Moving House

This will be my last post to Blogger and my first to Observation Deck’s wordpress based site.

Patrick and Kati of ‘It’s a Matter of Opinion’ have kindly offered to host my blog because er well they said I write well. Yes I larfed too.

Anyway Blogger is now ditched like a two year old does brussels sprouts and the blog has moved [click click] allll the way over to the Observation Deck. Yes the sun shines brighter, the birds twitter sweeter and OMG there are so many features I didn’t have before. Not to mention a good bunch of guys n gals. I’ll be posting on ‘It’s a Matter of Opinion’ from time to time as well.

Positive Music

Music is about feeling and thought if it can’t invoke anything it’s rubbish/noise to me. Recently it occurred to me that the music I listen to is often negative. Which is to say it invokes negative emotion or thought.

This got me thinking about it’s possible effect on my depression. It seems to me the emotional sway (positive or negative) after listening to music is lowered but it is still there. Depression is not as simple as a lowered set of emotions but it is heavily related.

So I decided to experiment with the idea of reducing negative music and bringing in some positive music to play.

In primary schooling our teacher did show the positive effect of raising pitch and the negative effect of lowering pitch. But of course that’s simplistic and I know there’s going to be a lot more to it. As well there are the lyrics and the singing if present.

Focusing on the music I usually play there’s some joy there like Maynard Ferguson’s Sesame Street (I told you I was weird) and some nastier stuff like Melayne Web’s Mine. On praying to the Goog of All I came up with these;

Dovesong

With all the vibes of born again Christianity this site still has something going for it. He’s a musician so might actually be on to something (his view is about chords and ‘duochords’ being the definition of positive and negative music). Not only that, you can actually download some music to listen to and it’s non mainstream stuff.

Reinventing Myself

In your face New Age site with a nice long list of songs they consider positive.

Pop Culture Madness

Some positive pop songs

So now hopefully I can listen to music with lifts me up and we’ll see how it goes. If you have any suggestions feel free to comment.

Sleepless in Seattle

H/t: Someone in castle arghh. I’ve damn well forgotten haven’t I?

A Muslim man decided to go kill a few Jews. Nothing at all unusual about that except that it was in Seattle. He killed one and badly wounded three, one of whom is pregnant, all of whom are women.

You know given his little speech this could be an act of terrorism. If they can establish it was done for publicity and persuasion I think they should go ahead and charge him for it. Well that and the murders and attempted murders and anything else they can find.

You’re it!

Under normal circumstances I loathe viral messages but who said I was normal?

3 things that scare me:
1. Nuclear weapons
2. The capacity for people to sit back and let things like the holocaust happen.
3. Politicians discussing ethics.

3 people who make me laugh:
1. My kids
2. People who ask me for money
3. Margaret Cho

3 things I hate the most:
1. Suicide/Homicide bombers. Two brands of insanity in one deadly package.
2. Pity
3. People who only understand self service.

3 things I don't understand:
1. Hare Krishna
2. Military lingo
3. Why we’re still using qwerty keyboards

3 things I'm doing right now:
1. Blogging
2. Trying to answer ry without setting a thread on fire
3. Trying to keep warm without that fire.

3 things I want to do before I die:
1. Visit the world.
2. Get a job.
3. Buy a silver ingot. (This would be better)

3 things I can do:
1. Work under pressure
2. Get along with women.
3. Count past 10 without taking my shoes off.

3 ways to describe my personality:
1. Loving
2. Distrustful
3. Strange

3 things I can't do:
1. Vectors.
2. Persuade people
3. Read women’s magazines

3 things I think you should listen to:
1. Silence. Trust me as a deaf man I know how beautiful it can be.
2. Music, I like a lot of it esp the 80s
3. People who know what they are talking about

3 things you should never listen to:
1. Celebrities. They rarely know what they are talking about
2. Rap
3. Pure sound from a hearing test. It’s just awful.

3 absolute favourite foods:
1. Fat
2. Sugar
3. Salt

3 things I'd like to learn:
1. Philosophy
2. Rupert’s business sense
3. Self-defence

3 beverages I drink regularly:
1. Diet Coke (by the bucket)
2. Orange Juice
3. Milk

3 shows I watched as a kid:
1. Jabberjaw. No respect!
2. Humphrey. The bear with dialogue.
3. Star Trek

3 people I'm tagging
Ry/Gollum I bet his answers fill a thesis

Seawitch because she’s interesting

Dreamkatcha because he hates viral messages even more than I do.

Don’t Ask don’t Tell

H/t: Gayorbit.

Clearly not real law or policy because the military is here asking and he is required to tell. On that basis alone it’s time to chuck the policy. Laws that are not upheld aren’t worth anything.

On one hand I agree with conservatives. Homosexuals really shouldn’t be in the military. It’s a hostile closeted system and is too risky to have a career destroyed.

On the other go ahead and do it anyway. Who knows it might change things for the better and you will still be doing your best to serve. Just be prepared for being dishonoured.

Translators huh. Who needs em?

Anti-Americanism

Many US citizens, particularly conservatives are talking a lot of ‘anti-Americanism’ these days and I want to stick my two bob in. This is a rewrite of a very old post of mine back in the good ol’ days when *I* was one of the anti-Americans. It’s also a big post but I think a few will bother to read it.

Long Term

1) The US is rich and powerful attracting the jealousy of the less rich and powerful. Never underestimate jealousy and never overestimate it either.

2) Multinational corporations. This is really visible in things like Coke, McDonalds, Microsoft, Mars and so many others. These aren’t just household names in the US they are household names right here in Australia and throughout most of the world. There is resentment of these companies. Apart from bad corporate practices of some of them, which is less a US issue and more a corporate one, there is a sense of invasion with it due to the proliferation and there is also the fact that these companies drag an awful lot of money out of host nations. You’ll notice anti-globalisationists are often anti-American.

3) Historical political meddling. During the cold war, for example, the US has meddled in politics at least as much as the Russians and this sort of meddling increases mistrust and dislike. I would say this is most obvious in Europe, the Middle East and South America and we might see some stronger anti-Americanism there. In Australia as recently as the last election the US Ambassador was on TV influencing the election.

4) US culture, for example, in the form of movies, music, food or whatever you care to name has been heavily exported from the US. Many of us are more aware of US icons than our own countries icons. The change and influence this culture has wrought makes cultural defenders very grumpy. Consider the culturally haute French or non Christian religion and their reaction to US culture. Australia and the UK, not nearly so culturally defensive and with a Christian background, is not as concerned about this.

5) Individual visitors (as opposed to impressions we get from the media and governments etc) from the US that most of us meet tend to be self-focused and disdainful of anything not US. There is also the type of contact we have eg religious fanatics or door to door salesmen.

6) "my way or the highway" The US treatment of others is generally believed to be exceedingly arrogant. Indeed most consider the French and the US to be the world arrogance leaders and I laughed when the French accused the US of arrogance.

7) World mainstream media (some call it MSM). The news and some other parts of the media portray the US in a worse light than is reasonable. In part this is reflective of satisfying customers own anti-Americanism and it’s also part of the fact that negative news sells better. But there’s more to it I’m sure and I don’t have all the answers.

Current

1) Bush is a factor in anti-US sentiment. Many consider him amongst the worst of the presidents the US has ever had. Iraq is a major part of this but it goes deeper. A lot of it is a matter of his style. His diplomatic conduct is appalling and to intellectual snobbery in Europe his frequent speech gaffes make him look rather stupid.

2) The US is acting as a kind of world police. Have you ever noticed the police aren’t that well liked in the first place?

3) The invasion of Iraq was generally against world desires at both a government and citizen level. At the very least the unilateralism concept has increased fear of invasion which even Aussies have felt.

So what about the phenomenon?

Firstly the term suffers the same messy problem of the United States of America is not America. Of course antiUSAism is a really clunky word.

That nitpick aside the first thing is that anti-Americanism is nothing new. It’s been on the boil since perhaps the 50s. It does need to be said that feelings towards the US don't exactly equate to feelings towards US citizens. There is carryover to be sure, but the bulk of it is aimed at the US system and government, not the citizens on the ground.

These feelings are also not uniform and they go up and down with different events. Australia and other western nations are far more forgiving. Places very different from the US seem more incensed. I think it’s heightened at this time due to media, Bush and the Iraq war.

Too many Americans are using ‘anti-Americanism’ as an excuse for something else. It’s often used to silence criticism. It should also be clear that the US has US interests at heart and Australia has Australian interests at heart. That’s nationalism. Calling a nation anti-American on the basis of not putting US interests before their own is pure idiocy and has nothing to do with anti-Americanism but rather self interest.

What do you think? And what do we do about it?

A New Direction

This blog is hereby moving in a new direction. When tempted into the blogosphere by an echo I left it open for whatever direction it took me. After exploring some doubts about previous stances led me to a castle full of soldiers and chocoholics some views have changed and I have a vague idea of where to head.

I’m going to try and retain honesty and relative openness and will continue to post off topic and personal stuff but I think I’d like to now focus on a wider picture of freedom and it’s meaning in international current affairs.

ACLU Hates Gays

Once upon a time yet another small kooky Christian church sprung up out of the US bible belt. This one had its usual evangelistic style and the message of gay hate is not unusual. This church also hates Canada, Sweden, Catholics, Jews, Mormons, Blacks, Islam and the UK oh my! But it had something special.

It hates the US and the military too. This is definitely not the sort of thing conservatives sit easy with especially when they protest at military funerals celebrating their death and insinuating the soldier was gay.

After being prohibited from their funeral protests they have about turned and decided to go ahead and do it anyway and this near perfect example of idiocy has occurred.

The ACLU group appear to have done many controversial and highly visible things in lawsuits. I think at the end of they day they are scrounging for donations by visibility. There’s something very screwed up inside this group.

Religion and Spirituality

Now at last the posts on narcismojoy can be finalised. It should be of no surprise that I am not a born n bred good Catholic boi. Religion is a definite interest of mine so I will post in more detail in time. I believe this era is the time every major religion is being challenged in its nature and existence.

My background is that of a mother brought up as Methodist yet no longer practicing and a father who was one of those who are Christian bible followers but not church goers and essentially made it up as he went along.

So I was a Christian of sorts until I grew up. Before I came out I had sorted my spirituality and am utterly at peace spiritually. It helped enormously as people said those ‘hell’ words for example because you see I don’t even believe in hell. It also helped me through the ground zero of my depression.

I am not a Christian. Nor am I a Muslim. Not a Buddhist nor a Jew. None of these.

So what am I?

First and foremost I take responsibility for my spirituality. I listen and question rather than use hard faith on what others say. I listen to logic and I listen to my heart and I am learning all the time and it’s this process that keeps me strong spiritually.

So what do I believe?

Well that’s a big question isn’t it? I take parts of what I’ve experienced. Here’s a simple example which others agree on too.

Wicca: Do as you will an it harm none
Christian: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you

It basically means the same thing and it is one of my spiritual beliefs. I have many others of course but they can be revealed later. To help the categoricalists I could be described as a mesh of many religions particularly New Age and Humanist. It’s far too big a topic for a post.

Occupation

And now for instalment 3 in “How to bore your readers to tears in 4 easy steps”

I am officially unemployed. Yep that’s right a bottomless pit for tax muney. No you don’t get any points for guessing it. It’s way too obvious from my other post.

In the beginning there was shcool and I was very good at maths science etc.

And after graduating from high school my marks got my first preference in University of Chemical Engineering. I did well in that getting 1^st Class Honours when I graduated 4 years later. After a short stint of work experience I went into the netherworld of a research based PhD. It was at this time my depression was getting worse and I can unreservedly say a PhD is an awful idea for the depressed.

I dragged this PhD on for a looong time and it is not yet complete. After a while 5 years actually I was no longer an official student and was instead a dependant on my exwife. Grand.

After coming out I was a dependant on the dole which has a fancy name now. I’ve been on it two years and been dunked in some of the dregs of society and it’s been a fantastic experience but I hate being on the dole.

The concept is a simple once really. A safety net much like trapeze artists use. We fall all the time in the job situation especially now that employer and employee loyalty means nothing. The net of small money is there to let us live.

You know when the trapeze artist falls do they lie there in the net until death do them part? No. They try to get up and out and back on the next show. Does everyone sit there gawking at them? No they jump to help the artist on their feet.

These two things aren’t happening enough.

At any rate in my case I’m working on depression so that I can finish my thesis and get a part time job for basic jobs skills in my CV. Hopefully to later springboard into a better job.

I have no doubt I’ll comment more on the dole but here are a few highlights from my opinion;

1) The dole pays very low here about $300 a fortnight ($US225). It is too low to be taxed. I think the dole amount is fair not too much or too little really. Too much and it would encourage people to remain on it. Too little and people would fail. Nearly all the money is gobbled up by rents, bills etc. A small rent assistance (it averages 1/3 of the rent cost) is paid as an extra.

2) Some time ago the Centrelink (the dole providers) split the duty of giving work searching assistance out and it is now managed separately by small groups, some corporate some quasi charity. This was a good idea IMO because it looks like the work assistance given in the past was appalling and the new form of assistance is more effective. Now Centrelink manages the money side basically.

3) Too many people have debts to Centrelink they are paying back. Some of them are fair but many are a failure of responsibility on Centrelink’s side. For example, if they are paying the wrong type of payment and discover their error they will recover all payments and not credit the payment they should have been making.

4) When choosing the group to provide the employment service you are given a list of company names with no info at all not even the address and of course you must decide on the spot. So you are choosing between say Employment R US and SupaJobz. How competitive.

5) There is a huge problem with single mothers in the dole. Plenty of them do the right thing dealing with the situation and bringing up their children. But there are the others. You know the more kiddies you pop the more money you get. And it happens. How well do you think those kids are looked after?

6) When you go for your initial interview you are not told all sorts of important things. Like cheap bus fares, special bill subsidies (mainly for families), rent assistance and the effect of part time work.

8) When my hearing aids broke which I am dependant on to communicate there was no assistance from any source. It took 8 months to get them and not from Centrelink. I remain bitter about that to this day yet happy they were provided eventually.

9) Mental illness is a hidden problem in the dole and I think accounts for a proportion of long term ones. There is no real support from Centrelink or elsewhere.

10) Another large segment are the ‘bludgers’ who are content with low payments and ‘live’ on it in a permanent way.

11) There is a requirement for many on the dole to list where they’ve looked for work (min 4 per fortnight up to 10) No big deal for an active jobseeker really except it ignores a few problems. The prime problem is the buckets of people ringing up and flooding the employees with inappropriate or blatantly false desires to get job X. This is costing business a fortune. The hidden problem is the inability to properly enforce it being genuine.

Mein Kampf

Well time for episode two of “This is Your Life”. There are two chronic problems I deal with everyday. Chronic meaning long term.

1) Depression

I have depression. To put it simply my ‘coming out’ process particularly the shock, pain and isolation triggered major depression (read nuclear blast) and I have chronic depression (read Iraq war) as well. Together they are colloquially deemed double depression which sounds just marvellous and is even better in practice.

I was in full swing and people who have not experienced depression can’t really hope to relate. Which is a damned good thing in most ways. I was suicidal. I was crying non stop, very little sleep at night and sleeping all day. I could barely think most of the time and my short term memory was all over the place. Oh, and I felt like crap too.

I had no clue at the time what was going on. Wasn’t really in the state to figure it out anyway. As fate had it my second problem triggered diagnosis of the first and that was by a doctor I had to see which occurred 8 months after ‘coming out’.

I work on managing my illness now and the major is in decline. Hooray! I take medication which was quite a turnaround for my ‘no drugs whatsoever’ philosophy. Unfortunately Australia ignores issues like these so the degree of support I have is limited. I saw a psychiatrist briefly after the doctor who made the complete diagnosis and helped me with the drugs. Very recently I have had an ultra short session (because it was community based and grossly overloaded) with a psychologist who has laid down the ideas which assist with managing and preventing depression. I am terribly grateful to all three.

Lots of things help depression to greater or lesser degrees. Sunlight works well for me as do the drugs. Exercise helps, getting out, social interaction, reviewing thinking and changing thinking habits does too.

It’s not easy and far from over as the chronic may never go away but I aim to bring it to management much like my second problem so I can get on with dear ol’ life.

2) Hearing Loss

But wait there’s more! I’ve also had hearing loss from birth. It’s pretty serious and the loss is worst at the vocal frequencies. I am not actually ‘deaf’ which really means no appreciable hearing. I wear hearing aids which assist me to hear properly. They are glorified microphones basically. They have improved enormously over the years.

I have worked on this problem since birth and you can bet I’m pretty good at dealing with it. There are still plenty of times it can piss me off and it has serious consequences in communication and social activity. Overall though to me it’s nothing to hyperventilate about.

Don’t tell me to ‘get over it’ or that depression doesn’t exist. Really.

Do not pity me. I don’t need anyone’s pity to wrap me up in a blanket and mollycoddle me. I am capable of dealing with depression and already superbly manage hearing loss. Pity is just vile and leads down the path to the poor me situation of victimhood where you do little more than roll over waiting for someone else to do everything for you. Pity is deadly to people with depression.

Do support me. I only wish our government wanted to.

Good gracious this has ballooned out like Hollywood binge eaters. S.t.o.p T.y.p.i.n.ggg

More War

With another kidnapping/murder attack by Muslims, Israel has tired of the attacks and has decided to fight a kind of two front war in Gaza and Lebanon. They’ve bombed infrastructure and closed air and sea routes. It’s unclear at this stage how far Israel will go. Syria the effective controllers of Lebanon may also be targeted.

One military blogger has even gone so far as to suggest WWIII is possible.

Lebanese bloggers show what a nightmare it is for them and that their country is overrun by the fanatics.

http://lebanonheartblogs.blogspot.com/

http://lebop.blogspot.com/

H/t: Blackfive

The UN has unsurprisingly petitioned to condemn the kidnapping/murder and Israel’s “disproportionate use of force” and the US has vetoed that.

For what it’s worth I side more on the Israelis on this one but frankly I don’t have much hope for their actions helping the situation. It underlines once again that there is no real peace process in the region and that UN and US diplomatic intervention is meaningless.

Edit: Now i know what H/t is let's use it.

I am Gay

When I uttered those three little words the shift of perception was enormous. It was brave I’ll give myself that much. It catalysed enormous change in my core beliefs and all but killed off the friend and family network instantly. I was married and it was to my wife that I first uttered those three words. And then it was time to rebuild.

Now two years later the earthquake and aftershocks have all but stopped. I did suffer and losses have been considerable but with it has come much good. Now I live as a free man more fully me and freedom is sweet indeed. Also with such a struggle and pain I have had the opportunity to learn a lot.

Now it should be abundantly clear why I will always be a liberal. I do stand against every bit of bull many conservatives and even some liberals say about gays. That said the ‘West’ is a true bastion of hope for gay people. That’s because of freedom and what extends from one freedom extends to another.

There ya go short and bittersweet. There’s lots more of course. All in good time.

About Me

In my first post I alluded to being somewhat revealing. I planned to roll out some of the major factors when I got around to it and had even written a bit about them. However, after a bit of blogging I’ve gotten hoodwinked by gun-totin’ conservatives which has been enormous fun as well as informative. I have also rapidly realised long windy posts (which frankly I adore) are a no-no in blogging.

Those two factors have changed the way I’m going to do things. I’m going to reveal more rapidly because otherwise I’m going to look conniving and it’s going to be short n sweet.

So over the next few days I’ll post 4 short articles, 3 of which I assure you are not usually popular with conservatives. I’ll expand on aspects of them as separate posts over time.

AWB Corruption Fallout

The US and Canada are now working on suing the AWB $1B.

The Australian Wheat Board (AWB) is the monopoly for wheat handling here in Australia.

So what do we have? More US trade attacks, decimated Iraq trade, a government that refuses to accept responsibility and an AWB that is the same as before.

Military

I was looking at the Australian military recruitment site. Don’t panic I’m not about to sign up. I have lots of reasons for not doing that.

This is more an exploration of ideas not exactly set in stone. I’ve been exposed to scary guntotin US military and have had quite a few of my opinions shifted. I will give some personal info here. My father was in the Australian military. I’ve seen a few things and heard a few more from him and others. Believe me it colours things a bit.

I despise war. I am a liberal after all. I despise the idea of people running around trying to kill and hurt each other to push ideas. I used to think war was not acceptable under any circumstances. I’ve known war is based on the clash of ideas and someone invariably tries to shove it down throats. Hitler, civil wars, the cold war, Iraq, even Iran-Iraq it’s all the same to me. But I’ve come to realise I live in the real world where flowers wilt and butterflies get squashed on the windshield. Now I think all that pain and death for an idea might actually be worth it. How to pick good ideas from bad though. Risky stuff that and just because your idea is ‘better’ doesn’t mean you’ll win.

Here’s some issues I have with the military

1) The entire website is rich with ambiguity. You have to dig to find anything and quite a bit of info is simply not there. I don’t like the basis of not keeping prospectives informed.

For example, to a question on what the accommodation is like onsite the answer given is of ‘high standard’. What does this tell the prospective? Nothing. The obvious reason is the get the prospective to contact the military which is where sales become much easier.

I seriously question ‘high standard’ If it means walls and running water sure. Some how I don’t think it’s going to be the Taj Mahal (or should I say Saddam Palace which would almost make me wrong).

2) In this day and age of freedom and flexibility there is a still a huge minimum forced 4 year joining. 6 years if you do a trade. A whopping 14 years for the air force. I only know of one other place you are locked in for a fixed number of years and they can get early release!

Add on top of this the fact that the prospective knows absolutely nothing about the job other than taking the promoters word for it. In a normal job when you discover it’s crap or doesn’t suit you out you go. In the military unless you happen to like it you’re in for many years of misery.

This requirement screams that the military isn’t worth it at least for those first 4 years. Because if it was there would be no need to restrain people. People would be staying because it is worthwhile. It’s very socialist which is odd for this country.

3) While claiming to be recruiting the best (of the best) the actual requirements for entry show a high standard of physical requirements combined with a low standard for intellectual requirements. Here’s a section for educational requirements of a basic job

“Completion of Australian Year 9 education (or equivalent) with passes in English and Mathematics. A 'pass' (or Sound Achievement) is defined as a result that places a candidate in the top 70 percentile band of students that complete the subject.

So you basically need to have been better than the worst 30% at 14 year old level English and Maths.

I will not call the military people stupid. Some are but my father isn’t, nor are many others I have met. But surely they can get better education than this?

3) Unless you are in a special higher paid category like medical, engineer etc your pay is much like this;

For the first year while being educated $28,805 ( $US 21,647) pa. After this it’s $35,110 ($US 26,385) pa. There are further small increases with time and rank it appears. It looks like the pay at high rank is fairly generous but I don’t think most will get this position, particularly in the first 4 years.

An estimate of tax taken out of the second higher figure is $6,393 leaving $28,717 ($US 21,580)pa or about $550 a week ($US 413 a week).

I dunno I think the pay rate is crap. I don’t view $550 a week as enough for me to be shot at. But then how much is? I note the young and presumably lowest paid are the most likely to suffer a casualty. I’ll admit the pay rate isn’t that bad for the low entry requirements should this be a normal job but then 4 years later you may still be earning this and there’s nothing you can do about it.

4) After care is totally ignored. I’m sure some degree of after care exists but I’ll have to chase it up later.

5) Holidays are the standard 20 day which most jobs have.

6) The military is trying to not look discriminatory. I even has a short statement of equal opportunity we often see regular corporations use. However there are weaknesses.

On gender discrimination it’s odd there is specially a law to exempt the military from gender discrimination law so that combat type positions are forbidden to women. I don’t have a problem with combat type operations being forbidden to women if there is good reason for it but none is provided and it’s good and proper for the military to go through discrimination laws rather than cowering behind an exemption.

If the military didn’t discriminate against women it wouldn’t need an exemption now would it?.

The general non discrimination statement also makes it clear that the military doesn’t discriminate on the basis of sexuality. Then in a “Regulation of Lifestyle” (can anyone say socialist?) statement it vaguely goes over what the military is not permitted to do which includes a prohibition on ‘certain’ legal sexual behaviour and, strangely enough, debt amongst other things. They do not provide any hard info. I presume such details are hidden in the fine print of the contract.

One wonders why the military is watching soldiers in the bedroom.

7) There is a strange comment about some tattoos being inappropriate which I find mysterious considering many in the military have them. Maybe the ‘Welcome to Jamaica Have a Nice Day’ is it?

8) Anywhere Anytime.

The military is not a 9 to 5 job at the office. It even uses this in advertising. You can be anywhere anytime. Iraq proves that. For some esp. singles travelling to mystery locations has an element of fun and holiday to it. For others it’s disruptive. It’s really disruptive to families.

Anytime is worse. There are no overtime or out of normal hours pay rates etc. You can be forced to work 24/7 or shiftwork and indeed it happens in Iraq. Your per hour rate can be very low indeed.

9) If you look at some of the keywords the military use like mateship, courage etc I see something that might be missing in our schooling. Maybe maths science etc aren’t enough. Maybe we need to prepare our kids as good citizens too. Now *I’m* being socialist.

10) While the military promotes itself as having a great internal environment I have my doubts.

There is the issue of hazing. I guess some people think hazing is good for building interpersonal bonds etc but really it’s unprofessional degrading practice about domination.

There are too many reported cases of power abuse leading to the removal/punishment of lower rank people. Apparently it’s one of the major reasons for retention issues.

A culture of secrecy. Anything remotely bad for promotion is through the camaraderie minimised or limited by peers as much as possible. Crime, abuse, drugs alcohol etc. Where is the principle of honesty? “Don’t ask don’t tell’?

11) The military is bad for families in my view. These soldiers often miss the birth of children. Often have little association with their wives and kids. Child abuse deathrate is much higher in military families.

Verbal and emotional abuse is also common. It’s widely reported and abuse groups and the military are trying to put strategies to deal with it. As an example. During an argument my father told me quietly that he had a gun stashed in the house and suggested he was quite willing to use it not only on ‘intruders’ but on us. Naturally it frightened me and I’ve now come to understand this situation is not unique. So as you can see my perception of the military was coloured heavily by my personal experience, particularly with my father.

Throw into this the many away trips, the isolation, the X long surprise service in Vietnam, Iraq or East Timor or wherever they march next. Throw in the convenient contract revision. Throw in the odd death, mental or physical damage as well.

It’s not all one sided either. I know a military guy who came back to his wife after WW2 who was happily bonking not one but two men. Why not invite the team over?

12) A lot of people think the military serve the people but actually it’s indirect. They serve their commander and so on and so forth to the government who theoretically serve the people. The military might be efficient at doing their job but if that job is defined by inefficient politicians I think there’s a problem. The PM has never served. The PM didn’t tell the people of Australia why he went in with the Iraq war. There’s no real accountability or people involvement at all. And should Labor get in they’ll turn around the troops to go home.

I can see a problem with wars lasting longer than a term of government.

There we have it some of my more major nebulous gripes about the military.

Youth Kills?

I was looking through a simple statistical analysis of the first 2000 soldiers killed. You can also find a database of those killed as individuals.

There are hints of minor things like overrepresentation of negros in the military and the a blip of military in Iraq dying of drowning but the 2 things that really struck me were;

1) The overrepresentation of males dying in Iraq. This might be due to more females being in non combat roles perhaps?

2) Being young really kills you in Iraq. The youngest age grp (which is also the smallest age group in the military) and to a lesser degree the second youngest dominate deaths. Why? The inexperience? The risk taking?

Happy Independence Day

To the US citizens out there:

Happy Independence Day. You not only gained Independence but forged a nation built of worthwhile principles.

To the Brits:

Maybe you should lodge for back-taxes.

To Us Aussies:

Why are we still Dependant on the Queen of England?

Judge the Jewry?

With the current ‘crisis’ in the Israel-Palestine drama with a 19 year old Jewish soldier abducted, another significant incursion and the abduction of a significant portion of the Hamas government I decided to jot down some thoughts about Jews.

1) The Jews hold a rich history and are even newsworthy today. It’s thousands of years old and still unfolding. Their involvement with the Romans and other powerful civilisations and Nazi Germany with the Holocaust means it’s quite entwined with European History as well.

2) The Jews are unusual in that it’s essentially a nation, a race and a religion entwined as one (with plenty of exception of course). So when one says ’Jew’ there are multiple meanings implied.

3) The Jews have a long history of persecution with the Nazi Holocaust being the famous one but there have been many other examples if one digs a little into history. While persecution is nothing new for any race or religion it does seem the Jews get a higher level of it.

4) When I looked up the population statistics for the Jews I was somewhat surprised that there were so few. There are 15 Million or so most of whom live in the US and Israel with some in Europe and elsewhere. The Holocaust killed around 5-7 million Jews so it’s hardly surprising that this issue is so significant to the Jews.

5) The Jewish religion is quite unique in that it is exclusionist. Most world religions desire and readily fully accept converts. The Jews, for the most part, do not.

6) The most clear cut cause of Jewish persecution are noticeable differences in cultural/religious etc practices. Some of which are considered repulsive to the persecutors of the time. This is not a deep reason because the question of why these differences were so significant or less tolerated is not covered.

7) There are loads of Jewish conspiracies. I was even brought up on a few. I think it’s high time they were tossed out. A favourite seems to be a relatively small number of Jews secretively controlling powerful institutions like banks or the US.

8) The attitude of the conservatives to the Jews is interesting for its lack of uniformity. Some appear to want to continue genocide and others are heavily supportive. There’s not much middle ground.

9) There is a strong relationship of Jews with two other major organised religions of Christianity and Islam. This may serve as part of the persecution from good old fashioned religious contention as well as the issue of Israel itself being an area of interest to all 3 religions. Major organised religions outside of these don’t appear to have the same level of antagonism to Jews. Of course there is also the fact that Jews don’t populate in those areas much.

10) Jews are fairly well known for being rather law based and with strict organised bases of ritual. Is the exclusionism and rigidity of the Jews setting a view of the Jews being implacable? Perhaps hardening the idea in the intolerant that extermination (the final solution) is the only way since change will not occur? This is a more nebulous idea not sure how much truth is in it.

11) Do I think Israel is by right the Jews through God granting it to them? No. I’m no supporter of the religion. However Israel fulfils all four of the most reasonable ways to define land ownership. They were there first. They are there now. They make good use of the land. Others accept their right to exist.

I’ll post more about the actual conflict later.

Man not so Super

Saw Superman the return yesterday. I enjoyed the movie well enough but it wasn’t that good. I’m not going to talk details cos that’s not fair on those who want to see it. There were too many little things in it that were somewhat irritating. Inconsistencies, predictability and even a degree of stalking. There was quite a bit of imagery a bit like watching an exaggerated medium like a play.

The ones who claimed Superman was gay were probably trying to market. There was too much Christ iconism in the movie and nothing gay at all.

White, Uptight and In Plain Sight.

A lill scare right here at home.

I pity the passengers wondering if it's

1) Anthax and they are gunna die
2) Mum's special cake mix has just been irrevocably contaminated
3) A stowaway with a bad case of dandruff
4) The Kidman honeymoon party bag broke

Update: Turns out it was a synthetic dye.

Iraq

The Past

Saddam’s Gentle Rule

In the Beginning there was Saddam. And he was not good.

There was a long a viscous war between Iraq and Iran in which the west offered considerable aid to Saddam in order to counter Iran which they considered a threat. Saddam desired WOMD and through this war even acquired a lot of resources for it from western governments and businesses including the US. I think one of the reasons for Western hate and fear in the Middle East generally is the degree of meddling in the area due ultimately to oil. Oil for WW2 and beyond.

The ruling 15% or so of people under Saddam, nominally Sunni, were looked after and the rest whose ideas were incompatible were brutally suppressed. Chemical weapons, torture, murder, discrimination and other forms of suppression were used on them.

The Iraq-Iran war along with the crummy economics of Saddam’s regime sapped Iraq’s economy greatly. Saddam decided the invasion of small oil rich Kuwait was a good idea to help the economics and that relates to his own survival. After that successful invasion most nations including the US understandably didn’t like it so after some UN wrangling and warnings liberated Kuwait and made a partial invasion of Iraq. The WOMD capabilities were destroyed as much as possible and some strong restrictions were placed on Iraq. Mainly no fly zones and inspections.

But that was not the end of it of course. Saddam chaffed at his restrictions and did not follow them as much as he thought he could get away with it. This led to a load of UN sanctions and requests to comply and Saddam trying to cut deals esp in Europe. These corruption deals even reached us here with our monopoly wheat board.

And then the US was terrorised.

War on Terror

The world trade centre attack of Sept 11 triggered an expectable desire for revenge and resistance to more such attacks. The US ramped up self defence and anti terrorist efforts and declared a hit them before they hit me doctrine.

This simplistic concept is pro war and violates the basic rule of sovereignty. Which is to say a nation is not subject to another nations rules. The US appointed itself the moral high ground of deciding what was ok and what wasn’t for all nations. To put it bluntly our crippled democracy of the UN was replaced with a new despot/leader. It doesn’t actually matter if the US has the moral groundwork or not. What matters is that it can make it happen.

Al Qaeda, a terrorist Muslim group, was declared the cause of Sept 11 and while I thought the process lacked transparency the declaration would have to do. Hence ‘War on Terror’ was born. It sounds good for motivating people but I don’t like the title myself. Why? Because Terrorism is not going to end. It’s gone on for a very very long time. It’s arrogant to think defeat of Al Qaeda will end it. Terrorism has many faces and causes and not all of them target the US. Opposing terrorism is great and indeed governments all over the world have been working on that issue well before Sept 11 and more effort is good especially after it’s clear the terrorists had some success. However, wars are meant to be won and I’m pretty sure US citizens think that even more than I do. But you can’t win a war on something that doesn’t end.

The initial efforts and reactions were good. I don’t know the ins and outs of these things but it appeared to me they did well at anti terrorism on the money side of things. The US didn’t pop off their WOMD and Muslims in the US were treated better than I expected.

Afghanistan

What was hardly surprising nor heavily opposed was the invasion of Afghanistan ruled by the fanatical Muslim Taliban who were harbouring Al Qaeda. Not that the Taliban was in any position to push them out.

It’s a bit sad but Afghanistan is now barely reported and largely neglected by the US and media alike. The capital seems to be doing ok but the rest would appear to be a mess.

The Axis Of Evil

But terrorism has many faces and Al Qeada is but one. Combining this with the hit em first doctrine Bush declared ‘Axis of Evil’ nations (Iraq Iran and North Korea) with all the style of a TV Evangelist.

The Switcheroo

For whatever reason; strategic position, oil, past grievances, those endless empty UN do-as-we-says Iraq was selected by Bush as the one to deal with first.

I wish I really *knew* why. My pet theory is to control oil. Not so much to take the oil but to make sure when oil goes belly up as it soon will that the US gets the best deal and primary access putting it in a much better economic position than other oil dependant nations. Not only that, I think the US hoped to get a non-fanatic and successful nation there. This would show the frustrated people in the ME that the US wasn’t quite so evil and there was a better way than terrorism to improve their lot which would really hurt terrorism in the region. Bush has to be involved here and his reasons will have been political.

And so we shifted from War on Terror to War on Iraq. Here is a concern. Iraq, Iran and North Korea might well have the potential to be nation level terrorists but there are plenty of terrorists out there today which were neglected. Which are neglected. And so we lost focus on the war on Terrorism.

My Way or the Highway

Bush went into Europe and the World and really pulled his weight around. It was all about attitude. ‘You are with us or against us’. He expected nations to not only do what he wanted but wanted it to be done on his terms. I am hardly surprised many countries turned their backs, particularly those which weren’t thrilled with the US in the first place or had their fingers in Saddam’s pie.

The US is the leading world power with WOMD and the will to use them and we were seeing a bully. I think it’s far to say Australians are quite friendly to the US but the US and Bush in particular lost a lot of our faith in that short time.

The Coalition of the Willing

Not that the US *wanted* to go it alone. So they petitioned for allies. They scraped the barrel pulling allies from some of the strangest places. Their best catch was the UK. A world power in itself with a strong modern military and a good economic base. My dear ol Upsidedownland is even in there but frankly speaking we’re no world power. It was a bad showing.

The Battle

Frankly I thought it was well done as much as I don’t like violence or war. Of course if the US had lost we’d all be in a lot of trouble. But let’s face it they were fast, efficient, caused less Iraqi military casualties than last time and very few civilian casualties and other collateral damage. The propaganda leaflet drop and accurate bombing helped things as well as the technology and modern trained and large military. This all likely helped later on.

The Occupation Plan

What plan? And herein lies one of my greatest objections. Where was the bloody plan of what to do when the country was taken? The consequences of invasion aren’t hopelessly unpredictable the bigger ones could have been dealt with much better.

Where was the policing to stop theft and crime? Where were the translators needed to communicate? Why disband a military into poverty when they still have their weapons? Where was the border control? And if the objective was the build a new democracy where were the plans for that? Each of these and others makes me wonder just how good the ‘brass’ in the military are.

Wot no Nukes?

Bush said via US and world intelligence that there were WOMD in Iraq. Iraq had WOMD at one point but a lot was destroyed in the first US-Iraq war. But they weren’t there. So the question is was it a lie or is the intelligence service that bad. Bush built the argument for war on those WOMD and links to terrorism. Neither proved true. We were left with a vague building a new nation argument and a highlighting of the removal of the brutal dictator.

Very recently several news sources though not many talked about WOMD actually finally after all these years being found in Iraq…. Kinda. Maybe.

Why the US

The US is not the best nation to have invaded Iraq for nation building etc. I would have vastly preferred another nation to do it. Iraqis have been exposed to a lot of US/Western bashing propaganda and suspicion and distrust run high. The US is still Christian and there’s the US support for Israel in the Israel/Palestine drama. We all know religions don’t get on that well with other religions and this would be much of the reason for such a long war. However the US is also the only country so easily able to project its power and wealth and it had the will and desire to do Iraq.

Abu Ghraib

US Torture by the military in this prison leaked out in graphic images. In my opinion it was dealt with reasonably by punishing the offenders. There is the question of how far up the chain it went and how widespread it is. Given the more recent US admissions of ‘approved’ torture (eg sleep deprivation, staged executions, isolation, religious desecration) in other places in Iraq, Afghanistan and in Guantanamo Bay I think we can see a pattern of psychological torture for selective enemies being a policy for the US. What I believe happened in Abu Ghraib is orders for psychological torture were given and it got out of hand.

I do not support torture including the ‘approved’ form. Torture is a form of individualised terrorism.

It sets an example and helps every person and every nation tempted to torture to a nice excuse for their own torture practices. It is not enough for the US to point out the torture and other immoral practices of these terrorists as an excuse for their own actions.

There’s also a lot of suggestion that torture doesn’t even work very well as an intelligence source suffering from the tell you what you want to hear problem.

Haditha

A strong rumour is some US soldiers massacred people in Iraq in response to a comrade’s death and was subsequently covered up.

After ‘exposure’ it’s now under investigation. Haditha occurred on Nov 19 2005. The report has dragged on and still we know nothing. It’s also internal making the results when it comes of far less value. The truth is lost whatever actually happened if anything and it will just blur into mistrust and conspiracy. I will probably take the report’s word for it (with salt) because I don’t have a better source.

There are other cases and recently an admitted one. But we need a reality check here. Most of these are claims with no real evidence or cases of military opening fire by mistake (usually the victims mistake too I might add) and they just aren’t big or widespread enough.

There was a recent case when the US military wiped out innocent yet stupid people in a speeding car. Stopping a car by shooting the car I have grave doubts will even work and shooting the driver isn’t much better but is as good as it gets when they are coming for you and you’re afraid of a bomb. Bullets aren’t designed to brake cars. There are ways to stop and slow cars and I wonder why these methods are not employed.

The military are dealing with a wily, honourless bunch that use torture, terror, civilian murder and follow no rules of warfare. Anger and the temptation to revel in terrorist blood is there and I hope they continue to hold on to their humanity.

The Present

The past is important and we can learn from it but we all deal with the Now. So what now in Iraq?

Progress

Bush’s recent Iraq speech talked about progress but didn’t give any good examples. That’s a bad sign. Progress is all about ‘hearts and minds’ which is how this war will be won or lost. Media has shown little to no progress. We see that the US is trying to train up the Iraqi police and military to replace them. We see nothing of power, schools and other infrastructure improvements. We see a new mostly powerless democratic government. We see no end to the terrorists. We don’t see Iraqis with rebuilding jobs.

Where is the progress and good news? Can’t find it in the media. Can’t go to Iraq to look for myself. Can’t even find good hard examples in the US military websites. Bush won’t talk about it.

Maybe it just isn’t there. The US is spending a lot of money on Iraq but I suspect most of it is going to contracts and military expenses.

The Mood of the People

A core question which most of us don’t know the answer to is do the Iraqis themselves want us there. If they do it’s worth it and if they don’t we might as well pack up and go home. I wanted to know. The useless media is unclear. The bombings suggest we aren’t welcome. There’s a good source tho and it’s so simple.

Refugees. Nations around Iraq and humanitarian groups feared it. It didn’t happen and hasn’t yet happened. In fact several million refugees in the region from Saddam have packed up and gone home. That tells me enough.

I’m not saying that means it’s universal. Some sunnis are, after all, passively or actively harbouring terrorists.

The Mood of the Military

There’s been a lot of suggestion that the military has very low morale. I hummed and harred about it but decided the best way to find out was… to ask them.

So I asked a few of them serving in Iraq right now. I know the more conspiratorial will assume they have to say everything’s fine but it’s better to be real.

And they answered. Morale is good. There is some limited morale sapping from deaths and wobbly support from home and the West generally. So the military is not going to walk away unless ordered nor pressure the US government to let it go.

The Mood of the US

With an election not too far away this festering sore is boiling to the surface.

Support for Bush has slipped now and support for the war is also low. Republicans are locked in status quo mode of “stay the course” and frankly with the citizens not happy with the status quo they are looking to loose. Democrats are bashing the disaster viewpoint for all it’s worth and want to cut and run. Not necessarily quickly.

A lot of the lack of support relates to Bush loosing confidence in the public eye. The mistakes (lies if you take that view) eg WOMD are part of that. So too are the near constant negative media reports and flow of US military dead. There’s not much positivity coming out of Iraq at all.

The Democrats don’t appear to be likely to put up a strong fight. Kerry might do ok but some of the new ones are dumb enough to make Bush look sharp.

A key factor here is the strong support initially being basically linked to security fears. When the WOMD rug was pulled the people were looking at a different scenario and were less supportive of that new nationbuilding, insurgency fighting role. I guess it has to be said. Don’t start wars with the wrong pretext.

What about Downunda?

We joined the US in this war but our absolute and proportional military and financial outlay was lower. A lot of Aussies are pacific and the support derived more from the government than the people. Aussies were slightly unsupportive at the outset and even less thrilled about it now. However, we’re much more laid back and aren’t in control over there so the Iraq war is deemed of less relative importance than people in the US might give it.

Contractors

Thousands of them doing nasty jobs that have to be done. Unaccountable. Not good enough. They need to be accountable and serious questions should asked about why the US military can’t or won’t do dangerous jobs.

Stand Up

Iraqis broiled in religiously supported US/Western hate for years and fearing the return of Saddam have been slow to get on their feet and the reject the extremists in some cases. I think I’ve seen a few signs that they are now. Dobbing on terrorists is a good sign but it’s still a bit thin.

If the Iraqis ‘stand up’ the terrorists in the region are doomed and the US will have no reason to remain. And really that’s what is needed.

The Future

So where do I in my oh-so-humble world view think all of this is going?

1) The US election is fairly important. The democrats might win. What would that mean in Iraq? Probably a faster troop withdrawal. More risk the Iraqi government won’t be functional enough. If the Republicans win we have a risk of dragging the war too long with ambiguous goals.

2) The Iraqi government’s politics is competing with destabilisation more from civil disorder than insurgency issues IMO. When the US leaves, early or late, either the government and people will hold it together or Iraq will fall into civil war. Either way the Shiites are likely to wrest as much power as possible and are likely to succeed. A Shiite theocracy is could happen with low resistance to that idea from civilians. The terrorist elements will be unwelcome and having no clear enemy will likely refocus elsewhere. In win or loss in Iraq will impact global terrorism no doubt about it. It will not, however, win or loose the ‘War on Terrorism’

3) I think the US are building permanent military bases. Reports of it are too sketchy to make it a clear fact. It’s reasonable to say even if the Republicans lose that those bases and associated forces will remain for many years. These bases will be used to exert US influence in the region including Iraq.

5) There seems to have been a degree of unintended lessons. The invasion of Iraq showed many despots and other governments that the US did indeed have the military might to easily brush aside a conventional defense. The troops were afraid of WOMD and of city fighting. Now if you’re El Presidente the dictator you have just witnessed the uselessness of your military against it’s most likely enemy meaning it’s really only good for suppressing the plebs. You know the US fears WOMD so basically it’s what you need. Hence North Korea’s missiles and Iran’s nuclear generators. Instead of reducing their desire for WOMD they’ve increased it along with the paranoia of these governments. They’ve also shown that to annoy the US if they invade and maybe survive themselves they’ll need guerrilla tactics.

6) This has been an expensive war and focus on it has detracted from other issues. This could lead to economic/societal issues later which I find too hard to predict.

Embarassing

It looks like our troops stuffed up. I’m guessing here but shooting the trade minister’s bodyguards is probably not the best way to win wheat deals screwed up by our corrupt wheat board.

De-Liberate

I am a liberal.

Looking at what appears a raging argument between liberals and conservatives I am concerned by what I see as a slump of the west into conservatism due to fears brought about by change and the gross oversimplification of people being identified by such a one dimensional term.

I am a liberal. The word basically means freedom and I believe in individual freedom. ‘Freedom’ is a word many are using to cliché levels these days. Conservatives themselves spout it out like vomit in the Exorcist yet attack liberals with abandon which is the twilight zone to me. So what exactly do I mean by liberal?

Freedom at the most basic level to me is lacking constraint. Control is the opposite. Control implies constraint.

Conservatism to me is all about preservation and the past. Retaining or going back to things the supporters of such a viewpoint value. It does have value at times because some things are worthwhile to retain. Conservatives, however lean heavily to retain all and the only way to preserve really is to control.

My view is that people as individuals are intrinsically capable and worthy of freedom and from that the power to do all sorts of things control would otherwise prevent. The power to think, to say, and to act.

But I temper freedom with responsibility. Personal responsibility and responsibility to my fellow humans. Make no mistake, I do not generally like control and I do recognise responsibility as a form of control yet what better than a form of control based on freedom itself? The power to think, say and act balanced by the consequences of such power.

I am a liberal and I’m very happy to be one.

So let’s move from those largely idealistic words and see how this relates to a few day to day things?

Political Correctness: When encouraged I see it is a good thing. We can learn to speak to other people with respect because that’s the core of it. But when enforced via law and policy I see control and a degradation of the freedom of speech. Worse, those who chose their words with care due to such control rather than self determination are still going to be the same racist, sexist etc bigots. Thoughts and beliefs define discrimination words do not.

Environmentalism: A commonly identified liberal area yet it’s interesting that environmentalism is very much about preservation which I’ve already identified with conservatism and control. Yet I remain a broad supporter of environmentalism because I see it as my responsibility to assist in the preservation of this planets valuable lifesystem of which we are a part.

Iraq: A hotbed of liberal/conservative antagonism of which I will post on later since it’s one of my interests and is likely to be a huge topic.

Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi is Dead

This figurehead of Al Qaeda and the insurgency at large in Iraq was killed via a US airstrike on an isolated safehouse he was occupying on June 7, at 6:15 p.m. The safehouse was located 8km from Baquba. He's apparently been verified by face, fingerprints and scars and the insurgency seems to be supporting it so no conspiracies.

This is pretty big news and so is all over the media at this time. While I don't rush to celebrate anyone's death with a negative tone I think his death is a good thing given his extensive murdering work and support of that. I also think it has significant political impact particularly pro Bush/republican at home and pro the New Iraq government. It's probably one of the few big morale boosters the military and Iraq have had in some time. However it is not something that will win the war alone and doesn't signal the end of the occupation or terrorism.

Some things which seem interesting are;
1) One of his lieutenants, spiritual adviser Sheikh Abdel Rahman was also killed in the blast. This is also significant. These advisors are the religious spindoctors which basically give the religiously motivated of the insurgency god's blessing to go around murdering people.
2) It appears 2x500lb precision bombs fired via F16 did the trick.
3) 6 others including a women and a child were killed. This is not so wonderful and one wonders how many innocent (not that all 6 were innocent) people were killed in such bombings over the years.
4) There are suggestions Al-Zarqawi's rather violent nature, denouncement of Iran and murder of civilian innocents was isolating him from support. It may be that he was sold out and certainly it seems he was pushed out of his turf making him vulnerable.
5) While the US certainly did the bomb work it appears that they may have had significant support from Iraqis on the ground. Given the nature of insurgencies and their rather strong need for groundroots support this is an interesting factor and might mean a weakening of the insurgency or at least that part of it. It would also make it a success/work for the Iraqi people as much as the US.
6) There seems to be some effort into capitalising on this for the Iraqi government. Iraqi police were there before the US military. It was announced with the Iraqi PM and soon after the overargued positions of Defence etc in the Iraqi government were filled.
7) The conservative/military is of course overjoyed many going overboard calling it a turning point etc but I think we all remember how the symbolic pulling down the saddam statue in Iraq was and how little it fit the reality.
8) The antiwar liberals are mostly downplaying it some of them coming up with tiresome conspiracy theories.
9) A small number of Iraqis interviewed on the streets showed they are happy he's dead too.
10) In an irony the pro-Al-Zarqawi ppl also think it's time to celebrate but of course it's because he's been labelled a martyr and is presumably celebrating in heaven by cutting off American heads. No doubt many think he’s really in Hell suffering unspeakable torments like eating McDonalds and getting supersized…. actually, he’s just a dead man.

Grande Entrance

Having been suckered into the blogger microsphere by a fellow Guardian of Insanity I have decided to make a few posts and see how it goes. I'm told blogging is thereputic for the soul and at least it lets me soapbox my own little view of the planet.

I shall endeavour to be honest and moderately revealing. I have my skeletons like everyone else and don't have any real need to pretend i don't. I'll chat about me, my view of the world and whatever else my whims indicate which seems to be what blogging is all about.