Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->


Intelliseek's BlogPulse Newswire

FROM THE COMMENTS: "Samurai warriors had a philosophy, 'ken tai i-chi' or attack and defend are the same thing. It is the highest form of defense to cut down your enemy before he launches his attack. Many schools of swordsmanship, particularly Jigen Ryu, had no defensive techniques in their curriculum."

Table test no line breaks

NPR's Transcript	My comments
Steve Inskeep: As always, the news in Iraq may affect the campaign. In the last day, that news has included a U.S. offfensive in Falluja and a bombing in Baghdad. The bombers killed six people inside the Green Zone. That's a fortified area surrounded by concrete barriers and razor wire. It is where the Americans have run their operations since coming to Baghdad. Journalist William Langewiesche has spent time in the Green Zone as a reporter for the Atlantic Monthly. he says that from the start of the occupation, security concerns have isolated American decision makers from the country around them.	Yup, Mr. Inskeep, tell how you want your conclusion to affect the campaign right upfront, even if the logic of the piece isn't well thought out, of broad scope and with deep insight, or particularly useful to voters.
WL: It is a highly fortified area that is mostly park and monumental buildings. Saddam's various palaces are in there, too -- one of which now is the center of American operations. This is not a military base, it is a civilian base protected by the military, but it has many of those cultural oddities that being somewhere far away yet eating all American food and Americans talking primarily to Americans.	In other words, let me convey at the outset that I believe people who live here must be out of touch. Otherwise they'd be eating local fare. I also want to convey that Americans here who are trying to help don't come into contact with the Iraqis who, you will remember, are actually running Iraq now.
SI: How did concerns about security affect the attitudes of people inside the Green Zone?	As if you expected them to want something other than to be secure while they were here. Couldn't you have started off with a more focused question like, who do you suppose has put coalition members at risk? Why do ou suppose Zarqawi wants coalition members at risk?
WL: Well, the Green Zone has always been all about security. As the insurgency has grown in Iraq, those concerns have magnified, for good reason. And the Green Zone has become the fortress.	Damn right it's a good reason. But keep things in perspective. Baghdad may be the biggest city, but Iraq is a big country. You have to be careful not to let focus on the center of Iraq to draw attention from all the positive that is at work in Iraq.
SI: When you go back a year or so, did the Americans overreact to the security problems?	Where did you get these questions?
WL: No. I don't think they overreacted to it. I think that it was institutionally inevitable the United States will retreat into fortified compounds. I think the mistake that was made was not to realize that about our ourselves. We need to think about where we want those fortified compounds to be. And what they look like to the locals. To the Iraqis it has always looked like fear of them. Disdain of them. The other effect is that it simply isolated the Americans from Iraq.	Of course they didn't overreact. They did what was required to protect he lives of people that did not deserve to be blown up by suicide bombers or beheaded by those who don't want Iraq to become a free, democratic society.
SI: Did they then make up unrealistic plans for Iraq?	Are you implying that mistakes were made because people are obliged to protect themselves while trying to rescusitate Iraq?
WL: Yes. Of course. Totally. It's hard to know where even to begin. You can pretty much look at the entire product of the CPA -- the Coalition Provisional Authority -- and say that it was unrealistic. I can think of attempts to regulate the traffic. There was an attempt basically to impose a Maryland State Traffic Code on Baghdad.	Some of the plans undoubtedly were unrealistic, but remember that Iraq had been systematically throttled for decades. It had no infrastructure or resilient educated middle class to draw on.
SI: Would you say that these are mostly well-intentioned people? People who thought they could impose American systems on Iraq and it would just work? That was the idea?	I repeat, where did you get these questions?
WL: Of course. I think we have been blinded by success and power into thinking that we are rich and powerful because of our own attributes. Well, to some extent that may be true. But there is also an element of luck. Chance. History.	Of course they were well-intentioned. Remember, they were also temporary. The idea has always been to turn the government of the Iraqis over Iraqis.
SI: Could there have been a different last year and a half? If the Americans had simply said we're not going to hide in fortified compounds. We're going to move about the country to make sure we understand the country and accept that some American civilians as well as soldiers are going to geet killed?	Is chronic compression of timeline a disease amongst such hosts? They seem incapable of conceiving that you can't go back and relive the past. You have to do now what can be done now.
WL: I think at this stage it is much too late for that. If you say a year and a half, yes. I mean, don't forget, when the United States first came in, though we were not greated with flowers, as people apparently in the White House expected, we were not greeted with aggressive hostility. We were greeted with a question mark. There were other things going wrong. If we could have addressed those, sure, we would not be in the situation we are in now. Look, this is not just terrorism -- foreign terrorism -- sure, that is an element... something that we could not have controlled. Far more important, this is a wide-spread and very popular insurgency against the American presence. And it's the insurgency that matters now.	That is what is known as a stupid-ass question that brings to mind the British in the Revolutionary War lined up column by column to be mowed down by the colonists. What sensible government is going to put its citizens into harms way unless it is absolutely necessary.
SI: We've been talking to William Langewiesche...	Or, "I've been leading William Langewiesche on to say what I want him to say in a most useless and non-productive direction...

Online locations of Periodicals
Continue reading ->

A few links to keep in mind.
Continue reading ->

A lecture by Michael Crichton -- January 17, 2003
Continue reading ->

SIDELINES

ZZMike: "One of these day's I'll join a Wal-Mart protest. I'll carry a sign reading "Down With Low Prices!!! Down with Wide Selections!!!" -- AMERICAN DIGEST: Comment on The Enduring Greatness of Walmart

A classic Daphne truth-telling. Appropriate for today:

I find myself increasingly repulsed by Muslim practices and beliefs. Middle Eastern, African, Asian, American, the country of origin makes no difference. Women and children treated as chattel, genital mutilation, child brides, honor killings, culturally accepted pedophilia, the black drapes and head coverings, no rights, no votes, little to non-existent educational opportunities, no voice, no choices, no recourse. Persecution of homosexuals. Imprisonment, stoning and whipping for morality crimes. Lack of free speech. The foul treatment of non-Muslims in Islamic countries. The demented hatred of Jews. Sharia Law. Wahhabism. Madrasas. Blind obedience to Mullahs. Praying towards Mecca -- a place on the map few will ever see. Individuality is shut down, originality and freedom of the mind discouraged. Islam pisses on human talents that fall outside the dark walls of its faith. Hell, I even dislike their dislike of dogs. -- Scheherazade Needs A New Tale « Jaded Haven

The original novel is mostly mistaught in our universities these days, a

s professors twist Mary Shelley’s themes—and even turn them upside down—to endorse this or that modern attitude or political viewpoint. Of the several reasons why the book is a classic, perhaps the most important is the portrayal of Victor Frankenstein as a compassionate utopian destroyed by hubris. The history of humanity is soaked in blood precisely because we throw ourselves into the pursuit of one utopia after another, determined to perfect this world that cannot be perfected.

Of all centuries, the 20th was the bloodiest because of Hitler’s National Socialism, Lenin’s and Stalin’s and Mao’s and Pol Pot’s and Castro’s versions of Communism; as many as 200 million were murdered or killed in war because of these utopian schemes. Victor Frankenstein, utopian of the first order, hoped to perfect God’s creation, to reanimate the deceased and thus defeat death, and his project could result only in calamity, for it was against the natural law and common sense.

Via KA-CHING!

The Russians think he’s a Putz.

The French think he’s rude. The Germans want him to stop spending. The Indians want him to mix his nose out of their environmental business. The North Koreans think he’s a joke. The Iranians won’t acknowledge his calls. And the British can’t even come up with a comprehensive opinion of him.

As for the Chinese, he’s too frightened to even glance their way. -- Editorial: I Told You So – Yes I Did - Galganov.com

Lawrence Auster had Johnson's number 2 years ago:

"Basically LGF seems to consist of Charles Johnson consigning people to oblivion on the basis of no facts and no arguments, followed by Johnson's followers crying, "Yes, Charles, yes! LGF is the greatest website! I'm so proud to be at LGF!", along with various other grunts and one-line ejaculations that convey no intelligible ideas but only assent. So there is the marginalization of the Outsider by the Leader, and the mindless banding together of followers around the Leader based on such marginalization of the Outsider. Sound familiar? I can't say I have ever seen anything remotely resembling this kind of behavior at Brussels Journal. I have, however, seen it in abundance every time I've read "Little Green Footballs" in the few days that I've been perusing the site. Take a look at the current LGF thread, "The Mask Comes Off," and see the mindless, mob quality of it." -- The method of Charles Johnson

Dalton Trumbo wore very cool hats.

Dalton Trumbo may have been a good screen-writer. Dalton Trumbo may have been screwed by HUAC. Dalton Trumbo may still be a Hollywood darling and the subject of a recent hagiographic offering by PBS. But I am here to tell you that Dalton Trumbo was also a Communist acolyte of Joseph Stalin, a denier of the gulag, and a maligner of truth-tellers like Koestler and Kravchenko. He was in short a useful idiot member of the American Communist Party. -- Gladly Lerne, Gladly Teche: Inbound, from the Internet

Al Gore as our soon-to-be, first carbon billionaire.

Accounts included both his earlier and contemporary angry denials that he was greedy, or had used his vast network of government contacts to influence public loans, contracts, and regulations, in parlaying a 2001 net worth of $2 million apparently into a green empire of several hundred million....

To distill Gorism is to live in a 1,000 sq. ft. solar house, bike to work, and take the train on long distances; but to promote Gorism, one lives in a mansion, jets on private planes, and is chauffeured from airport to conference center—a rather heavy carbon footprint indeed. I mention that because this week he has insisted that he only invested in what he believes in and is thus not a hypocrite—sort of like a 1990s Fannie or Freddie director saying he is only taking mega-bonuses because he believes in public support for housing.

Works and Days » The Discreet Charm of the Left-wing Plutocracy

Worth listening to. Just click play and listen in the background. You'll come back to the foreground often.

At their Monday night poker game in hell, I’ll bet Stalin, Hitler and Mao are kicking themselves: “ ‘It’s about leaving a better planet to our children?’ Why didn’t I think of that?” This is Two-Ply Totalitarianism—no jackboots, no goose steps, just soft and gentle all the way. Nevertheless, occasionally the mask drops and the totalitarian underpinnings become explicit. Take Elizabeth May’s latest promotional poster: “Your parents f*cked up the planet. It’s time to do something about it. Live Green. Vote Green.” As Saskatchewan blogger Kate McMillan pointed out, the tactic of “convincing youth to reject their parents in favour of The Party” is a time-honoured tradition. -- Gullible eager-beaver planet savers - Mark Steyn - Macleans.ca

"Yes, Sir; and from what I have heard of him, one would not wish to sacrifice himself to such a man. If he must always have somebody to drink with him, he should buy a slave, and then he would be sure to have it. They who submit to drink as another pleases, make themselves his slaves."

Paging Newt Gingrich.

The Tea Party world

is still that of genuinely funny things -- not the sour mordancy of Letterman; it is still one of basic fears and simple joys, of aching feet and a welcome ice-cream soda at the end of the day. Some people spend their whole lives trying to get away from it; to forget the memory of people sitting around a sunny porch eating peanuts, to try with various expensive unguents to wash the smell of new-mown grass and two stroke gasoline fumes from their hair. That is what "success" all too often means in certain circles. That and a line of white powder across a table. In the end they may arrive at a palace of chrome and glass, all cold air and ice at some dizzying height above the world. But they must always remember, or forget at their peril, that it is all upborne by truth and human love. -- Belmont Club » Bows and Flows

If you've ever heard the sound

of the old inboard motors in these vintage wooden boats you'll know what I mean when I say heads all over the marina snapped 'round when the twin Chrysler Hemi V-8's caught a spark and roared to life. Idling out and clearing the end of the marina, there was a small voice on one shoulder telling me to start slow and take it easy as the old power plants probably hadn't been run hard in who knows how long. On the other shoulder however was the slightly more insistent voice of "Old Vatted Demerara Rum" saying "Pour the coals to her!" Throwing caution to the wind, I pushed the throttles forward as far as they would go and the old wooden boat surged out of the water and was at top speed as I passed the last dock in the marina and burst into the open water of Lake Washington.

When something of a mechanical nature goes sideways on a boat running at speed.... -- The Demon Rum: « WESTSOUND MODERN

"When was the last time you sat on a couch upside down and looked about the house? Kids do that all the time, and I have done it again and thought, "Whoa - I seriously need to vacuum." And "So that's where that [object/thing] went." -- Mikey commenting on Side-Lines: One of the Burning Questions of Life

What happens next?

The President took a lot of the nation's hopes as political capital into the Big Casino. Now, after sitting at the tables for 9 months, there's only a small pile left of what was once a mountain of chips. Is the next hand going to win him big? Is he going to double down again? Or get up and catch a cab home, in case what's left in his pocket will cover it. Or will he write out a check on the basis of the family farm and spin the wheel of fortune again on the basis of his faith in the fundamental goodness of America's enemies? Order another round of drinks for everybody on the house? Go watch a play on Broadway and keep being Diamond Jim long after all the real diamonds have been hocked for paste? Is there a point where betting on hope means stuck on stupid? -- Belmont Club ｻ Another turn of the wheel

Exurban Jon asks:

With all the advances in scientific knowledge why has no one designed a manlier Kleenex box?

Here's a burning question I was reminded of by the video: do you eat your candy corn in sections? And, if so, do you consider the top to be the yellow part or the white part? I've always seen the little white triangle as the "foot" of the candy corn, but I learned when I designed my costume years ago that most people see it the other way. -- neo-neocon » Blog Archive » Get ready for Candy Corn Day

“Barack Obama is the most powerful writer since Julius Caesar.” — Rocco Landesman, President Obama’s handpicked chairman of the National Endowment for the Arts -- via KA-CHING!

"It takes no courage for an rich, unbelieving “artist” to piss on Christ. After all, that’s been done before. And Jesus voluntarily submitted himself to much worse, which means nothing an “artist” does to any image of Christ can do anything but reflect on the spiritual poverty of the “artist,” himself. For an “artist” to use Jesus for a cheap joke is about as “courageous” and “bold” as making a joke about George W. Bush before an audience of like-thinkers; it takes no courage at all.

"But for an “artist” to make an identical satirical “joke” on Obama and his adorers? That would take great courage. That would be bold, and daring. And it would speak reassuring volumes about free speech in America.

"I would not want to see it. I would not want to see the image of any American President so ill-used; he’s my president, too.

"But if Larry David could see the humor in pissing on Christ and the excesses of Catholic piety, surely he must see the humor in pissing on Obama, and the excesses of Obama worship?

"Haha. It’s all so funny, isn’t it? Are you laughing? Are you not entertained?" -- via The Anchoress | A First Things Blog

@ KA-CHING!

It's the word of the day @

Urban Dictionary A very deep sleep where you are unable to hear telephones, text messages, and even the Air Force. Named to honor the two fine pilots from Northwest Airlines and there little "in flight snooze"

A measure of the absence of any realistic self-appraisal is

Ms. McCain's failure to grasp that her prominence as a "writer," rather than as a Paris Hilton-style reality show performer, is owed first to her famous father, and second, to the fact that this is the Age of the Idiot.

Idiots have come into their own in a big way, courtesy of depraved consumers, and complicit TV producers and publishers, of pixel and paper alike. The duller you are and the louder you crow in contemporary America, the better you do. Clearly, Meghan McCain is not working with much ─ and is eminently qualified to dim debate in the Age of the Idiot. A familial predisposition, it would seem. John McCain finished 894th out of 899 at the Naval Academy and lost five jets. As IQ ace Steve Sailer once quipped, "To lose one plane over Vietnam may be regarded as a heroic tragedy; to lose five planes here and there looks like carelessness." -- By ILANA MERCER

So, okay, it's war. I get it.

The next year, I get a bunch of guys from Pixar to come over and we make the most amazing Halloween lawn you've ever seen, with shitloads of stupid coffins and ghosts and a skeleton playing the piano. We have music, and lights, the whole works. Meanwhile, Larry comes over and brings a bunch of Navy SEAL type guys that he knows. In addition to all the stupid Halloween decorations, we rig up water cannons on the perimeter of the yard and up in the trees, loaded with a mixture of water, bleach and gasoline. We plant IEDs in the lawn, loaded with rock salt, and at each corner we put a dispenser that blasts pepper gel. We lay exposed wires across the lawn carrying enough current to knock you out, but not kill you. Then we put on our black commando outfits, and blacken our faces, and we wait. -- The Secret Diary of Steve Jobs

Watching this will be either the funniest or most disgusting 2-minutes of your day.

Iowahawk breaks tradition and endorses Douglas Hoffman, the Conservative Party candidate for the US Congress in New York's 23rd district. Why? Because....

"Canuck reader Maryann Crabtree forwards this photo of the candidate posing proudly in front of his Two Lane Blacktop - worthy 1955 Chevy 210 2-door sedan. Note missing rear bumper. Note radiused rear wheel well. Note nose-up gasser stance. Note the all-bidness custom paint, which appears to be a blend of Hugger Orange and Riverside Red. An educated guess tells me that lurking under the hood is a high winding destroked 301 small block, mating a 2-bolt main 327 with a 283 crank, with a set of Doug Thorley or Hooker headers huffing through glass packs. White ball Hurst shifter atop a Muncie 4-speed, natch. Visual cues indicate this photo was taken circa 1969; thus, while his Congressional cohort was tripping on brown acid in the mud at Max Yasgur's farm, Mr. Hoffman was gearslamming down the quarter mile at Fulton Speedway. (via iowahawk: Iowahawk Endorses ) @ Van der Leun

If you've ever seen the History Channel series Ax Men,

filmed in and around these counties, understand that the foul mouthed, hot tempered, illiterate rednecks featured on this show are the creme de la creme of mossback society. Supported mostly by what is left of the logging industry in these parts, they live largely in dilapidated singlewides surrounded by clearcut woodlands and collections of the rusted remains of every car, truck, motor, transmission, and assorted piece of machinery or scrap metal that have been handed down through generations from father to son. To a city boy like I was at the time, they were suspect in every way. Which leads me to the proverbial hole in the donut of this tale. -- WESTSOUND MODERN

KaChing!

The Spirit of Ecstasy

is the name of the hood ornament on Rolls-Royce cars. It is in the form of a woman leaning forwards with her arms outstretched behind and above her. The Spirit of Ecstasy carries with it a story about a secret passion between John Walter Edward Scott-Montagu and his secret love Eleanor Velasco Thornton, his secretary. -- Best of Wikipedia

.... because Peggy Noonan is terrified to get it. neo-neocon Noonan and Obama: public and private selves

What Noonan is so far refusing to understand is that, although Obama is narcissistic and likes adulation, he's not primarily interested in popularity -- except as a tool to policy. Policy is paramount, and his goal is not to be responsive to what the American people want, nor to hear their actual concerns and then to shape policy around them. His goal is to tell them what they want, to lie if required, to silence and ridicule and chastise and threaten the opposition, and if necessary to pull every political trick he can get away with in order to ram his agenda down our recalcitrant throats.

Why neo-neocon is not writing a column for the Wall Street Journal is a mystery that passeth all understanding.

The first and most important thing is for the impostor to claim the motivation of revolutionary impulses.

That way even those who know he is lying will think he is lying in a “good” cause. If the last refuge of scoundrels is the flag, the ultimate protective banner is the Red Flag. Hannah Arendt once wrote “Lies are often much more plausible, more appealing to reason, than reality, since the liar has the great advantage of knowing beforehand what the audience wishes or expects to hear.” Find the hole in your audience’s brain and drive your truck of manure through it.

The second rule is to put forward the most extravagant claims.

Don’t be half-assed about lying. The more extravagant the fib the better. A sufficiently resourceful fraud clears his path of unbelievers by sheer audacity alone. Tell a big enough lie and no one would believe you could be so bold. As the fictional Rudolf Rassendyl proved in the Prisoner of Zenda that it is better to pass yourself off as King of Ruritania rather than a minor noble. A minor noble may be questioned, but the King will not be. It is all or nothing. And given that no one wants to tug at the Royal Robe to see if it is real ermine, the fraudster often gets it “all”.

The third rule is that when questioned, destroy the questioner.

When impersonating the King be determined to have everyone who doubts your identity thrown in the tower for treason. Once you succeed in beheading the first challenger there will be no second challenges.

The fourth rule is the most important. Avoid trying to bluff those who are too big to be faced down.

What undid both Fairey and Ward Churchill was that they didn’t know when to stop their imposture. They finally took it too far. Fairey, who had been successful up to that point tried to bluff his way past a major news organization and failed. Ward Churchill was already a professor when he made his “little Eichmanns” speech after 9/11 unleashed a tide of outrage he couldn’t outface. If Fairey had not launched his poster and Churchill had not made his “little Eichmanns” speech, they might still be intellectuals in good standing.

-- Belmont Club » Honest as the day is long

Anderson Cooper:

I have an uneasy feeling only 10 months into the new administration that we're beginning to see the symptoms of this same kind of animus developing in the Obama administration. And as those of use who served in the Nixon administration know, that can get you in a lot of trouble... Don't create an enemies list." -- Anderson Cooper Compares Obama to Nixon, Spotlights Declining Approval Ratings | NewsBusters.org

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