Gentle Reader -- You are welcome to peruse my web-based journal. I assure you that my contributions to this medium will be both infrequent and inconsequential. Read on!

INTELLIGENCE FAILURE

While I was in Budapest, I dated Inna, a Russian woman who was attending Central European University as a graduate student in Medieval Studies. Inna had this interesting habit of putting down people with a single word -- a former boyfriend of hers was "primitive," for example, spoken with a tone of deep disdain. Sometimes the word was not always overtly negative, but conveyed a particular inchoate put-down, as when she referred to a female Czech student in her program as "civilized." (As in: "Oh, Katerina is . . . civilized.")

One thing Inna really respected in her friends and colleagues was intelligence. Oh, X was very intelligent, she would say, glowing. Y wasn't really, but he worked very hard (another subtle put-down). Once, I asked her whether she thought I was intelligent.

She thought for a moment. "You're very practical," she said.

So, I'm practical. (Not that Inna is always right, of course -- she predicted that I would be married very soon after we parted ways, which was six years ago.) That word has been stuck in my head ever since she said it.

I have more to say on this, but I think I?ll leave it for now. Enough navel-gazing for one day.
posted by Carlton at 8:08 PM

NEW STUFF

I'm going to replace my old link to Molly's blog with this link to her new cartoon page. I am a bit partisan, of course, but I like her stuff a lot.

In related news, two unrelated people this week told me I am "a lucky man" to be associated with Molly. My response in both cases: Lucky for me, she's got low self-esteem. Otherwise, I'd be back on match.com. posted by Carlton at 3:24 PM

EASTER BUNNIES

I've mentioned this before, as have others, but it is truly amazing how no one in the entire administration seems capable to admitting a mistake. The recent 9/11 testimony has once again thrown this into relief. At every turn, administration officials are working hard to hide facts that are not in accord with their public statements or threaten or discredit persons who point out such facts. It happens so often that it's become commonplace -- whether it's jobs, WMD, Medicare, whatever. (This cartoon sums it up better than I can.) The point of it all is that the Bush people cannot admit that they are or ever were wrong about anything, for even one second. This is pretty common to politicians, honestly, but the Bush people are positively pathological.

Regarding 9/11: The mere fact of the attacks, coupled with the information that was apparently available to top-level decision-makers, indicates that there were things that could have been done that were not. I'm not suggesting that the attacks could necessarily have been prevented -- they were a surprise, extremely bold and well-planned, and on an unprecedented scale. Also, they ran counter to the conventional wisdom regarding terrorism at the time, which was that terror goups generally do not attempt to cause massive damage and casualties, because to do so causes a backlash against their cause. In the same way, I am pretty sure that the flight crews on the hijacked planes let the hijackers into the cockpit out of a similar misapprehension of what airplane hijackings are all about -- hijackers hold the plane and the people on board for ransom, or divert the plane to some alternate location. No one expected them to turn the plane into a giant suicide bomb. It was a mistake, and an understandable one.

The 9/11 commission is about determining how understandable were the administration's mistakes, and how they can be avoided in the future. This is driving the administration crazy, because the commission is prdicated on an assumption -- mistakes were made -- that they fundamentally cannot abide. They cannot admit it -- they feel trapped, their claws come out, they must attack someone, anyone, like a cornered rat.

This inability shows a truly deep defect in character, a lack of substance. It shows a fear that the least contradiction, retraction, admission, invalidates my entire person. Such a person is like the cheap chocolate bunnies that many people get in their Easter baskets -- a thin shell with nothing inside. No one who disagrees with me can be right, no one who disagrees with me can be my friend, no one who disagrees with me can be allowed to speak. If this is allowed I will be revealed to be . . . nothing. To prevent this I will commit crimes, ruin reputations and tell a thousand more lies to cover up the first, and each of those lies must be subsequently defended to the death.

I hope that this election is about character -- 'cause Bush ain't got any.

I hear "You're the Reason Our Kids are Ugly," by Conway Twitty and Loretta Lynn, and "Zoot Suit Riot", by the Squirrel Nut Zippers. posted by Carlton at 3:19 PM

FOOLS GONE WILD

Well, I haven't died or anything -- I just haven't had much time in front of the computer at home when I felt like writing anything. Work has been busy busy busy, which is a good thing, except that I'm a little more pooped than normal when I get home.

There's certainly a lot going on right now -- the 9/11 hearings are just the start. The Bush people have really bungled their response to Richard Clarke's testimony, and continue to bungle it pretty spectacularly. By trying to sink the commission initially, they drew attention to it; by raising such a fuss about who from the current administration could testify, and in what forum, and for how long, they made it look like they have something to hide, attracting even more attention. Additionally, the Bush people delayed the release of Clarke's book for several months (citing "national security" of course), which backfired on them by arranging that his book release would exactly coincide with his testimony before the commission, allowing Clarke to go on "60 Minutes" and trash the administration on Iraq mere days before going to Congress and trashing them on the leadup to 9/11. As result of all this, the media this week has been all-Clarke, all the time.

And it looks like it will continue -- GOP luminaries in the Senate have been making noise about prosecuting Clarke for perjury. This charge, should it be brought, would apparently be based on some classified testimony that Clarke gave to the Senate in 2002 -- the rationale being, I guess, that if the two sets of testimony diverge in any way, even the remotest scintilla, if he even put his commas in different places each time, then Clarke is a liar and a criminal and should go to jail.

These people, I swear. Let's put aside the fact that this administration has the most hypocritical stance towards classified information imaginable, declassifying anything and everything that would hurt an opponent, even for one news cycle, while keeping everything else sewn up tighter than a frog's cooter. (Showing the classified Presidential Daily Briefings to Bob Woodward, who was writing a Valentine's Day card of a book about Bush, while refusing to allow the 9/11 commission to use even the notes taken by the commissioners who were allowed to read but not copy the PDB's, is another.) Let's also put aside the fact that, in addition to being our nations' foremost expert on terrorism and legitimately nonpartisan, Clarke is a veteran bureaucrat with, from all accounts, a sixth-degree black belt in Cover Your Ass, which strongly implies to me that there won't be anything in any former testimony that he's given that will trip him up. Even if all of these things were not true, The Bushies seem oblivious to the fact that their going nuclear on Richard Clarke is itself news.

Clarke may be a stand-up guy but, let's face it, former counterterrorism officials don't get this kind of press on their own. The more they attack him, the stronger he gets. He's already sold out the first couple of printings of his book -- the first one was, I think, for 300,000. If the perjury charge actually materializes, he may break a million.

To steal a motif from Greg, I currently hear "We Rule The School" by Belle and Sebastian, which is a great song. posted by Carlton at 2:19 PM

AND STILL MORE

Anyone interested in the whole USM thing should certainly turn to Scott's blog (link at left) -- he has the real story about some of the inaccuracies and lies I have been spreading. I don't have much more to say about the whole thing.

Actually, I do have one more thing to say: I looked at Shelby Thames' bio, which indicates that he received both his undergraduate and masters degrees at Southern. Thereafter, he made it as far as Tennessee for the Ph.d. Then, back to USM for the various academic and staff positions, and now president.

That's truly old school, to coin a phrase. What it says to me is that this fellow has played inside baseball his whole professional life, which is maybe what you have to do to end up as king, I mean president. Aubrey Lucas certainly did his share of back scratching back in the old days. Maybe Thames was somewhat justified in thinking of USM as his own private playground, where he could do whatever he wanted. I'm guessing he could have done any ONE thing that he wanted -- but to mess around on so many fronts was probably too much for even the sleepy 'patch to bear.

Hardly my business. After all, I never even paid them any money. posted by Carlton at 11:44 PM

SOUTHERN MISS UPDATE

So, I spoke to my sources in the 'burg, and have gleaned the following pieces of information/unsubstantiated rumor:

There have been a number of protests on Southern's campus against the firing of the two profs. Apparently, during a press conference on the steps of the Aministration B'ld'g, Shelby Thames derided the protesters by saying that (history professor) Dick Chambers had let his morning class out and given them extra credit if they would protest. His rotten luck was that Prof. Chambers happened to be passing by at that very moment. Hearing his name impugned, Chambers intruded into the press conference (shouting "That's not true!") to announce that he had had jury duty that morning, and that his graduate assistant had held the class in his place and let the students out with an assignment.

Leading the faculty resistance to President Thames is none other than William Scarborough, professor of American History (my professor for Old South and Civil War). My sources tell me that he has a new book coming out, and that the visibility in this campaign can hurt his stature in the academic community. So fine!

Another issue on the table is that the funds annually budgeted for faculty raises were distributed in an unusual way this year -- in the middle of the term (which is apparently not the norm) and to only a select few faculty. The recipient of one of, if not the largest raise (+- 15%) was none other than Thames' daughter, who is an instructor.

In the unsubstantiated rumor column: this brou-ha-ha started when the two fired profs investigated the credentials of a female Vice President at the university -- evidently, she had claimed to have been a tenured faculty member at another university before coming to Southern, and apparently that was not the case. When this was brought to his attention, Thames did not discipline the VP, but suspended the professors. The rumor portion is that Thames may be having an affair with the VP. (Ooooh, faculty-on-faculty sex!)

Oh, and um . . . the orchestra is sounding really nice this year, and the Bradford Pears are in full bloom. Apparently they had eighty-degree weather this week, although it's much cooler now. posted by Carlton at 8:31 PM

SOUTHERN MISHAP

Imagine: an unelected president launches a controversial and divisive agenda, while at the same time taking steps to stifle dissent and remove career professionals (holdovers from the last administration) who publically disagree with his program.

Sound familiar? Well, it's the apparent state of affairs at Southern Miss, the alma mater of such celebrated bloggers as me, Scott and Greg (links to the side).

I don't have any opinion at all about the controversy, since I'm not around there any more (and I haven't had the chance to ask my dad about it, although he's the type that doesn't believe that you should bad-mouth, so he might not tell me anything). I will say that I think that I have heard some very bad things about one of the removed professors -- personally, not professionally -- but I won't repeat the stories because I am not certain that it's the same person.

First BU and now USM -- all we need now is for Indiana University to hit the skids and I, too, will have hit the trifecta. posted by Carlton at 11:08 PM

RANDOM NOTES RE: KERRY

It certainly seems like Kerry is the nominee. Looks like I need to warm up my checkbook. And, you understand, I NEVER give away money.

Molly and I are looking into volunteering at the Democratic National Convention which is being held -- guess where. I think that we should also go to New York and protest the Republican one. The jury is still out on that second one, but I think it will be a hoot. The more egregious the use of September 11 -- Bush giving his acceptance speech at "Ground Zero", placing the cornerstone of the memorial during the convention -- the more likely I'll be to go. I don't really want to get my head cracked open by a billy club or to get tear gas in my sensitive eyes, but I'll go, and stand in the crowd, and take pictures, and chant slogans. And, you understand, I NEVER do any of those things.

Greg has been bitching about Kerry, and how he isn't progressive enough to be considered human, much less an acceptable candidate, and that you might as well vote for Bush if Dennis Kucinich isn't in the race. All I have to say to that is that Dennis got more than his fair share of attention this go-round. My personal opinion is that he did poorly enough to have hurt his own cause.

My brother, writing from Hattiesburgistan, laments that Kerry is so liberal that he wants to give al-Quaeda members access to food stamps. At the same time, my brother is hungry for an alternative to Bush. There's only one.
posted by Carlton at 10:26 PM

HABEAS CORPUS

This is a really good reason, as if I needed another one, why I won't be giving to the building fund.

I used to sit in a dusty little corner of the law library and study, where each of the wooden bookcases had a small plaque mounted on its side, inscribed with the name of some benefactor. In three thousand years, we have progressed just far enough so that we can fill the sarcophagus with books instead of mortal remains. posted by Carlton at 10:04 PM