Not “Obama’s War,” But OUR War…
“The true soldier fights not because he hates what is in front of him, but because he loves what is behind him.” – G.K. Chesterton
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There has been considerable analysis laid out by much more cognitively endowed people than I regarding President Obama?s Tuesday night West Point speech.? Any attempt to separate reactions based solely on ideological grounds (or the traditional ?right?/?left? spectrum) seems fairly futile.? It seems to me that those who are more middle-of-the-road are inclined to favor the President?s recent decision regarding troop levels in Afghanistan and subsequent policy; while those who are considered on the more outer fringes (of both the left and right) ?are none too pleased with the outcome.?
Those who have been critical of President Obama?s speech tend to be critical on two matters.? One is the length of time it took President Obama to come up with a decision, and the second being the substance of his speech.? On the former point, I will refrain from commenting.? This is not an article for me to be a polemicist.? On the latter point, I do not see the importance as it pertains to the policy announcement.? People seemed disappointed in our rhetorically gifted President?s lack of rhetorical flair.? I only mention this briefly, because there is a greater meaning to his delivery.? He may not feel it necessarily, but it was the vibe collectively felt by many who watched: uncertainty.? He was at the ?enemy camp? according to Chris Matthews, a la the symbol of the military class: West Point, our miniature Spartan community.? With all of the pomp and circumstance, postulating and analyzing, and finally, the postponement of A Charlie Brown Christmas; he stood before America and her warriors to announce the direction of a policy that didn?t merely affect numbers and graphs and charts.? This affects people and families and communities and countries far greater than any other markers in history.?
Don?t let this fool you.? The delivery was poor, and perhaps unenthusiastic.? What President Obama did, however, was make the right decision.? He will take shots from people within his ranks, and there are some particulars that many of us Conservatives?may disagree with.? However, it is at this moment that President Obama was asked to make the life altering decision for hundreds of thousands of Americans attached to the military, about whether or not their sacrifices were to have been made in vain.? He chose not.? He chose a step toward a victorious end instead of a mild defeat.? He came out and gave our men and women in uniform an opportunity to win a battle nearly a decade in the making.? We may not agree with much that President Obama does, but at this turbulent moment in our nation?s history, with regard to this specific circumstance that defines our Nation?s ability to combat those who threaten our being, our President faced a choice and he chose to support our troops and their cause: now we must support him in this endeavor.
-rj
Where?s the Sense? A look at the Hofstra Rape Hoax
Many of you may be familiar with the recent arrests of 4 men for the alleged rape of an 18-year-old freshman student at Hofstra University.? The ?victim? reported an incident where she was bound in a bathroom and raped by 5 young men at a frat party.? Later this week the young woman recanted her story claiming that she didn?t want to tell her boyfriend about the consensual activity between herself and the several other young men; this coming of course after the 4 arrests had been made and the men falsely dragged through the mud for their ?crimes.?
This looks to be a classic case of ?hook-up regret? where a consensual situation quickly ran into a downward spiral of morning-after denial and disgust.? Perhaps it would be worthwhile to look at how and why young women and men have progressed to a place where such activity is acceptable.
In the past, if an 18-20 year-old college student of either gender wanted to be sexually intimate with another it was done in the strictest of secrecy and in areas where others were not likely to loiter (the term ?parking? comes to mind here).? Nowadays if your college roommate is expecting to engage in sexual activity, you the helpless bystander are encouraged and sometimes forced to leave the situation and retreat in what is sometimes called being ?sexiled.?
What happened?? The answer: the tail end of the sexual revolution and the last wave of feminism.? Women were encouraged to engage in sexual activity just like men did and were told that they could do so with as many partners as they wanted with no consequence to them thanks to the evolution of birth control and the legalization of abortion.
The truth about frivolous sexual activity is being sacrificed in the name of political correctness and young women, and indeed young men such as the 4 arrested in the Hofstra case, are suffering because of it.
Various scientific studies have suggested that there are a number of biological and chemical affects of intimate activity that occur in men and women.? The most prevalent of these is the chemical Oxytocin which releases in the brain of a woman causing them to form emotional bonds with those they are intimate with.? This often leads to feelings of depression and regret when a casual hook-up does not produce a relationship.
The Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute is launching a new website called Sense & Sexuality that deals with these very issues and tackles the myths of sexual activity full force.? Check out the new website www.senseandsexuality.org starting September 21st and start getting answers about the frightening misinformation that produces the kind of situation seen this week at Hofstra University.
- catherine
No Prosecution for Patriots
While I would certainly argue that President Obama has championed and proposed terrible pieces of legislation such as the stimulus bill, and supports liberal fantasies such as a radical environmentalist agenda and single payer health care, he has made the right call with regards to the proposed prosecution of CIA officials.
The President and Attorney General Eric Holder who has called us ?a nation of cowards,? have decided not to prosecute CIA officials who used harsh interrogation techniques during the post 9/11 administration of President George Walker Bush. Obama did however condemn the ?enhanced interrogation techniques? as the President said he seeks to move beyond ?a dark and painful history.? I find this to be a bit unpatriotic as courtesy of Mr. Bush?s national security policies, America has not been subject to another act of terrorism while the UK and other countries such as India have. But that?s another argument.
Furthermore, it would be extremely unpatriotic to prosecute these CIA officials for merely following through with their orders. The Attorney General shares my view, “It would be unfair to prosecute dedicated men and women working to protect America for conduct that was sanctioned in advance by the Justice Department.?
The President did however release four memos in which Bush-era lawyers approved in often graphic detail tough interrogation methods used against 28 terror suspects. This was a horrible idea considering we are still fighting a war in Afghanistan, Iraq, and a war on terror. A former top official in the administration of President Bush called the publication of the memos ?unbelievable.? ?It’s damaging because these are techniques that work, and by Obama’s action today, we are telling the terrorists what they are,? the official said. ?We have laid it all out for our enemies. This is totally unnecessary. ? Publicizing the techniques does grave damage to our national security by ensuring they can never be used again ? even in a ticking-time- bomb scenario where thousands or even millions of American lives are at stake.”
The most controversial of these interrogation techniques is undoubtedly waterboarding and members of both parties including Republican Presidential nominee John McCain have condemned the practice. I think it is fair to note in that argument that many military personnel undergo waterboarding in training. “Tens of thousands of American Air Force and naval airmen were waterboarded as part of their survival training,” says a Senior U.S. intelligence official, who has spoken on condition of anonymity. “We don’t maim as part of our training. We don’t mutilate. We don’t sodomize. Those are things that are always bad. . . . Intellectually, there has got to be a difference between [waterboarding] and the others; otherwise we wouldn’t have done it in training.”
-sam
Norway Neutrality: What does the Norway Neutrality Policy Mean for the US?
New post up at openmarket.org on the subject of the new Norway Net Nuetrality policy.? Will neutralist start pushing this type of approach stateside?? Post is here
-nick
Joe Klien is Looking For a Sugar Daddy.
Well, I am unaware just how knowledgeable people are of myself and my beliefs, but I will begin by stating my political tendencies are geared toward the right, put mildly of course. Surprisingly enough, I enjoy a good episode of Morning Joe every day; a habit that cannot be beneficial to my heart health. Nonetheless, I listened Time Magazine?s Joe Klien explaining how the American people polled by CBS (because a flash poll conducted at 10:30pm on a weeknight of people who watched a liberal president?s liberal manifesto presentation wouldn?t have skewed results) showing 80% of Americans liked what they heard last night. Mr. Klien exclaims that the people are scared, they need a leader, and they are looking for a daddy in government. I would ask those educated individuals (whether or not you committed the treasonous act of dropping out of high school) to search the repository of their history books, and tell me what happened to a people?s freedoms when such sentiments were supposedly shared by the volkgeist.
I want to point out the danger behind such lines of thought. The public as of late has been ebbing and flowing with emotion. A dangerous situation as founder James Madison points out in the Federalist Papers where the ?tyranny of the majority? was pointed to as a real possibility in democracies. The United States has become increasingly apathetic, and today we are beginning to understand a true beginning of nihilism here on our soil. People did not vote based on their principles, they voted in the heat of the moment, to be a part of history, for an articulate leader instead of his ideas. When we stop being guided by our core beliefs, and begin to question everything our country has and continues to stand for, and then develop a mutual understanding that anyone can be right so in arguing your point you demonstrate old prejudices; we then become bewildered beasts in our own society. All it takes is for a situation to scare the people into looking into a man, or a god. Heidegger points out how a people will look for a ?superman? or god to lead them when they feel vulnerable. He would know after all. I do not mean to make any unfair comparisons, or be accused of reducto ad Hitlerum; however, if similarities exist, we would be derelict if we didn?t point this out.
Now we have President Obama. He is not Hitler, or a tyrant. Please do not misconstrue what I say as a mere ad hominem attack shallow in understanding. Can we please point out the fact that he is a mixture of the worst parts of our most liberal presidents? His ideas of an intellectual elite guiding us out opf the recession, and heading these bureaucracies reeks of Woodrow Wilson; his lack of understanding regarding the military, and promulgation of an argument to raise the number of troops and their pay and their benefits, but cutting the budget drastically; and the most lauded comparison with F.D.R. and his misguided belief that radical spending will drive the US out of an economic recession. Adding short term ?infrastructure? projects to rebuild roads and schools and anything else? where does someone who was a part of the 52,000 Citi employees fit in to that? After having worked as an IT recruiter for years, I cannot understand how an IT recruiter today finds a way to place his .Net Developer on a new project that involved re-paving I-495.
There are myriad particulars in President Obama?s speech last night that we can argue against. That would take more time than I have currently, and I have bored you enough as it is. I would point out the one thing people said the President needed to do in order to have a successful speech; instill confidence. Well the Dow is down 150 points. I will let the events pass final judgment on the level of success. And I would hope that MSNBC has tissues in their preparation rooms for their guest, to wipe the brown residue off their noses. No wonder they can?t smell how bad this stinks.
Obama’s Broadband Stimulus
Had another post go up on openmarket.org regarding the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, specifically the section on broadband stimulus.
$6 Billion For Broadband, Or How I Learned To Stop Worrying And LOL At The Recovery Act
-nick
Rated M for moron
Last week Rep. Joe Baca (D-CA) co-sponsored a bill (H.R. 231), [sic] The Video Game Health Labeling Act of 2009, along with Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA), (because the issue obviously crosses party lines) that would place a cigarette like warning label on video games to make gamers and parents aware of the dangers of playing video games. You read that correctly. This isn’t a content warning. It is a warning of the mental and/or physical damage that could be wrought upon an individual venturing into the dangerous waters of playing video games.
Specifically, the bill would require video games with an ESRB T rating or above in both the virtual and meat space to be presented to the purchaser with a label reading:
“WARNING: Excessive exposure to violent video games and other violent media has been linked to aggressive behavior.”
First of all: What?
Secondly: But more importantly, why are video games being singled out here? Why are we not placing warning labels on other products like this as well?
Coca-Cola?? “WARNING: Excessive exposure to caffiene has been linked to aggressive behavior.”
After this, I will link increased ice cream sales with robberies.
This type of program would be a complete undermining of a production companies content and their First Amendment rights to produce that content.
It would also seem that the goal of such a measure would be to strip all “adult material” out of the video game arena.? Let me explain why I believe this.? You see the MPAA uses a ratings system in which movies can have a classification of so much violence, so many swear words, so much sexually themed content, and so on.? When that metrics limit is exceeded for a specific rating, the film is given the next more strict rating, or when content is removed the rating decreases in strictness.? In other words if a movie’s producer is after a PG-13 rating, and the review board finds that it contains two F-bombs and will be rated R, he removes one use of the F-bomb and reaches the one use limit for PG-13 and gets the rating he is after.
This bill seems to follow a similar goal.? No one is going to want this label on their product, so they continue to decrease the violence of their game until it reaches under a T rating.? At this point the Lancer in Gears of War fires rainbows.? Except that it’s called Gears of Happiness because war is violent.? But then Gears could suggest grinding which could be considered less than acceptable, so we rename it Marshmellows of Happiness.
What I would be interested in here is for people to stop being morons.
We have a rating system.? It has been in place for years.? If parents are ignoring it, that is not the content producers fault.? That is the fault of the parents not regulating what their children are doing, and it is the fault of the brick and mortars and virtual retailers for not verifying age, which is an entirely different issue.
The ESRB is a fine organization, which has been self regulated, and done a tremendous job.? Content producers are scared of getting the AO (Adults Only) rating.? They have stripped content to keep from getting this rating (see: GTA).? Other content producers that are creating a game for adults get an AO rating and they don’t care because their game is for adults, and their age is supposed to be verified by the vendor.
For comparison sake, look at the comparable ratings by the ESRB and MPAA.
I’m not going to link to the description of Adults Only, because it has a requirement of being 18 years old.? They call it Adults Only because it is only for adults, and our country determined a long time ago that 18 years old was the magic year that one transitions to full responsibility in the 24 hour period on the date of their birth.? That being said, if they can join the army and shoot a gun, they should be able to buy whatever video game they want.
In a press release following the introduction of the bill on Jan. 7th, Baca stated, ?The video game industry has a responsibility to parents, families, and to consumers ? to inform them of the potentially damaging content that is often found in their products. They have repeatedly failed to live up to this responsibility.?
I seriously believe this man has no idea what the ESRB is, that it has existed since 1992, that every mainstream game is submitted for rating and carries a visual rating label on the front of the box with a detailed rating description on the back of the box.
?I am proud to introduce the Video Game Health Labeling Act of 2009, and am hopeful my legislation can work to stop the growing influence of violent media on America?s children and youth.?
And here’s where the whole thing falls apart. First of all I thought this bill was to prevent “aggressive behavior” instilled via video games?? But now the press statement is talking about influence and that this is for the children? But aren’t children a lot younger than 17? I mean if we consider R movies ok for a 17 year old then a 17 year old certainly can’t be a child, right? So if the rating above T, which is the M (Mature) rating, is for a 17+ year old then those games aren’t for children right? And obviously, AO is for only Adults, 18+.
So in actuality this comes down to regulation and not any real concern about actual children. The content is already policed with a rating label system.? And the end user can look at that rating and determine for himself whether he should play it or not.? But aside from content, does playing potentially violent video games induce aggressive behavior?? Most likely, yes. I’m not going to hide from this.? Yes, violent content probably induces emotions of aggression.? You know what else induces emotions of aggression?? Playing football in highschool.? Driving in Atlanta traffic. Reading about morons who waste tax payer money by spending their time getting upset that hormone driven 17 and 18 year olds are going to get excitable playing Halo.
And once again this will burn in the fires of Jack Thompson lunacy, disappear, then return again in six more months. Rinse and repeat.
- nick
Don’t Be Evil?
Four days ago I woke up to a Wall Street Journal article indicating that Google wanted to join forces with various telecomms to obtain a fast lane to their services.? Now, four days in Internet time is certainly akin to years in meatspace, to be sure.? But before I put my fingers to keyboard I decided to give the issue some careful thought.
My innitial impressions were reactionary and I was somewhat enraged.? I took it somewhat personally at first.? The reason being that a year ago, post-graduate school, I was denied a recommendation from a Google VP for a position in a technology fellowship they were hosting with various tech/Internet think-tanks across the nation because I “Did not share Google’s vision” on Net Neutrality.? The reason for this was because I had written several papers on the subject, which covered Net Neutrality policy across the gamut, from avoiding policy all together by using the precautionary principle, to my suggestions for appropriate regulatory options that would prevent destroying both corporate and garage scientists contributions and innovations to the medium.
I wanted to immediately throw Google under the bus.? This is the company that runs its own blog completely dedicated to public policy and focuses on the Net Neutrality issue a great deal.? The “Don’t be evil” company turning on its previous stance for its own benefit? I honestly wasn’t even surprised.
But here is the thing.? After giving the details of EdgeCaching a going over I don’t have a problem with this.? EdgeCaching, the technique Google is exploring using is a brilliant technology.? And it is something that should not be prevented by Net Neutrality policy.? It is something that should be embraced just like the possibility of fast lane tiers for users that want to pay more because they play time sensitive video games, or watch streaming high def movies.? Future technology and innovation should not be stymied by policy that is not future proof.? And anyone that joins me in a game of Gears of War 2, and gets pawned not by lack of skill, but because of incessant lag can appreciate this.
That being said, I still don’t find it appropriate for Google’s Richard Witt to try and swindle us on the fact that using EdgeCaching would not even possibly by-pass Net Neutrality principles.? Of course, we in the community still do not have a standard definition of Net Neutrality.? The versions of such definition alter depending on who you are talking to or citing.? But generally the definition includes some sort of case for everyone having the freedom or ability to connect equally.? And even these, freedom and ability, are two different things.? Freedom for one company to conduct services in the same way that another does them are certainly different than a company having the means to conduct business.? The point being is that when Witt explains that the implementation is “non-exclusive, meaning any other entity could employ similar arrangements,” does not mean that any other company could afford to go up against a deal penned with say AT&T and implement the same plan.
Now that may simply be capitalism.? It’s certainly not Google’s fault that they are successful and have the financial means to get certain arrangements and use advanced technology to their benefit.? But on the other hand wouldn’t allowing certainly technologies that give certain content providers a speed advantage over others by-pass our Net Neutrality principle of allowing each of us to connect equally?
The long and short of it is that the WSJ was probably somewhat off in their proposition.? But the longer I study Google’s pattern of behavior my face begins to facilitate the expression of two High Noon gun fighters, eyes focused, squinting in the sun, teeth clinched in cautious consideration of the next move.? Let us not forget this is the same company that blatantly mislead the FCC, and the public less than a year ago, with no real intention of placing a winning bid on the wireless spectrum auction for the sole purpose of forcing the spectrum to be open, thus allowing them the opportunity to benefit from the spectrum in the future without having to actually own it and incur any costs.
Google, Don’t Be Evil.
- nick
Video games are bad. I mean me. -Blagojevich
I honestly cannot think of anything?more unscrupulous in politics besides straight out murdering someone than trying to sell off an empty seat in the U.S. Senate.? But that’s exactly what Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was attempting to do.? Seriously. U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald called it, “truly a new low.”
If your memory can take you back a bit, this is the same guy that wanted to regulate the sell of video games because of moral concerns.
On a wire tap Blagojevich was recorded saying that the Senate seat “is a f***ing?valuable thing,?you just don’t give it away for nothing.”??Going on to say, “I’m going to keep this Senate option for me a real possibility, you know, and therefore I can drive a hard bargain. You hear what I’m saying. And if I don’t get what I want and I’m not satisfied with it, then I’ll just take the Senate seat myself.”??Additionally referring to Obama as a?”motherf***er,” saying that if “I don’t get anything,” he would not appoint a friend of the?Obama camp.? “F*** him. For nothing? F*** him.”? “They’re not willing to give me anything except appreciation. F*** them.”
It’s interesting to note that one of the prime targets of his video game regulation was aimed at?the Grand Theft Auto series because the moral depravity and violence would negatively influence teenage kids.? Is it possible that maybe teenage kids are affected negatively by a politician playing the real life counter part to the dirt ball political leaders of the GTA series story lines?? Games influenceing?life?? Nope, games imitating life.
-nick
