This is Moosebase Alpha, come in Planet Earth...

This is Moosebase Alpha, come in Planet Earth...yea, all quiet again...

Figured that it was time for some sort of an update from here in the land of extreme freaky stuff. The oddest thing of late has been that life has been quite normal. Now, I know that would not bother many of you, but around here it just makes the hair stand up on the back of my neck.

It's been quiet...almost too quiet.

Two things in the news. One of which I don't get at all. Okay, I don't get either one. Seems some guy ripped of a bunch of people for $20 MILLION dollars, yet if convicted, he faces a fine of $250,000. Um, I am not sure about you but I would gladly pay out the fine. So his net profit from his ill gotten gains is $19.75 MILLION dollars. Um, yea. Justice, right...

Number two on the list is something I read on the BBC website:
Scotland is looking to outlaw the ownership of swords by individuals. HELLO! No guns, no swords, limited to itty-bitty knives. Hey, didn't Cromwell do that once already?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/4031405.stm
Here is a quote for ya from the article:

"There can be no reason for people buying swords off the street for use or to have in their homes," Jack McConnell, First Minister

Are boot-sales overrun with swords of late? Um...sword, concealed...right.

To interject a few euphemisms you may understand, Mr. First Minister "You are a total pratt! A git of the first degree, a ninny and a complete and utter tosser!"

But wait! It gets worse:
"It is not acceptable. The law in Scotland must be clear, the system must protect innocent victims and the culture of Scotland, particularly in our cities, in relation to knives and violent crime, must change," he said.

Protect the culture of Scotland? Okay, but there are no exclusions for re-enactors, fencers or heaven forbid the Highland Dancers. Dance a traditional dance, go to jail for 4 years. Regia ? Do not pass go, head directly to jail for 4 years. Oh, did you notice the expanded police powers? Yea, they can stop and search anyone suspected of carrying a knife. Pedestrians and vehicles can be searched without a crime being committed. Any knife, any person, anywhere, at any time. Boy would I be screwed!

All this seems to be brought about by some recent crime statistics. The first Minister stated "That 50% of the homicides in Scotland in 2002 were caused by knives or other sharp instruments."

What are "other sharp instruments"? Pencils? Ice picks? Pointed sticks? Gee, wonder why? How about no firearms for the general public for one. Wait till this goes into affect and the crime rate will show a rise in the use of cricket bats as the weapon of choice in homicides, then they will get outlawed too. I suggest polearms. You will never be accused of concealing it.

Outlawing swords and knives has been tried before. Know what happened? The birth of Kung Fu. Yea, China had outlawed all weapons for private ownership once. Even the communists let people have guns and swords for their own use now. Maybe we will see the new Scottish martial art we have joked about come to be. Swift kick to the mommy and daddy button with steel toed boots then punch to the eye as they lie on the ground. Then they can outlaw boots, too. Pretty soon, they will all be naked, and that will be quite funny.

So, I think this calls for some drastic measures.
Anyone care for a fresh hot, steaming cup of Scottish revolution? I'll bring the swords.

Well, next time I'll try to leave Europe alone and take some time to bust on the U.S.
With so much material, I am sure I can find something to occupy say 80 or 90 pages.

Till then,
Be mindful and awake

The UN-peacekeepers

One if my readers posted this to me:
“Ok, I’m confused about your statement of no UN mandate. As an article in the Times states “That action, (the bombing of the air force) taken with the full support of the UN Security Council” would seem to me that the UN had supported the French. Also the French and UN have had peacekeeping forces in Côte d'Ivoire for quite a while since the last civil war. At present there are about 6,000 U.N. troops in the Ivory cost and 4,000 French. And the French were only replying to a bombing of one of there buildings. Keep in mind there were also American aid workers killed or injured in the attack on the building. So the French retaliated by destroying the Côte d'Ivoire’s air force but not killing anyone because they had people killed and was probably deliberately attacked. Considering that by reports the planes circled overhead three times before attacking. Seems to me kind of hard to argue with the French position for the way they carried out there retaliation. As to weather or not the French should be there, well that could be traced back to their colonial days.”

Okay, fair enough. I made some statements, now I need to clarify what I said with a few facts. He has his points, but a little research shows something a little different at least how I see it. I will address this a little at a time. I did not include his name as I did not ask him if it was okay first. My choice, but the email is presented in its entirety, minus the name.

“Ok, I’m confused about your statement of no UN mandate. As an article in the Times states “That action, (the bombing of the air force) taken with the full support of the UN Security Council” would seem to me that the UN had supported the French.”

The UN mission to Côte d'Ivoire is separate from the French troops there. I will post my resources here so if they seem abrupt, that is their wording, not mine J
“As stipulated by resolution 1528, the mandate of UNOCI, which was to be implemented in coordination with the French forces stationed in Côte d’Ivoire, shall be the following:…” (1)
Okay, so the UN forces are to work in coordination with the French forces there. The French are not part of the UN mission; therefore they are troops from an outside government and do not enjoy the protections given UN Blue Helmets. They can be considered viable legal combatants.

“Also the French and UN have had peacekeeping forces in Côte d'Ivoire for quite a while since the last civil war. At present there are about 6,000 U.N. troops in the Ivory cost and 4,000 French.”
I don’t argue this at all. Here are some more statistics:
Total authorized strength
”6,240 military personnel, including 200 military observers; as well as 350 civilian police officers, some 435 international civilians and 529 local civilians, and 119 United Nations Volunteers.
Strength as of 30 September 2004
6,221 total uniformed personnel, including 5,843 troops, 166 military observers; 212 civilian police supported by 220 international civilian personnel and 156 local staff “(2)
Now here is where things get a little muddy.:
“Contributors of Military Personnel:
Bangladesh, Benin, Bolivia, Brazil, Burkina Faso, China, Congo, Croatia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, France, Gambia, Ghana, Guatemala, Guinea, India, Ireland, Jordan, Kenya, Moldova, Morocco, Namibia, Nepal, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, Paraguay, Peru, Phillipines, Poland, Republic of Korea, Romania, Russian Federation, Senegal, Serbia and Montenegro, Togo, Tunisia, Uruguay, Yemen and Zambia
Contributors of civilian police personnel:
Bangladesh, Benin, Cameroon, Canada, Chad, Djibouti, El Salvador, France, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Togo, Turkey and Uruguay”(2)
Now why does the UN list that they are working in concert with French troops, but list them separately from any others in the resolution? The only thing I can figure out is that there are both French peacekeepers and French regular troops deployed in the same area. Wouldn’t you say this is a problem waiting to happen? Which ones are UN and which ones are not? I would say it is a little hard to tell from an aircraft moving at 250mph plus. High-speed ants still look like ants even if they do have blue helmets.”

“And the French were only replying to a bombing of one of there buildings. Keep in mind there were also American aid workers killed or injured in the attack on the building. So the French retaliated by destroying the Côte d'Ivoire’s air force but not killing anyone because they had people killed and was probably deliberately attacked.”
Okay, time for a little more clarification. The area they are occupying is in the sovereign territory of Côte d’Ivoire, not France. The buildings they are using are not property of France, but of the lawful government of Côte d’Ivoire and its people. That aside, I feel that their retributive strike against the legitimate government of Côte d’Ivoire was uncalled for and beyond reason. Some would say that it could be construed as an act of aggression. As for deliberately attacked, who knows, but they did not even ask, they just struck back. The US and other nations have accidentally hit “friendlies” during engagements. This is called “The Fog Of War” when targets are misidentified.
“On 6 November 2004, air strikes in Bouaké left nine French soldiers and an American civilian dead, plus 30 more French soldiers injured.”(6). 10 people killed, 30 injured. I would like to say that I do feel sad for the soldiers and the aid worker and their families. There were there to do a very difficult job and paid the ultimate price for doing what they thought was right.

“Considering that by reports the planes circled overhead three times before attacking. Seems to me kind of hard to argue with the French position for the way they carried out there retaliation.”

The fact that the jet made 3 passes would seem to indicate the pilot tried to identify the troops involved. He may have questioned the target, but after the third pass had to error on the side of the attack. Who knows? We are all guessing, only the pilot knows for sure. Although I do have a question about this; why did the French, who some would say have a modern army, not try to radio the aircraft and warn him off? Why did they not throw smoke to show they were friendlies? An even simpler question is why did they not get out of there if they saw this attack craft buzzing them? Why when the aircraft took an attack attitude did they not cut and run? One answer jumps to mind: Engaged combatants do not retreat during a potential air strike. Hell, if they would have just waved to him he may not of attacked.

“ As to weather or not the French should be there, well that could be traced back to their colonial days”

Amen. I would recommend reading http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/citoc.html just to get an idea of how much influence France has in Ivory Coast. I would say colony in all but name.

If in fact the French ground troops are operating as an authorized extension of the UN Peacekeepers then I think the following applies:
“While affirming the Blue Helmets’ right to defend themselves and those they are mandated to protect, the Secretary-General has stressed that this new “doctrine” should not be interpreted as a means of turning the UN into a warfighting machine, and that the use of force should always be seen as a measure of last resort.” (3)

Um, they hit the air force within a very short period of time, like an hour or so. So much for measures of last resort.
Here are some interesting tidbits:
“On Saturday, government aircraft bombed a French position near Bouake, killing nine French soldiers and an American aid worker. The Ivorian government said the bombing was an accident.” (4) Oh, like the French never had an accident. I would direct my readers to footnote number 5. Not once, ever has any “allied force” taken retribution against the accidentally offending party. Sorry, France, that dog does not hunt. They call it Amicicde. Heck, even the French know the word Ami; it is French! It means friend you dolts!

And on that thread:
Would you agree that the destruction of a countries air force, however small, would be an unstabilising factor both politically and economically? I would, and apparently so does the French minister of foreign affairs:
“In a communiqué released on 7 November, Michel Barnier, France’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, focused his attention on the fact that “the mission of French forces is above all to increase the security of our citizens. (...) That is their mission: to increase security - nothing more. To increase security, not to destabilize.”” (6)
I’ll take bets that when this is all over, France will kindly offer to sell them a few Mirage fighters to replace the Russian-made Sukhoi jet fighters they destroyed.

Okay, I could ramble on even more. While I do like the input from my readers, sometimes I just must respond publicly. I hope this did not come off as adversarial as that was not my intent. I just wanted to present some of the facts that led me to my statements and conclusions. I know some of this is just supposition and conjecture, but when we do not have all the information that is all we can hope for.

I did try to find an offical government website for Ivory Coast, but none exists. I will edit out the snide anti-French comment I was going to post here as it takes away from everything else.

References:
(1) http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/missions/unoci/mandate.html
(2) http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/missions/unoci/facts.html
(3) http://www.un.org/Depts/dpko/dpko/faq/q9.htm
(4) http://www.cnn.com/2004/WORLD/africa/11/11/ivory.evacuation/index.html
(5) http://www-cgsc.army.mil/carl/resources/csi/Shrader/shrader.asp
(6) http://www.premier-ministre.gouv.fr/en/information/latest_news_97/cote_ivoire_taking_stock_51531.html

Only half evolved

So here I sit typing with one thumb out of commission. You know we joke about having or not having thumbs as the case may be as part of a we are so better than the animals type attitude, which is all fine and dandy. They do not have lawyers, mostly. And you never see protest marches about Evolutionary Profiling or such nonsense, but when you are sans one thumb it does make you think a little bit.

Sans one thumb, you may ask. Yes, a bizarre sword accident. I broke my thumb in a sword fight. How many times have you ever heard /that/ particular comment before? I would exclude SCAdians and Regia people from that question. To us it is as normal as saying I broke my arm on a skateboard. While it may seem odd to some to hear me say I broke my arm on a skateboard, to others they would just say “Oh, too bad…” not even thinking twice about me doing something like that.

So anyway, the past few weeks have mostly been full of the same stuff. Work, more work, and did I mention work? Still it was my parents wedding anniversary. Happily married for 10 years. 10 out of 30, but hey got to start somewhere right? I just thought I would mention to all my readers that today is Judi’s birthday.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY SWEETY!!! So take a sec and zap her off an email or a card.

On the international front, I think Dubbua aught to hold a press conference condemning the actions of France in the Ivory Coast. What, did you not know about that? Okay, here is the short of it: Ivory Coast has some unrest. France sends in Peace Keepers (Read Foreign Legion) without a UN mandate. So the end up getting accidentally bombed and 9 French peacekeepers get killed. Okay, I feel bad for the guys on the ground and their families.

So what does France do? They destroy the entire Air Force of the Ivory Coast! Now granted 5 planes and 8 helicopters are not much of an air force, but still! Then they take up a “defensive position” surrounding the capitol. People are in the streets telling them to go away and punctuating their message with machetes. A reporter I read about was set upon by one of these mobs and they attacked till they found out they were English, not French. When they found out, they all left.
Take a read about it at:
http://www.cnn.com

Of course, there is nothing about it on the front of CNNs site, but they do have the article on
Brittany Spears new "best of" cd. A true “best of” from her would be 3 cds of silence!

Well, guess what! Time for more work…

Till next time, be mindful and awake.

Okay, I am better now

So much so I created these:
Click here WARNING GRAPHIC INTENSIVENESS
Chao!

Alight, that is it..I'M PISSED OFF!

Yea, Halloween in Athens. Big fucking deal.
Pricks from around the nation descend on this already overcrowded little town and proceed to screw everything up and dump all their trash for us to clean up. On top of this some Goddammedpigfuckingsonofbitchingworthlesspeiceoftrash, stole the cover off of my motorcycle. They stole a fricking rain cover. Ohhh, big cool factor there. Bet for an encore you swipe stacks of your local free newspaper, hu? Well guess what! If I EVER find my cover in Athens on someones bike, I hope my friends will pool their change and bail me out of jail for what I will do to that person. I’ll not go into graphic detail here, lets just quote a movie shall we? Pain…Lots of Pain.
Now, at first I was not that mad. Okay, no biggie. Well, I just had to drop 80 bucks on a replacement and ya know it just kinda got to me after a while. Lets see now, that makes one wind chime, one broken mirror, one dented car door, and now a motorcycle cover. Yea, I got an idea for next Halloween. I am going to go as a psychotic killer lurking in the bushes on Mound Street, say around number 50. Armed of course.

And if by some weirdness of the cosmos, whomever stole it does read my blog I have this for you:

You are a thief and a coward,
A poltroon of the worst order,
I curse you and the nearest 5 generations of your family,
I curse your parents; because it is their fault you are the way you are
I curse your siblings for letting be such an idiot in public,
I curse your grandparents for not teaching your parents to bring you up with at least the social responsibility the gods gave a slug,
I curse your children to treat you as you have treated others,
And I curse your grandchildren so they may revisit all your evils upon you a second time, since the will be so far removed from your control.
But, even with this I offer you a blessing:
May your life be long and your offspring be many.
This way, my revenge will last.

If you did take it, I would really advise you to return it for your own sake. No questions asked, just leave it on the porch. Then, having made an effort to correct your error, I would revoke all I have wished upon you with the exception of the blessing.

If in doubt, just remember one thing:
The gods like me, else I would have never lasted this long.
Can you say the same thing?