M9 Dispatch: Interesting Videos

Thanks to my friend MMMMMMMMM (or M9 because I am a lazy typist and it sounds cool, don't it?) I finally got to see the ads from former Generals and vets against this war.

Movie Maven: Superheroes, Smokers, and Shameless Hype

With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility

Of all the superhero films, I have enjoyed the Spider-man series the most. That is even taking into account the Superman 1 and 2 in the 1970s-80s. Spider-man 1 did a fine

job marrying great special effects with great stories and sympathetic characters. One set up the Spidey origin story, his uncle's death that gives him purpose, and the Green Goblin

who would ultimately get between him and his best friend. Spider-Man 2 bettered the first by having a great villain of Doc Oct, Spidey's struggle with his dreams and his responsibilities, and a simply great fight and rescue scene.

When it came to Spider-Man 3, I had read an article in Entertainment Weekly how this film had been rushed and between casting and writing the script filming it was getting a bit tight.

We went to Spider-man 3 having read much of the reviews that were very, very mixed. The reviews said that this installment was an obvious attempt to cash in on the francise and was just seemed thrown together. We watched the film and afterwards saw what the reviews meant, but found that it wasn't as bad as some of the reviewers made it to be.

It was a very long movie that could have been tightened and edited down more. It really didn't help that the theater we went to had played endless commercials and coming attractions. It was an 11:15AM showing, but we didn't get out 2:00PM.

My hubby, who is a big fan of comic books was very wary of using Venom as one of the villains because it wasn't one of the better ones in the Spiderman universe. If you are going to have a multiple villain fight with Spiderman that should include a little origin for each villain, it is hard to fit a subplot about Spidey's struggle with fame, relationship issues with his girlfriend and best friend, and dealing with the memory of his dead uncle and his need for revenge. It was just too much to try to fit well into a film. I didn't get the dance scene either. The ending was a bit sloppy as well. On the other hand, the effects are great and there are some really good fight scenes. What saves the film and what some reviewers missed is that I still cared about the characters. The core cast are people you care about and the director Sam Raimi is a talented director.



Spider-man 3 will make a lot of money even though it is the weakest installment, and that is okay. That is a testament -- a reward for how good the other two movies were.

All I ask is that if they do Spider-man 4, that they slow down and give us something of the caliber of Spider-man 2. Please.

Nicotine Poisoning

We have also renewed our Netflicks and have checked out various films. There are three movies with cigarettes in their title, only one was good. 200 Cigarettes is set in 1981 in New York City on New Years Eve. A bunch of angst-ridden twenty-somethings are looking for parties to go to or being angst-ridden hoping people will come to their parties. I guess 200 Cigarettes are smoked during the film, but we didn't get that far in before we ejected the disc. There were no characters that we cared about. Like its characters, it was a movie that desperately wanted to be cool.

The Smokers is another film that wanted to be cool. It calls itself another "Heathers", a cult-film in the 1980s. It just wasn't. We watched the entire film to see if it ever reaches "Heathers" status, but it just failed. You just have unpleasant rich girls (who, of course, smoke) and a troubled Scholarship Student who go on an anti-male revenge kick to get the feeling of power. They only give a momentary tease that they will deal with cliques, but they never really

follow through. Unlike "The Smokers", "Heathers" had a wry sense of dark humor with better cinematography. Skip "The Smokers" and rent "Heathers" if you want a film on teen angst, cliques, revenge, and wry comment on how communities deal with teen tragedies.

Thank You For Smoking is a very clever film about lobbyists and the art of spin. The lead character is a lobbyist for the Tobacco Industry, who lunches with lobbyists from the Gun and Alcohol lobbies and with a twinkle in his eye argues persuasively for his clients. Check it out, it is really enjoyable. While not as good as Thank You For Smoking, Fast Food Nation and American Dreamz are moderately interesting satire on American life.

We Have Been Oscar Hyped!

It is a truth for the ages that during awards season, studio marketing people are priming the pump to create buzz for their films. You get proclamations every year that their film is

"The Best Film This Year", "The Best Film of the Decade", and "Best Film EVER". For sole purposes of awards prognostication, it is important to pay attention and guess what hype the members of the Academy will fall for. This is why I try not to see any film before Oscars, because I almost always find the movie lacking in proportion to the amount of hype it gets.

Then I get indignant and refuse to vote for a film to get best picture, because the movie I saw was not an Oscar Worthy film. I temporarily forget that "Oscar Worthy" isn't the best film or best performance, but which marketing department throws the most pixie dust over their film.

As I mentioned before, I lost points this year on the Oscar competition because I watched The Departed before the Oscars. I refused to vote for it for Best Picture even though

I picked it for Best Director (even though I knew that it was Martin Scorsese's year since he was due after a large body of work without an Oscar) because I was disappointed in direct relation to the amount of hype it got. It wasn't that The Departed was bad, it just wasn't the best crafted film that Martin Scorsese ever done. Another problem was casting Leo Dicaprio, who just didn't sell the lead role, which just made the movie lack the weight it needed. This was a problem in another Scorsese film, The Aviator.

The Inconvenient Truth was not a bad movie. It had an important message to deliver. Unfortunately, there was not much new information for us and we thought it was a PowerPoint presentation mixed with a campaign movie for President. It certainly wasn't the best documentary that year. The best documentary I saw last year didn't even get nominated and that was Shut Up and Sing. Jesus Camp was a compelling and scary documentary about how the religious right evangelists are indoctrinating young children to be an army

for God, but I still think "Shut Up and Sing" had a better narrative.

Happy Feet won for best animated feature. While the music was good and the message was laudable, I don't think it was better than Monster House or Cars. Like Inconvenient Truth, this Happy Feet won because of its message.

Little Miss Sunshine was a pleasant film that had its moments of charm and humor, but it really wasn't one of the best films last year. It was better than The Devil Wears Prada which felt like an updated Working Girl from 1988. Meryl Streep will forever be one of the best American Actresses for her work in Sophie's Choice and Out of Africa, but Prada wasn't her Oscar worthy role.

So much hype surrounded Dreamgirls. Jennifer Hudson and Eddie Murphy were shoe-ins for Oscars. Three songs from the movie were nominated along with a host of technical awards

like costume design. Much was made post-Oscar about only Jennifer Hudson winning for best supporting actress and the movie only getting awarded for Sound Mixing. People

cried foul that it got snubbed for Best Picture because it was an all-Black cast. After watching the film, it wasn't a bad film. Bill Condin, who also directed Chicago, did the best he could with a flawed musical with forgettable songs, broad characters, and lack of humor. Given better source material, this would probably be Oscar worthy as Chicago was regardless of the color of the cast.

Children of Men was not a bad movie. It created a very oppressive scary world were there is a world-wide epidemic of infertility. It had a really good use of sound and and had some really suspenseful moments, but it somehow fell short for me in comparison of another futuristic film, V for Vendetta.

So far, Pan's Labyrinth is in my mind the best film for 2006. It is so good on so many levels. I am still interested in watching Last King of Scotland, The Lives of Others, Volver, and maybe just maybe United 93 before I make a final decision.

Post Freaky Friday

TGIF?

Friday just came and went yesterday. Maybe it was the shock that the Golden Gate Warriors actually beat the Mavs post-season. It has been 16 years, and 13 years of it one of our friends would call us for his annual, "This year the Warriors will make the playoffs!" prediction. We would think, "Oh, that poor, pitiful man...why does he keep doing this to himself? What a masochist!" This should teach us a lesson -- if you keep saying something will happen, year after year, chances are, eventually it may happen.

My Cinco de Mayo

While I am always a big fan commemorating revolutions, Cinco de Mayo is a sad day for me. Five years ago, my mom passed away. Naturally, this was the saddest days of my life -- just days before Mother's Day. She had suffered for years with Osteoporosis and had developed emphysema after smoking for 57 years (much of that was 2 packs a day).

It started getting bad when she was pulling files out at work and cracked a vertibre. Her mother and my grandmother had broken both of her hips and probably had osteoporosis as well.

It got to the point where she could barely take one puff before having to put out the cigarette and going back on oxygen.

The pain she endured was simply awful and there was no pain medication that didn't make her terribly sick. She had always been skinny, but she looked like an Auschwitz survivor the last couple of years of her life.

She was such a wonderful soul with a great big heart and had this really cute sense of humor. She loved kids and was a wonderful and warm mother. My mother would have adored my son and it breaks my heart that she died before she could meet him. I love her still and miss her terribly. If I am lucky she appears in my dreams -- but it makes me deeply sorrowful when I realize that its only a dream. Be resting in peace, my little sparrow.

Spring Fashion Police

If only it could be Queer Eye for the Straight Guy cast or Mr. Blackwell walking the streets stopping fashion crisis after fashion crisis, but in Tehran it is a crack down on "immodest dress" and western fashion.

Over 300 women were arrested the first day of the crackdown for too tight overcoats or having too much hair showing from their veil. Authorities have already issued warnings to 1,347 women for being inappropriately dressed. Another 59 deemed provocatively attired were briefly detained. 11 European tourists were issued warnings.

I checked out Gulfnews.com and found an interesting debate forming in the article comments -- some quite scary to me -- a modern American woman. This is straight out of the book, "Reading Lolita in Tehran." What gets me that the rationale for this dresscode is because it seems Iranian men don't have the sense to discipline themselves in the face of a stray hair, a sight of an ankle, a shoulder, or calf. I would think they would have more restraint and maturity to be able to mind their own business. If they cannot control themselves, shouldn't it be the men who are cracked down on, not the women?

"Men see models in the streets and ignore their own wives at home. This weakens the pillars of family." - Mohammad Taqi Rahbar, Iranian lawmaker

Some are speculating that the crackdown is a mere distraction to overshadow other government problems and an upcoming rise in gas prices.

Foxes Get Free Reign In The Hen-house by SCOTUS

In a recent Supreme Court decision in Watters v. Wacovia, the Supreme Court upheld that state regulators cannot regulate Banks that they charter, specifically mortgage subsidiary
of banks like Wacovia which are national banks. The decision was 5-3 (Ginsberg writing, Alito, Souter, Breyer, and Kennedy with Justice Thomas taking no part in review) .

"The NBA is thus properly read by OCC to protect from state hindrance a national bank’s engagement in the “business of banking” whether conducted by the bank itself or by an operating subsidiary, empowered to do only what the bank itself could do. See supra, at11–12. The authority to engage in the business of mortgage lending comes from the NBA, §371, as does the authority to conduct business through an operating subsidiary. See §§24 Seventh, 24a(g)(3)(A). That Act vests visitorial oversight in OCC, not state regulators. §484(a). State law (in this case, North Carolina law), all agree, governs incorporation-related issues, such as the formation, dissolution, and internal governance of operating subsidiaries.¹⁴ And the laws of the States in which national banks or their affiliates are located govern matters the NBA does not address. See supra, at 6. But state regulators cannot interfere with the “business of banking” by subjecting national banks or their OCC-licensed operating subsidiaries to multiple audits and surveillance under rival oversight regimes."

"Watters’ alternative argument, that 12 CFR §7.4006 violates the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution, is unavailing. As we have previously explained, “[i]f a power is delegated to Congress in the Constitution, the Tenth Amendment expressly disclaims any reservation of that power to the States.” New York v. United States, 505 U. S. 144, 156 (1992) . Regulation of national bank operations is a prerogative of Congress under the Commerce and Necessary and Proper Clauses. See Citizens Bank v. Alafabco, Inc., 539 U. S. 52, 58 (2003) (per curiam). The Tenth Amendment , therefore, is not implicated here."

What Ginsberg is arguing that regulation of the business of banking (conducting transactions, setting up accounts, making loans and mortgages, etc.) is the business of the federal government even if the business is being done by an affiliate or subsidiary of a national bank that is incorporated by a state. The only thing a state can do

That means that your state cannot do anything to protect consumers against predatory or other exotic loans that have lead to increasing cases of defaults. Federal charters of banks are enormously permissive.

"This decision undermines effective state laws and regulatory enforcement mechanisms in place to protect consumers. We are disappointed because states have been extremely active in defending borrowers against abusive lenders, especially in attorney generals' offices. It's possible that the ruling has left some wiggle room on enforcement, based on our first
read. This decision, though, strengthens our resolve for meaningful national anti-predatory lending legislation that covers all lenders throughout the country." - David Berenbaum, Vice President, National Community Reinvestment Coalition

I am finding myself in this really bizarre position agreeing with Scalia and Roberts in their dissension with Justice Stevens.

"Congress has enacted no legislation immunizing national bank subsidiaries from compliance with nondiscriminatory state laws regulating the business activities of mortgage brokers and lenders. Nor has it authorized an executive agency to preempt such state laws whenever it concludes that they interfere with national bank activities. Notwithstanding the absence of relevant statutory authority, today the Court endorses an agency’s incorrect determination that the laws of a sovereign State must yield to federal power. "

Jesus Not Only Saves, But He Delivers?

I didn't know it, but there are parts of this country where post offices are run by churches that are subcontractors to the USPS with non-Postal Service employees. There are about 5200 such places. These contractors are used in places were official facilities are not possible or appropriate like colleges, grocery stores, pharmacies, and some private residences.

There is one such facility in Manchester, New Hampshire called, The Sincerely Yours Inc. Post Office run by the Full Gospel Interdenominational Church. This facility is at the heart of a recent ruling by a Federal Court that privatized post offices cannot promote religion. A WWII and Korean veteran, Bertram Cooper, who is Jewish, went into The Sincerely Yours in 2003 to find Christian posters, Christian videos playing, and Christian prayer cards were prominent where postal-like activities were taking place. This was the only post office in the downtown area.

Cooper contacted the ACLU because he believed that his First Amendment rights were being violated. Under the First Amendment, there is a right to religion and from religion. The establishment clause prevents the State from establishing or favoring one religion over another.

The religious displays "put the church's beliefs front and center, out for the public to see, endorsing the church's form of Christianity and seeking outsiders to join the church in its mission," wrote U.S. District Court Judge Dominic J. Squatrito. The judge found while the contract between the Church and the Post Office didn't violate the First Amendment, the displays themselves did and the U.S. Postal Service must notify their contractors that they cannot promote religion or display religious materials in their stores.

The church that runs Sincerely Yours may appeal and the U.S. Attorney is reviewing the decision and deciding whether they will appeal. Certain sections of the Department of Justice is also reviewing the ruling.

Quote of the Day

A Humanist Code of Ethics:
Do no harm to the earth, she is your mother.
Being is more important than having.
Never promote yourself at another's expense.
Hold life sacred; treat it with reverence.
Allow each person the digity of his or her labor.
Open your home to the wayfarer.
Be ready to receive your deepest dreams;
sometimes they are the speech of unblighted conscience.
Always make restitutions to the ones you have harmed.
Never think less of yourself than you are.
Never think that you are more than another.
- Arthur Dobrin

President Pelosi, Please!

Can We Call This Impeachment Thursday?



So I made my call thttp://impeachforpeace.org/impeach_bush_blog/?p=1384o President...err...House Speaker Pelosi to register my support for impeachment of BOTH Cheney and Bush (in THAT order, please). If we can impeach a president for a trivial thing as lying about a consentual extra-marital affair no one cared to hear about in the first place, why not impeach these two incompetant and beligerant actors against our constitution and our security.

Here are Kucinich's documents relating to the impeachment of Dick Cheney for high crimes and misdemenors. Vermont senators voted Friday to call for the impeachment of President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

Impeachment sites:

Impeachbush.org

Impeach for Peace

Democrats.com Impeachment page

CNN's Impeachment "reality check"

Quotes of the Day:



"The genius of impeachment lay in the fact that it could punish the man without punishing the office."

Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

"When people ask if the United States can afford to place on trial the president, if the system can stand impeachment, my answer is, "Can we stand anything else?"

George McGovern

"Impeachment is not a remedy for private wrongs; it's a method of removing someone whose continued presence in office would cause grave danger to the nation. "

Charles Ruff

"The only conduct that merits the drastic remedy of impeachment is that which subverts our system of government or renders the president unfit or unable to govern. "

Charles Ruff

"[Imeachable conduct is] misconduct by public men, or, in other words, from the abuse or violation of some public trust." - Alexander Hamilton

"All in all, the framers would probably agree that it's better to impeach too often than too seldom. If presidents can't be virtuous, they should at least be nervous."

- Joseph Sobran

Ideas for Protesting The Current Administration



There are emails circulating on A Great American Gas-Out, but this hasn't been verified as a real campaign as yet. I think instead we might want to really hurt the oil companies by pledging to Vacation in the Backyard in the Summer of 07. Instead of taking road trips like the Oil Companies are expecting, just stay at home and spend money at your local tourist traps or hold BBQ's where you talk about organizing politically and getting people registered to vote. 40 Summers ago it was the Summer of Love -- maybe this will be the Summer of Change?

Post-May Day Roundup

ABOVE: LE FISHER, "KITE FLYING"



Good Afternoon, Comrades!



Yesterday was May Day, International Workers Day, Ex-American Labor Day which turned into Loyalty Day. We put the American flag out for Loyalty, while humming the Internationale (in mumbled Russian as if I was in the cast of the movie, "Reds" which I love).

There is a reason why we put a picture of Lenin above our child's changing table in his first 2 years of life. Perhaps there is latent rebellion against my dad knowing that we are raising his grandson red. He has no right to complain too much. Even though he has been kidnapped by Fox News, he is only person I know who has voted for a communist -- in 1960 - he wrote in Kruschev for President.

While on a May Day drive to downtown San Rafael, I registered my support as we drove by a pro-immigrant protest to my dad's displeasure. When my dad offered to register his displeasure with them, I told him to settle down.

My view is that I don't see people lining up wanting to pick strawberries or other stoop labor involved in agricultural harvesting. I never hear the opposition offer up stories of Americans who missed out being nannies, janitors and housecleaners, fast food workers, or other manual labor. The only thing I could think of is construction work and truck drivers.

There is some work Americans just don't do and Americans are unwilling to hold corporations accountable for the low wages and no benefits they offer that we the tax payer have to pick up. If we were willing to start a national (if not international) workers rights movement and penalize corporations who do not hire legal residents for a living wage and provide health care, you are going to have illegal workers come over our border no matter how dangerous it would be. Wouldn't you do all that you could do to feed your family?

Quote of the Day

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if Labor had not first existed. Labor is superior to capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. - Abraham Lincoln



What I Am Reading Right Now



Right now I am reading Assassination Vacation by Sarah Vowell. If you don't know her by her work on This American Life, you may know her as the voice of Shrinking Violet in the Incredibles. Vowell is a self-described "history geek" who has a particular or peculiar facination with presidential assassins and their presidents. From Lincoln to Garfield to McKineley, she visits landmarks well known and obscure to get insights on assassins and their prey. Along the way, she makes me chuckle at her dark humor. Speaking of This American Life, there was a pretty sobering episode called "Habeas Schmabeas" on our shrinking right to Habeas Corpus, which earned them a Peabody Award.

I'd Rather Be Kiting

Personally, I have always disliked windy days. Windy days blow pollen and leaves around. Then, I have discovered the zen of kiting, starting with a cheap Spiderman batwing kite. Once you launch a kite free into the wind, feel the frantic unwinding of string, and the tug and pull of the kite on your spool -- there is a calm adrenolin that flows through your veins. Today, I took out a 3-d Shark kite that is long as I am tall. The wind shook the shark out of my hand and as if it was on its own volition zoomed up into the somewhat cloudy sky in between two trees. It pulled out the entire string and dived and weaved through the air. It fabric body quivered in the gale and tugged at the string. We are still trying to master the dual line trick kite, but it is a little bit tricky for us. Nevertheless, I want to try all different kinds of kites and have a collection of them in the back of our van. It is kind of like when life gives you lemon, you make lemonade, but when life gives you wind, you fly a kite.

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The Ghost of Vietnam & Recent US Military Conflict

[The following is something I wrote back in fall 2002 to practice for a midterm written exam in my Strategy and War class at SFSU. This was a highly demanding class in the International Relations department that required us to study 60 conflicts through history and 4 hour closed-note essay questions. Professor Hanami taught me to analyze war not from the lens of a hippish anti-war activist, but on tactical and strategic grounds. This hippie got an A-.

This was written during the lead up to the current Iraqi invasion and occupation, so many of the observations I had back then were somewhat prophetic. Knowing what was known then, a reasonable person could forsee problems and know that this war and how it was executed would be a mistake. Keep in mind that this essay is not exhaustive as it was designed to be handwritten in a blue-book within 4 hour time limit where this was not the only essay question. ]

When you look at the Persian Gulf War, Vietnam, and Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan, you see different ways the US has approached War. They differ in causes and foes faced. The Persian Gulf was informed by the experiences and mistakes of the Vietnam War. It seems that only a decade later the lessons of Vietnam have become lost in the Operation Enduring Freedom.

The Persian Gulf War

The Persian Gulf War was a conflict between the United States with Coalition forces against Iraq. This conflict occured between January and February 1991. The Coalition forces were made up of 34 countries including Britain, Saudi Arabia, and France. This was the first conflict where the United States was the lone superpower after the fall of the Soviet Union. I rely on course readings, lecture, and frontline interviews from Trainor and Atkinson, both authors if books about the Persian Gulf War.

Unlike US conflicts in Grenada and Libya, the US faced the fourth largest army in the world in Iraq. The Iraqi Armed Forces had been built up during the Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s with help from the United States. In the Iraq-Iraq war, Iraq was seen by the United States as the lesser of two evils against Iranian Fundamentalism that had held our people hostage. The United States supported Iraq knowing they were harboring and supporting Palestinian terrorists, using Chemical weapons on the Kurds, and were purchasing materials that strongly suggested development of a nuclear program. In face of this Iraqi behavior, the Reagan-Bush and Bush Sr.'s administration made the call to look the other way. Clearly, Saddam Hussein was a thug, but he was seen as our thug that could be controlled while countering the influence of Iranian power.

Causes of the Persian Gulf War

There are two answers to the question of what caused the Persian Gulf War -- the short answer and the long answer. The short answer was that on August 2, 1990, Iraq invaded or "annexed" Kuwait - it's neighbor. The long answer is that Saddam Hussein had felt slighted by Kuwait and his other Persian Gulf neighbors. He accused Kuwait of overproduction of oil which ended up costing Iraq 14 million dollars and pumping illegally from the Rumaila oil field. After fighting the Persians for the Arabs in the region, Saddam had reasoned that he should get more priveledge and respect.

When Saddam was making noises and threats toward Kuwait, the US viewed it as merely saber-rattling. US intelligence saw something completely different in the build up of troops along the Iraqi-Kuwait border.

In July 1990, the US State Department sent Iraqi ambassador, April Glaspie, to meet Saddam Hussein. April Glaspie's message to Saddam was that the US did not have direct interest in border disputes in the region including one between Iraq and Kuwait. Glaspie concluded the meeting without advising any stronger actions against Iraq to warn them away from taking the disputed territory between Iraq and Kuwait. It can be argued that this gave Saddam a green light to take what he could move into Kuwait without any US intervention to stop him.

Why didn't the Bush administration not use stronger language during the July meeting or why didn't they forward project their naval forces in the region to send a clear message not to cross the Kuwaiti border? Was it because the Bush Sr. administration was distracted by the events of the fall of the Soviet Union? Was it that the Bush administration simply failed to come to terms that Iraq couldn't be controlled by a series of carrots when sticks were necessary? Was it because Bush's relationship with Saddam was personal and he couldn't imagine that Saddam would betray him.

It took three days after the invasion before Bush declared that the invasion "could not stand." King Fahde asked US troops to station themselves in his country for protection. US planes and troops arrived to guard the oil reserves.

On November 29th, the UN Security Council voted on a resolution that called for Iraqi withdrawal by any means and set a January 15th deadline. From November 29th to January, US troops were forward positioned for the conflict to come.

Objectives of the Persian Gulf War

US objectives were the immediate, complete, and unconditional withdrawal of Iraqi troops from Kuwait. The secondary objectives were the re-establishment of the legitimate rulers of Kuwait and the safety of Americans. To this end, they had the following military objectives:

- isolate and incapcitate the Iraqi command structure

- win air superiority

-destroy all nuclear, chemical, and biological capabilities

- Eliminate Iraqi offensive

-Eject Iraqis from Kuwait

The Persian Gulf War commensed on January 18, 1991 under the command of Army General Norman Schwartzkopf. Operations were in four parts: 1. Strategic air campaign; 2. Suppression of enemy air defense; 3. Air attacks on ground forces; 4. Ground operations as needed.

The tactic of the air campaign in 1991 was to destroy Iraqi air denfenses to the point where Coalition pilots felt confident. If a pilot doesn't have to worry about Iraqi air defenses of anti aircraft weapons, the pilots can concentrate on strategic targeting or offensive strikes.



The US fired a total of 291 TCIBM or tactically-launched cruise missles from two submarines in the Red Sea which were focused on the command bunkers.

The air campaign showed that Saddam was using economy of force with his air force. At most, Saddam was thought to have 700 air planes, but in the first nights of the campaign, only 50 went up, flew around and landed. Saddam sent about 122 aircraft to Iran which stayed there throughout the war. He lost about 90 aircraft to Coalition forces. It was suspected that Iraqis decided that in the face of overwhelming strength and numbers of Coalition forces, it was better to hold back and wait out the Coalition -- saving their air force to fight another day. At the very best, Iraqi aircraft were mediocre by US standards.

On February 23rd, Coalition forces commensed the ground force attack. US forces feigned an amphibious attack through Kuwait as the Iraqis suspected they would. This was merely a diversion or cover for the land attack about 40 miles West and North of Kuwait. While Iraqis were responding to the mock amphibious attack, the bulk of the force could encircle the Iraqi forces. Encircling is squeezing enemy forces between your two flanks.

Iraqis were forced to try to escape toward the Eurphrates River. Since US forces knocked out the railroad bridges, they were forced onto exposed highways which made them vulnerable.

In 100 hours, US forces had successfully repelled Iraqi forces from Kuwait by using deception and encirclement after a successful air campaign. The decision was made not to go onto Bagdad to unseat Saddam. Bush received much criticism for this. The argument for not going in was that the UN had not sanctioned more than expelling of Iraqi troops from Kuwait, and that going beyond that mandate would have broke the Coalition especially Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Egyptian support.

Flaws of the Persian Gulf War

Twelve years since, the Persian Gulf War was seen as a decisive victory to be celebrated by the United States. This notion has been contested by those who believe that anything less than total victory, defined by Clauswitz as the total defeat of your enemy and its forces, makes the Persian Gulf War less decisive than conventional wisdom would have it. Saddam and over 100 Republican Guard Elite were allowed to remain in power. The fear after the conflict that someday we would end up fighting two wars in Iraq instead of one to resolve the Iraqi question once and for all.

Another flaw of the Persian Gulf War was the heavy reliance of Electronic Warfare (EW) which is known to flakey and prone to some close calls. For example, a satellite mistook our B-52s as SCUDS. Fortunately, AWACSwas able to correct the error just in time. EW also failed in damage assessment which made for duplication in bomb sorties to knock out targets that has already been destroyed.

Despite these flaws, the Gulf War was a vast improvement over the Vietnam conflict. In fact, it was the ghost of Vietnam that informed tactics and strategy of the Gulf War. There was a desperate need on the part of the generals not to replicate mistakes made in Vietnam.

There are many contrasts between the Gulf War and Vietnam. The most obvious was the differences in the battlefield itself. The Gulf War was a desert which was mostly flat lands, whereas Vietnam was a literal jungle with triple canopies where the enemy could hide and easily conduct guerilla tactics. Air power was vital in the Gulf War since it softened up conditions on the ground prior to ground operations. Air power in Vietnam was rendered ineddectual against guerilla operations by the Vietcong. In the Gulf War, there was never more than a two hour break in Air Stikes to great effect, whereas in Vietnam, there were infrequent strikes with minor effectiveness. The Gulf War had much more logistical concerns than Vietnam. In the desert, water was scarce and had to be brought in, in Vietnam water and rice was available.

A major differece between wars is that there was a centralized command off all forces, but decentralized control of troop targeting and when to target. In Vietnam, over all command was decentralized between the branches of the armed forces, yet targets would be picked thousands of miles away in Washington DC. This practice would rear its ugly head in Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan.

In Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan it seems all that had been learned in the Persian Gulf War and the conflict that informed that operation was lost. Just as the Ghost of Vietnam was put to rest in our Persian Gulf War victory, it was reawakened in Afghanistan.

Operartion enduring Freedom was in response to the events of 9/11. Unlike the Gulf War, this conflict was organized by the CIA and took sometime to get off the ground. Instead of using this time to forward position an overwhelming force, what eventually was mustered was paltry. The tactic was to rely on the Northern Alliance, Pakastani troops, and payoffs to the warlords. This is reminicient of the Vietnam War where we relied on the South Vietnamese. The Northern Alliance and the Pakistanis proved to be unrealiable allowing US Special Forces to be ambushed and allowing the enemy escape.

Similar to Vietnam, bombing in Afghanistan was unable to penetrate enemy natural fortifications. In Vietnam, bombing was unable to bring down the system of underground tunnels, whereas in Afghanistan we were unable to collapse the system of caves and paths that allowed Al Queda and Taliban fighters to move around with impugnity. As of this writing, only 1/3 of the Al Queda leadership has been eliminated.

Despite declarations of success and progress in Afghanistan, it seems that US Troops are still involved in the region and Al Queda is still a threat. They have been unable to capture Bin Laden and Afghanistan is still quite unstable. Instead of a quick and decisive campaign, we may have the potential re-emergence of the Taliban and an ongoing conflict similar to Vietnam on our hands.

It is essential that we look at what went right and wrong in the Persian Gulf War, Vietnam, and Afghanistan -- given we are on the eve of another major conflict in Iraq. It is essential that we avoid the dangers that could lie ahead.

We may have won the Persian Gulf War, but often the victors learn less than the losers of the conflict. If we go into Iraq once more, we may find that there will be a different result. This time we will not be repelling an army from a neighboring country, but be facing an enemy with the advantage of being a native defender against an invading force and defender that has learned from its own mistakes.

It may have been necessary to repel Iraq from Kuwait back in 1991. On the other hand, it may have been easily averted by stronger language, pre-emptive diplomacy to resolve issues between Kuwait and Iraq, and forward positioning to warn Iraq of our serious objections to encroaching on Kuwaiti territory. Once we got UN sanction and support from a wide coalition that includes Middle Eastern Actors, we went in and we went in with an exit strategy based upon the Powell Doctrine, which was informed by the Ghost of Vietnam.

Cloneburgers?

Do we really want to eat meat that comes from cloned animals or the progeny of cloned animals? Do we want milk from cloned animals? Do we really want to be guinea pigs to test if the FDA is right about such cloned animals being safe to eat? You will have until May 3, 2007 to write to the FDA, your concerns about eating such animals.

So far, the FDA has said that there is not any danger in eating cloned meat and drinking milk from cloned animals, but opponents say that the FDA has used studies from two sources that would most likely benefit if FDA approval goes though. Opponents say that there is simply not enough data to make a judgement to its safety. Cloned animals could be carrying genetic markers that have been overlooked that could create health risks down the line. Plus, this could give other countries reason to block our meat and hurt our farmers.

You can write the FDA at WWW.FDA.GOV and make a comment on Docket # [Docket No. 2003N-0573]: draft animal cloning risk assessment; proposed risk management plan; draft guidance. The regulation will not require any labeling to let you choose whether or not it is from a cloned source.

Let's tell the FDA to say no to cloned food.

Carole Migdon has authored a bill in California that would be more stringent than federal laws where all meat and milk from cloned animals have to be labelled as such. A similar law has been authored in the California assembly. If the FDA allows cloned meat and milk, it is essential for accurate labelling so consumers can have the liberty to decide whether or not they want to apply the precautionary principle if the FDA refuses to.

Thanks to MMMMMMMMM for the heads up and check out his article about this whole issue.