Tannishblog

Vladimir Putin says the US is destabilizing the world and forcing an escalation of nuclear proliferation.

The world, he said, is now unipolar: “One single center of power. One single center of force. One single center of decision making. This is the world of one master, one sovereign.”

[…]

“It has nothing in common with democracy, of course,” he added. “Today we are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations — military force.”

“Primarily the United States has overstepped its national borders, and in every area,” said Mr. Putin, who increasingly has tried to re-establish Russia’s once broad Soviet-era influence, using Russia’s natural resources as leverage and defending nations at odds with the United States, including Iran.

American military actions, which he termed “unilateral” and “illegitimate,” also “have not been able to resolve any matters at all,” and, he said, have created only more instability and danger.

John McCain challenges Mr. Putin, as does Gordon D. Johndroe, a White House spokesman. What would you expect?

Meanwhile, Nuclear Arms talks with North Korea has broken down and Iran reiterates its resolve to pursue nuclear technology. Indeed.

Dahr Jamail offers a unique view on Iraq by wondering if coalition troops aren’t being toyed with:

The slaughter of 263 people in Najaf by Iraqi and U.S. forces Jan. 29 provoked outrage and vows of revenge among residents in and around the sacred Shia city in the south. The killings have deepened a split among Shias. Iran is predominantly Shia, one of the two main groupings within Islam along with the Sunnis. Iraq has for the first time a Shia-dominated government, comprising groups that have been openly supportive of Iran.

The people killed were mostly Shias from the Hawatim tribe that opposes the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq as well as the Dawa Party. These two pro-Iranian groups control the local government in Najaf and the government in Baghdad. The Najaf attack has provoked strong reactions among members of the Hawatim tribe and among other Shia groups who are not loyal to Iran - and who became the target in those killings. An attack on a local tribal leader led to an assault on members of the tribe by U.S., British and Iraqi forces. The tribe was described by government officials as a "messianic cult."

Abid Ali who witnessed the Najaf fighting told IPS that a procession of roughly 200 pilgrims from the Hawatim tribe had arrived in the Zarqa area near Najaf to celebrate the Ashura festival. Following a confrontation over the procession, Iraqi army soldiers at a checkpoint shot dead Hajj Sa’ad Sa’ad Nayif al-Hatemi, chief of the tribe, as he and his wife sat in their car. Members of the tribe then attacked the checkpoint to avenge the death of their chief.

"It was after this that the Iraqi army called in the Americans, and the planes began bombing civilians," Ali said. "It was a massacre. Now I believe the internal Shia fighting has entered a very dangerous phase."

Ali added that most people in the area believe the U.S. military was told by Iraqi security forces loyal to the pro-Iranian government in Baghdad that "terrorists" or the "messianic cult" was attacking Najaf. They say the misinformation was intended to mislead occupation forces into attacking the tribe.

Many Shias in the southern parts of the country and in Baghdad now say they had been fooled earlier by U.S. promises to help them, but that the Najaf massacre has dramatically changed their views. Significantly, the Association of Muslim Scholars, a group of Sunni Muslims headed by Dr. Harith al-Dhari, issued a statement condemning the Iraqi-U.S. military attack in Najaf against the Hawatim tribe. The statement, which seeks to bridge a Shia-Sunni divide, denounced the killing of dozens of women and children and added, "It was an act of vengeance and political termination."

"They (the United States) were misled, and their last move in Najaf shows how the smart Iranians are leading the Americans deeper into Iraqi sands," Jaafar al-Jawadi, a political analyst from Baghdad told IPS.

"I really admire the way Iranians are dealing with the situation in a professional way while the Americans are walking with their eyes closed. They are losing the last Iraqi fort they were hiding behind, and that was the peaceful way Arab Shias were dealing with occupation."
(c)2007 Dahr Jamail.

As bumbling as our administration is, this scenario seems possible. In a top-down organization based upon secrecy, how are the grunts supposed to make a informed decision? In such a convoluted situation who can tell who the enemy is? (rhetorical question; the enemy is us.)

Also, America’s anti-Iran propaganda gets a nudge from a new report linking the manufacture of explosively formed penetrators or E.F.P.s, to Iran. These are munitions designed to send blasts of molten copper through the armor of nearby troops. Almost half of our casualties are a result of this technology. Speak after me: "Weapons of Mass Destruction." Yep, we’re almost to Tehran…

No wonder they’re starting to quote William Butler Yeats.

The Second Coming - W.B. Yeats

Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.

Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?

I’ve been wondering lately about Barack Obama’s decision. Will he or won’t he run for president. The Washington Post seems to be smoothing the red carpet for him with a summary of Barack’s experience. I guess that’s the danger of entering the national political circus looking like and undergrad. People will question your leadership credentials in way they, well, haven’t lately with anyone else.

The real question is this: Is America ready for a black presidential candidate? Let’s leave aside the possibility, however remote is may be today, of a black president. Can the guy bring all his charisma to bear to overcome covert and overt expressions of racism?

Is the money there? Black leaders and white uber-liberals will turn our en masse, but that’s the race thingy again.

Will he have mass appeal? I’m sure he’ll have Chicago and Illinois in his pocket, assuming the Domcratic Party wants to join the festivities. But hat about - again the race issue - the deep south? The Christian Conservatives? Hey, I’m not calling the CC racists, but I cannot recall them backing a non-Caucasian for any post, ever. If I’m wrong, comment.

Then there’s my concern, posted here, about some nutjob doing a Bobby Kennedy on the guy. ‘Nuff said.

Regardless on anyone’s views, Obama is the quintessential Media Darling: eloquent, photogenic, dynamic. He’s still fresh enough to be a pseudo-outsider in regards to the beltway, thereby affording him underdog status. A lot of attention is going to be focused on how much money he can or cannot gather, whose pitching in, and how it compares to the war chests of Hillary, McCain or Edwards - whoever, really.

The Media is going to focus on the man, not his words. Their going to show the cult of personality, not the issues on the minds of Americans. All fluff, no substance: Obamathon 2007. Get your tee-shirt.

The NY Times today had an interesting "Quote of the Day:"

"This is all being made up as we go along. It is difficult to apply the old ways campaigns were run in late 20th century to this new wide-open citizen-led politics."  SIMON ROSENBERG, of the New Democrat Network, on politicians’ use of the Internet.

Referring to an article on the recent trend of hiring prominent bloggers for  presidential campaigns, this quote obstensibly covers the clash of cultures between the loose-cannon, almost-anarchistic blogosphere and the tighty-whitey stodginess of political presentations. Interesting. But that’s not what the article is really about.

John Edwards came under fire last week for hiring two feminist bloggers, Amanda Marcotte of Pandagon and Melissa McEwan, aka Shakespeare’s Sister. These ladies are well loved in their communities, stellar bloggers, and - and this is the sticking point - highly opinionated. Both have said disparaging remarks about religious institutions and the political stances they own.

In some of their online writings, Ms. Marcotte and Ms. McEwan used vulgar language to characterize religious conservatives and Roman Catholic teachings on birth control, homosexuality and the virgin birth.

On her personal blog, Shakespeare’s Sister, Ms. McEwan had referred to conservative Christians as “Christofascists.” On the Pandagon blog site, Ms. Marcotte had said that the Catholic Church’s prohibition on the use of birth control forced women to bear “more tithing Catholics.”

This week, William A. Donohue, the president of the Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights, had called for Mr. Edwards to dismiss the women. Stunned to learn that he did not, Mr. Donohue said in an interview Thursday, “The bloggers are no longer the issue. Edwards is the issue.”

To my jaded mind it speaks volumes about the sensitivity and fear many religious leaders have about open debate within their sphere of influence. To exemplify this fear we only need to re-read the above clip. Mr, Donohue didn’t get what he wants, so he responds with what amounts to a declaration of war. If he was more genuine, he would scowl and stamp a foot like the petulant inner-child he appears.

To appease the accompanied media frenzy, Mr. Edwards extracted a public apology from his bloggers. Unfortunately this give credence to such sinister tactics folks like Mr. Donohue love to wield.

In deciding to retain Ms. Marcotte and Ms. McEwan, (John Edwards) extracted public apologies from them for some of their work and a promise from them to maintain a civil tone while in his employ.

Give me a break. Both women are team blogging with like-minded friends. Nothing is stopping their co-authors from ripping out. Okay, they don’t talk about work during the campaign. Any blogger worth her keyboard knows work-whine is poor subject matter. Not only are these self-renouncements hollow and desultory, they will affect no change in the actions of offended parties like Mr. Donohue. The damage has been done.

So: we have a convergence of the grass roots political blognation with old-school political aspirations. We also have a divergence of passionate free speech from a culture of stymied rigidity as exemplified by religious leaders.

What do these conflicts have in common? A palpable shift in power is accelerated by the unpredictable and (so far) uncontrollable Internet. Politicians are trying to ride the wild bull, fundamentalist leaders are trying to kill it. Both institutions fear this shift and anyone fears change. Both institutions have much to lose if they cannot make this new beast behave. Politics will attempt redirection through assimilation. Religions will do what they’ve always done: kill the infidels.

I haven’t mentioned lately how much I like Jan Schakowsky. She’s a feisty lady with spine and that’s what the Democrats need more of - backbone. In her recent newsletter, she’s hopping mad at President Warmonger’s latest unbalanced budget (he’s at least consistent.) Read the President’s Dangerous Budget.

President Bush has produced a dangerous budget that puts Americans at risk. The budget cuts programs vital to our economic well-being, sinks hundreds of billions more into the war in Iraq without fully equipping our troops, and puts us further in debt to other nations. This budget must be stopped.

The President’s budget gives the Pentagon $623 billion, an increase of 62% since he took office. The budget sinks another $145 billion into the war in Iraq - another sign that the President has no plans to bring our troops home before the end of his term. Even with the massive increases in the Defense budget, the President still leaves behind our troops. Just last week, an Inspector General’s report concluded that our troops in Iraq still do not havethe equipment they need to defend themselves after four years of war

The President’s budget not only endangers our soldiers in the field, but it also threatens Americans at home. This budget takes money directly out of vital domestic investments by cutting education by $3.1 billion, slashing food assistance for 440,000 seniors, and reducing child care assistance for 300,000 of the working poor. Furthermore, it includes cuts of $280 billion to Medicare and Medicaid. The President won’t allow Medicare to negotiate for lower drug prices, but he’s content to make the elderly pay more and to limit health care coverage for the poor.

A list of who is affected by the President’s budget cuts is availablehere.

The Washington Post does a one-two punch on budgetary concerns with today’s coverage: Bush Plan Reigns In Domestic Spending, and A Closer Look at Where the Money Will Go. (Domestic spending? Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do - Go to Disneyland and leave all the war stuff to the President?)

Jan’s not the only one bristling. The Act For Change people are collecting petition signatures in support of the War De-Escalation Act of 2007. After Downing Street (ADS) reports on several non-violent peace rallies occurring in congressional offices of war supporters. Even Democratic darling Barack Obama had a few visitors, according to Democrats.com. ADS offers their own petition for impeachment.

Several states are jumping on that particular bandwagon. Maine has an impeachment site, as does a New Jersey group. There’s a whole list of state motions of impeachment. Approve or not, the wagon’s rolling.

Sen. Harry Reid notes how the Republicans in congress are blocking a motion for a up-or-down vote on Bush’s escalation plans. He has his own petition to counteract recalcitrant elephants and open the floor for debate. (I can almost hear the conservative shine about the First Hundred Hours and how the Democrats didn’t play fair. That’s playground thinking, immature. Because of this bogus blockade, soldiers are dying. Let’s all count how many Americans die during this debate debacle, as a direct result of Republican hubris.)

All in all, there’s fighting words all about. Americans, by way of a Democratic majority, are waking up to this nightmare and wishing they were really asleep. At least then, there’s hope of awakening.

I look at my last few posts and I see the Week of the Geek. So, I turn again to politics, news and such, and am sucker-punched by my muse. I guess she’s been feeling neglected lately…

Looking more like Global Warming soon must be addressed.
Thunder clouds again are forming. Debaters acquiesce.
Threatening a greater storming in the East and West.
See the death of misinforming; are we truly blessed?

Another type of storm is brewing in the desert sand.
Culture wars, resentment stewing, blame the High Command.
Homeless hunger lines are queuing outside no man’s land.
Prince of Peace is sadly viewing, cannot understand.

I've been playing around a lot with software installations this week. After running out to buy Vista and experiencing the morning-after buyers remorse (or is it grieving for dearly departed money?) I look forward to a New User Experience (trademark pending.) I didn't go into this project blind - I did my homework. Several people, when writing about their experiences with the beta releases of Vista, recommending a dual-installation with XP. Paul Therott, whom I look up to as a mentor, recommends Symantec's Partition Magic to manage partitions and boot sequence. Yes, Vista has its own boot manager, but if Paul doesn't use it, who am I to argue? Symantec. I've had trouble with their stuff lately, but if Guru Paul says so, I'll try it. What's another seventy dollars?

For the un-geek, Partition Magic has two parts, the namesake program divides hard drive space into smaller, theoretically more manageable spaces. There as several benefits to this, but the one I'm interested in is to separate operating systems into their own niches. Then comes the need to inform the computer which system to run at startup. That's the job of Boot Magic, which loads before Windows does to ask us just that.

Don't you love the names? I could insert a whole litany here. It's enough to note that the first time I tried to prepare my hard drive in accordance with instructions in Partition Commander's skimpy booklet, Symantec's magical technology hung during the process. I waited an hour for a simple repartitioning command to complete. It should've take three minutes, max! End result: goodbye Windows XP and all its accoutrements. Now that's Magic! (They thoughtfully provide a manual in PDF format which installs with the program. When your computer fails to reboot, however, access to the manual is lost. Perhaps they thought everyone would waste paper by printing out the 90+ page document.)

I'm faced with a dilemma. Do I embrace adventure, install Vista alone and hope all my legacy programs work? Or do I still take Paul's advice and dual-boot? (Actually, my ultimate intention is to triple-boot with Ubuntu Linux as a third operating system.) I decided to stay the course and begin to rebuild my XP install. I'm still miffed about wasting money on Symantec - again - and give into the urge to try them - again. Several hours later, I have a working XP install with all the latest drivers, Partition magic installed, a new partition created for Vista, a working install of Vista, and Boot Magic managing the whole thing. I'm up past bedtime testing the configuration.

In the morning, the computer won't boot: something about a corrupted MBR (Master Boot Record, the first part of the hard drive where all the formatting information is kept.). Luckily, I made the recovery disks for both Partition Magic and Boot Magic. A quick adjustment from the recovery disk, and XP started right up. Vista, however, wouldn't. It seems that the fix provided by Boot Magic's recovery disk was incompatible with the way Partition Magic reads the MBR, resulting in corruption. Need I remind you that these programs are sold together on the same CD? Need I reiterate how I hate Symantec? Sorry, Paul. Your uncontested sagacity didn't work for me. Seventy dollars, POOF!

Rebuild, rebuild, rebuild. Using Vista's native boot manager flawlessly, I ponder the wisdom of attempting to add Linux to the mix. Ubuntu uses it's own boot manager, which may cause conflict. I'll have do to some research.

Oh, but I LOVE computers, this is so much fun! Costly, sure, but still fun. It's sort of like paying for concert tickets and seeing a mediocre performance - you know, that dry taste in your mind as you tally the dollars-per-hour you just experienced?

Windows Update:

It’s nice to know a service is running that keep abreast of all the tweak and security fixes needed for the world’s most ubiquitous operating system. But those word-bubbles at the bottom right of your screen are hard to ignore, and once clicked on you get a friendly reminder that "You can continue working." But you can’t, really, because the installer invades the center of your workspace with at least four pop-up windows: I’m going to install now; is it okay to install now; legal-document-you-don’t-care-to-read listing all-the-rights-you-don’t-have despite the money you spent; Okay, I’m installing now…

I’m typing this as I finally give in to allow MS to install IE7 (I use Firefox, but I’m tired of the interruptions.) Seven times during the creation of the above paragraph, the caret focus inexplicably de-focused on what I was working on. In the middle of typing a word, I hear the digital plink-plink of wasted keystrokes, causing me to point-and-click at the top window to refocus attention on my work, insert the cursor into the correct spot in the document, and finish the word. Wait, it did it again?

Then comes the "please restart" window, which I ignore because - HELLO! - I’m working, here! But I have to wrap this post up. In a couple of minutes, ad infinitum, I will be reminded by my friendly operating system that its waiting to restart…

…Yep. It just asked me again. Microsoft should reassess its idea of "continue working." As the man said, "I don’t think it means what you think it means…"

I've been trolling this week anything I find regarding Windows Vista. As part of a postpartum depression for dropping a chuck of money for what is essentially two DVD's (one of which is actually used,) I subconsciously gravitate to the I Hate Windows crowd. Most I could ignore, but one message in particular stood out because the word Zen is prominent in the blog's title. So I click to find out why Leo Won't Be Switching to Vista.

I feel bad, but I trolled him a bit about his attitude. Read the comments. To his credit, he was good-natured about it. Kudos for that.

It got me thinking: The whole computer operating system debate, Windows v Mac v Linux, is really about people's expectations. In fact the way people interact - or don't - with computers is about their expectations of the computing experience.

I'm old enough to remember Tandy's TRS-80, the first truly mass market personal computer. Several other quickly followed, but the early adapters had mixed feelings about these trendy new gadgets. Some people didn't mind learning a few tricks to use them, some were turned off by that.

Later, When the big OEM's emerged, marketing madmen were learning how to sell people on the concept of buying a machine that a person needs to learn how to use. Even today, that issue is being wrestled. These companies took a page out of the automotive industry and began sell their brand, then following up on the details of the tech. Imagine a typical conversation between neighbors:

"Is that a new car in your driveway?" One guy says leaning over the fence for a better look.

"Yep," came the reply, barely hiding pride.

"Looks nice. What kind is it?"

"It's a Jaguar."

No more needs saying. Neighbor number two has arrived. it's unlikely anyone will out-status this guy soon. Dell computers wanted that same dynamic to work for their brand: you went out and bought a Dell, not a Pentium III, 1.5 gigahertz with 512 mb RAM and a Radeon graphics card. But computers are not cars. They can't be sold like any previous product. In fact, there is no "one good way" to sell computers. that's why some sell software foremost; some sell the glitz. Some sell the whole package, and some prefer the components. It all depends on consumer expectation.

Many people, uninterested in the minutia of machinery, just want to take the thing home and plug it in like their TV. After all, it looks like one. (But computers never got as simple to use as a television set. As time progressed, the TV became more like a computer. Today, there's many more connections to be made on your new widescreen than "back in the day".)

Mac users seem to me to be in that category: Just turn the thing on and use it. As response, Apple's software gurus have consistently lead the way to more a intuitive User Interface. Microsoft (and everyone else) has forever played catch-up.

At the other end of the spectrum, the digital equivalent of grease monkeys embraced the hardware itself. To them, software was just what you did when the thing was assembled to prove how well it was built. They gravitated toward command-line programming languages that eventually lead to UNIX and Linux. In terms of point-and-click, these systems, while technically elegant, were way behind the ease-of-use trend.

Fast forward to today, and the two camps still stand between the same lines drawn in the proverbial sand. "That product sucks, this one's great." The truth lies somewhere in between, as truth is wont to do. All operating systems have flaws. The same can be said for all products created by humans. There are Pro's and Con's to, well, anything I can think of.

In terms of computers and human interface software, what you prefer depends largely on how you intend to use it, but also upon what you're willing to put up with. If you're looking for a stable, secure platform, Linux rules. If you want style, simplicity and artistic licence, Mac is your choice. If you want general business and communication, media and entertainment - read: games - "Hello, Microsoft".

Increasingly, the computer is becoming central to our lifestyles. It's only natural to assume it will become a central appliance in our households. Microsoft is ahead of that curve, wisely so. We can only guess what our grandchildren will expect out of their computing experiences. But expectations will continue to drive the industry.

While people are killing each other across the globe (what else is new?), famine, AIDS and more warfare in Africa, Mudslides in Jakarta, and all the other wonderful happening on this beautiful Earth, my fellow Chicagoans are stoked about the Super Bowl. (phew! What a sentence.) I guess it’s a matter of priorities…

Meanwhile, today’s headline is - brace yourself - yet another study on climate change and its causes. You’re sitting down, right? he culprit is… humanity! I know you were surprised by that one. CNN headlines a study by French climatologists (is that a word?) placing the blame squarely on everyone’s heads.

"The observed widespread warming of the atmosphere and ocean, together with ice-mass loss, support the conclusion that it is extremely unlikely that global climate change of the past 50 years can be explained without external forcing, and very likely that is not due to known natural causes alone," said the 20-page report.

Human-caused warming and rises in sea-level "would continue for centuries" because the process has already started, "even if greenhouse gas concentrations were to be stabilized," said the 20-page report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Wait! It get better…

[A] 2001 report projected a sea level rise of up to 35 inches.

Many scientists had warned that this was being too cautious and said sea level rise could be closer to 3 to 5 feet because of ice sheet melt.

But despite losing on that battle, scientists said the report is strong.

"There’s no question that the powerful language is intimately linked to the more powerful science," said one of the study’s many co-authors, Andrew Weaver of the University of Victoria, who spoke by phone from Canada. He said the report was based on science that is rock-solid, peer-reviewed, conservative and consensus.

"It’s very conservative. Scientists by their nature are skeptics."

So what exactly are these skeptics implying must be done?

"What you’re trying to do is get the whole planet under the proverbial tent in how to deal with this, not just the rich countries," Mahlman said Thursday. "I think we’re in a different kind of game now."

[…]

On the war front, a different report illuminates the difference between theory and practice as applied to training Iraq’s "military." Games are being played here, too, and the US of A doesn’t have an updated playbook. Via TPM Muckraker, McClatchy Washington Bureau kindly explains how those pesky Al-Sadr insurgents train their people - with US help. Regarding the Iraqi government’s finest:

"Half of them are JAM. They’ll wave at us during the day and shoot at us during the night," said 1st Lt. Dan Quinn, a platoon leader in the Army’s 1st Infantry Division, using the initials of the militia’s Arabic name, Jaish al Mahdi. "People (in America) think it’s bad, but that we control the city. That’s not the way it is. They control it, and they let us drive around. It’s hostile territory."

These people aren’t stupid. Infiltrate your enemy, get issues their weapons, learn tactics and inside information of strategic significance, then join the other side. Brilliant! Why didn’t the US forces countermand this technique? Political pressure upon the generals.

In hindsight, many American officers said there was too much pressure to give Iraqi army units their own areas of operation, a process that left Iraqi soldiers outmanned, outgunned and easy targets for infiltration and coercion.

"There was a decision … that was probably made prematurely," said Lt. Col. Eric Schacht, a 42-year-old battalion commander in east Baghdad from Glen Mills, Pa. "I think we jumped the gun a little bit."

Al-Sadr’s militia has taken advantage of the chaos.

Iraqi soldiers, for example, often were pushed into the field by Iraqi commanders who didn’t give them adequate food, clothing or shelter, said Etienne, a 1st Infantry Division platoon leader.

Etienne was on patrol one day when he saw Iraqi soldiers eating fresh vegetables and meat. The afternoon before, the same soldiers had complained that they had only scraps of food left. Who’d brought them their meal? It had come courtesy of Muqtada al-Sadr.

OH, the games people play!

I feel the need to say something snarky about "Winning hearts and minds." Give me a minute, it’ll come to me…

Yesterday in Boston, the city was shut down. CNN reports a bomb scare occurred throughout the area that literally closed the city down. A man was arrested in connection with the placement of several "suspicious objects" found in prominent areas of the Boston, described as "circuit boards with blinking lights." State police responded, news spread at the speed of pixels, and statewide panic ensued. On CNN’s video clip of the incident, comments by the governor illustrates the level of fear experienced.

What happened? A "guerilla marketing campaign" by Turner Broadcasting System backfired. The devices were depictions of a new cartoon character on Adult Swim, done in LED lights in a similar style to the old lite-brite games.

Is this a bomb?
Would anyone really plant a bomb that flashes with this many lights?
What kind of idiot could possibly think that this is dangerous?

Have we gone that far? When did we get so fearful? Here is a textbook example of the effects of political propaganda in the Internet Age. We in America have been conditioned to believe in the over-hyped, bludgeoned to death and ceaseless coverage of "the War On Terror ™." Despite the disinformation, bogus reasoning and the political, economic and social fallout, the belief in our post-cold-war boogie-man is palpable, destroying our reasoning capacities. Despite the education and reasoning of a whole metropolitan populous, a few dumb-looking devices ignites the fear and loathing of America.

We’ve all seen enough TV news coverage to imagine how the media first-responders can whip up a situation, sensationalizing for the camera, without bothering to gather facts - let alone check them. Milliseconds later, the vacuous reporting in in living rooms across the globe. Instant panic. This illustrates how the terrorist responsible for 9/11 have won.

Conservative supporters of our president ( all eight of them) will likely scoff my reaction. Let them. They’ve been wrong the whole time. Once again, I lay at the feet of our leaders the consequences of  a failed leadership built of social distortion, negative propaganda, fiscal irresponsibility, and an attitude of contempt of the law and disdain of the political process.

We average people, represented by the commuters and businesspeople who reacted illogically in Boston, just want to feed our families. We want our leaders to lead us into a good place, not to where we stand right now. We wish for a comfortable retirement, and a safe future for our kids. Although nothing is certain in life, what we’ve been seeing lately is daunting, and our uncertainty grows. Perhaps it’s not terrorists we should be fearing , it’s our leaders.