April 12, 2004 by s.z.

A Few Thoughts On the Preznit's Press Conference My overall impression: for somebody who was dealing with questions submitted ahead of time, he didn't answer those questions all that well.  It reminded me of calling one of those centralized "customer support centers" where the people taking your calls don't actually know anything, they just find the section of the prepared script on their computer that matches one of the words in your question, and read it to you.  And when you say no, that doesn't actually answer my question, they just  read it again, but in a different order.  But he did seem to have strong convictions about stuff.  Mostly about brave soldiers, grieving family members, and how nice it will be to have a free Iraq spread freedom throughout the Middle East. But here are a few specific things I learned from the Q &A: 1.  A country that hides things is a country that's afraid of getting caught. 2.  Bush feels bad for those grieving families, but in hindsight, he has done everything right.  3.  The North Korea leader is a threat.  You know, that guy who leads in North Korea. 4.  "People don't believe Iraq can be free; that if you're Muslim, or perhaps brown-skinned, you can't be self-governing or free."  Who are those people who believe that?  Freepers? 5.  The reason that Bush is appearing before the 9/11 Commission with Cheney, even though the Comission requested that they appear seperately, is because the 9/11 commission wants to ask them questions, that's why they're meeting. And Bush looks forward to meeting with them and answering their questions.  And to follow-up on why he has to hold hands with Cheney while appearing before the Commission, if there's a simpler way to exchange long protein strings, he'd like to hear it.  Oh, and he looks forward to answering the Commission's questions. 6.  Mustard gas was found in a turkey farm in Libya.  7.  Bush doesn't plan on losing his job because he plans on telling the American people that he's got a plan to win the war on terra.  And he won't tell them what that plan is until after he's re-elected.  So, if you want to know the secret Winning the War on Terra plan, vote for Bush next November. 8.  Nobody likes to see dead people on their television screens.  Unless you're watching The Sixth Sense on video, maybe. 9.  When asked what his biggest post 9/11 mistake has been, and what he's learned from it, he said in part: You know, I just -- I'm sure something will pop into my head here in the midst of this press conference, with all the pressure of trying to come up with answer, but it hadn't yet. Even knowing what I know today about the stockpiles of weapons, I still would've called upon the world to deal with Saddam Hussein. See, I'm of the belief that we'll find out the truth on the weapons. That's why we sent up the independent commission. I look forward to hearing the truth as to exactly where they are. They could still be there. They could be hidden, like the 50 tons of mustard gas in a turkey farm. . . .I hope -- I don't want to sound like I have made no mistakes. I'm confident I have. I just haven't -- you just put me under the spot here, and maybe I'm not as quick on my feet as I should be in coming up with one. So, even though Saddam wasn't involved with 9/11 and had no stockpiles of WNDs, it wasn't a mistake to invade Iraq.  Because, you know, Saddam hated us.  And those WMDs could still be there!  Maybe hidden on a turkey farm in Libya.  Or Turkey! And even though Bush got the questions ahead of time, he couldn't think of an answer to this one.  Nothing popped into his head.  It was the media's fault for putting him under the spot. 10.  "Our soldiers who have volunteered to go there [Iraq] understand the stakes."    Well, the ones who joined the reserves because they needed the cash to feed their families, and were told that that their duties would consist of some weekend drilling, and a few weeks in summer painting tanks or something, didn't actually understand the stakes.  And nobody actually volunteered to go to Iraq, they were just in the all-volunteer army and got sent to Iraq.  11.  In answer to a question about possibly restructuring the FBI: So long as I'm the president, I will press for freedom. I believe so strongly in the power of freedom. You know why I do? Because I've seen freedom work right here in our own country. 12.  As President of the "greatest power on the face of the Earth," Bush had been called by the Almighty to help spread freedom to the Middle East.  13. In answer to a question about whether, in light of  Bush's use of canned speeches and his reluctance to do press conferances, he's been effective at communicating his policies for dealing with Iraq: I guess, if you put it into a political context, that's the kind of thing the voters will decide next November. That's what elections are about. They'll take a look at me and my opponent and say, let's see, which one of them can better win the war on terror? Who best can see to it that Iraq emerges a free society? . . .I hope today you've got a sense of my conviction about what we're doing. If you don't, maybe I need to learn to communicate better. And what is Bush's plan for winning the war on terror and fixing Iraq?  Well, he never says.  But he's really got strong convictions about it.  So, vote for the man who will best win the war on terror. Anyway, those are a few of my thoughts on it.  Feel free to share your own. 9:58:14 PM

When Bad Poisons Are Made by the Sons of Good People From the Moonie Times (as reported by the Moonie Wire Service): SEATTLE, April 13 (UPI) An autistic man from the Seattle, Wash., area has been charged by the FBI's Joint Terrorism Task Force with possession of the deadly poison ricin. Robert Alberg, 37, is being held pending a hearing Thursday in U.S. District Court, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported Tuesday. Federal criminal justice sources told the newspaper they do not believe Alberg had political motivations for having the ricin and that he had no plans to use it. [snip] The seeds seized in Friday's raid could have been turned into enough ricin to kill 200 people, according to a federal criminal justice source. What they didn't tell you, courtesy of the Seattle Times: In a written statement, Alberg's father, Tom Alberg, said his son has "waged a life-long struggle" with various "medical and psychological conditions." "Over the past year his condition has changed, increasing his isolation," says the statement, released through a public-relations firm hired by the family. "The Alberg family is cooperating fully with authorities and is grateful for the opportunity for Robert to surrender himself voluntarily at their request." Tom Alberg is the managing director of Madrona Venture Group, a Pacific Northwest venture-capital firm. An early investor in Amazon.com, Alberg continues to sit on the board of the Seattle online retailer. A former lawyer with the Perkins Coie firm, Alberg served as executive vice president of McCaw Cellular. Robert Alberg has a Web site in which he describes himself as a singer. Investigators learned from Alberg's family that he had been sending them disturbing e-mails since July; investigators also were told Alberg had apparently ordered various chemicals through the mail and had them sent to his home, court papers say. In his e-mails, Alberg discussed growing bacteria and sent his sister a 14-step recipe for making ricin, which FBI scientific experts later concluded was an accurate formula, the complaint says. Court papers include excerpts from the e-mails. In one dated July 27, Alberg wrote: "It's now exciting working with poisons perhaps I'll find a way to end all life on Earth through some interesting items." An e-mail sent a month later said, in part, "I hope I die on Federal Death Row some day that would be so nice."  Reuters adds that he told his sister in an email that he "could now poison water supplies." And here's what the Seattle Times didn't tell you: Robert's father, venture capitolist Tom Alberg, is the past Chairman of the Discovery Institute, a group which, per an interesting article from the Seattle Weekly about the local media's ties to Seattle's corporate elites, "espouses--among other things--teaching creationism, forming militias, lowering environmental standards when corporate profits are threatened, and increasing the role of religion in politics." (In 1988, when the article was written, a local TV anchorwoman served on board along with Alberg and a former member of the Nixon cabinent and a former Republican senate candidate.  Alberg was further described as a confidant of Seattle's mayor, Paul Schell.)   Per the Discovery Institute's website, a couple of its major projects are "The Center for Science and Culture," which tries to get Intelligent Design taught in the schools, and the "Technology and Democracy Project," which seeks to free technology from "the burdens of undue government regulation."  Tom Alberg is on the advisory board of the T&D project.  Interestingly enough, several Moonie Times articles are featured on the Institute's homepage. And per The King County Journal, last year Tom Alberg was also on the committee which organized a Bush fund raiser at the mansion of cell phone billionaire Craig McCaw: "In all, 77 top-tier players in politics and business comprise the host committee and state Bush-Cheney campaign leaders."  The event was expected to raise $1.4 million.  So, when your father is a millionaire, a big Bush donor, on the board of a conservative/libertarian foundation, and a friend of the mayor, you get to to turn yourself in voluntarily to the authorities when you are found to be making a deadly poison and talking about using it in the water supply.  And your father hires a public relations firm to tell everybody how well your family is cooperating with the investigation, and that you're not responsible for your actions. And the Washington Times never mentions your father, and begins its story with the information that you're autistic, had no political motivations for possessing ricin, and never planned to actually use it.  Based on the web info about Robert  (his web site follow-up to the "Wife Wanted" sign he hung in his window; his CD, selections of which have been included on various "Worst Music Ever" programs), I doubt that Robert is actually autistic, but believe he may well have Asperger Syndrome, a condition on the autism spectrum ("Because of their high degree of functionality and their naiveté, those with AS are often viewed as eccentric or odd").  And he may have developed other problems this past year, as his father's PR person indicated.  But it will be interesting to see if he get the same treatment as another Washington state man, one Kenneth Olsen, who, per the Seattle Times, "said he was merely curious about the toxin," but "was sentenced to 13 years in prison last fall." 3:30:44 PM

Pre-elected to Failure I am getting tired of all those conservative "Even if Bush had known of 9/11 ahead of time, there's nothing he could have done differently, thanks to the Democrats, who would have whined about racism if he had shot all the Arabs" columns.  So, I'm going to take it out on young Judson Cox, because his is the third of these I've read in the past couple of days: Let's pretend that after finally assuming the Presidency (after months of fighting Democratic election fraud and obstruction), the President and his team moved into a White House (vandalized and looted by Democrats) and began picking up the pieces of our intelligence services (defunded, degraded, hampered and nearly destroyed by Democrats from the Church Commission to Clinton). Richard Clarke tells President Bush the details of the 9-11 attacks. Clarke, having spent the previous two years as the nation's leading Chicken Little, warning that the year 2000 would usher in a cyber Armageddon, somehow convinces the President of his veracity. So, we're pretending that there's no way Bush could have been an effective President after being in office for eight months because (a) the Democrats (Gore) asked for a recount in Florida; (b) the Democrats (Clinton) stole all the White House furnishings and TP-ed the place before left; and (c) the Democrats (Frank Church, Clinton) destroyed the intelligence services.  [Note: this is Judson's scenario, so we're pretending that Bush COULD have been an effective President, if not for the above damage inflicted on him by Democrats.  We're also pretending that Bush was elected President.]   Okay, then, into this scenario, comes Richard Clarke with the details of the 9/11 plot, and he somehow forces Bush to believe him and agree to take action.  What can Bush do to save the country (you know, lacking as he is a desk and a phone and stuff, and being all tired out from having to fight the Florida recount)? Per Judson, if Bush had tried to push the Patriot Act, he would have been impeached by the Democrats and ACLU for being a fascist.  If he had ordered an investigation of Islamic groups, then "The nation would have cried that he was a religious bigot bent on imposing Christianity on America."  If he had asked for screenings of Middle-Easterners at airports, he "would have been branded a racist, and enemy of civil rights." Should he have ordered Air Marshals be present on all domestic flights? Should he have shot down the planes before they reached their targets? Should he have closed our borders? Should he have rounded up all suspected terrorists and placed them in internment camps? All of these actions could have prevented the 9-11 attacks. None of them would have been tolerated by the Congress, the courts or the American people. Maybe, maybe not.  But since Bush has the 9/11 details (al Qaeda terrorists hijack planes and crash them into significant American buildings), then why couldn't he tell the FAA of the plot, and order them to upgrade security screenings of all passengers (and to strictly enforce the already existing regulations prohibiting people from bringing mace, box cutters, and knives on board)?  And maybe have the FAA inform pilots and flight crews about a possible terrorist plan to hijack planes, warn them to be extra alert, and tell pilots that under no circumstances should they open the cock pit door in the event the cabin is seized by hijackers.  And Bush could order the FBI to more closely monitor all suspected al Qaeda members in the U.S, and he could ask for frequent updates on their activities (both the al Qaeda members and the FBI's counterterrorism units).  That's all stuff he could have done as President, and without getting impeached or denounced as a racist.  If would require him to actually DO stuff, instead of just talking about someday remaking the Middle East in our image.  And it might have cut back on the brush clearing time.  But these steps could possibly have prevented 9/11.  You know, in this scenario where he has the details of 9/11 plot, but no furniture, and a headache from the Florida recounts. 2:36:36 AM

Gripes From a Talking Dog Young Kyle Williams complains in his blog about . . .  Chronological snobbery In November, I’ll turn sixteen. That same month, I’ll have been writing for WorldNetDaily for three years. A lot has happened just in these two years and five months that my column has been published, but one thing has been constant. Every week, for the past two and a half years, I’ve received criticisms of my writing solely because of my age. [snip] If I am intelligent in my ideas and my writing and you enjoy it, please read. Yet, if I’m wrong and I’m ignorant, please just don’t read. Yes, why must everyone focus on Kyle's age?  Could it be that the ad for his book at the bottom of his WorldNetDaily columns starts out, "In Kyle Williams' book, Seen and Heard, America's youngest national columnist takes on the establishment"?  Could it be that the blurb on his own blog begins, "Kyle Williams is 15 years of age"? Kyle, if you market yourself as a 15-year-old pundit, then of course people are going to pay attention to your age (and attribute the immaturity of your ideas and writing to the fact that you're young).  If you want them to just focus on your ideas and writing ability, then just present your ideas and writing ability.  You know, like Ezra and Jesse do at Pandagon.  Unless you're afraid that without your "youth" gimmick, nobody would pay any attention to you . . . 12:07:09 AM