Life at the Lake
a diary of living at a small lowland lakeWHAT IT'S LIKE
Early moonrise over Lake Ketchum
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LIFE GOES ON, OR DOES IT?
A jerk, yes, but a member of the circle jerk club, too?
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David Radosh, in the July 26,2004 edition of The New Yorker, writes of Zig Engelmann, an author and professor at the University of Oregon in Eugene, who calls himself "a political rebel." (He wrote the children's book President Bush held in his hands in the classroom and kept staring at, ostensibly reading, when he was advised of the 9/11 bombing of the twin towers.)
He is not fond of George Bush, and says, "For whatever it's worth, I think Iraq is a total circle jerk. I couldn't think of how to do it worse." (p.29)
A good visual image. Picture Bush, Cheney, Ashcroft, and Powell, all seated on the ground around a campfire. . . .
There is a correct place for obscenity and sexual allusion in American life, and it's not on TV. This is one such appropriate instance.
Brilliant writing! Or rather speaking.
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TELL ME, WHAT IS "INTELLIGENCE"
And can you trust this man's "intelligence?"
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Tell me, what is "a failure of intelligence?" That's what the TV news and papers are calling the findings of the Senate select committee's investigation of the 9/11 debacle. Is that apt phrase a euphemism for doing something stupid? Or not doing something smart? Does the committee mean that there was an absence of intelligence involved with the FBI, CIA, Pentagon, White House, and "all ships at sea?"
Dumb, dumb, dumb. Now, the recommendation is for a new Super Agency to oversee all the others. What, pray tell, might lead us to think this new agency would be any smarter? Why would there be any less a chance of failure of planning intelligence?
When you are at the gambling table (and you had not better be), the idea of doubling you bets when you are losing is not a good idea. It is a bad idea. It is a poor idea. It is a failure of common sense, that is, a failure of intelligence.
If it is true that the new director of the CIA says they have learned from their mistakes and have already implemented corrections in areas of known failures, why not give them a chance? It won't cost any more billions, I don't think, and maybe the FBI can be induced to do the same, if it already hasn't. (If it already hasn't, it should be disbanded, and we could start all over again.)
And there will be an election in four months. Speaking for only myself, I don't think Bush deserves a second chance.
Too many failures of intelligence already. Such as invading Iraq.
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