Hey Pete, noticed you're posting your blogs for a while. I guess we can both post them, that'll confuse people.
posted by wil forbis 12/31/2001 07:05:26 PM

Saturday, December 29, 2001
In some cases, it would seem the real winner of the Afghani War or the War on Terrorism is going to be moral ambiguity. The more I dive into this stuff, the more I create scenarios in my head as what caused this, or who's to blame, not only do I find myself unsure, I find myself less sure about propositions I thought I could depend on.

For instance:

Let's make an assumption that no matter what your grievances are against a nation or an organization of some sort, it's illegitimate to kill civilians. This would give us a handy swash of moral righteousness to wave at the attackers. The obvious rebuttal to the U.S. position would be "Then why are you killing civilians in Afghanistan, perhaps more than were killed in the WTC bombings?" This seems to disprove our first assumption, or at least prove it impossible to wield in the real world. All a terrorist would need to do would be to cause some kind of suicide attack ala WTC, then hide himself in a well populated civilian area (Which is what Osammy did.) No attack on that area would be possible without some civilian deaths. At the same the instigator could well be planning further atrocities while he glows in this protection. So we have to revise our statement to something like, "It is legitimate to kill civilians if a credible threat exists that more civilians will be killed through inaction." That, I think, summarizes our position in Afghanistan. Yes, it sucks that we're killing civilians, or anybody for that matter, but Osama has done nothing over the past ten years but bomb, bigger and harder. Undoubtedly he'd love to surpass the WTC attack*, and has shown interest in gathering nuclear capabilities. (I would venture to say we're closer to a nuclear attack now than we ever were with the Russians because the threat of Mutually Assured Destruction is no longer viable. If some fringe group on Muslims blew up New York, what do we do? Where do we attack?) Our theory in Afghanistan is that whatever damage we do is offset by the disruption of the terrorist network we have created. (Those who argue that we haven't disrupted these networks show such obliviousness to the facts it's not worth arguing about.) However, that opens up an argument that if it's okay for us to kill foreign civilians, then it's okay for foreigners to kill our civilians if they can present a solid argument that their people are in danger.

* There is and underreported story that Osammy has diabetes, and may be dying. As such, perhaps he saw the WTC as his final hurrah, but I wouldn't bet the bank on it. Plus, even if he dies, someone else will arise to take his position.

But let's take a hypothetical situation. There's a bomb in an undisclosed location in New York. It was planted there by a terrorist leader who is now hiding in a village in Sudan. In one hour he will press the button and kill, say, 10-20 people. The only way in we can stop it is by firing a missile at that village that will probably kill 500 innocent Sudanese and 1 terrorist. DO we trade those 500 Sudanese for 10-20 Americans. I would argue yes. But let's bump up the figure. 20,000 Sudanese for 20 Americans? I'd argue no. So somewhere between 500 and 20,000 is some magic number that represents my cut-off point. I have no idea what that number is. And we can make the scenario more interesting. What if we only have rumor that the bomb is going to go off? What if we think we know the general area where the bomb is going of and think we can evacuate in an hour? This is the ambiguity I talk of.

But don't think I'm simply attacking the resoluteness of only the U.S. Government here. The Anti-War movement, of which I mean those opposed to any instance of war, not just the War on Terrorism, also claim in frustrating flip tones to have the moral high ground. But it's easy to appear righteous when you don't ever come down to earth and deal with reality. I've talked to a few, and posed basic scenarios, such as do you kill 3000 people to save 3001, and they've yet to get back to me with any real response. (If you've got one, email me.) Most people ultimately admit that stopping Hitler was a good idea. Shouldn't we have gone ahead and stopped Stalin while we at it? (Granted, it would've been dirty pool, since Soviet Russia was invaluable in winning WWII, but I think the millions of people Stalin killed would've forgiven us.) This starts to raise the question as to whether we are the world's policemen. And I can't answer these questions.

There's one thing I am sure of. Those who operate from a position of moral certainty - be they Arab fanatics, "War on Evil" Bushites, or Anti War protestors preaching from above and never getting their hands dirty - are full of shit.




posted by wil forbis 12/29/2001 01:44:12 PM

Friday, December 28, 2001
Well, everyone seems to be offering their reviews of Lord of the Rings and being that I just saw it, I thought I'd add mine. Yeah... not bad, you know. A fun movie with an obviously well thought out world behind it. I guess that's part of the appeal, the fact that some dude put and extrordinary amount of effort into the whole world. Some dude named Tolkien. He was probably just chillin' in his crib in the east forties and thought, "Damn. I should write a five million page fantasy novel." I know what that's about, dawg.

Pete Moss sent me several new blogs to post and I'd swear I posted some but now I see they aren't there.
posted by wil forbis 12/28/2001 10:50:31 PM

Thursday, December 27, 2001
It seems computers everywhere are failing. Blogger itself was taken down by hackers. I returned from Christmas to find that my home pc had been fried and am now in the process of setting up a new one. I've heard tales a few more machines going down. Obviously the only explanation is that some strange radiation from space has leaked onto the surface of the earth causing massive computer failure. We can only assume that it will be followed by an alien invasion of some sort. Perhaps I should be honered that the aliens chose to attack me first - they probably realize that my intrinsic value to this planet is much higher than most perceive. I suppose I'll die a Christlike martyr on some slimey alien prison farm, but generations of children after me will be told my story and eventually rise up and conquer our 6-armed masters. Remember, their weak spot is their forehead. One blast of your mecca-lasers and they're done for.
posted by wil forbis 12/27/2001 10:26:15 AM

Saturday, December 22, 2001
I gotta tell you, I was bit disappointed by some comments that George Bush made about Osammy recently. Discussing whether or not the Army knew where Osammy was, George stated that Osammy, "may have slithered back into Pakistan." Look people, I understand we are at war, I understand that there's a rhetorical need to demonize the enemy but do we really have to take it to the level to which we are comparing Osammy to a snake?

After all, snakes really are very loveable creatures. They often want to just curl up in a ball and lie under a rock. A snake never ordered people to fly into a building. A snake never subjugated women to laws that barely gave them their humanity. I think George Bush owes a big apology to snakes everywhere.

Perhaps George (who is a frequent reader of this blog) should visit this page - "Snakes and Snails -- These misunderstood creatures can make learning fun."

On another political note: While I didn't vote for Nader, I've always had a soft spot for they guy and felt he was probably the only candidate running in 2000 that honestly believed everything he said. And I was always upset by these Democrats who accused him of blowing Gore's election* and that he'd doomed us to two thousand years of darkness. (As if the election was Gore vs Hitler.) Well, now Bush is riding an 80-90% approval rating. If you do the math, people - some of the same Democrats who mewed and moaned that Nader had delivered us into the hands of Satan are now ready to send George Christmas cookies. Talk about shifting priorities.

*At one point a reporter asked Nader how he felt about stealing all these votes from Gore to which he replied along the lines of, "I thought Gore stole all the votes from me."

For the record, I voted the for Libertarian, Harry Brown, whom, while I consider him to be somewhat of a douchebag, at least he was against the drug war. Next time I'll vote for Harry Potter. MORE TAXES FOR HOGWARTS!

Am I they only one who thinks the World's Funniest Joke is incredibly stupid?

posted by wil forbis 12/22/2001 12:35:38 PM

Friday, December 21, 2001
I've been having a sort of one man debate with myself lately as to whether or not there's something intrinsic in Arab culture that finds nobility in killing civilians. After all, without any comment on the righteousness of their cause, one need look no further that the WTC attacks or the various suicide bombings in Israel (note: I leave out the Pentagon attack on purpose because that was a legitimate military target) . But then I thought, what about McVeigh? He was non Arab willing to kill innocents. So perhaps it's not so much Arabs (though I do think they're more prone that sort of thing.) but the fanatical segments of their religion. Then an interesting article shows up in Salon today about fundamentalism. This section seems especially relevant:

"That is why it's not such a leap for these fundamentalist extremists from another part of the world to see others as nonentities. As far as they are concerned, those outside the true faith might as well be dead. Unbelievers have missed out on the only real thing on planet Earth, the only opportunity for redemption and a ticket to paradise. Through their own choice and because of their own rebellion, they have sealed their fate. Even a loving God must allow humans to exercise free will and take the path they choose. "

What I find so frustrating from the progressive point of view is that they seem so eager to condemn our fanatics but go out of their way to excuse Arab fanatics. Regardless to the cause, walking into a Pizzeria with a bomb in your pepperoni just ain't kosher, you know. (Get it? Kosher? Pepperoni? I kill me, which is certainly better than some Arab fundamentalist killing me.)


posted by wil forbis 12/21/2001 11:00:45 AM

Thursday, December 20, 2001
Oh, hey, did I mention I've got a music column over at diskant.net? Click here to read it.
posted by wil forbis 12/20/2001 08:02:27 PM

Wednesday, December 19, 2001
WARNING: If you don't wish to read about any of the "surprises" in Ocean's 11, you may not wish to read any further because I can't be trusted not to blow the plot for this very, very crappy film!!!!

Yeah, so I saw Ocean's 11 last night. What an utter piece of dogshit. I think, quite possibly this is the worst movie of the year and anyone remotely connected with it should be executed and converted to foodstuffs that can be fed to starving Afghanis.

What's wrong with it? Well, I was talking to frequent Acid Logic contributor John Saleeby today and I came up with this: the movie has no tension. You know how most films have one or several scenes where the hero is this close to being caught by the enemy agents or he's walking around with a bomb in his pocket and doesn't know it? O11 has none of that. Here's the plot:

1) Professional thieves decide to rob casino

2) Professional thieves assemble team

3) Professional thieves lay groundwork

4) Professional thieves rob bank, with very little going even remotely wrong

5) The end

There's a whole romantic side plot with Julia Roberts and George Cloony that's insulting to the intelligence of women and men.

Not that the film was totally without merit. Bernie Mac was pretty funny and it was good to see Carl Reiner, if only to assure myself that's he's still alive, but the rest was crap. There's a ridiculous ending where Andy Garcia as the casino owner asks Cloony whether he robbed his casino. Cloony says "no" so Andy Garcia just LETS HIM GET AWAY. What kind of gay villain would do that? It's like "Luke, join me on the dark side and together we will rule the universe!" "Nope, I don't think so pops" "Okay, run along then. Best of luck to ya."

On another note: You all know that I'm hardly a bastion of political correctness... in fact many consider me a hate filled bigot. Nonetheless, even I was amazed at the balls of twisted Humor dot com to offer these ebonics Christmas cards. I mean check out the big lipped racist caricatures... I think they might be feeling some heat over this one. You should write your congressman and have twisted humor dot com destroyed, thus moving acid logic one step closer to the position of world's biggest humor web site.
posted by wil forbis 12/19/2001 05:34:04 PM

Tuesday, December 18, 2001
Interesting... the Only My World blog is talking about last minute gift ideas and I've yet to buy a single gift.
posted by wil forbis 12/18/2001 06:39:08 PM

Here's a great MSN headline: "Al-Qaida prisoners quizzed." I can just see them - "Okay you camel jockey, what was the name of Jerry Van Dyke's character in My Mother the Car*?! Too late! What was the middle initial of Abraham Lincoln's wife? Wrong, you towelhead! Last chance, what's the square root of the circumference of the earth, to the fourth decimal! Come on, Ahab! You need to make it to the bonus round!"

*With apologies to Max Burbank.
posted by wil forbis 12/18/2001 04:03:36 PM

Monday, December 17, 2001
Well, as Saleeby pointed out, Drew Barrymore and Tom Green are hitting Divorce Court. I think I know the problem - Tom Green only has one testical! You'll recall that he had testicular cancer about a year ago and they had to let one of his boys go. That's gotta be a real problem in the bedroom. A big movie star like Drew probably wants a man who can blast out a couple quarts or so. However, I think I can save the marriage. A few weeks ago I mentioned a pill that could increase ejaculate by 581%. That'd put Tommy at a respectable 265% or so. C'mon Drew, that's gotta be enough! It's not like you're shampooing with the stuff!
posted by wil forbis 12/17/2001 12:42:39 PM

Just watched The Seige, which is the Denzel Washington flick that came out a few years ago about terrorists targeting sections of Manhatten. Talk about a film ahead of it's time. Of course, the death total from the attacks in the film was still much less than that of the 9/11 attacks but the government's reaction in the film was far more facistic than what we've seen.

A couple nights ago, several people I know and I went out barhopping and ended up in this out of the way, white trash tavern. We we're just casually hanging out, when a young woman at the other end of the club got up on the bar and lay there. Then another woman, a friend of hers, pulled up the woman's top and brassier and began massaging her breasts. This is in a bar of about 30 people. Then the bartender came over, sprayed whip cream on each her nipples and around her navel and then he, the other women and some other guy proceeded to lick it off the lying woman.

I need to go to white trash bars more often.



posted by wil forbis 12/17/2001 12:03:05 AM

Friday, December 14, 2001
A man is only as strong as the 4 women behind him - old Taliban saying
posted by wil forbis 12/14/2001 04:53:42 PM

So I've been watching the Osammy video, and I gotta tell you people, I think we've made a big mistake. Some people might say, "What are you talking about!? He's confessing all over the place." But that just goes to show how little you know about Arab speech patterns and their intensive use of metaphor. See, Arabs are big on saying one thing when symbolically talking about something else. For instance, Osammy might say "We executed the mission well and even more American infidels died than I had hoped." But translated through the Arab metophor engine, he's really saying, "I enjoy playing with puppy dogs and also find kittens quite delightful!" Or he might say, "I can hear Allah's praise when he looks at the beheaded bodies of American babies" but he's really saying, "I'm really hoping to get a pony this Christmas. Have you seen the new Will & Grace?"

When Osammy starts talking like, "I find the romantic pop songs of Jefferson Starship quite heartwarming!"... That's when we gotta worry
posted by wil forbis 12/14/2001 04:09:58 PM

Check it out, my homeslice from the east forties has his own web log! I'm talking of course, about Dick Cheney. The Cheney Daily.

Personally, I can't tell if it's a joke or not, but it's still amusing. Make sure you check out the FAQ section.
posted by wil forbis 12/14/2001 02:17:57 PM

Thursday, December 13, 2001
Lately I've been really getting into these Morningstar vegetarian breakfast sausages. They taste exactly like real smoked sausage but with no meat, so they're vaguely healthy. Just pop 'em in the microwave and cook 'em up.

I'll be God damned if they don't look like little severed baby penies though.
posted by wil forbis 12/13/2001 10:29:35 PM

What's the deal with these truck ads (Chevy or some other motherfuckers) where these giant dudes drive around in giant trucks and splash dirt on these tiny little men? What is the message here? Buy a Chevy and you too can pick on people one 30th your size. Does anyone else find this alarming?
posted by wil forbis 12/13/2001 10:48:48 AM

Wednesday, December 12, 2001
I'm listening to this pretty weird cd featuring a solo pianist playing the music of Devo. It's some trippy music, really makes you realize how discordant Devo were. Done on this style it's like a Bartok composition or something. A strangely soothing descent into madness....

As I mentioned earlier, the web zine The Morning News included me in a roundtable discussion on writing on the web. However, they never used two of my answers - answers I felt with brimming with scintillating knowledge and quick wit. Thus, I thought I would include them here.

1. Are certain types of writing (e.g., journalism, Web logs, personal
non-fiction) proving to be more effective when published on the Web than
others (e.g., fiction, poetry, criticism)? If so, or not, why?

ME: For the purposes of gathering a large audience I would definitely say
web logs and zine style writing (what you would probably call "personal
non-fiction") are much more effective on the web. The simple act of
search engine registration is bound to bring in readers who would never
see your material were it in paper form. I did an interview with a
zinester from Scotland a while back and she also made the point that the
speediness of getting something up as a web presentation has tremendous
advantages over the traditional zine construction process of designing
something via cut and paste and then spending late nights and dollars at
Kinko's.

Fiction and in depth journalism tend to exist in longer forms and I
think they suffer on the web. That's the kind of material you might
start reading at the breakfast table and finish up that night in bed,
and the web clearly lacks the portability of a magazine or newspaper.
However, that could change as the web gets more embedded into our lives.
I was in Europe recently and there's a web cafe on every corner there,
so you could conceivably start reading a story on your lunch break, and
finish it up at your workstation in the office. (What would help here
would be transportable "favorites" that can be easily accessed from any
machine.)

I've found poetry to be effective only as a sleep aid, online or
otherwise.

2. Are you more likely to trust a piece of writing that is published off
the
Web than one that's published on a Web site? Are you more likely to
trust a
piece of writing published on, for example, NewYorkTimes.com than a
personal
Web site? For both, why?

ME: One of the great strengths of web delivery is that it's so fast; a story
can be up within hours. But that's a weakness as well, because that
lessens the time available for grammar and fact checking. I've
definitely seen typographical errors in online versions of magazines and
newspapers that I would never see in their print counterparts. On some
subconscious level I imagine that affects my faith in the medium so that
I generally "trust" a printed format more than web.

Of course, there are some obvious caveats - I trust the web version of
Salon a lot more than the printed version of the Weekly World News. (As
we all know, the Bat Boy married the World's Fattest Woman, not
the Abominable Snowman.) A news organization's dedication to fact
checking (or lack thereof) will carry through to any medium they chose.
My dad used to work at Time magazine and he often tells a story in which
they discovered a typo that had made it to the print run. Of course
there was nothing they could do, so one of the bosses called up the guy
who should have caught the error and told him about it. A few hours
later they discovered that he'd hung himself.

Now, that's dedication.

posted by wil forbis 12/12/2001 03:41:38 PM

Tuesday, December 11, 2001
Whoa, this is kind of trippy. Arnold Schwarzenegger broke several ribs in a motorcycle this Sunday. However, Steven Spielberg also injured himself recently, while riding some sort of scooter. Arnold is 54 years old. But check this out: Spielberg is also 54 years old!

You don't have to think hard to figure out what that means.
posted by wil forbis 12/11/2001 07:18:58 PM

Here's a pretty interesting essay about the Democratic convention in 2000. Written by a non-pinko hippy, though still a lefty. Some legitimate criticism as to why the progressive movement is too fractured to really accomplish anything.
posted by wil forbis 12/11/2001 04:18:56 PM

You know, it seems to me that they should avoid leniancy for this John Walker guy for one very simple reason: it would be racist not to. After three months of sputtering about "absolute evil" it would be foolish to say to the guy "Well, gee, seeing that you're a white American and all, I guess we'll ignore the fact that you'd allied yourself with people who were actively seeking the destruction of the United States." That said, since so much of what we learn here is going to be depenedent on the police investigations of other countries, many whom foolishly oppose the death penalty, I really think we should remove that (the death penalty) from the table. I'd be quite happy to let ol' Johnny Walker spend the rest of his life in one of those Cali prisons filled with LA gangbangers and and Aryan racists.

Those are my thoughts on foriegn policy. Go forth and do my bidding.
posted by wil forbis 12/11/2001 10:59:36 AM

Monday, December 10, 2001
Well, it looks like something in my past is about to blow up in my face, so I figured I'd try and address it ahead of time. Prez Bush is going to release the Osama video and once he does you'll all see that I was right there with him, laughing and drinking, and making chicks take of their burkas. If I recall, I said some pretty unkind things about the US, but Osammy and me were totally spoiled on some great X and we'd both just won a couple mil at the casinos in Usbhekasthan so we we're in a jiving mood. You forgive me, America.. don't you?
posted by wil forbis 12/10/2001 06:25:14 PM

Sweet Jesus, this is the best Christian television show ever! It's by a guy named Jack Van Impel and it's sort of like the Ronco commercials in that guy buys 30 minutes of airtime which he then uses to explain why Jesus is returning NOW! That's right, bitch, NOW! Jesus is coming and when he sees you moanin' and groanin' with a copy of GALLERY in your hand, he ain't gonna be pleased. Basically Jack yaks away about current events and then relates them to Bible passages that seem to be vaguely connected to what he's talking about. He's got some co-host, who's either his sister or wife, or both, and she provides all sorts of scintillating comments like "That amazing Jack, how did you know that?" or "The interesting thing about all this Jack, is that you were telling people about this two years ago."

Needless to say, he was having a field day with whole WTC thing. One of his thoughts was that we should release vampires bats into the caves where the Al-Qaida are hiding... and you know, that's not a bad idea.
posted by wil forbis 12/10/2001 04:31:12 PM

Sunday, December 09, 2001
Saw SNL tonight. I'm starting to become strangely attracted to Rachel Dratch. Should I be concerned?
posted by wil forbis 12/9/2001 01:18:31 AM

Saturday, December 08, 2001
So I checked out Spy Game last night, somewhat against my will. How was it? Not fucking bad, really. In a strange sort of way, it's one of the more political films of the past decade, basically Redford and Pitt are two spying homeslices that have a 15 year history working for the CIA. Pitt gets captured by the Chinese, and this causes Reddy to reminisce about their past adventures in various political hotspots (Nam, Beirut, East Germany) over the years. The plot is basically a look at the political motivation of CIA activity throughout the cold war but it's done in an even handed manner. I was sort of wondering why a pinko-commie like Redford would take a role as a CIA agent, but the movie definitely gives him a chance to push his agenda in a tempered way. There's a definite acknowledgement that much CIA activity was questionable, including some alliances with pretty ruthless factions, but also places a moral imperative on US actions that you don't see in most liberal Hollywood spy flicks. (e.g. these terrible actions were in pursuit of a greater good.) It definitely allows you to get a better understanding as to how large segments of the Arab world could end up hating the US, thus making the film timely and topical.
posted by wil forbis 12/8/2001 02:32:00 PM

Thursday, December 06, 2001
So three Green Berets got killed yesterday. I guess that proves we're even better than the Taliban at killing our own troops.

w
posted by wil forbis 12/6/2001 05:48:25 PM

I have to take some disagreement with the statements made on the Welcome to My World blog in regards to the wholesomeness of Harry Potter books. Are you familiar with the upcoming Harry Potter book - "Harry Potter and the Crack-filled Syringe?"
posted by wil forbis 12/6/2001 10:21:46 AM

Tuesday, December 04, 2001
Hey, more on this later, but they recently posted the results of a email discussion group I was involved in about writing on the web. It's here at themorningnews.org. My responses are in questions 3-7.
posted by wil forbis 12/4/2001 06:11:53 PM

You know, sometimes life can be a downer. I was emailing this friend of mine who lives across the country and I just realized how seldom we actually got see each other. You meet all these interesting, great people but then your job or your family requires that you move away and you never really see them again. If I had my way, I'd just like to live the rest of my life in a great big house in the country with all the dear friends I've met over the years. Then we could spend all day hanging out and talking. That'd be great.

Wait, this would be even better! Instead of living with all my friends, it'd be great to live in a house filled with naked supermodels who would provide me with oral sex on demand! That would really kick ass!
posted by wil forbis 12/4/2001 03:52:06 PM

Monday, December 03, 2001
Hey, here's the web site that sells the pill that makes you ejaculate 13 feet. Check out the testimonials, they're the best!
posted by wil forbis 12/3/2001 11:04:47 PM

Well, I managed to lock myself out of the apartment today. But I managed to break back in as I have had to do SO MANY TIMES BEFORE!!! The feeling that occurs after you break back into your apartment really is a double edged sword. On one hand, it's nice to be back in your rightful living quarters, on the other hand, it's disturbing how easy it is to get there.
posted by wil forbis 12/3/2001 05:38:25 PM

Sunday, December 02, 2001
Longtime readers of this blog know that people are always coming up to me and saying, "Hey, you look like" and then rattling off some quasi-celebrity or fictional character. Well, it's happened three times to me this past weekend. On Friday, a rather jovial bum informed me that I look like Buddy Holly, which is pretty common. Then last night at the Christmas party, a co-worker said I looked like Clark Kent, also a common one. But today - get this - some chick at the pizza place said I look like The Joker! That's completely new! How can I look like Clark Kent and The Joker? Gosh, I'm amazing.
posted by wil forbis 12/2/2001 08:52:24 PM

Well, I seem to have convinced a rather lovely lass to go out with me. I think what did it was my vast insight into the symbolism in Return of the Jedi. We were watching it a few nights ago and couple of very profound observations dawned on me.

For instance, towards the end when Luke and Vader are fighting, there's a scene where Luke cuts of Vader's mechanical hand and then looks at his own mechanical hand, with fear on his face. I'd never realized it before, but Luke was realizing that the Emperors' warnings were true - that he was slowly turning into Vader, or what Vader was: a cold mechanical machine.

Pretty cool, huh. Let me tell you, chicks love that stuff. With that and my 13 foot ejaculation pills, I should leave quite an impression.
posted by wil forbis 12/2/2001 08:45:53 PM