Flit

THINGS OVERHEARD AT THE WEB

THINGS OVERHEARD AT THE WEB OFFICE

Said to another developer: "It has taken so long for Dopey [the client] to sign off on your website that I'm surprised you didn't end up writing "Kill Dopey, kill Dopey, kill Dopey..." in the metatags by the end."
Response: "Nah, that's just what you get when you play the site backwards."

BLOGGERS UNCLEAR ON THE CONCEPT

BLOGGERS UNCLEAR ON THE CONCEPT

A sampling of LGF opinions on the Egyptian turncoat who gave over Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, and his receiving the promised $25 million reward:

"If he even looks cross-eyed at any non-Muslim, he should be shot immediately."

"Now we should publish the man's name and address so his friends in Al Qaeda can go and congratulate him and his family on their good fortune."

"Put this guy on a reality TV show living large playing XBOX, throwing darts at pictures of Bush, wearing towels, etc. Whatever their idea of living large is. Let the other Jihad Jerkoffs be tempted by the life of Ryan [sic]..."

"We'd be better off if we could get the guy in the U.S., at least we'd get half of it back through estate taxes. If we do the award ceremony at CAIR headquarters, he won't last long."

"Lord Towelhead of Finsbury Park... Baron Arafish of Bradford... Lord Oiltick of Oldham"

"We could leave this guy with the following conundrum: how do you spend $27 million in a cage in Guantánamo?"

I hope we burn the little cocksucker informant a bit.... What will he do if he is burned a bit by way of a comeuppance? Go to the nearest UK Mosque and complain?

And remember... this what they'll say about a Muslim who HELPED the cause.

Flit... since 2001, reading Charles Johnson's Fans of Hate so you don't have to.

UPDATE: Others among us, on the other hand, just have to deal with the driveby loonies. BruceR's zen thought for the day: maybe the best blog is the one nobody ever reads. Including the owner.

THE PROBLEM, YOU SEE, IS

THE PROBLEM, YOU SEE, IS ALL THE LYING

Speaking of press appearances without substance, it's getting difficult to find ANYTHING in Colin Powell's presentations to the UN that can stand up to any scrutiny. The "Weedwhacker drone of death" stories today are just the latest example. The New Republic racks up a few more.

I've long been in the camp of those who thought the Iraqis had no serious weaponized NBC capability... certainly nothing that could hold up an invasion force, or damage Israel (gassing unprotected Kurds or Iranians without air cover, sure). Nor did I see much need for terrorists like Al Qaeda to rely on their "expertise"... yes that anthrax attack is still mystifying, but still untraceable, and those Japanese domestic terrorists saw no need for Iraqi assistance, after all. I think the American leadership knew that, too: NBC was ALWAYS the pretext for them. I actually suspect when an invasion finally settles the question, there won't be much of anything to find... it's a reasonable alternate hypothesis to argue that Hussein has been withholding information for fear of losing status within the Arab world and his own people by admitting he's lost his bio-mojo. Like I said yesterday with the American "Turkish option," he has to play the cards this way, as a series of non-denial denials, regardless of the actual reality. The American leadership, on the other hand, felt they had to play up the WMD threat because they thought it the only way their own WTC-traumatized public would go along with war, or at least that's what the polls told them. Their consistent failure to be honest with the world about their motives and intentions has led directly to the current dilemma, far more than any structural weaknesses in the UN/NATO system.

The upside is I believe we're seeing how the withering scrutiny of blogs and other independent media is actually giving the West a defence mechanism against government-sanctioned lying that we didn't have, say, in 1991 with the baby incubator story. (No, that does not mean we were wrong to go to war in 1991, and yes, it is important to remember that was a Kuwaiti lie, not an American government one, please. The first president Bush just believed and propagated it, not made it up.)

NOTE: Does this mean I think the Iraqi drone on display, that can only fly 2 miles, is the best they've got at their little ersatz Area 51? Of course not. When war comes, and the Humvees pull up with the keys to the blast door of the secret hangar, they will find the drone Mk. 2, that can fly at least 100 per cent farther than that. With an actual lawnmower engine this time. And carrying a small hand grenade.

UPDATE: I'm grateful to Jim Henley for the linkage. Here's another story I left out on another couple Powell claims proven false. And, in my free associative way of picking new endearing nicknames for public figures that only regular Flit readers (all three of them) will ever understand, and in an homage to my favourite online comic strip's recent adorable venture into continuity, I hereby christen our Colin as the "Aluminum Tube Samurai."

TIDBITS? Okay, so where are

TIDBITS?

Okay, so where are we? Both Matt Welch and Josh Marshall are thinking they've been transported to an alternate reality ("McLaughlin Group mixed with Lord of the Flies"? Now that's reality TV I'd watch!) And according to Andrew Sullivan, Donald Rumsfeld still won't shut up.

Sullivan, meanwhile, comes perilously close in his Fallaci post to advancing on his enemy while holding up the sacred bone relics of the World Trade Center victims... I found it offensive when those poor people were described by the anti-Afghan war side as not worth avenging, and I find it close to offensive now for him to try and stifle debate by "reminding" us of the one thing no one worth listening to in this argument has ever for a moment forgotten.

Meanwhile, George "Weeks Not Months" Bush has decided to wait another week, meaning his silly press conference last week can now officially be considered devoid of all content. So much for a March war, then... how's everyone's April looking?

The Star, meanwhile, in speculating why Bush has now not been seen in public since that conference, runs William Kristol's recent quote in Esquire on the influence of re-election planner Karl Rove on the president's thoughts:

"Karl thinks X. Bush thinks X. Clearly, it's a very complicated relationship."

Complicated? There's a lot of words for this kind of relationship. "Ventriloquism" comes to mind. So does "Richelieu." "Complicated," however, is not one I'd have chosen, personally.

INTERESTING TAKE I read the

INTERESTING TAKE

I read the New Yorker article on Perle on the subway last night... not exactly damning. It would have been forgettable if Perle himself on his first opportunity to respond, hadn't gone so batshit (see below). I think Gary Farber's analysis, though, is spot on.

WOAH As much as I'll

WOAH

As much as I'll miss him, Colby Cosh is probably right to take a break. Any blogger who can write a sentence like this probably should take a time-out:

I'm sure I'm burning readers faster than Columbia vomiting astronauts here.