Far East Cynic

For not posting. However this is the only excuse I have.

On Monday I was notified that I was going to be allowed to participate in different part of one of our current projects-STARTING THIS WEEKEND.

Its a good news / bad news situation. The good news is I will be posting from across the globe starting this weekend. That’s at least a break from Shopping Mall. The bad news is the hours will be long which will probably negate the idea of being overseas in the first place.

Be careful what you wish for. All the news from a new location coming soon.

So consider what George Will has to say about Afghanistan. More to say on the return of the “Teflon General” tomorrow-but suffice it to say, I’m still not necessarily a fan of the man. Fox Fallon must have had his reasons not to like the guy-and I’d like to know more about those -and less about the success of the “surge”  Which was neither a surge and not a success-not by the standards that the were set for the surge-e.g. giving the Iraqis time to solve their political mess. They got the time-they never solved the mess. Are you really surprised at that?

Of course when the Afghan’s screw up any gains that are made-it will never be there fault, or Petreaus’s. But it seems pretty clear that William the Bloody will be happy-the war there will go on and on and on with no end in sight. The war and occupation stretching for ever into the future, with no realistic chance of success.

More on that tomorrow. When it comes to Afghanistan-as with Iraq, I am a total pessimist. No amount of counter insurgency will fix either the Afghan or Iraqi people. They both have had years to change and haven’t. Don’t think they are going to start now.

I was going to post tonight.

A 13 hour day at work cured that notion.

Now if it were doing something useful that made sense-well that’s one thing. But to just have to re-do work because some idiot thinks its a good idea, and then demands things on an unreasonable deadline-that is another thing entirely. By my figuring a whole boatload of man-hours were wasted today, just because of the whims of one person. For the work we do-that’s simply ridiculous.

End of rant. Night.

My, my, my-how quickly the worm turns.

For years loads of military bloggers have been fawning over Michael Yon, supposedly the only honest reporter covering the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.  Now it would seem,  he no longer enjoys the adoration of the masses.

I mean after all-God forbid you would call Uncle Dumbo the insensitive writer that he is.

I never had that much fascination with Michael Yon and still don’t. For me he was always a cheerleader for the war in Iraq-when it did not need one. I had an e-mail alteraction with him myself a few years ago when I had the termerity to e-mail him and tell him that he was wrong. He did respond-which is actually nice, but he never could make any sense. Going back tonight and re-reading it, he still doesn’t.

 Now that he has burned his own bridges, he’s not as happy as he once was. A lot of that is his own fault. A lot of it is the thin skin of the milblogsphere which fails to put any value at all on honest discussion and disagreement. Especially if you do not parrot the right wing party line.

And when you don’t value intellectual honesty-this is what you get. On both sides of the argument.

Still its fun to watch.

Beacause I can turn it on-and the resident Fox News morons fans don’t come along and change the  TV. Last week was perfect. We could turn on the World Cup in the morning then switch it over to the US Open. A whole week without Glenn Beck on the tube ( something I rise to switch off the TV near my cube when it comes on). That is worth celebrating.

I do find the passer’s by reactions very interesting. One of the folks at work who is ardent hocking fan called the game “boring”. Uh, yes-but fundamentally it is not different than hockey. In fact its a lot like hockey-without checks to the boards.

I agree with this quote about Americans and Soccer though:

I’m an avid fan of football, baseball, and basketball, and while I appreciate the international love for soccer, I’m certainly in the majority of Americans who will never be soccer fans.  It wasn’t enough that stars like Babe Ruth, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, Michael Jordan, Red Grange, and Jim Thorpe were charismatic; they were the top scorers of their time.

Die-hard fans of any sport enjoy the nuances of fundamentals and defense. But to attract the casual fan, American sports leagues have had to cater to higher scoring.  In baseball, they seized on Ruth’s popularity as a home run hitter by ending the “dead-ball era,” lowered the mound after the late ’60s favored the pitcher, and turned a blind eye to performance enhancing drugs in the late ’90s when Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa’s home run chases brought back fans that had left after the mid-’90s labor issues. Football has tweaked its rules from the beginning to favor scoring, right up to this day when quarterbacks and wide receivers are protected to an enormous degree by the rules.  Similarly, the rough and tough defenses of 1980s basketball have been practically outlawed by the foul-calling of NBA officials to stimulate scoring, and the NBA’s first big breakthrough was spurred by the installation of the 24 second shot-clock to pressure players to score more quickly.

The problem with soccer, and the reason it will never be widely accepted by the casual American sports fan, is that it cannot adapt the game to increase scoring – such as shortening its huge friggin’ field – without losing legitimacy within the international community.

I played soccer for two years in high school before deciding that I liked making money more than chasing the ball up and down the field. ( I did love having money that was mine-and that my parents had no say in how I spent it). So I have an appreciation for the beauty of the game. Furthremore-30+years of stalking various and sundry bars around the world, force you to become interested in the game-if only for a means to start a conversation with a woman in the bar. ( Thanks to the increasing ban on smoking-my old trick of bumming a cigarette from a woman smoking has decreased in potential over the years. Don’t laugh, if a woman smokes, she ……..).

But they have it right-Americans will only get on board if and when the US makes it to the finals and hopefully it will be against a team that the beating of which would have political implications. (e.g. US vs Iran).

Go USA!

When I was a young man, I was a fan of the short lived TV show, Battlestar Galatica. I was going through flight school, there had been only one Star Wars movie and the Galatica seemed like an aircraft carrier. Besides-the chicks on the show were pretty hot.

When its reimagined version came out a few years ago- I did not follow it much-I was living in Japan and had other things to do, like go to Tokyo for my Japanese classes and find new and better bars on the way home. I did watch the final episodes of the series when it closed-but I found the ending, and the changes from the original series-to be dissapointing. For the record, Starbuck is supposed to be a man. And second, when you come upon a young planet earth wth nothing but natives for the conquering, you don’t just toss your technology aside and live like the natives.

So I was curious what was going to happen when Sy Fy developed the prequel series Caprica. Caprica is set 58 years before the Cylons destroyed the 12 colonies and launched the “rag tag, fugitive fleet” on its lonely quest for Earth.

The first time through- I did not warm to the series so much. I could not get it. Here was a world that had developed spaceflight, yet still had people dressing like they lived in the 1950′s-complete with fedora hats for the men. And while there was lots of new technology-it seemed odd to me that so much of the world looked and seemed like the current world we live in now. After all we don’t have interplanetary travel yet-much to my chagrin.

Then, quite by accident, I stumbled upon the first 12 episodes available for down load on I-Tunes. I down loaded and loaded all of them up to my I-Phone. While I was on this recent series of international travel I watched the series again. The light bulb finally came on -and now I can truly say I am hooked. I can’t wait till the series resumes again in October.

Science Fiction has always been a clever way to provide interesting commentary on current events and I realized that Caprica was following this old SciFi tradition very well. The plot line of  Caprica tells the story of how Colonial humanity first created the robotic cylons, who would later plot to destroy humans in retaliation for their enslavement.  I always hate it when they use that term-they are machines, they are meant to be used and abused. That is not enslavement. People are enslaved. Machines are used.

Nonetheless, it is the interesting story of how the first Cylon robot becomes self aware. I also find the technology of the show fascinating-especially the Virtual world that creates the vehicle to make the first Cylon self aware. ( Plot spoiler follows). The virtual world is the ultimate of electronic gaming-enabled by “holobands” that allow you to assume the form of an avatar and navigate through a world where any thing is possible. ( Pioneered by the porn industry of course).

The central characters, the Graystone family includes the father Daniel and mother Amanda, a computer scientist and surgeon respectively. When their daughter Zoe dies due to the religious fanaticism of her boyfriend, Ben Stark, her father manages to resurrect her — after a fashion. Already having acquired a digital clone of her personality developed by Zoe herself, he uses stolen technology to create a robotic version of his daughter, the first step towards creating the Cylon race.

In the worlds of the colonies, polytheism is the religion. Try to imagine Greece-with 21st century  technology. Monotheism-the belief in the one true god-is the Caprican version of Islam in this series. Ben Stark is the modern day Islamic terrprist. Or is he a Christianist? It is never really clear.  In one of the early shows, this line is spoken: ” Don’t you realize how dangerous this is? A belief in one all knowing, infallible god, with which there is no disagreement-and in whose name unspeakable acts of violence can be committed.”  I found that particularly interesting and it provokes interesting parallels with our own age and history.

And that is what Science fiction is supposed to do. Provide a vehicle through which clever commentary on our own society can be expressed. In Caprica, its about a   a world intoxicated by success. And technology. It opens a lot of ideas for discussion-since the virtual world featured in the series can be likened to some of the video games of today.

The second  half of the series airs in October-I can’t wait. If you have not watched the first episodes-buy it or down load it.

Finally, a job opportunity in Asia I know I am really qualified for:

Rent a White Guy.

Not long ago I was offered work as a quality-control expert with an American company in China I’d never heard of. No experience necessary—which was good, because I had none. I’d be paid $1,000 for a week, put up in a fancy hotel, and wined and dined in Dongying, an industrial city in Shandong province I’d also never heard of. The only requirements were a fair complexion and a suit.

Lily white skin?-Check, got that. ( And darned handsome in a distinguished sort of way).

Suit?-Check, got that. ( Ten really nice ones made by favorite tailor in Singapore over the years).

Where do I sign up? And do I get to hang around with any of these?

One might think that my skirmish with the state of Alabama as noted below might have me changing my thoughts about government. Not really-clearly this represents what is a pretty obvious trend, the state is so short of money that they will do every thing they can to avoid paying it back. I had a similar struggle with them last year-I know I will win in the end. If need be, I’ll get a lawyer to depose my ex-wife. That should make the exercise worth it in the long run.

However, it does not shake  my faith that there are services that need to be provided and paid for. A recent article in the New York book review helped me codify what’s really wrong with the teabagger nation.  Americans have not caught up yet with the changes that are going on in the world. They are two slow witted, for the most part,  to recognize them. The 20% or so of us who do recognize it-are castigated for having the gall to point it out. As I have pointed out before-the Tea Bag revolution bears little resemblance to the American revolution and a lot of resemblance to the French one. Mrk Lilla explains why.

What happened? People who remember the article sometimes ask me this, and I understand why. George W. Bush, who ran on a platform of “compassionate conservatism,” seemed attuned to the recent social changes. The President Bush who emerged after September 11 took his party and the country back to the divisive politics of earlier decades, giving us seven years of ideological recrimination. By the time of the last presidential campaign, millions were transfixed not by the wisdom or folly of Barack Obama’s policy agenda, but by absurd rumors about his birth certificate and his “socialism.” Now he has been elected president by a healthy majority and is grappling with a wounded economy and two foreign wars he inherited—and what are we talking about? A makeshift Tea Party movement whose activists rage against “government” and “the media,” while the hotheads of talk radio and cable news declare that the conservative counterrevolution has begun.

It hasn’t. We know that the country is divided today, because people say it is divided. In politics, thinking makes it so. Just as obviously, though, the angry demonstrations and organizing campaigns have nothing to do with the archaic right–left battles that dragged on from the Sixties to the Nineties. The populist insurgency is being choreographed as an upsurge from below against just about anyone thought to be above, Democrats and Republicans alike. It was galvanized by three things: a financial collapse that robbed millions of their homes, jobs, and savings; the Obama administration’s decision to pursue health care reform despite the crisis; and personal animosity toward the President himself (racially tinged in some regions) stoked by the right-wing media.¹ But the populist mood has been brewing for decades for reasons unrelated to all this.

I think Mark Lilla is on to something here. The current list grievances is not a list of political grievances in the conventional sense. It is something different-egged on by the changes in technology:

A new strain of populism is metastasizing before our eyes, nourished by the same libertarian impulses that have unsettled American society for half a century now. Anarchistic like the Sixties, selfish like the Eighties, contradicting neither, it is estranged, aimless, and as juvenile as our new century. It appeals to petulant individuals convinced that they can do everything themselves if they are only left alone, and that others are conspiring to keep them from doing just that. This is the one threat that will bring Americans into the streets.

Welcome to the politics of the libertarian mob. 

If we want to understand what today’s populism is about, we first need to understand what it isn’t about. It certainly is not about reversing the cultural revolution of the Sixties. Despite the rightward drift of the Republican Party over the past decade, the budding liberal consensus on social issues I noted in the Nineties has steadily grown—with the one, complicated exception of abortion.²

Lilla makes some great points about the “populist” movement of the right, is way too easily swayed by today’s demagouges-and more importantly for all their high sounding rhetoric masks a real childish, and selfish view of the world:

 My own view is that we need to take it even more seriously than they do; we need to see it as a manifestation of deeper social and even psychological changes that the country has undergone in the past half-century. Quite apart from the movement’s effect on the balance of party power, which should be short-lived, it has given us a new political type: the antipolitical Jacobin. The new Jacobins have two classic American traits that have grown much more pronounced in recent decades: blanket distrust of institutions and an astonishing—and unwarranted—confidence in the self. They are apocalyptic pessimists about public life and childlike optimists swaddled in self-esteem when it comes to their own powers.

Robespierre and the boys had the same idea back in the 1790′s- and when they failed to get the solutions they were seeking, they turned violently upon one another. Then, as now, they actually believed their rhetoric. That is not something even Ronald Reagan did: “ Ronald Reagan was a master of populist rhetoric, but he governed using the policy ideas of intellectuals he knew and admired (Milton Friedman, Irving Kristol, George Gilder, and Charles Murray among them). ”

Today’s conservatives are not so lucky-they are stuck with Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck.

Today’s conservatives prefer the company of anti-intellectuals who know how to exploit nonintellectuals, as Sarah Palin does so masterfully.¹⁶ The dumbing-down they have long lamented in our schools they are now bringing to our politics, and they will drag everyone and everything along with them. As David Frum, one of the remaining lucid conservatives, has written to his wayward comrades, “When you argue stupid, you campaign stupid. When you campaign stupid, you win stupid. And when you win stupid, you govern stupid.” (Unsurprisingly, Frum was recently eased out of his position at the American Enterprise Institute after expressing criticism of Republican tactics in the health care debate.)

We know how this book ends-and its not well. The French showed us that. However Lilla’s final point is worth remembering, this America, and bad dreams can come true:

For half a century now Americans have been rebelling in the name of individual freedom. Some wanted a more tolerant society with greater private autonomy, and now we have it, which is a good thing—though it also brought us more out-of-wedlock births, a soft pornographic popular culture, and a drug trade that serves casual users while destroying poor American neighborhoods and destabilizing foreign nations. Others wanted to be free from taxes and regulations so they could get rich fast, and they have—and it’s left the more vulnerable among us in financial ruin, holding precarious jobs, and scrambling to find health care for their children. We wanted our two revolutions. Well, we have had them.

Now an angry group of Americans wants to be freer still—free from government agencies that protect their health, wealth, and well-being; free from problems and policies too difficult to understand; free from parties and coalitions; free from experts who think they know better than they do; free from politicians who don’t talk or look like they do (and Barack Obama certainly doesn’t). They want to say what they have to say without fear of contradiction, and then hear someone on television tell them they’re right. They don’t want the rule of the people, though that’s what they say. They want to be people without rules—and, who knows, they may succeed. This is America, where wishes come true. And where no one remembers the adage “Beware what you wish for.”

I’m going to war with the State of Alabama. Got home after work today-and in my mail was this:

” Payments under the USFSPA are not considered alimony. Accordingly,  your claim for alimony payments has been disallowed. You owe us money!”

No f*cking shit, Sherlock. However did you read the rest of the 15 pages of documentation I provided you? A copy of my divorce decree, copies of cancelled checks, statements from DFAS, blood stained specimens of my enlarged a-hole. What more do you assholes need?

Of course-since I work for a living I got home after five-so I have to call them tomorrow. This ought to be fun. If you see me in a shoot out with Alabama state troops on TV -you will know this did not end well.

How much beer is in the fridge?

Under the category of ” I did not see that coming…” it would seem that when Sarah Palin needs to inject herself into the news cycle, and she is out of ideas ( a process that takes all of 30 seconds), she falls back on her funbags:

Which brings me, in a roundabout way, to the former governor’s tits. Mrs. Palin is possessed of a remarkable rack. Those are truly formidable funbags, particularly for a middle-aged woman who has had no fewer than five kids. She’s nothing less than three times hotter than America’s next sexiest governor, the Canadian Jennifer Granholm.

Because there hasn’t been anything serious happening in America this past week, there has been a great debate over whether Palin’s had her milkbags enhanced. Enquiring minds, after all, need to know … like me. Not that I care all that much. I’m of the unyielding conviction that all women over thirty should have their cans done, if only because I’m a compassionate conservative who cares deeply about family values. Nothing has driving up the divorce rate quite like wives with droopy jugs. Don’t those wives know that there are young secretaries with perky knockers out there just begging for overweight, balding husbands?

Palin denies having work done and I have no reason to disbelieve her, which might be a first. I think that she might be genetically perfect, or as polite society would put it, a mutant.

But that’s why she’s popular in the first place. I’m actually shocked that normally serious people would suggest otherwise. I can’t think of another reason why sa rational adult could listen to someone who’s being paid $2 million from America’s largest cable news network rail against “the lamestream media” without breaking out into hysterical laughter. That someone like Bill O’Reilly can pretend to take her seriously says more about O’Reilly’s skills as a thespian than it does about Palin’s integrity or intelligence.

I seriously doubt that Palin got a boob job-although it would be great to think that she did.  Where is Elaine when you need her?

I was in Japan on Memorial Day-and while I remembered the day in my mind-I also did little in the way of observing it. Certainly did not go to any ceremonies or the like. AFN had a bit about Memorial Services at the respective bases in Japan and ran the usual war movies.

A good number of bloggers ran poignant pieces about the cost in human lives that the nations 200+ year history has taken to maintain. Regardless of when they served, all the veterans interred in our  cemeteries sacrificed the comforts of home and absented themselves from the warmth and affection of loved ones. Since 1776, more than 1.5 million Americans have lost their lives while in uniform. Their sacrifices need to be honored, if for no other reason than that it reminds us of our history and the great price that has been paid for all Americans.

However there is a nagging voice of doubt in the back of my head, that points out that much of the words written-while dutiful and laudatory-miss an important point. Namely that the world has failed to keep its part of the bargain these men ( and women) made when they went off to war in the first place. Namely that the world was supposed to improve itself so that their sons and daughters would never have to make the same sacrifice that they had to make.

I find it exceedingly troubling that in our current time-we have pretty much come to accept continuous warfare as a fact of life. For just about all of the 29 years I served on active duty in the Navy-American forces were in combat somewhere in the world.  The last decade has seen the armed forces at war for the entire time. The odds are pretty good that they will be fighting for the next decade as well. And there seems to be a begrudging acceptance of this, as the way it was and will ever be.

This is progress?

That was never supposed to be the deal. In two world wars alone-75 million people died world wide. The world was supposed to find a saner way to run the planet. And yet, now after 6000 years of civilization’s history-we still try to solve problems through the clash of arms. This has to change. To paraphrase Herman Wouk:

[These events] stand as a monument to the subhuman stupidity of
warfare in our age of science and industry. War has always been a violent blind man’s bluff played with soldiers lives and nations resources. But the time for it is over. As the race has outgrown human sacrifice, human slavery, and dueling, it has to outgrow war…..The silliness of it all would be slapstick if it were not so
tragic.

The living have failed the dead. They broke the covenant-namely that their sacrifice was supposed to mean something and leave behind a better world for the generations that would follow. If anything, despite all our technology, the world is worse off today.

But what of the advances and the liberated peoples you ask? The liberation only has meaning if it brings material improvements in their lives. In so many places, that simply is not happening-if anything a lot of people are losing ground not gaining it.

If the sacrifices of our Soldiers and Sailors, Airman and Marines is to truly have meaning, we have to show improvements in this world. Not just in our own nation but in the other nations as a whole. That improvement was what they were really fighting for-we dishonor their memory by not taking that aim to heart.

Wouk’s admonition remains germane-Either war is finished, or we are.

Trying to convince the S.O. to do something. It does not appear to be working from this self portrait:

Speaking of portraits I have uploaded some more pix from the Japan trip.

A visit to Neko town.

Out to Chiba. ( Where the S.O. used to live).

Harajuku for girl watching.

And a Sunday afternoon at Yoyogi Park

Boy I could sure use one of these:

And this year-I’m getting behind the World Cup. Every where else in the world-businesses and life in general comes to a halt while national teams play for nationalism and bragging rights. The US? Er, not so much-we don’t seem to get behind our team the way other nations do. The World Cup will be a never thought or an after thought. It is a shame really-after all its an excuse to go to a pub.

So here is to all the World Cup widows out there:

Keeping the chain moving from Savannah: “the latest meme in blogville. the twist is that after i answer her [very good] questions, i get to ask 10 NEW questions and tag another set of bloggers!”

1. How many countries have you traveled to? ( Travel to means at least an overnight stay. Does not have to be exact.)

2. What is the best place you ever visited?

3. What was the worst place you have ever been-and would you go back?

4.  If you could change one thing, and only one thing, in the world to make it a better place, what would it be?

5. Who would you rather sleep with? Men: Tonya Harding or Nancy Kerrigan? (When they were in their figure skating battle). Women: Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert? Explain.

6. What is the worst thing to happen to the country you hold a passport for in the last 50 years?

7.  Do you view someone that you know, or know of as a “hero”? If so, what makes this individual so special?

8. If you could be born again would choose to be a different sex to what you are?

9. What is your favorite alcoholic drink? If you say,  ”I don’t drink”-STOP NOW. Just hang your head in shame.

10.  What is your favorite magazine?

Now to tag six people:

Sourrain-sorry, got to get you blogging again.

SJS

SkippyStalin

The Loon

Curtis-I’ll post it for you.

Lola

ja ne!

New albumns posted this morning-a couple more to follow.

For now you can visit Ameyoko, which is a neighborhood near Ueno Station. A great place to people watch and buy things for less money.

Tsukiji Fish Market.