| Light blogging for the next couple of days. Last minute preparations for tomorrow night's TestingTesting concert. TestingTesting is an Internet webcast that I, and some friends, do every other Monday night from my living room. Tomorrow night will be webcast from the Whidbey Island Center for the Arts. Click on in and enter some comments in the show guest book. I read those comments to the performers and live audience during the show. Click on in and be part of the show.
Back to surreality.
Lurching towards catastrophe
The most serious objections are, first, that by triggering large-scale refugee movements and interrupting food supplies, the war is turning an existing humanitarian crisis into a disaster, which will cause the deaths of many more than were slaughtered in the World Trade Centre, for no remotely proportional gain. Second, whatever success is achieved in killing or capturing Bin Laden and his supporters or forcing the Afghan theocrats from power, there is no reason to believe that that will stamp out anti-western terrorism, even by the al-Qaida networks, which operate across the world without assistance from their Taliban friends. In other words, it won't work. Finally, and most dangerously, the entire "crusade" in defence of civilisation, as Bush the younger so sensitively described his campaign, shows every sign of creating a political backlash throughout the Muslim world and spawning even more terrorist attacks, rather than curbing them.
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Missing the Oil Story
Why can we assume that global businessmen like Bush Senior and Jim Baker care about who runs Afghanistan and NOT just because it's home base for lethal anti-Americans? Because it also happens to be situated in the middle of that perennial vital national interest -- a region with abundant oil. By 2050, Central Asia will account for more than 80 percent of our oil. On September 10, an industry publication, Oil and Gas Journal, reported that Central Asia represents one of the world's last great frontiers for geological survey and analysis, "offering opportunities for investment in the discovery, production, transportation, and refining of enormous quantities of oil and gas resources."
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If it's a good idea, it's a good idea
by Molly Ivins
The point is that policy needs to be judged not on who is for it or against it - for all we know Saddam Hussein may be right about something - but whether the policy works. We are the shrewd, pragmatic Yankees, remember?
It is in our interest and the interest of Israel and the Palestinians to get that situation settled, so let's get it. Who cares if bin Laden is for it, too? (He's not, of course. He wants to destroy Israel and the West. No one is appeasing bin Laden - you can't appease a fanatic.)
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Molly Ivins for president! She is the Texan we should have voted in for the Presidency. Oops! I forgot, he was appointed.
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