Iraq however being the 'Axis point' on Satan's Domain on earth the of course will do nothing to help these Saints who only wish to do the lords work by bending the Iraqi ppl over and taking their oil....

Talk:
Like it or not America will not get anywhere until they can reach an arrangement with both countries... You know the amazing thing The president of Syria, in a BBC interview, announced that he wanted to talk.. but
of course the Bush administration is to (beeeeeeeeep) to do so. Now dont get me wrong the Syrians are going to make sure that they get the better end of the stick in any talks they have With the US. Right now they are sitting pretty quietly helping Palestinians, Lebanese and Iraqi's make life difficult for the Bush and his allies.
The reality is it will come to a point where they realize that they are beating their heads against a wall.... At least Blair seems to begin to realize this... seeing that Bush doesn't really have much off a brain to damage we have to wait for the next election. Once they do and they start talking I believe allot of these 'terrorist groups' will find themselves in trouble....

Reality check:
Then again even as I type this I know I am being an Idealist... I do believe talks are necessary but how effective will they be??? will the world ever find peace?

World Affairs titbits

1) "I plan to emulate the graetest Socialist that ever lived, Jesus Christ"

Those were the words of Hugo Chavez when giving his inauguartion speech... this man is a real thugi-thug
DWL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2) So in an interview recently a US diplomat referred to Castro and Chavez as being arsonist..... I know! I know! Doesn't sound like much.. but for a state official/Diplomat to use such strong words on BBC is unusual.... oh wait... My bad Totally forgot the "The Devil was here yesterday" speech... ah well try again US.. no oner and I mean NO ONE can top that speech TUFFFF!!!!!
Those of you who had the privileged of seeing the speech, mark that day as the day the UN saw the wickidess speech it had ever heard.... HYPE!!!

3) Again the the US has done it... WHY THE **** , (calm down )
It turns out that the US unilaterally launched air strikes in Somalia recently. Now, I don't care who you said you were attacking but to violate the sovereignty of a nation and to attack anywhere u please unilaterally is just @#$%^&*#@!!!!!!!!!!
In any case within days of assuming leadership of the UN the new Secretary general has felt the need to speak out against the actions of the almighty F*** the world don't ask me for S**** United States. Of course, he as only succeeded in reminding the world of the impotence of the UN against the awsome might of (beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep)

** This titbit has been discontinued as it may offend some readers of the blog**

4) Ortega is president (raised eyebrow)... my, the world has changed... or has it?

Death ofa dictator

On the 30th day of the 12th month in the year of our Lord 2006 the world rejoiced as man was hung by neck the until dead.

A truly proud moment for the Human race.

I do not dispute that fact that this man committed evil deeds, yet it is clear that that his trial was a mere formality a true mockery of what justice should stand for... Just because the whole world THINKS someone is evil should we do away fair trials.

I would have felt better if he was tried before an international tribunal. At least there the law is followed to the letter (or at least so it seems).

I don't know how I feel about the death penalty, there are times I support it and there are other times I feel its barbaric and it reduces us to the level of those who we wish to kill.

In either case I felt a bit repulsed with the way we all were glad that a human life was snuffed out.... It felt wrong.

Turkey and the EU

I don’t know, I see both sides of the argument, But I do believe Isolating Turkey from Europe will push them towards the Middle East, do you really want that?
Besides, Those against the move Talk about Europe loosing its Identity, But I challenge you to tell me what Europe’s Current Identity is. One Journalist referred to the Europe and some Kind of exclusive Christian Club. That is dangerous. I do understand the reservations; Turkey is a very different country… Boy this a tuff case that I am glad I don’t have to choose. What do you say?

Allies

It is interesting how NK’s biggest ally, China, Quickly turned on it the minute they followed a course of action that they did not agree with. It made me rethink the old belief that “The Enemy Of My Enemy Is My Friend”. How true is the statement?

In the arena of world politics, this sort of attitude has lead to many problems. The list includes countries like Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Columbia. The reality is the Enemy of My is really my temporary Ally. In light of this, in today’s society where ones power is dependent on who you ally yourself, to what extent should one look at the consequences. How much responsibility do you have to the people you ally you self to as well as to what extent can you be held accountable for the actions of these Allies. Take for example Syria, for quite a number of years now Syria has refrained from taking any direct actions against Sire or any other western country, however, because of there support for Lebanon Iran and the Palestinians they have been put under enormous pressure by the “Western countries”. However when the Taliban started supporting terrorist attacks no pressure was put on the US for funding them. But then again I do realize this is not a fair comparison. What I am driving at is the fact that countries need to be more careful of the people/regimes they support. At some point one needs to look at the long-term consequences of your actions.
I won’t even start with the US… I am upset thinking about it.. But look at China. If China does not believe they can trust Little Kim with a nuclear weapon why on earth are they support them? Look Iran is developing a nuclear Program But Syria Knows they can trust them as such they have unwavering support, Pakistan and India recently developed Nuclear weapons but the US knows they have their Military in their corner so they have no Qualms supporting them. The fact is, if you think the man is unstable WHY are you supplying his army? (sigh)
It is sad state, and that just one example, Russia and the US are by FAR Worst. Really these countries need to be help accountable for the actions of their so-called allies Seriously! But then the Question is who is going to hold them accountable :S certainly not the UN

World War 2

In 6^th form one could say I was a world war 2 buff, I found the war the battles the struggle somewhat interesting. As such I went out of my way to read articles and watch documentaries about it. Today, for the first time I was shaken. I mean near the point of tears, and that is allot for me. It was history channel documentary on the part of the war that involved Japan and the US.

Over the years I have not come across much with regards to it. I have always held the US in some contempt with regards to Nagasaki and Hiroshima, but never had I truly thought about the horror.

Even typing it now and replaying the images in my mind makes me pause at the sheer horror and futility of it…

This documentary unlike most others I had seen held nothing back. I mean war in all its Grotesque fury was on display. I saw Soldiers empty a revolver into a seemingly dead body because they could not risk the Jap being alive. I saw an interview of an American soldier who mater of factly spoke about the battle for Okinawa where they took no prisoners. He, in a very calm and steady voice, spoke about interrogating those captured and then shooting them in the head, or if they were to close to enemy lines they cut their throats. I could have cried, not for the prisoners only but for that and the many other young full of life youths like me who joined or were drafted who had to be bathed in blood and scarred to the point where to slit another mans throat and have his blood on your hands literally had to be fact of life.

I cannot begin to describe to you how much this documentary has made me despise war. And the hard part is all these ppl had to die because some guys in an air-conditioned office said they had to do it.

How does such a man who has seen horrors and done atrocities that not even TV could show rejoin society and live a normal life?

For whatever reason they attacked Pearl Harbor, the Japs only killed soldiers, but here were the Americans forced to fight a war they did not want because these Japanese hurt them as individuals and as a country. They were violated in the as bad a way as any country could be violated. As expected they wanted revenge, perfectly normal and so they went to hurt them as much or more than they had been. Again I cannot wrong them for this.

But the Japanese were different when defending their homeland; you see they love their country, and even taught school children how to kill American soldiers. In the end the Americans wanted to hurt a ppl that would fight to their last breath to defend their homeland. All so futile Soldiers who felt the need for revenge and a ppl who would die to save their country.

2 Sides bent on killing each other.

There was no way out, American honor and need to avenge the violation of their country compiled on individuals who saw this never ending wave of Japanese soldiers come in and kill their friends over and over again. And to the Japs who all they wanted to do was to protect there homeland, whose honor would not allow an American to set foot on their homeland while they drew breath… sigh…

And today I ask myself have the japs forgiven the Americans truly? Have they forgiven the sea of dead fellow countrymen, women and children who blood covered their country? Forget that, How do you for give Nagasaki and Hiroshima.. I tell you I couldn’t… Children babies Mothers fathers’ daughters whose skin was stripped from their flesh…. I couldn’t forgive that…

And I ask about these soldiers that came back from the war that sparked the baby boom, these were broken men re-molded in a inhumane world, what sort of upbringing did they give their children, what did they teach what could they teach…

Time To Go Old Boy

So it is the End of days for Tony Blair’s rain and it seems the British ppl, or at least the ones in his own party, cant wait to see the back of him.

My view on this whole situation is that it is a classic case of ;
‘bad people happening to good individuals’.

The fact of the matter is Britain and the US are allies and during Clinton’s presidency Blair and Clinton Forged a very strong relationship between the two countries. Together moving and shaking the world in as a positive way as they saw. Their partnership at all times appeared as two good friends who lead two of the most powerful nations in the world.
Between them, and their allies things were more or less ok. When the ppl of Florida decided to scre… err… let me rephrase that.

When the ‘American people’ elected Bush to power,
quite naturally Blair sought to continue this close relationship. Not too bad an idea at the time even in spite of Bush’s seeming problem with speaking coherently over a period of time. However after 9/11 everything changed. The war in Afghanistan was not too bad a call to support. However, after that the nature of the relationship changed. All of a sudden Bush broke off on a tangent at full sprint, essentially pissing off everyone in his wake. Blair not wanting to jeopardize the relationship with the US took off after him…. .

Now I can’t blame Blair for his choice. A close partnership with the world’s most powerful nation is never really a bad idea and in the end when America (hopefully) gets a sensible president, he is counting on them to remember that Britain had their back when the going got tuff.
A huge sacrifice to make.
He essentially shot himself in the foot politically to remain in the good graces of Britain’s most powerfully ally.
Now it may sound away to many ppl but the repercussions of this most likely will spell good Britain and its citizens for some time to come. Added to that, you can bet that if Britain finds itself against the wall, they expect America to come running.

All in all I will say Blair was as good a leader as Clinton, But had to make some tuff unpopular decisions and tried to stay on the fence which is never easy, I don’t think he did it very well, others may differ, but his relationship with the rest of Europe or the rest of the world for that matter (not including Muslims of course) is not too badly damaged and its Relationship with the US is intact.

Mission accomplished?