Mundane Monday

After spending the weekend complaining about the governments propensity to kill living things of all persuasions and species I checked back in to the mundane business of day to day life. Had to pay some bills, hit the bank and swap my cable box for one that works. Well I am hoping it works, with the suddenlame folks one never can be sure.

As the missals fly in Libya I am hoping for the best but expecting the worst. It only took 1 day for the Arab league to throw us under the bus. It is possible that they thought that a no fly zone would be like Top Gun and we would send up a bunch of planes and prevent the Colonel from sending up his planes. That is not how it is done. We first blow up all the air defenses we can find. Then we blow up what we call, "command and control" which is a catch all for any kind of communications system in the theater of operation. Then and only then do they send in the aircraft.

The news media are reporting that the bodies at some of the sites were taken from the morgues to claim civilian casualties. The possibility that they are collateral damage seems as likely to be true. When our troops have dug the bullets out of the bodies of pregnant women to claim they were killed by insurgents they do not have a lot of credibility. I find it telling that the oil producers are worthy of intervention once again while the rest of the continent can have any number of atrocities.

I like to think that we are pure in our motives and that we will not get dragged in to another sectarian disaster. I just don't have any faith in the folks running things at the moment to make the right decision. All of the cheerleaders for this adventure are the same folks that ginned up the Iraq war and they are using the same justification that they eventually settled on to justify that disaster.

Peace at the Pier

spent the day holding down the right rear corner of the canopy at the F street pier in Eureka. The wind howled and the rain poured and the Pa system played some killer whale song before Jack and Jan and the "Angry Grannies" fired up the crowd. The rain stopped after about an hour and a half and we got a little sun along with an earful about the war, the Navy and their war on marine mammals. The folks were a little angry about the war in Libya that we started this morning with the sending of 110 cruise missals at anti aircraft facilities that might be used against? I am hoping that this exercise goes like Bosnia and not like every other, (Lebanon, Iraq, Iran, Palestine, Somalia, Yemen) intervention in the region. I worry when the Republicans are on the side of France.

Not just the usual suspects

Went down to the courthouse today to show a little Solidarity with the Union folks. Move-on organized the rally and members of the nurses and teachers unions were there as well as the veterans for peace. The Move-on folks brought out some new faces as well as the usual lefties like myself. The rain was intermittent intense showers and wind but the stoic crowd didn't seem to mind.
After a moment of silence to remember the people suffering in Japan a few speakers talked about a progressive agenda to combat the problem of the recession that is causing so much suffering in this country. The calls were for an end to the war on public sector workers. No more cuts to education or women's health care. Instead we want an end to the wars and higher taxes on the rich. Ending corporate person-hood and the investment in infrastructure required to provide good jobs for middle class Americans.