Al-Maliki tacks on another Friedman unit

One of the older posts I recycled during my recent absence noted the August projection by Iraqi President Jalal Talabani that Iraq would be able to assume security duties by the end of the year. This year, that is. Well, we pretty much knew even then that Talabani was just skylarking, but now it’s official as Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki says the same thing…only it’ll happen a Friedman unit or so later (CNN link defunct).

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said Thursday he believed Iraqi forces would be ready by June 2007 to take full control of security in Iraq, an issue on which he pressed President Bush during their meeting in Amman, Jordan.

In making the argument that his military and police could handle security in the country, al-Maliki has routinely said the force could do the job within six months.

“I can say that Iraqi forces will be ready, fully ready to receive this command and to command its own forces, and I can tell you that by next June our forces will be ready,” al-Maliki said in an interview with ABC News.

Ready, fully ready. Sure thing, Nuri. But if not, don’t worry. We’ll just keep kicking the can down the road. As Atrios says, with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of Friedmans, we can stay in Iraq forever.

Good thing, too, since any thoughts of actually leaving Iraq are - according to The Decider - “unrealistic.”

Technorati Tags: Iraq

The speed of meme

Remember that lame science experiment you performed in grade school? You know, the baking soda and vinegar volcano? “C minus,” intoned your teacher, shaking her head. Well, here’s your shot at redemption. Scott Eric Kaufman at Acephalous is attempting to impress the Modern Language Association by quantifying an answer to that age-old (actually, fairly new) question: What is the speed of meme?

People write in general (typically truimphant) terms about how swiftly a single voice can travel from one side of the internet to the other and back again, but how often does that actually happen? Of those instances, how often is it organic?

Most memes, I’d wager, are only superficially organic: beginning small, they acquire minor prominence among low-traffic blogs before being picked up by a high-traffic one, from which many more low-traffic blogs snatch them. Contra blog-triumphal models of memetic bootstrapping, I believe most memes are—to borrow a term from Daniel Dennett’s rebuttal of punctuated equilibrium—”skyhooked” into prominence by high-traffic blogs.

Yeah, yeah, whatever. The important thing is that he needs about a jillion people to link to his post along with a brief description of his grand experiment. Oh, and be sure to ping Technorati manually, unless your blog’s settings do so automagically or something. Go ahead, do it. You’ll finally be able to put that grade school humiliation behind you once and for all.

Rerun season is over at Waveflux

The recent run of recycled posts here at Waveflux ended as of yesterday. I was out of town, as some of you likely suspected, but didn’t want the blog to go totally dark in my absence. Hope you enjoyed the blasts from the past, all made possible by the magic of scheduled posting.

Now then! I need a little time to catch my breath, and then we can get back to business as usual.

Interview with the officer: The Waveflux guide to impending arrest (redux)

(Another blast from the past while I am otherwise occupied: an encore presentation of a post first published here on September 27, 2004. Ask not for whom those sirens blare, friend; they blare for thee…)

During my last trip home, my brother and I chatted a bit about Cops. We love that show. My brother is always amused by the standard biographical spiel offered by an officer just before the lights come on and the hammer comes down. “I love this job” is how it usually goes, followed by something like “It gives you a chance to help people, help the community.” Then next thing you know, it’s “Get on the ground! Get on the ground now!” Not much touchy-feely “helping the community” jazz after that.

Most Saturday evenings will find me watching the usual two half-hour episodes of Cops. This usually follows the standard run of home shows on PBS, unless (like this week) the local affiliate is running one of their annoying, interminable, all too frequent pledge drives, in which case the home shows are replaced by Wayne-freakin’-Dyer, for the love of…but back to the topic. M usually watches Cops with me, though for the life of me I can’t explain why. One night as we witnessed the inevitable undoing of some meth dealer or other, M shook her head. “This show is all about people making bad choices,” she remarked.

“I’d say so,” I replied.

Of course people who commit crimes suffer from bad judgment; it goes with the territory. The problem on Cops - the problem in many intersections between lawbreakers and the police - is that the offender chooses to compound that initial bad choice. As a result, we have chases and shootings and other dire consequences. Many such regrettable incidents could be easily avoided, to the benefit of the offender, the officer, and society at large.

This is where yours truly, Waveflux, steps in. I am here to help.

Understand that there are indeed bad police officers out there: racists and homophobes and bullies and borderline psychopaths. However, they are relatively few in number. In my dealings with the law (and I’ve had a few, never you mind exactly how many), my officer was always professional and polite. Urban or rural, white or black, male or female; they were all very nearly courteous, actually. It’s certainly possible to aggravate any situation by way of bad choices, even situations involving heretofore polite police officers, and make it worse. Cops teaches us that, if it teaches us nothing else. However, it doesn’t have to be that way. Heed these tips and make your interview with the officer a survivable experience:

Ask not for whom the light flashes - it flashes for thee. This should not be a “judgment call.” Always assume that the squad car with the blinking lights and blaring siren wants you to pull over. If that’s not the case, you’ll know it when the officer drives by. Pull over immediately, rather than seeking a clear parking space a block away, or across town. This helps to avoid misunderstandings.

Do not attempt to flee the interview. Car chases endanger officers, fellow motorists, pedestrians, and you, the offender. Willingness to put the world at risk for your own sake does not speak well of your character, and officers take character into account when they decide how tight the handcuffs should be. Besides, officers have resources such as radios, fellow officers, spike strips, and helicopters that make flight a dubious proposition.

Sit still. You’ve pulled over; the officer is approaching. This is not a good time to move around in your car. You may want badly to stash the crack pipe or pour the beer out of the window, or to fumble for the Glock 18 you received as a graduation present. All of these are bad choices. Resist them. Instead, put the car in park, shut off the engine, and place your hands on the ten and two o’clock positions of your steering wheel. Do not get out of the car until and unless instructed to do so by your officer.

Show the papers. Surrender all documentation requested by the officer. License, registration, proof of insurance. Of course, the chances are good that you lack any or all of these documents. That’s part of being an offender. If you don’t have it, say so.

Do not pretend to be somebody else. Giving an alias never works. It takes mere minutes for the officer to determine that you are in fact Joe Blow, wanted felon, and not Bill Gates, software tycoon. Deception only irritates the officer, undermines trust, and promotes hostility.

Do not run. This bears repeating: do not run. Shows like Cops may give the impression that police officers enjoy a good foot pursuit. You may be certain that this is not the case. You’ve started the interview with an officer who is suspicious and alert; you do not want to make the officer hot, sweaty, tired, and footsore. Politeness pretty much goes out the window after a chase. You want politeness. Again: do not attempt to flee the interview.

Follow all commands promptly. Police officers usually speak in imperatives; the upside of this is that their instructions are unambiguous. “Get on the ground” is not subject to interpretation. “Put your hands behind your head” is similarly clear. You lose points by not obeying such commands quickly. Officers have an internal timer by which to measure your response. It goes like this: “one.” And that’s it. As with the flashing lights, always assume that such commands are directed toward you and not, say, the onlooker across the street.

No surprises. Children and spouses like surprises; police officers do not. This pertains particularly to anything you have on your person that can cut, puncture, or fire a bullet. Confess immediately to your interviewing officer that you have a syringe in your left pocket, or a switchblade in your right, or that Glock 18 you received as a graduation present stuffed down your crotch. While the officer will not be pleased that you have such objects on your person, volunteering this information ahead of time can spell the difference between a cordial interview and your face suddenly becoming one with the pavement.

No hide and seek. Similar to to the previous tip, but pertaining specifically to contraband in your vehicle. Trust is undermined when you deny the presence of drugs or weapons in your ‘78 Pacer and the officer subsequently discovers such items on his/her own. If it’s in there, it will be found. Lying to an police officer shows a lack of respect. Officers are big on respect. The intelligent offender keeps this in mind at all times.

Courteous is as courteous does. This speaks to the concept of respect mentioned above. Do not seek to antagonize your interviewing officer with insolent speech or a surly manner. This works against your own best interests: you want your officer calm and focused on the facts at hand. Forcing the officer to deal with bad manners on your part will swiftly turn the interview into an arrest. I’m assuming that you would like to avoid the arrest.

Stop resisting. If you hear that, it means that you have continued to make bad choices even after the beginning of the interview. Your options now are severely limited, and your prospects poor. The intelligent alternative is to give no officer cause to yell “stop resisting.” When you feel the cold bite of steel around your wrists, comfort yourself with the knowledge that the cuffs will be removed just as soon as you’re in a warm holding cell. Under no circumstances should you attempt to threaten an officer or fight him/her in any fashion. The officer’s right to return safely home to his/her family considerably outweighs your right to resist arrest. Remembering this is one way to emerge from the interview process healthy and whole.

I hope you keep these tips in mind during your next interview with a police officer. Following them may not keep you from being arrested - after all, that is your crack pipe on the floor of the Pacer. But intelligent actions during the interview can still make for a cordial and survivable experience. Sometimes that’s the best you can hope for.

Tales of Homeowning: The hellmouth (redux)

(As I toil in another vineyard, I am pleased to present the earliest post that really explains just who your’re dealing with here. First published on May 27, 2004. Enjoy.)

M and I own a charming little house in the Dogtown area of St. Louis. (”Dogtown?” you ask? There are competing theories on how the area got its name.) The house was constructed a few years after the 1904 World’s Fair. We have lived there for three years, and in that time have vacillated between various stages of relationship to our dwelling: enthusiasm, disquiet, dismay, pride, more disquiet, more dismay, dogged (sorry for the pun) persistence. That is, we’re like most other first-time homeowners.

You can always tell that spring has arrived when flying insects make their reappearance. That being so, we were initially unconcerned to note the occasional fly buzzing around the house. They were odd bugs, smaller than common houseflies, and not the kind of flies I had learned one might expect to see in a home this time of year. The cats - especially Baxter - were fascinated by the flying interlopers and would stalk them in hopes that one might light within striking range. We’d often had windows open, and the cats had done a number on a couple of the screens (who knows why they do that) and we assumed that the insects had gotten in that way.

Friday evening, I started to head downstairs to the basement for some reason or other, and was startled to find more flies just sort of hanging out on the walls of the stairwell landing. Not one or two flies. More like ten or twelve. I stared at them and thought: the basement. A chill ran through me, just like in the horror novels.

“Going downstairs, honey,” I said to M.

I went downstairs and looked around. I noted a couple of flies lazily wandering about. I glanced at the old single basin sink into which the washing machine empties when in use, then turned to stare at the circular drain in the basement floor. I felt another chill.

I cleared some boxes and odd items from around the drain, then removed the rusty grate so that I could peer inside. At first I could see nothing; it was dark inside. Then I saw that the darkness was in motion - a black, bubbling liquid.

“What the hell?” I asked.

Then I realized that the liquid was not bubbling, but moving on the surface, stirring, churning.

“What the hell,” I murmured.

Then I saw that what I was looking at wasn’t liquid - not entirely, anyway. From what I could tell, it was only about ten percent black liquid. The remaining ninety percent was composed of writhing, wriggling maggots.

“Hell,” I gasped.

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The fantasy president’s formula for victory (redux)

(Just a reminder that Bush’s plan, such as it is, hasn’t evolved. Originally published on December 19, 2005. You know, if you actually went back and read my archived entries, I wouldn’t have to resurrect them this way. Don’t worry; I’ll write new stuff when I can.)

Clap. Louder.

Louder.

Louder!

Thank you, and good night.

Technorati Tags: Iraq

This great and glorious day (redux)

(This post is an encore presentation - in the old days we called them reruns - of a post written on November 12, 2004.)

Via Running Scared:

As democracy is perfected, the office of president represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.

- H.L. Mencken (1880 - 1956)

Welcome to it.

Clip and save: “Iraqi forces to take over by year’s end” (redux)

(Here’s something we need to remember: another example of “hope as a plan” out of Iraq, originally published here on August 2, 2006. This is another in a series of reprints meant to distract you while I do other things.)

So says the president of Iraq:

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said Wednesday he foresees Iraqi forces taking over security in all 18 Iraqi provinces by the end of the year.

Talabani, who was speaking at a news conference, said the transition will be gradual and multinational forces will be playing a supportive role to the Iraqi troops.

“The role of the multinational forces is a role to help the Iraqi armed forces, and, God willing, the Iraqi armed forces will at the end of the year take over all of the security in all the Iraqi provinces, little by little, gradually, and, God willing, we will be in a position to do that,” he said.

God willing.

Technorati Tags: Iraq

All husbands are Homer Simpson (redux)

(Waveflux is proud to present an encore presentation of an earlier entry. This post was first published on June 1, 2004…which was a while ago.)

M and I ate dinner by candlelight a couple of evenings ago. This bit of romance came courtesy of the latest of several powerful storms that swept through the St. Louis area, felling trees, damaging cars, disrupting electrical grids (thirty-eight hours without electricity at our place at last count). About halfway through the meal, one of the large aromatic candles began to dribble wax onto the table top. “Careful, honey,” M warned.

I glanced down at the small pool of wax. It seemed to be cooling quickly. “This doesn’t look so hot,” I said, and promptly stuck my finger into the blue glob. A moment later, I found myself dashing for the sink where I ran blessedly cold water over my scalded finger.

M sat watching me for a moment. Then she sighed, the way all wives must sigh at some point in their lives. “I married Homer Simpson,” she said.

I was in no position to deny it.

Now that’s versatility

At every local TV station, there’s one reporter who’s the real workhorse, the most versatile correspondent, the man or woman that the producers can rely on to handle any story. The horrific early-morning car accident; the tragic house fire; the political press conference. For St. Louis-based NBC affiliate KSDK, that workhorse is Cordell Whitlock. He’s a solid reporter - not glamorous, not flashy, just serious-minded (more often than not) and clear. That may be why we like him so much here in Gatewayville. I bring him up today because of a Thanksgiving Day piece he wrote for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (link defunct) about the late Ed Bradley, who was Whitlock’s godfather. Bradley provided the younger man with much inspiration and guidance. Indeed, Bradley officiated at Whitlock’s wedding. (Lay people can do that in Massachusetts, apparently).

Evidently, Whitlock learned something of versatility from Bradley.

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