The law does not require that the impossible be done. Nemo tenetur ad impossibile.
Not that I am the law.
Still ---
I am not stupid, I may be good for something one day.
--- Anaïs Nin
And yet, I --- great-at-most-things-now,1 capable-of-more-soon,2 and level-headed-always,3 --- oh. Well. There you go: rather full of myself, am I.
And according to my kalabans, indeed capable of:
2) sophistry; and
3) ingenuity,
but allegedly nevertheless lacking in: arithmetical acuity.
Well I have never claimed to be nimblest with numbers. In fact I was tres in Math (what was it?) 12, and had to re-take Math 100. Okay maybe I was 2.75 in Math (what was it really??) 12. I can't quite remember. But I fared quite well on the Pain Scale:
Sappy-Happy; Medical City, February 2009.
...eventhough the nurse had some doubts whether or not I could put words together in a meaningful manner:
Coherent: Yes and No.
In any case, it is Science that I love, (hence ---
From climbing boat with knees from 12 feet deep in Bohol.)
...with flame fanned, fire fed and flare fueled by such things as:
Making Science Popular.
Somebody should give me more of Mr. Gould's books. He is funny and smart and makes Science less Unintelligible Details, more Wonderment and Awe. Dear Mr. Gould,
Play me a song to set me free
Nobody writes them like they used to
So it may as well be me
Here on my own now after hours
Here on my own now on a bus
Think of it this way
You could either be successful or be us
With our winning smiles, and us
With our catchy tunes, oh us
Now we're photogenic
You know, we don't stand a chance.
--- Belle and Sebastian, Get Me Away From Here, I'm Dying4
And so it is. There is no escaping. Because ---
--- Database
*Or, Why Nobody Loves Me. Or, more like, World's Most Unfocused Post Ever. Or, perhaps most appropriately, This One Took Three Weeks to Write??
1 Except focusing, volleyball, and Lumines. Also these.
2 More consistent posting? More honey? More.
3 Yes.
4 Or when I'm feeling more uppish:
That could happen, happen to someone.
--- Ambulance LTD, Ophelia
July 15, 2009
By Scott Stewart and Fred Burton
www.stratfor.com
On June 23, 2009, Director of Central Intelligence Leon Panetta learned of a highly compartmentalized program to assassinate al Qaeda operatives that was launched by the CIA in the wake of the 9/11 attacks. When Panetta found out that the covert program had not been disclosed to Congress, he canceled it and then called an emergency meeting June 24 to brief congressional oversight committees on the program. Over the past week, many details of the program have been leaked to the press and the issue has received extensive media coverage.
That a program existed to assassinate al Qaeda leaders should certainly come as no surprise to anyone. It has been well-publicized that the Clinton administration had launched military operations and attempted to use covert programs to strike the al Qaeda leadership in the wake of the 1998 East Africa embassy bombings. In fact, the Clinton administration has come under strong criticism for not doing more to decapitate al Qaeda prior to 2001. Furthermore, since 2002, the CIA has conducted scores of strikes against al Qaeda targets in Pakistan using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) like the MQ-1 Predator and the larger MQ-9 Reaper.
These strikes have dramatically increased over the past two years and the pace did not slacken when the Obama administration came to power in January. So far in 2009 there have been more than two dozen UAV strikes in Pakistan alone. In November 2002, the CIA also employed a UAV to kill Abu Ali al-Harithi, a senior al Qaeda leader suspected of planning the October 2000 attack against the USS Cole. The U.S. government has also attacked al Qaeda leaders at other times and in other places, such as the May 1, 2008, attack against al Qaeda-linked figures in Somalia using an AC-130 gunship.
As early as Oct. 28, 2001, The Washington Post ran a story discussing the Clinton-era presidential finding authorizing operations to capture or kill al Qaeda targets. The Oct. 28 Washington Post story also provided details of a finding signed by President George W. Bush following the 9/11 attacks that reportedly provided authorization to strike a larger cross section of al Qaeda targets, including those who are not in the Afghan theater of operations. Such presidential findings are used to authorize covert actions, but in this case the finding would also provide permission to contravene Executive Order 12333, which prohibits assassinations.
In the immediate aftermath of the 9/11 attacks, Bush and the members of his administration were very clear that they sought to capture or kill Osama bin Laden and the members of the al Qaeda organization. During the 2004 and 2008 presidential elections in the United States, every major candidate, including Barack Obama, stated that they would seek to kill bin Laden and destroy al Qaeda. Indeed, on the campaign trail, Obama was quite vocal in his criticism of the Bush administration for not doing more to go after al Qaeda’s leadership in Pakistan. This means that, regardless of who is in the White House, it is U.S. policy to go after individual al Qaeda members as well as the al Qaeda organization.
In light of these facts, it would appear that there was nothing particularly controversial about the covert assassination program itself, and the controversy that has arisen over it has more to do with the failure to report covert activities to Congress. The political uproar and the manner in which the program was canceled, however, will likely have a negative impact on CIA morale and U.S. counterterrorism efforts.
June 22, 2009
By George Friedman
www.stratfor.com
Successful revolutions have three phases. First, a strategically located single or limited segment of society begins vocally to express resentment, asserting itself in the streets of a major city, usually the capital. This segment is joined by other segments in the city and by segments elsewhere as the demonstration spreads to other cities and becomes more assertive, disruptive and potentially violent. As resistance to the regime spreads, the regime deploys its military and security forces. These forces, drawn from resisting social segments and isolated from the rest of society, turn on the regime, and stop following the regime’s orders. This is what happened to the Shah of Iran in 1979; it is also what happened in Russia in 1917 or in Romania in 1989.
Revolutions fail when no one joins the initial segment, meaning the initial demonstrators are the ones who find themselves socially isolated. When the demonstrations do not spread to other cities, the demonstrations either peter out or the regime brings in the security and military forces — who remain loyal to the regime and frequently personally hostile to the demonstrators — and use force to suppress the rising to the extent necessary. This is what happened in Tiananmen Square in China: The students who rose up were not joined by others. Military forces who were not only loyal to the regime but hostile to the students were brought in, and the students were crushed.