Pacific Views

In Review

Ampersand wishes us to know that, contrary to the views of bestselling authors who shall remain nameless, men and women are from the same planet. So there.

At Back to Iraq, Albritton describes the worsening mood of Iraqis after the bombing in Karbala as part of a steady trend.

Barefoot and Naked has collected the jobs and growth goods.

Body and Soul writes about the Iraqi prison of Abu Ghraib now that it's in American hands, Arnold's entry into publishing, and the possibility that Bush administration coup plotters are still interested in Venezuela.

Calpundit notes that John Kerry isn't exceptionally liberal, being almost solidly in the middle of the Democratic party. But I was pleased to discover through a link in his post that WA congressman Jim McDermott is in fact the most liberal member of congress, edging past even Kucinich.

Dave Cullen thinks there's no going back on gay marriage, and I hope he's right.

Corrente brings us a second conflict of interest for Scalia, bad human rights news from Uzbekistan, and information about the high price of privatizing military duties.

dKos: From the diaries, an interesting question about Aristide's resignation letter, and more thoughts on the possibility that Venezuela might be next. Kos says that the blog contribution of fact-checking their a**** 24/7 has created quite a pickle for the GOP, linking to Billmon's landmark WMD quote list and a recent dKos diary chronicle of Bush flip-flops.

Free Thoughts on Iran posts from a guest blogger from a western background who learned to live with hijab. Doesn't make me want to run out and buy a scarf, but very interesting.

Gallimaufry points to an anthropological study of marriage that found no good basis for declaring that the current incarnation of the nuclear family has been the norm for time immemorial.

Guardian columnist Gary Younge talks about the ouster of Haitian democracy, and Nick Cohen says that we should be just as keen to protect the young from advertising as we protect them from sex. (I personally think that young people need to be protected from advertising even more than they need to be protected from sex, though considering many of the media images they're exposed to, it practically amounts to the same thing.) Also, George Monbiot takes on the round-the-bend arguments agribusinesses are now using to bully the public into accepting GM foods. He debunks the argument that GM will solve hunger at length, but the argument that GM is a great boon to science with dispatch. Emphasis mine:

...Now forgive me if you've heard this before, but it seems to need repeating. GM crops are not science. They are technological products of science. To claim, as Tony Blair and several senior scientists have done, that those who oppose GM are "anti-science" is like claiming that those who oppose chemical weapons are anti-chemistry. Scientists are under no greater obligation to defend GM food than they are to defend the manufacture of Barbie dolls. ...

At Hullaballoo, the permalinks seem to be broken. I'd wanted to direct readers to a post about the growing popularity of the Prius, but you can scroll through this archive for it, and be rewarded with plenty of other good tidbits. Including a partial transcript of the Howard Stern show the day before he was fired.

Just a Bump in the Beltway has more on Haiti, some on Chalmers Johnson. If you know who Chalmers Johnson is, you'll rush over. If you don't, you should rush over and get acquainted, because the guy definitely knows where his towel is.

Magpie found a link to Candidate Bush vs. President Bush, the debate brought to you by the wizards at the Daily Show video editing department. If the DNC or any other liberal organization were looking for an ad, they should consider lifting it wholesale.

Ms. Magazine posts about global women's issues as well as literature from the axis of evil, as translated by Words Without Borders, a society sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts. Though, if I'm not mistaken, the Treasury Department may have recently declared their activities illegal. Which is a shame, because it all sounded pretty interesting.

Finally, the funny stuff.

Read the whole diary of Kerry's running mate vetting process, by Notes on the Atrocities. Quick excerpts:

March 2, 2003
War looming; a few nuts in Portland and San Francisco protesting. Must compete with a war president. Contact DLC to find pro-war moderate with foreign policy experience. Lieberman leading polls. This is the year for an insider with experience. ...

August 12, 2003
Dean on cover of Time. Must run from the outside, the Democratic wing of Dems. Liberal is in. DLC still suggesting Zell Miller. What about Joe Trippi? Focus groups don't know what they want. Bush is targeting Hispanics. Bill Richardson? ...

Don't miss Courteous Miner's Howard Dean in Braveheart, in part:

John of Edwards: Invade? That's impossible.

Howard: Why? Why is that impossible? You're so concerned with squabbling for the scraps from Bush's table that you've missed your God given right to something better. ...

And Wonkette found stories about the Gridiron dinner, which I'd been wanting to look for, but ultimately hadn't got around to. So enjoy, because this is funny stuff. Or what passes for it with politicians.