China has begun a program of "patriotic re-education" of Tibetans, where the benefits of Chinese rule are stressed, and the Dalai Lama is reviled. Thank goodness we don't resort to such obvious propaganda tactics here.
No siree ... nothing like that here. Nope. Instead, we engage in sophisticated data manipulation to stampede the country into an unnecessary and unjustified conflict. Should some few prove resistant to such tactics, we simply shout them down as "unpatriotic" or "anti-American".
When three, four, five years later those dissenters turn out to have have been correct in nearly every particular, and the shouters equally wrong, anyone who has the temerity to point out such matters is "unpatriotic", or "anti-American". Besides, to leave with the job undone, even though a job which should never have been started in the first place, would "dishonor" those who died in the cause.
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice taunted Iraqi cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, for residing safely in Iran while directing Mahdi Army forces to fight against US and Iraqi army forces. From his front-line command post in the White House, President Bush had no comment.
Politics, mostly national, some AZ, and whatever else hits my fancy.
About Me
- Sirocco
- I work as a software researcher. My political views are on the liberal side of the fence. Like many people, I consider myself an expert on all subjects, but in reality I am adequate in some, abysmal in most.
5 comments:
Well said.
I've had second thoughts on my chess challenge. You would crucify me, and I need all my cerebral horsepower for the dissertation.
The invasion of Iraq will go down in history as one of the greatest blunders in the history of the planet. Saddam Hussein was in his late sixties already. Perhaps his sons could consolidate power, but I would predict their demise.
Heh, I had just seen the post and was considering whether to play or not. I haven't played a tournament game in a while, but I play online a fair bit, so I am not completely out of practice.
There is no game quite like Chess. Like pure mathematics, it has an elegance, a purity, a simplicity that strips away any ability to fake, disguise, or hide.
In sports, it is running. In academics, it is mathematics. In games, it is Chess.
I can think of no experience that matches the sensation of the shift of power that occurs as one color seemingly dominating suddenly finds itself in sheer terror.
Perhaps we'll play some day.
Word of advice, stay away from the Russians when playing chess, unless you are Bobby Fischer.
In probably the last game of chess I'll ever play, I was playing a 14 year old Russian kid. Who giggled after my sixth move and told me that I had already lost, and called others over to show them. Of course they saw it right away as well destroying any opportunity that I would have had to dismiss my loss 12 moves later as being the victim of some prodigy.
Their daily news covers chess matches like we cover the NFL here.
Heh. Best player I've ever beaten is GM Alexander Baburin, now living in Ireland I believe, but formerly of Russia.
Yeah, they've been teaching chess in their school systems for generations over there, and the old regime would finance their players ... less so nowdays, but there are soooooo many strong players from the former Soviet republics. Seeing a lot of strong young players from China now too.
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