Who'll stop the rain?

Unexpectedly I went to the Timberwolves playoff game on Friday. It was fun as hell. They were winning in much of the first half, but it is hard as hell to get rebounds with Shaq around the basket.

I've been lying low this week, trying not to get too psyched out about the news of new photographs, war around the holy Shiite shrines, the wretched border cases in Rafah and along the Syrian border. What does it mean if Chalabi's intelligence was mainly a front for Iranian schemers?

Was the Pentagon that foolish? The answer seems to be that some agencies, such as the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency, knew that the guy who talked about mobile bio-weapons labs was a liar, but somehow that sanity check got blocked by someone else in the Pentagon. The State Department and CIA certainly were never big into the Chalabi fantasy.

Chalabi's people were the ones who provided the lurid wallpaper of fear that surrounded us in the leadup to war. The hawks bought the silly garbage because they needed it to justify the unreal, hellish nightmare that has unfolded. They needed the false intelligence to fabricate fear in the public mind.

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I have been taking a lot of walks, exercising, and I went to see Troy next door. That inspired me to play Civilization III like mad, a retreat that I felt I deserved for a few days while these storms blow over. Also I have started doing some part time website work this past week, but that is not really quite enough labor to keep me going this summer.

Finally, David's artwork for our wall came in. It is about damn time and maybe I will put up a couple photos of the drawings, which are made of chalk, ink, colored pens and pencils, all around some good stuff.

I will try to put together some of the new information, but my God it is hard to figure out which way things are spinning right now. One of the key questions is how fanatics like Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson view this stuff. I found an interesting story in the Village Voice about 'theocratic' advice in Washington....

Also I haven't forgotten to explain the story of the lawn chair from hell, as an example of weird patterns, rather than a conspiracy. More later, ever later...... The story continues, whether I like it or not. I will have to go back into trying to deal with it, before it deals with me.

Posted by HongPong at May 23, 2004 03:17 AM
Listed under Iraq , Israel-Palestine , Minnesota , News .