Why Bin Laden had to die

Initial reports of military actions are like the first receipt the Safeway cashier gives you, inflated. Fog of war and all that, but the second reports never make the US military look better, any more than the “mistakes” made by Safeway cashiers are somehow never in your favor.

(Guess where I just came from and guess who tried to over-charge me $5?)

Anyway, I’m assuming until proven otherwise that the reason we’re not seeing the Bin Laden pictures is that he was shot at extreme close range and was wearing Winnie the Pooh pajamas.

Not that it matters. Bin Laden was always going to be shot dead after making a threatening gesture. In the same way that Clinton executed brain-damaged Ricky Rector to prevent him becoming another Willie Horton, and would likely have lost the 1992 election had he not done so, so Obama had to kill Bin Laden to prevent him becoming another Khalid Sheikh Mohammed. If shooting Bin Laden dead sealed his re-election, taking him alive would very likely have led to endless demagoguery over where he was held and whether he was tried and by whom and when and where he’d be executed, and whatever Obama did would be wrong and he might very well have lost the 2012 election. Capturing Bin Laden alive would just have been dumb electoral politics.

Today -100: May 6, 1911: Of suffrage parades, Jewish colonies, and great combinations of wealth

Women’s suffragists are about to hold a large suffrage parade in NYC to try to put pressure on the Legislature to pass a suffrage bill. Or, as the NYT puts it, they “will try to demonstrate their fitness for the suffrage by parading on Fifth Avenue.” Actually, the Times editorial isn’t being as sarcastic as that sounds. It adds that the parade “will indicate the courage of the paraders, the strength of their conviction, and their determination to win. No cause can be won without efforts of this strenuous and showy sort. ... They may get the suffrage some day, but never by reading papers at women’s clubs and passing resolutions.” It goes on to “sincerely hope, for their own sakes and the sake of the State, that they will fail.”

While not the first suffrage parade, the spectacle of women marching and giving speeches outdoors is something new, previously the province of women of the Salvation Army, and is still somewhat controversial among the national suffrage leaders. So what does a women’s suffrage parade look like? It will begin with someone playing “the delicate little lady of long ago in her sedan chair”, followed by a float featuring women in the domestic industries that have since moved into factories and shops, then actual workers from those factories and shops, then a float from Pennsylvania showing early Quaker women. It will be “a democratic procession,” i.e., no automobiles and only one carriage, for old pioneer suffragists who can’t walk five miles. There will be male supporters, led by Prof. John Dewey. Women from the five suffrage states, and 20 women from suffragist Norway, will march under their own banners (and a five-starred US flag, which some people will write letters to the Times denouncing as unpatriotic). There will be groups of college women and athletes. Some businesses are threatening to fire any female employee who marches in the parade.

Banker Jacob Schiff is planning to finance a colony of Jewish farmers in New Mexico.

In Kansas City, MO, on his testing-the-water-tour, NJ’s Gov. Woodrow Wilson says that what needs to be corrected in political life is “the control of politics and our life by great combinations of wealth.” Phew, glad they cleared up that problem 100 years ago.

First Republican debate: One of the things about leadership is that you’ve got to show up

Random quotes from the first Republican presidential debate:

Tim Pawlenty: “I love the Huck.”

Pawlenty complained that none of the big names showed up at this debate, evidently worried that he was being totally eclipsed by Herman Cain, the Godfather’s Pizza dude, instead of by Palin or “The Huck.” His greatest dream is to be totally eclipsed by Donald Trump. “One of the things about leadership is that you’ve got to show up,” he said, desperately hoping that no one would ask him what the other things about leadership are.

Pawlenty: “I think the momentum is on my side.”

Pawlentum™ is the new Joementum.

Pawlentum™ says he is the child of a “working-class family in a meatpacking town.”

Speaking of meatpacking, Rick Santorum (see what I did there?) (what did I do there?) said: “Anybody [i.e. Mitch Daniels, who wasn’t there] who would suggest we call a truce on moral issues doesn’t understand what America’s all about.” Moral panics and telling women what they can do with their hoo-hahs?

Ron Paul came out in favor of legalizing heroin. SUGGESTIONS FOR BUMPER STICKERS IN COMMENTS, PLEASE. There was great applause from all the audience. He is so our next president.

T-Paw on the shooting of Bin Laden: “But that moment is not the sum total of America’s foreign policy.” It kind of is.

T-Paw-Canoe-and-Tyler-Too attacked Obama for letting the UN tell us what to do in Libya because the UN is “a pathetic organization.” Now you’re just hurting its feelings.

Santorum: “It’s not just checking the boxes. It’s having the courage to lead.”

Ron Paul, asked why he supports the Defense of Marriage Act despite having said that government shouldn’t dictate who people can and can’t marriage, said oh, he didn’t mean state governments. Or water and sewer district boards, community college districts...

Paul said Americans “vote from their bellies.” Or from their inner thighs under their ball sacs, in the case of his new heroin-addict fanbase.

Wait, that wasn’t the line I started writing. Paul said Americans “vote from their bellies,” glancing nervously at the pizza guy.

(I didn’t see the debate and there’s no transcript, so I’m piecing this together from various sources. One has that quote as “Americans vote with their bellies,” which is an image I could have done without.)

He went on: “Because it’s whether they’re hungry, or have jobs or need things, that’s why they vote.” Oh, I thought I was the only one who ate my “I voted” sticker.

Everyone except the pizza dude would totally release the dead-Bin Laden pictures.

Santorum, the pizza dude, and Pawlenty would all resume waterboarding. Paul opposes it simply because it’s ineffective.

They were all in favor of lowering taxes.

A little song, a little dance...

Headline of the Day: “Israel Stops Hairdressers Travelling to West Bank.” And quote of the day: “I’m not sure what security risk [is posed by] hairspraying models.”

And note the death of Claude Stanley Choules, the very last surviving combatant veteran of World War I. Known as Chuckles, because the last surviving combatant veteran of World War I would just have to have been called Chuckles. He also served in World War II and, as if two world wars weren’t scary enough, a 76-year-long marriage. He was a pacifist.

Today -100: May 5, 1911: Of national insurance, anti-reelectionism, grave-robbers, and Hitchcock plots

British Chancellor of the Exchequer David Lloyd George introduces a National Insurance bill, a plan for insurance against sickness and unemployment. Workers’ contributions would be partially matched by contributions from employers and the state, but the benefits would be mostly administered by “friendly societies,” which are private voluntary bodies formed in the nineteenth century for the purpose of providing mutual insurance by members of the upper working classes and lower middle classes. The Tories aren’t putting up any significant opposition, talking about death panels, nuthin’.

Mexico’s Congress is working on a bill to ban re-election for the offices of president, vice-president, governor, legislator (although a provision to ban the relatives of incumbents from succeeding them failed).

Evidently those English archaeologists didn’t steal the Ark of the Covenant, but are believed to have stolen Solomon’s sword, crown and ring.

Disappointing Headline of the Day -100: “Sees a Hitchcock Plot.” Sadly, the Hitchcock in question is Postmaster General Frank Hitchcock, accused by Sen. Jefferson “Jeff” Davis (D-AK) of a “diabolical plot” to bankrupt a women’s magazine. Not exactly North by Northwest, is it?

What does it say about American politics

that all 235 voting Republican members of the House voted for the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion” Act? How is this a party-line issue?

Today -100: May 4, 1911: Of crashes, peace, and raiders of the lost ark

Don’t think I’ve mentioned that the US has an air force now, which the NYT calls the Army Aero Corps, although I doubt that’s the official name. Anyway, its head, Lt Paul Beck, just had a little crash in the Texas desert after his engine cut out at 300 feet, but was uninjured.

Pres. Taft opens the Third National Peace Congress in Baltimore. Talking in a veiled way about Mexico, he says that the US is hampered in bringing peace by the suspicions of others about its territorial ambitions. Taft, the former governor of the Philippines, says the US has none.

Riots in Jerusalem because some English archaeologists are believed to have stolen the Ark of the Covenant (they then fled the country very quickly indeed, on a yacht)(possibly with a giant boulder rolling after them)(or should I be doing H. Rider Haggard jokes?).

Today -100: May 3, 1911: Of mothers, polar explorers, child labor, and pie

The National Congress of Mothers’ 15th annual meeting passes resolutions for a federal law against polygamy, for a ban on the marriage of “feeble-minded and degenerate” people, and denouncing soothing syrups, medicated soft drinks and comic supplements.

Competing polar explorers Scott and Amundsen meet at Whale Bay.

Following the Triangle factory fire, NYC aldermen vote to require quarterly inspections of all buildings in NYC used for manufacturing. Mayor Gaynor vetoes it because there aren’t enough inspectors.

The NY Assembly passes (86 to 36) a bill to restrict the work of children under 18 and women under 21 to 54 hours a week. Republicans object that the bill is unconstitutional because it curtails the right of contract.

Headline of the Day -100: “Ate Pie Daily, Lived to 96.” Twice a day, in fact. Job Tillou of South Orange, NJ. He also chewed tobacco.

It’s a miracle!

Peru’s President Alan Garcia says the credit for the killing of Osama bin Laden belongs to... wait for it... the late Pope John Paul II. According to Garcia the extra-judicial execution was, literally... I mean LITERALLY, a miracle.

Today -100: May 2, 1911: Of May Day and special delivery

May Day riots in Paris, just, you know, because. At one rally, a German worker made an anti-militarist speech, saying that in the event of war, German workers would refuse to fight against their French comrades. That’s reassuring.

Rebels in Mexico capture Mazatlan, Durango City, and Topolobampo.

A man attempts to mail himself in a wood box from Lawrence, Kansas to Galveston but is forced by heat to come out in Fort Worth.

Peace and human dignity

First Obama shows us a birth certificate, then a death certificate.

I’m not sorry to see bin Laden dead, but I can’t share in the triumphalism currently flooding the airwaves, nor do I feel any sense of relief, since I don’t expect this to change anything.

(Triumphalism in Obama’s address: “tonight, we are once again reminded that America can do whatever we set our mind to.” Dude, it was killing a dude on dialysis, not the freaking moon landing. Though it did take as long to accomplish.)

I could have done without Obama’s use of the word justice – “bring him to justice,” “justice has been done.” This is George Bush’s definition of justice, a shooting without a trial. It might be justice in a moral sense, but from the standpoint of a state – the only standpoint a head of state should adopt – the phrase “justice has been done” should only follow a judicial process.

Obama: “His demise should be welcomed by all who believe in peace and human dignity.” Because nothing says peace and human dignity like sending soldiers into a foreign country guns blazing.

Speaking of peace and human dignity, this happened 8 years ago today:

Protocol

Following NATO’s attempted assassination-from-above of Qaddafi that killed his son and three grandsons, mobs have attacked the American, British, French and Italian embassies in Tripoli. A British official called the attacks “a very strong breach of international protocol,” an example of British understatement made all the more impressive by the fact that he was on fire at the time.

Today -100: May 1, 1911: Of train delays and aerial torpedoes

New Jersey’s new governor, one Woodrow Wilson, will take a four-week speaking tour of the Western states, but claims not to be running for any higher office.

The Mexico City Express which arrived in San Antonio at 2:30 pm yesterday -100 (the only line still open between the capital and the United States) was stopped ten different times by rebels looking for federal soldiers.

Who will be the first to weaponize aircraft? The problem is that light-weight 1911 airplanes can be destabilized by the recoil of guns. Krupp has just patented a self-propelling aerial torpedo for use against a “hostile balloon.”

Un-Saif

Yesterday, Qaddafi called for a cease-fire and negotiations with NATO. Today, NATO killed his son and several of his grandchildren. A simple “No” would have sufficed.

Today -100: April 30, 1911: Of tunnels, hanging, and hobble skirts

The Colorado Legislature votes to dig a tunnel through the Rockies. The NYT seems to think that the most important thing about this story is that the bill passed a close vote in the lower house due to the votes of two women legislators.

Minnesota abolishes the death penalty.

The NYT updates the situation in Mexico: the government is fuuuuuuuucccccckkkkked. The military is losing or on the defense everywhere. “The patriotic efforts of the members of Congress to arouse the conservative sentiment throughout the county to the support of the Government is largely without effect, because most of those gentlemen have no local standing or influence. They have spent their whole lives in the capital. The case of Deputy Bulnes is a typical one. Although he has represented Lower California for twenty years, he has never even visited his constituency.”

The queen of England has banned hobble skirts and other tight skirts from court. Not that you could curtsy in one anyway.

It’s the only logical explanation

Last month, doctors in Libya claimed to have found Viagra in the pockets of some of Qaddadi’s soldiers. And you know what that means, don’t you? Don’t you? Well, UN Ambassador Susan Rice does. This week she told the UN Security Council that Qaddafi is giving his troops Viagra to encourage them to engage in mass rape.

(Asked to back up the Viagra claim or to offer any evidence of sexual assaults by Libyan troops, State Dept spokesmodel Jake Sullivan declined.)

Ah, Texas

The Voter ID bill Texas Gov. Rick “Good Hair” Perry wants won’t let people use college photo ID cards, but will let them use handgun licenses.

Today -100: April 29, 1911: The philosophy of what now?

Taylorism. Frederick Taylor holds a demonstration of “scientific management” at Carnegie Hall. He showed how 30 girls in a bicycle factory can do the work of 100 in less time. Taylor bemoans the short-sighted trade unions for opposing putting 70 girls out of work through scientific management. For example – and watch out for one of the greatest phrases in the history of the English language – “When my friend [Frank Bunker] Gilbreth worked out his philosophy of bricks he ran against the unions.”

Headline: “Russia Grants Privilege to Jews.” Recently Russia’s been expelling Jews from the cities and restricting their education, so it’s good to see them being granted an entirely new privilege. Jews in Siberia will be allowed to use the curative waters of Minusinsk for up to two months, provided they have a medical certificate and don’t engage in trade while they are taking the cure.

Wait, which sports stars?

So the British will be voting on whether to hold elections under the Alternative Vote system. The Tories, currently running Britain despite having received just 36% of the votes in the last general election, like the current system just fine and say that AV, in which voters rank candidates according to preference, is simply too confusing for the poor, stupid British people (Jimmy Carr points out that AV is just basically a game of fuck-marry-kill) (although he called it shag-marry-kill, which is just adorable).

Anyway, I got an email from the Conservative Party chairthing which has this convincing sentence: “So if, like me, like Churchill, like many leading historians, sports stars and scientists, you know that AV would be a disaster for our democracy...”

(The other big news story in Britain is that at Prime Minister’s Questions, David Cameron adopted a line from an insurance commercial and told Labour MP Angela Eagle, who had just pointed out that he had told an untruth, “calm down, dear.”) (Cameron says the furore over this proves that socialists have no sense of humor.)

Today -100: April 28, 1911: Of reapportionment, a Jew in Egypt, the value of fingers and toes, dinners, and bosh

The House votes on a reapportionment bill, expanding the House from 391 to 433 (435 if and when Arizona and New Mexico become states). That would be one rep per 211,877 people. This is the last time the size of the House was increased, as was done in every previous decade (every previous decade also saw the accession of new states). (Historical oddity: after the 1920 census, there was no reapportionment. Not sure why; check back here in ten years.)

Reapportionment of districts will be decided by the states as usual; the D’s voted down an amendment to have it done by the Department of Commerce and Labor and another one which would have allowed for referenda for those states so inclined. Republicans from Democratic-dominated Kentucky and Missouri complain that gerrymandered Democratic congressional districts in their states have much smaller populations than Republican ones, and propose several amendments to correct that, all of which fail.

Rep. Victor Berger, Socialist from Wisconsin, proposed a joint resolution for a constitutional amendment to abolish the Senate, which he described as “an obstructive and useless body, a menace to the liberties of the people and an obstacle to social growth; a body many of the members of which are the representatives neither of a State nor of its people, but solely of certain predatory combinations”. Berger may be disciplined for violating the House rule against telling the truth about criticizing the Senate.

France announces that its military intervention in Morocco is necessary to protect foreigners at Fez, re-establish order, and protect the sovereignty of the sultan. Isn’t it nice of them to help out like that?

In other North African colonial news, Britain is rumored to be planning to send Sir Mathew Nathan to Egypt as its new Resident. Or as the NYT puts it, “Jew May Rule Egypt.”

Headline of the Day -100: “Value of Fingers and Toes.” In Lake County Superior Court, an employee at the Standard Steel Car Works who lost four fingers in an industrial accident was awarded $100, and another man got $500 for five toes.

President Taft is visiting New York City. Last night he attended a dinner of newspaper publishers, a dinner of Methodists, and a dinner in honor of retired Congressman J. Van Vechten Olcott.

Headline Expletive of the Day -100: “Bosh, Says Taft of Annexation.” At, I believe, his second dinner of the evening. He again denied plans to annex Canada. Canada must be feeling either relieved or kind of insulted by the constant repetitions of how the US is just not that into them.