evolution

Yeah, that’s probably a sarcastic-sounding headline.

The only reason I’m highlighting this is because I taught¹ at Junction City High. Some students of mine had relatives that were hurt in the war.

Not sure why this was news in Lawrence on February 11, 2009, but there you have it.

No political commentary here or in the story really; I’ll just say that a) the effects probably run a lot deeper than this or any story can convey, and b) Military service exacts such a toll on one and one’s family that I can’t imagine why anyone would want to do it.

Thankfully for those of us that are not so motivated, they do.

1. or whatever it was I thought I did [↩]

Possibly.

Samantha Power, you’ll recall, was one of Barack Obama’s senior foriegn policy advisers. I say “was” because she was fired after referring to Hillary Clinton as “a monster” to The Scotsman (fired after what, an hour?) and an el foldo by the Obama people.

Turns out, as this Obsidian Wings post shows, she may have formed that opinion long before she ever met Barack Obama, based on her evaluation of how the Clintons, the worthless State Department¹, and the U.S. government dealt with the Rwandan genocide of the 1990s.

The content of the post is shocking (but hardly surprising) if it is an accurate portrayal of events — and I must say that I believe it is. Be sure to read it all.

1. Just because State was staffed by Democrats then isn’t what makes it worthless. It’s headed by Republicans now, and it’s still just as worthless. [↩]

I’m sure the rebel leader appreciates Mia Farrow’s gesture, but she just doesn’t get it:

KHARTOUM (Reuters) – Mia Farrow has offered her freedom in exchange for that of a respected Darfur rebel figure, virtually imprisoned for more than 13 months, in a letter to Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir.

That would be the Omar Hassan al-Bashir who overthrew a democratically-elected president in order to impose an Islamic state by force, while attempting to exterminate other ethnic and religious groups in Sudan.

Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) Humanitarian Coordinator Suleiman Jamous has been confined to a U.N. hospital in Kordofan, neighboring Darfur, since the United Nations moved him there without permission last year.

He needs a stomach biopsy which cannot be performed there.

Khartoum said if he left he would be arrested, but has said it is open to talks on his release.

“Before his seizure, Mr. Jamous played a crucial role in bringing the SLA to the negotiating table and in seeking reconciliation between its divided rival factions,” Farrow said in the letter dated August 5.

“I am therefore offering to take Mr. Jamous’s place, to exchange my freedom for his in the knowledge of his importance to the civilians of Darfur and in the conviction that he will apply his energies toward creating the just and lasting peace that the Sudanese people deserve and hope for.”

This, of course, assumes that all parties want peace. And they do — but on vastly different terms.

NATO: Iran caught red-handed shipping arms to Taliban.

NATO officials say they have caught Iran red-handed, shipping heavy arms, C4 explosives and advanced roadside bombs to the Taliban for use against NATO forces, in what the officials say is a dramatic escalation of Iran’s proxy war against the United States and Great Britain.

“It is inconceivable that it is anyone other than the Iranian government that’s doing it,” said former White House counterterrorism official Richard Clarke, an ABC News consultant.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates stopped short earlier this week of blaming Iran, saying the U.S. did not have evidence “of the involvement of the Iranian government in support of the Taliban.”

Welcome to the face of post-Iraq “realism”.*

But an analysis by a senior coalition official, obtained by the Blotter on ABCNews.com, concludes there is clear evidence of Iran’s involvement.

“This is part of a considered policy,” says the analysis, “rather than the result of low-level corruption and weapons smuggling.”

Iran and the Taliban had been fierce enemies when the Taliban was in power in Afghanistan, and their apparent collaboration came as a surprise to some in the intelligence community.

The “intelligence community”, at least as pertains to that region and to Islamic extremism, doesn’t seem to be worth a bucket of warm piss over the last fifteen years.

*: I’d love to say years of being addled by transnational leftism and its Orwellian notions of “tolerance” caused this, but as much as anything, George Bush’s incompetence in an astonishing variety of arenas caused it.

Hillary announces effort to revoke war powers.

A cursory scan of the right-o-sphere — which, let’s be honest, is where I hang out most of the time — will show that the British sailors recently captured and then released are alternately objects of pity and objects of scorn. What happened to the “stiff upper lips”, they ask. What happened to standing up for your country, they ask. You should have resisted, they say. What happened to “name, rank, and serial number”?

Leaving aside the question of whether or not England is worth standing up for these days, which is ultimately irrelevant, I don’t blame them one bit.

If you are captured by a regime such as Iran, or any of a dozen other terrorist financiers, you can assume the following (particularly if you are an American, but this applies to any Westerner):

1. That, contra the Geneva Conventions, you will be trotted out and displayed for as many propaganda purposes as your captors can think of;
2. That you will be killed as soon as either these purposes run out or they decide that killing you serves such a purpose (for example, stirring their own people up); and
3. That no one — certainly no Western power — is going to come to your aid, unless that “aid” comes in the form of toast points and shrimp cocktails. Their own politics at this point preclude it.

And what about “name, rank, and serial number?” As every teacher knows, the key to expecting a certain behavior is to a) clearly define what is acceptable and b) either demonstrate or provide detailed instruction on how to produce that acceptable result. If none among these sailors demonstrated that, it’s not the fault of the individual sailors — it’s the fault of the Royal Navy. Also the fault of the Royal Navy are whatever rules of engagement that did not allow them to defend themselves when they were clearly not in Iranian waters.

The predictable calculation of someone with a well-developed sense of self-preservation in this situation would be a strictly mercenary one — if no one’s going to bother putting any effort into defending me (or helping me defend myself), why should I bother defending them?

It might be reasonable to ask for at least some stoicism rather than to wave and blow kisses to Ahmadenijad on the way home, but that too is irrelevant on balance.

So under those conditions (and for civilians under any conditions), the sailors have my blessing, for whatever that may be worth, to lie, grovel, and schmooze their way to survival. They weren’t equipped to do any other.