The letter at this website really pissed me off. Here's a copy of the letter for those of you with browsers that don't support links:

RE: Blacklisting

From Robert Kennedy

Hello again Charles,

How Darel Jenkins can see recent actions by France as fighting for freedom is a mystery to me. And Saddam is a beacon for freedom? The facts are out there, if one only takes the time to look. Why on earth anyone would choose to believe Saddam's assessments over the United States is another total mystery. Who has given more aid around the world? Saddam? Who has killed hundreds of thousands of their own citizens? The U.S.?

Point by point, the claims of 99 percent of the oppositions to Saddams removal can be countered with very little research. Therefor, I can only conclude that there is a blind hate for Bush/U.S.

Some of my favorite point-counter points:

The US is bad because of the large percentage of consumption.
- So we should strive for an Iraqi like existence?

Bush rushed to, and was hell-bent on, a unilateral war.
- 14 to 16 months of diplomatic talks is a rush?
- Diplomacy was attempted to avoid war. If the whole world had united against Saddam, war could very well have been avoided.
- Unilateral seems to be confused with unanimous. 40+ nations is hardly unilateral!

Bush is only after oil.
- Why hasn't this happened in the numerous previous opportunities?

It's none of our business. Saddam hasn't bothered anyone lately.
- I guess then we shouldn't pursue criminals, as they are just trying to make a living.
- As long as a criminal hasn't killed lately, it is good evidence they will not kill again.
- Crime is inevitable. No point in doing anything to prevent it.

Again, thank you Charles for your Canadian voice of reason! This American (with Canadian family) really appreciates it!

Rob Kennedy

Rather than going through the tediousness of actually crafting a new response, I'll just post the e-mail I sent to the author of that "mailbag" article here and be done with it:

The Strong Evidence against the War in Iraq

Charles,

I'd like to address this letter that Mr. Rob Kennedy sent in to your mailbag.

Hello again Charles,

How Darel Jenkins can see recent actions by France as fighting for freedom is a mystery to me. And Saddam is a beacon for freedom? The facts are out there, if one only takes the time to look. Why on earth anyone would choose to believe Saddam's assessments over the United States is another total mystery. Who has given more aid around the world? Saddam? Who has killed hundreds of thousands of their own citizens? The U.S.?

Who has bombed more countries since WWII than any other nation in the world? Iraq, led by Saddam Hussein? Certainly not. Here's a list of countries that the U.S. has bombed since the end of WWII, compiled by historian William Blum:

China 1945-46; Korea 1950-53; China 1950-53; Guatemala 1954; Indonesia 1958; Cuba 1959-60; Guatemala 1960; Congo 1964; Peru 1965; Laos 1964-73; Vietnam 1961-73; Cambodia 1969-70; Guatemala 1967-69; Grenada 1983; Libya 1986; El Salvador 1980s; Nicaragua 1980s; Panama 1989; Iraq 1991-2003; Sudan 1998; Afghanistan 1998; Yugoslavia 1999; Afghanistan 2001

( Source: http://members.aol.com/superogue/bomb.htm )

Can Iraq claim as many bombings? Or perhaps Mr. Rob Kennedy would like to name one of those instances where a democratic government respectful of human rights occurred as a direct result?


Point by point, the claims of 99 percent of the oppositions to Saddams removal can be countered with very little research. Therefor, I can only conclude that there is a blind hate for Bush/U.S.

Here are some of my "counter-point"-"counter-counter-points":

Some of my favorite point-counter points:

The US is bad because of the large percentage of consumption.
- So we should strive for an Iraqi like existence?

Is this supposed to be a response to the fact that people in the U.S. consume and waste so much food and energy? Is the recommended solution to look at Iraqi's existence to justify this horrendous wastefulness? I hope that Mr. Rob Kennedy was just joking. The point is that we in the U.S. use more resources per capita than many other third-world countries combined. Shouldn't we be trying to lower our resource consumption without lowering our standard of living so that more resources can be given to help people in these other countries?

Bush rushed to, and was hell-bent on, a unilateral war.
- 14 to 16 months of diplomatic talks is a rush?
- Diplomacy was attempted to avoid war. If the whole world had united against Saddam, war could very well have been avoided.
- Unilateral seems to be confused with unanimous. 40+ nations is hardly unilateral!

Oh, really? On September 17, 2002, the first meeting with weapons inspectors with Iraq took place( source: http://www.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/meast/09/17/iraq.un/ ). By my count, that makes only 7 months, not to mention the fact that Bush didn't even let weapons inspectors finish their work, and that Bush announced his plans to potentially invade Iraq later than this date. Blix himself stated that Iraq was cooperating and that they were confident that the issue over biological/chemical/nuclear weapons could be resolved fully through weapons inspections. Yet Bush ignored this.

Yes, the whole world was backing the weapons inspections in Iraq. Yes, war could have very well been avoided, had it not been for Bush's rash decision to ignore the weapons inspectors AND the U.N. Security Council, and to invade Iraq. Obviously, there were serious ramifications to invading Iraq that many countries identified, yet Bush decided to ignore these.

Bush is only after oil.
- Why hasn't this happened in the numerous previous opportunities?

North Korea has publicly stated that it has chemical/biological/nuclear weapons and that it will use them if necessary. Why aren't we forcing inspections on North Korea, or even invading North Korea? No, we want to invade Iraq, because of the POSSIBILITY of having these kinds of weapons, whereas we should use diplomacy with North Korea when there is a CERTAINTY of having these kinds of weapons. Can Mr. Rob Kennedy seriously tell me that this policy makes sense?

Furthermore, our administration now says that we need to halt nuclear weapons programs in IRAN after dealing with Iraq. WHAT the?!? How come we haven't done anything about North Korea?

The key to the puzzle is the vast oil reserves that exist in the Middle East. It is a fact that we are going to run out of oil in about the next 50 years, so if we want to continue our outrageous wastefulness that exists in this country (the U.S.), then we need all the oil we can get. Somehow, "our" oil got planted underneath Iraq, and now we feel we have an obligation to claim "our" oil. The fact that we are going to war with Iraq with some doubt and continuing diplomatic negotiations with North Korea without any doubt shows that this argument is indeed true.

Lastly, why is it that WE OURSELVES are allowed to continue to have nuclear weapons? Where are the weapons inspectors coming into OUR country expecting US to disarm and destroy our weapons. It seems that the current administration has set a double-standard: "nobody should have nuclear weapons*" ( *except the U.S.). This is ridiculous.

It's none of our business. Saddam hasn't bothered anyone lately.
- I guess then we shouldn't pursue criminals, as they are just trying to make a living.
- As long as a criminal hasn't killed lately, it is good evidence they will not kill again.
- Crime is inevitable. No point in doing anything to prevent it.

No, it really IS none of our business. Saddam HAS NOT bothered anyone lately. Can Mr. Rob Kennedy please mention what an Iraqi/Saddam has recently done to him? I can mention a recent tragedy that was committed not by Iraqis, but by someone else: I hope Mr. Rob Kennedy remembers the September 11th attacks of 2001. Was that by Iraq or Saddam? No, that was by Osama bin Laden, who carried out his operation from AFGHANISTAN. Why aren't we invading Afghanistan, then? Why aren't we going after Osama bin Laden anymore? When was the last time you heard Osama bin Laden mentioned in the news anymore -- not recently, because Bush has turned our focus away from who really has committed a crime against our citizens on to one who controls the oil in the Middle East, claiming that there is a link.

Perhaps Mr. Rob Kennedy could identify the link that exists between Al-Qaeida/Osama bin Laden and Iraq/Saddam. I certainly have seen no credible evidence.


One last thing that I would like to address: the usage of fake evidence to support this war. Don't believe me? Then just read this article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn?pagename=article&node=&contentId=A59403-2003Mar7&notFound=true ("Some Evidence on Iraq Called Fake", by Joby Warrick, 3/8/03).

The facts from this article are damning: the tubes that Iraq had "attempted to purchase" were "'not directly suitable' for centrifuges, but appeared intended for use as conventional artillery rockets, AS IRAQ HAD CLAIMED [emphasis added]".

Maybe Mr. Rob Kennedy would like to explain why later on in January, specifically on Jan. 28 as the article mentions, Bush told to the American public about the use of these aluminum tubes for nuclear weapons when it had been discovered EARLIER IN THE MONTH that they were NOT SUITABLE for such a purpose. Bush lied to the American public in his State of the Union Address, and yet there has not been a major outcry about this.

It is outrageously clear, merely from the facts I have stated, that the war in Iraq has not been suitably justified.

Charles, I would appreciate it if you publish my e-mail in its entirety to your mailbag page. I understand that it is very long, but I feel that this response is necessary because of the false arguments of Mr. Rob Kennedy that you published. Note that I have refrained from calling anybody names, yet I have only expressed my indignation and anger at the fact that this war is being allowed to continue.

If you feel so inclined, I also would like to hear your response on the points I have outlined above.

Thank you.

-- Simone Manganelli
Ellipsis Productions

For some reason I used my company name in the signature, and I'm just noticing that now. :shrug:

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Enough of that political stuff of which I've been raging about lately. Here's something a bit cooler: I got to test-drive a Segway (you DO know about the Segway, right?)! That was pretty cool, I must say. There was a guy from the garbage company on the sidewalk near our dorm who was riding one, and I saw it as I went off to class. Luckily, my class was cancelled, so as I was riding back the guy was still there talking to some students, so I hopped off my bike and listened in.

It was pretty cool, the guy was talking about it and allowing interested students to ride on it. Apparently he intended to go out for a 5 minute break but so many people were interested in it that he eventually stayed out there for an hour! Anyway, I got to ride on it for a few minutes.

Getting on was kind of funny, because I didn't have a clue as how to balance myself, and I realized seconds later that the guy was holding on to the Segway to prevent me from rolling, so when he started letting go, I started to go backwards! Anyway, you have to kind of bend your knees a bit to give yourself a bit of suspension when you're starting off. Then you just lean forward a bit to go forward, and lean backward a bit to go back. There's handlebars to help keep you on the thing, but it's pretty well designed. I pretty much got the hang of it in about 20-30 seconds (I didn't do any fast riding or anything, but I was comfortable with moving back and forth and turning). The left handlebar is also turnable, and you use that to turn the Segway. You can turn in place (which is pretty cool, allowing you to be much more maneuverable), and of course you can still turn while moving forwards and backwards. Once you get on it, it's pretty straightforward and you get used to it pretty fast (or at least I did). It was pretty natural once you got the hang of it.

Of course, there are two caveats (and possibly more in the future). The first is that it costs $5000, which is quite the pretty penny. The second is that you can't use it in San Francisco... they've banned it on sidewalks, and needless to say it would be quite dangerous to ride it in the streets. It's quite possible that more cities will start banning them on their sidewalks due to the fact that they could be pretty dangerous.

All in all, though, it seems like a really cool invention (I saw Dean Kamen on the Segway last Saturday at the FIRST robotics competition, where I also saw Mr. Randall, Mr. Florendo, and a few other people I knew from high school), and if I could afford one, I might possibly eschew my bicycle in favor of this newfangled contraption.

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The last thing on my list is this gem of a website, which needs no introduction: it lists the top 100 April Fools Day hoaxes of all time. Here are a few of my favorites:

#1: The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest
In 1957 the respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in, and many called up wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti trees. To this question, the BBC diplomatically replied that they should "place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best." Check out the actual broadcast archived on the BBC's website (You need the RealVideo player installed to see it, and it usually loads very slowly).

#2: San Serriffe
In 1977 the British newspaper The Guardian published a special seven-page supplement in honor of the tenth anniversary of San Serriffe, a small republic located in the Indian Ocean consisting of several semi-colon-shaped islands. A series of articles affectionately described the geography and culture of this obscure nation. Its two main islands were named Upper Caisse and Lower Caisse. Its capital was Bodoni, and its leader was General Pica. The Guardian 's phones rang all day as readers sought more information about the idyllic holiday spot. Few noticed that everything about the island was named after printer's terminology. The success of this hoax is widely credited with launching the enthusiasm for April Foolery that then gripped the British tabloids in the following decades.

#6: Hotheaded Naked Ice Borers
In its April 1985 issue Discover Magazine announced that the highly respected wildlife biologist Dr. Aprile Pazzo had discovered a new species in Antarctica: the hotheaded naked ice borer. These fascinating creatures had bony plates on their heads that, fed by numerous blood vessels, could become burning hot, allowing the animals to bore through ice at high speeds. They used this ability to hunt penguins, melting the ice beneath the penguins and causing them to sink downwards into the resulting slush where the hotheads consumed them. After much research, Dr. Pazzo theorized that the hotheads might have been responsible for the mysterious disappearance of noted Antarctic explorer Philippe Poisson in 1837. "To the ice borers, he would have looked like a penguin," the article quoted her as saying. Discover received more mail in response to this article than they had received for any other article in their history.

#36: Discovery of the Bigon
In 1996 Discover Magazine reported on the discovery by physicists of a new fundamental particle of matter. This particle, dubbed the Bigon, could only be coaxed into existence for mere millionths of a second, but amazingly, when it did materialize it was the size of a bowling ball. Physicist Albert Manque and his colleagues accidentally found the particle when a computer connected to one of their vacuum-tube experiments exploded. Video analysis of the explosion revealed the Bigon hovering over the computer for a fraction of a second. Manque theorized that the Bigon might be responsible for a host of other unexplained phenomena such as ball lightning, sinking souffles, and spontaneous human combustion. Discover received huge amounts of mail in response to the story.

#7, 8, 11, 15, and 24 are also some great ones. I'm sure you'll all find your own favorites. :)