He has sex with a female bartender numerous times, always while wearing his Santa hat.

[zotz]

That's from here, of course [Spoilers!]. Ah, the Childcare Action Project. Not just there for the nasty things in life. No, they're there for some of the funniest, too.

Ah. Well, I got one or two trivially useful things done today, and yesterday too, which counts as astonishingly productive by the standards of this job. I was incensed by this story, of course. You can get into a lot of trouble now for saying that you understand why people are so angry they run off and commit multiple murders, but faced with this sort of thing I can't honestly see why more people don't.

Of course, the response will be met with a counter-response, and the blood of the innocent will be spilled both by the vicious and by the well-meaning-but-angry-or-misled. It's going to get worse before it gets better. If it gets better soon enough for me to see it, which it may not. A family friend married an Israeli bloke a few years ago. They're bringing the kids up in Canada. Wise choice.

Mmm. White phosphorus. Nice to know that people are being good to each other, isn't it? As they say, give a man a fire and he'll be warm for an evening, but set him on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. And it worked so well in stopping the attacks on US soldiers, didn't it? Clearly a masterful tactician has been at work.

Comments

[nmg.livejournal.com]

Re: white phosphorous, I've been slightly narked that so much of the press has been referring to it as a chemical weapon. I'd expect John Pilger to cast it in that light, but this really is far more widespread. It's most commonly referred to as "incendiary smoke"; in order words, it sets fire to things and also makes a lot of smoke.

It makes no more sense to call WP a chemical weapon than it would napalm (or for that matter to call a depleted uranium round a radiological weapon on account of the residual radioactivity of DU), and to do so devalues the use of the term to refer to weapons whose ability to kill or wound is based entirely on their chemical toxicity (chlorine, phosgene, lewisite, mustard gas, chloropicrin, not to mention the families of nerve agents).

[zotz]

Yes. I've been saying that to people for the last couple of days. Then trying to explain that using it like that may possibly still be illegal, but under a mess of other conventions instead . . .

[nmg.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. With the current media storm, it isn't clear exactly how WP has been used; much of the reporting has concentrated on the likelihood of civilian casualties due to its use, and has ignored the question of its legality as you point out.

That said, it makes little sense to single out the use of WP for criticism if it has been used in ways which endanger civilians, given some of the other ordnance which has been used in Iraq, not least cluster munitions. They're a damn sight less discriminatory and more persistent than incendiary artillery rounds!

[pigeonhed.livejournal.com]

I think the use of the term 'Chemical Weapon' is a loaded term. Most people read that and are appalled (which is good) whether they know what White Phosphorus actually does or not. Whether such hyperbole is useful or dangerous I am in two minds about.

[nmg.livejournal.com]

The problem with the hyperbole is that there's some interference with another term that the media has heavily promulgated over the last four years, namely weapons of mass destruction.

We've been told that the case for war in Iraq was based on Saddam Hussein's development of weapons of mass destruction, more specifically chemical weapons. The reporting at the time, and the rhetoric from government, equated chemical weapons with nerve agents (and to a lesser extent blister and pulmonary agents), which is largely accurate and within the conventional meaning of the term. Referring to incendiary weapons as chemical weapons is deliberately misleading because it plays to the statement that chemical weapons are weapons of mass destruction.

As I've already said, I don't know why WP has been singled out for this current round of media attention when there have already been retractions of statements in Parliament by ministers concerning the use of napalm-like substances by US troops, and the use of cluster munitions and FASCAM continues to cause civilian casualties.

[zotz]

Crying wolf, I'd say.

[decomposingsoul.livejournal.com]

I personally think that there is an issue in modern society of how far govermnments will go towards turning blatant murder into procedure. It seems that firearms are being given to thick, easily twisted people, who will do exactly what they have been told to do without questioning the morality of the act itself. If I had my way, people like that would be used as target practice for people with more discretion

[original-aj.livejournal.com]

Yes, there are some people who really do go out of their way to make a bad situation worse, aren't there?

I have also opined in the past that it surprises me how few people end up hurting their children, given how much stress is involved in being a parent.

[decomposingsoul.livejournal.com]

It surprises me how many people bother having kids at all as they know it's just going to stress them out. But, hey, maybe that's just me being cynical

[original-aj.livejournal.com]

Very few people really know what it'll be like. And the rewards are amazing, too. The biggest problem is that too few people really think about it at all - they just do it.

[decomposingsoul.livejournal.com]

Thought about it for all of a few seconds and shuddered at the thought!

[steer.livejournal.com]

He has sex with a female bartender numerous times, always while wearing his Santa hat.

It can't be just me that thought "How many letters?"

[zotz]

On current evidence . . . . no, it is just you.