Libya and foreign affairs

"The Libyan leader directed Alamoudi to tell a Saudi dissident in London "to arrange the assassination of Crown Prince Abdullah" in retaliation for a public insult to Gaddafi a few weeks earlier."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A62796-2004Oct25.html

I was going to provide some comments, but then I had second thoughts. :-)

War for Dummies

It certainly seems like our gov't administration did not read this book before going into Iraq. It's just been reported that 380 TONS (!) of high-explosives is missing from a military storage complex 30 miles south of Baghdad. This site was classified as "medium priority" after the invasion. How can securing vast ammounts of explosives be considered a MEDIUM priority?!? How did this happen? Who will be held accountable? Oh, wait this is a GWB administration - no one is ever held accountable. Out with Bush!!!

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/international/middleeast/25bomb.html

Update: Washington Post has an Editorial today on the missing explosives which presents the issue quite well. In true journalistic fairness they point out that IAEA's cheif ElBaradei is not a big fan of Bush and may be purposefully giving more fodder to the Kerry campaign. Even if it's true it still doesn't change the fact that these explosives are missing and that this most likely happened after the US invasion which means that the administration should be held accountable.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A3936-2004Oct27.html

Slashdot users interview Neil Stephenson

For all you Neil Stephenson fans out there. You know who you are! :-)

http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/10/20/1518217

"There is nothing better than a Slashdot interview with someone who not only reads and understands Slashdot but can out-troll the trolls." hehehehe

All hail to Ray Kurzweil!

Ray Kurzweil is a major visionary and forward thinker, but not in that informercial, motivational-speaker kind of way. He's just an incredibly intelligent guy who has the ability to look at the world from outside the mold (or box if you prefer the cliche term). Here is an interview with him that examines what life might be like in the next 20-30 years. I like how the article starts in the present (discussing productivity and job outsourcing) and then slowly progresses into the future. To give you a taste of Mr. Kurzweil's thinking:

"I take 250 supplements a day. I'm really reprogramming my biochemistry. A lot of people think it's good to be natural. I don't think it's good because biological evolution is not on our side. It's in the interest of our species for people past child-rearing age not to stick around, at least in an era of scarcity, and our biological program hasn't changed since we lived in an era of scarcity. We have a lot of outmoded programs in our genes. One says, "Hold on to every calorie because the next hunting season might be fallow." These are all programs that need to be changed. We have a lot of aging processes that really accelerate when we get into our 50s and 60s, and I'm working aggressively to reverse those."

http://www.cio.com/archive/101504/interview.html

Needless to say the man is brilliant. Computers and technology have allowed us to enhance our knowledge. As a result they have taken a prime spot in many people's lives - we use them for work, learning and personal growth, communication and entertainment. How cool would it be to have the ability to have instant access to the entire English dictionary and be able to perfectly express oneself at any occasion? What about every dictionary out there? Who needs a translator if we inherently understand what someone is saying in a different language? And that is but a grain of sand of what is possible.

I tell ya, if there is any reason to live longer than our one life it would be to see how technology develops and be able to consistently enhance our knowledge and understanding of the world. Long live progress! :)

World Citizens Guide

A cool guide on how to respect customs of other countries when travelling.

http://www.worldcitizensguide.org/index2.html
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=519&ncid=519&e=39&u=/ap/20041006/ap_on_re_us/cultural_correctness

No excuse

OK, if you get paid $40,000 to do a mural for a library and you mispell "Einstein, Shakespeare, Vincent Van Gogh, Michelangelo and seven other historical figures" names that's pretty bad. There really is no excuse.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=514&e=19&u=/ap/20041007/ap_on_fe_st/library_mispellings

Iraq, WMD and warfare

The suspicions that Saddam Hussein kept deluding the world about his WMD programs in order to maintain his strategic position have proved to be true. He may have been a brutal dictator, but he was also a shrewd politician. When asked about why Iraq never used WMD in 1991 Gulf war he replied: "Do you think we are mad? What would the world have thought of us? We would have completely discredited those who had supported us.''

I think this proves further that Iraq was not (and most likely would never have been) a real threat to the United States. Israel perhaps, Iran definitely, but not the United States. So much for going to war to rid his regime of WMD. This adds further evidence that Iraq was more about the neocon dream of reshaping the Middle East than anything else.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/07/politics/07saddam.html

Natural immunity to HIV?

How cool is that? They found that some people actually have immune systems that have a natural defense against HIV. Once again I am speechless at the power of diversity and evolution to solve problems thrown their way. Awesome!!!

http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english/doc/2004-10/01/content_379267.htm

Mandatory voting?

Here is an excellent overview of the merits and faults of mandatory voting. The site itself is a wonderful effort on part of UN to provide a comprehensive guide to organizing elections.

http://www.aceproject.org/main/english/es/esc07a.htm

Voting is essential

This country exists as a democracy because we as citizens get involved. It is really easy to call to our "freedoms" to excuse ourselves from participating in the process. What we forget is that it is that very process which allows those freedoms to exist in the first place. Ideally voting should not be mandatory, but should be perceived to be so as a social and moral obligation. If we are willing to spend billions on a campaign to discourage smoking we should be willing to do the same to strengthen the very foundation of our great society - democracy.

In my opinion this would be best achieved by promoting stronger civic involvement through education and public campaigns. Voting (and the democracy it upholds) needs to be highlighted as the basic right and duty of every citizen. In a democracy patriotism starts with voting.

Ok, maybe a bit of a grandstanding speech there, but this is something I feel very passionate about. It pains me to see how twisted our political process is at this point. Perhaps it was always like that, but that doesn't mean we shouldn't try to right it.

References:
1. This post stems from a discussion on voting in another blog where I posted it originally.
http://xyliaa.blogspot.com/2004/09/mandatory-voting.html