Hurrahpertif Monday – Earle, Hurricanes, Casualties

By Meteor Blades

Tom DeLay and the GOP chorus still haven’t given up trying to unpaint the stepped-aside Senate Majority Leader out of the corner he’s found himself in by smearing Austin District Attorney Ronnie Earle as a partisan hack. If you’d like to make up your own mind, you can’t do better than checking out John Richardson’s look at Earle in the March 2005 Esquire. An excerpt:

If he wanted to lay it on thick, he could mention that he's been voted Texas Prosecutor of the Year and Public Administrator of the Year for Austin or that his office was listed among the country's ten model offices by the National District Attorneys Association or that the Harvard professor who wrote "Broken Windows"—the influential study that helped Rudy Giuliani clean up New York—called his office "one of the most thoroughly problem-oriented agencies in criminal justice today." He could even give Fox a tweak, pointing out that Bill "Fair and Balanced" O'Reilly once singled him out for "innovative approaches to law enforcement." Or he could brag about the time in the early nineties when crime in Austin and Travis County dropped 19 percent a year, faster than in any other city in America.

Given the damage done by what seems to be an increasingly deadly cycle of hurricane frequency and intensity, one would think a little more money would flow toward researching these storms. One would be wrong. According to the Miami Herald, Money woes stifle hurricane science

While the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has been warning the nation about the rise in dangerous hurricanes, the agency has denied requests from its hurricane researchers for more scientists, modern equipment and backing for breakthrough projects, a Herald investigation found.

Since 1995, NOAA's Hurricane Research Division lost 11 scientists and has replaced just four, leaving 31 people and a base budget that hasn't topped $3.5 million in more than two decades. …

Our requests were dead on arrival,'' said former Hurricane Research Division Director Hugh Willoughby, who quit the post in 2002 after seven years of denials. ''Basically, it was a fool's errand.''

It won’t be long before the Iraq war costs the life of the 2000th G.I. Even if you’re among those like me who grinds their teeth every time American (or “coalition”) casualties are mentioned without reference to the horrific toll on Iraqis since March 2003, this milestone comes as another reminder of the price of imperial hubris.

Mark Benjamin over at Salon.com wonders why these fatalities aren’t registering with the American people. If you’re not a subscriber, you’ll have to read an ad to get access to the whole piece.

Military analysts say the outcry over deaths in Iraq is muted because the burden of war falls on a tiny percentage of Americans and their families. Most Americans simply don't have any personal connection to the battlefield.

To be precise, less than 1 percent of 297 million Americans are engaged in active duty military or the reserves, the lowest percentage of the population serving under arms in a century. Some Marines who died in Iraq were on their third tour of duty.

Americans felt other wars. Drafted civilians marched alongside career soldiers. More than 12 percent of Americans were involved in World War II, according to data compiled by Louisiana State University. Over 4 percent of Americans were in the military during Vietnam.

"Fewer Americans are serving, and fewer Americans know people who are serving," says Paul Rieckhoff, an Iraq vet and the executive director of Operation Truth, an advocacy group for veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan. "So many people are going about their business without thinking about our soldiers fighting and dying a half a world away. Maybe the 2,000th death will remind people of the human cost of this war, given how few people are really touched by it."

Nine days from now will mark the 40th anniversary of the death of one of those first 2000 to fall in Vietnam … Manny Miller, a high school buddy of mine. And although I had been in two dozen antiwar protests by the time Manny caught a jagged piece of metal in the face, not many Americans were yet taking notice of the toll that that insane 18-year–long war was taking.

Indeed, it would be almost eight years before the last “combat death” was recorded in Vietnam, although American soldiers, sailors, marines and flyers continued to die right up to and after the reins of government were handed over to Hanoi in 1975. If more people had paid attention sooner, perhaps that wall in Washington would be shorter, and there would be a few million fewer graves in Southeast Asia.

Comments

[greyhair]

I just put up a post that I think is related.

http://greyhairsblog.blogspot.com/2005/10/tacking-to-oblivion.html

I'm sick to death of a leaderless Democratic party. What "seems" to be happening to Paul Hackett is an example of the stupidity going on in the Democratic party.

Why aren't the Democrats out front on the war, the casualties, foreign policy, healthcare.... Those poor guys fighting and dying in Iraq have been abandoned..by both parties. It's pathetic and I'm disgusted.

[Pedant]

"Nine days from now will mark the 20th anniversary of the death of one of those first 2000 to fall in Vietnam"

40th anniversary, surely?

[Meteor Blades]

Indeed. Thanks. Fixed.

[thutmosis]

How sad.
Democrats can't make their **ing mind. Not a good omen of coming attractions. Mr. Brown had all the time to decide whether to run or not for the senate before Hackett got in the ring. Both of them appear to be equally appealing candidates, a breed Democrats are sorely lacking, and may end up shooting each other in the foot to the glee of Republicans. The race is just starting. Lack of organization and communication will doom democrats in 2006 and 2008. The Democratic party better get accustomed to living in the political wilderness. They do not seem ready for prime time. I would not be surprised if Hackett switches parties. Soldiers will continue to die.

[thutmosis]

How sad.
Democrats can't make their **ing mind. Not a good omen of coming attractions. Mr. Brown had all the time to decide whether to run or not for the senate before Hackett got in the ring. Both of them appear to be equally appealing candidates, a breed Democrats are sorely lacking, and may end up shooting each other in the foot to the glee of Republicans. The race is just starting. Lack of organization and communication will doom democrats in 2006 and 2008. The Democratic party better get accustomed to living in the political wilderness. They do not seem ready for prime time. I would not be surprised if Hackett switches parties. Soldiers will continue to die.

[mindgeek]

In line 1 of your post, don't you mean the House Majority Leader, not the Senate leader (Frist)?

[jonnybutter]

Even if you’re among those like me who grinds their teeth every time American (or “coalition”) casualties are mentioned without reference to the horrific toll on Iraqis since March 2003

(...)

If more people had paid attention sooner, perhaps that wall in Washington would be shorter, and there would be a few million fewer graves in Southeast Asia.

I grind my teeth every time. Iraq and Vietnam are pretty different wars in some ways, but the plain immorality of slaughtering tens of thousands of 'local' people is the same. Also the same as when the governments of Iraq and Iraq slaughtered a few million of each other's people just to keep folks 'fired up' and patriotic. Our president is a weak man who, when confronted with a new kind of enemy, tragically chose to make America more, rather than less, like that enemy (and by 'enemy' I mean the Salafis). It's a world historical blunder, the quintessence of bad character writ large.

As Jon Stewart said last week: 'Remember Iraq? That was the category 5 shitstorm...'

As old man Plato said: 'One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors.'

[jonnybutter]

Since this is an open thread, one more pertinent quote, from Brecht (just to 'balance' the Plato):

Those who take the meat from the table
Teach contentment.
Those for whom the taxes are destined
Demand sacrifice.
Those who eat their fill speak to the hungry
Of wonderful times to come.
Those who lead the country into the abyss
Call ruling too difficult
For ordinary men.

Hard work!