This Is Some Scary Shit

Serious people are openly talking about the Bush administration’s plans for war on Iran, which many believe is ready for its debut sometime after next week’s elections. In a new article for Antiwar.com, William S. Lind, director of the Center for Cultural Conservatism at the Free Congress Foundation, writes that a lame duck George Bush is preparing to launch an air war on Iran that will destroy the American economy and risk cutting off the exit route of the entire US military currently occupying Iraq.

Here is an interview with Scott Ritter on Democracy Now.

Here is a previous posting about the possibility of this war, which I wrote in January 2006.

Bagpipe Video Archive

This will sound like a question the late, beloved Mr. Rogers might have asked, but I’ll ask it anyway.

Do you like bagpipes? I do.

Here are some links to some sounds and video of bagpipes that I have been obsessed with recently: bagpipe solo 6/8 Marches; bagpipe solo Viscount of Dundee; street video of a pipe and some drums jamming in Scotland; street video of Banda Gaites Corvera; Clan MacFarlane at a Highland Games somewhere; Holbaeck Pipe Band; crowd video of Simon Fraser University Pipe Band; Strathclyde Police Pipe Band; champion piper Jori Chisholm; high school band from Singapore. That’s about it.

After watching an Oregon Public Broadcasting feature on the world-class quality of bagpipes made in Oregon by Murray Huggins, I am thinking of buying a practice chanter, which is the “flute” part of the bagpipe, without the bag, to learn how to play.

[Postscript: A lot of these videos feature pipe bands in contest, much like military reviews. For me, there is a bittersweet dichotomy in listening to this music. These melodies melt the soul, but they have also been used quite effectively over many centuries by rulers martialing their populations to war.]

Monty Python: Galaxy Song

Monty Python’s classic Galaxy Song has been set to video with images from NASA. It is a beautiful combination.

Frontline: The Lost Year in Iraq

If you are saddened and dismayed by the carnage in Iraq, last night’s episode of Frontline: The Lost Year in Iraq goes a long way in explaining how the Bush administration screwed up at every turn, starting with the decision to invade Iraq in March 2003. Watch this program online: It will enlighten you to the vile plans of the Bush administration and clarify why the American occupation of Iraq has been described by one general as “the greatest strategic disaster in United States history”.

For the Frontline trifecta, also watch The Dark Side, about Dick Cheney’s scheme to invade Iraq after 9/11, and Rumsfeld’s War, which lays the blame for this quagmire squarely at the feet of the man most responsible for it.

Internet Radio

Check out Pandora. Free streaming radio that assembles music based on what you already like.