baldilocks

Through the Looking Glass

Max Taves of LA Weekly interviews me about my parallel/mirror life with Obama and about my effort to save the school in the senator's father's hometown and named in his honor. The profile is pretty accurate, though I don't recall saying that I "worry about my bills." And I have never met my father face-to-face, though we do talk by phone and e-mail.

I've already been called irresponsible by an Obama supporter for "naming" the school "Barack Obama's School" and advised that I needed to "re-think" that decision. I received no apology for all the erroneous assumptions in the friendly advice, however, when I pointed out that it was the residents of Nyang'oma-Kogelo, Kenya who dubbed their secondary school 'Senator Obama Kogelo Secondary School.'

(And, yes, I hate the picture. The bougainvillea were swelling me up yeah, I've gotten fatter since this latest bout of not-smoking--ten months.)

(Thanks to Michael Bowen, Patrick Frey and Jill Stewart)

To Russia With Love--Or Something

Speaking of philanthropy, Georgians haven't lost their sense of humor, it seems. In response to Russian looters, Tbilisi residents set up a fine display of modern art and world-class snark in front of the city's Russian embassy (click photos to get larger versions).

"To the Russian Army from the Georgian people"

Veronica Khokhlova has the English translation from Oleg Panfilov's blog.

To the Russian embassy in Tbilisi they brought old refrigerators, toilets, rolls of toilet paper, irons, bottles of vodka, forks and spoons, clothes and other objects that [looters from the Russian army] took interest in during their visits to private houses of Georgians, state institutions, military bases and army barracks.

People are coming up to have a closer look, shake their heads, laugh. Cars that are passing by are honking...

Now that's generosity!

UPDATE:Thanks, Glenn.

NOT SO FUNNY: "Russia can have at its borders only enemies or vassals."

Who Said This?

Americans’ greatest moral failure in my lifetime [hint: since the 1960s] has been that we still don’t abide by that basic precept in Matthew that whatever you do for the least of my brothers, you do for me.

Really? Okay.

UPDATE:The audacity of...Audacity.

COUNTRY…………….PER CAP. GIVING (pdf)

Spain……………………..122
Belgium……………………120
U.K……………………….117
Netherlands………………..110
Ireland……………………100
France……………………..74
Finland…………………….70
Austria…………………….50
Germany…………………….39
Hungary…………………….32
Slovakia……………………25
Czech Republic………………25
Romania……………………..5

U.S……………………….278

Measured in Euros for the year 2003. The report was produced by Spain.

Russia Planted

In spite of all the talk for the last few day that Russia had agreed to pull out of Georgia, Russia plans to build 18 new check points inside of the country--with the minority of them being in South Ossetia--while Russia's Deputy Chief of General Staff Anatoly Nogovitsyn says "we're not moving." "Peacekeeping," you know.

So much for the terms of the cease-fire.

What I'm Reading, August 20, 2008

Our first Flakian-American President.

Mikhail Gorbachev defends the decisions of Vladimir Putin Dmitry Medvedev.

Reuters/Zogby poll shows that McCain has a five point lead on Obama; Ace gloats (mild language alert).

A fool and his money…and John Edwards, too.

Another Obama sibling is found in a shanty on the outskirts of Nairobi. (Hey, you can’t pick your parents or your siblings, but was O’s father busy or what?)

From the UK with Love: A World Without the American Soldier.

Leading Democrats—the Speaker and the Candidate—are now mouthing new words on domestic drilling, but the 2008 Democratic Party Platform going into next week's convention tells the same old story.

Rich Lowry is hoping that Senator Joseph Biden will be Obama’s running mate, strictly for the entertainment value.

Condoleezza Rice and Polish Foreign Minister Radek Sikorski sign agreement to put a missile defense base in Poland, one which will contain ten American interceptor missiles. That deal had been nearly dead but Russia’s invasion of Georgia resuscitated it.

And speaking of the dead standing up …

Duty Calling Again

If you've guessed that I have more than one on-going responsibility, you're correct. It's a blessing for sure but it takes up time away from the computer. I'll try to get in some posting this afternoon.

I can throw you a bone: my father is very ticked-off at some American journalists right now--especially Jerome Corsi.

Back later.

Separated at Birth

It's beginning to feel like it...and that each of us was born in a separated dimension. You know who I'm talking about.

I've been busy as a bee today—in a good way.

However I have to take time to share a few things.

LA Weekly will be featuring a profile of me on Thursday, the 21st. The subject? My mirror life with Obama and the effort to save the Kenyan school named in his honor.

Oh, yeah and the site is up! A lot more basic than I had envisioned but we’ll see what happens as I add features.

And here's the hot newsflash: my mother is white. Well, that’s what Jerome Corsi assumed when he used my father’s four-year old Obama op-ed as reference material for his best-seller The Obama Nation.

[Philip] Ochieng's point in writing this insightful piece was not just to set the record straight on Obama Senior. More important, he sought to describe how Obama Junior, when first visiting the "Home Squared" of his father's native village during his 1992 trip to Africa, was confronted with the perplexing accusation, "You're lost!"

The expression comes from the Luo verb lal, which Ochieng explained means to disappear or be away for a long time without an explanation. "Simply by being born and growing up in America, Barack Junior had never been a Luo: He had lal," Ochieng wrote.

From there, Ochieng argued Obama Senior "had lost his way by marrying a white woman -- Barack Junior's mother." Ochieng confessed that he shared this plight. For decades he was estranged from his daughter, who was born of a white woman who left him while Ochieng was in the United States studying.

My mom’s response: “Well, that certainly isn’t the first time someone has described me in that manner.” (I could hear her smirking over the phone.) Well heck, me neither. However, my father does mention my name in the op-ed and a quick bit of Google work would have revealed that I was probably not half white. It's an...interesting...assumption. But what can one expect from someone who uses Andy Martin as a source?

The part about my parents’ separating also leaves the impression that my father was in the US studying while my mother was in another country. Wrong. They separated—later divorced--while both lived in the US in the same abode.

Out there somewhere is a list of things which are allegedly wrong about Corsi’s book. I don’t know what any of the items on the list are but if it's an accurate list, then this item should be on it.

Seemingly unrelated: my step-father and I were agreeing the other day that there are no coincidences. You'll see what I'm talking about on Thursday.

"21st Century Barbarians"

Watching the press conference, taking place in Tblisi, featuring US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Georgian President Mikhiel Saakashvili. The president is formidable and eloquent in making his case against Russia.

More later. I have yet more duties this morning, however brief.

UPDATE:

UPI:

"With the signature of the Georgian president on the cease-fire accord, all Russian troops and any irregular and paramilitary forces that entered with them must leave (Georgia) immediately," Condoleezza Rice said Friday during a news conference in Tbilisi with Saakashvili. [SNIP]

At times speaking emotionally, Saakashvili emphasized the document he signed was "a cease-fire agreement, not a final settlement," stressing that his country would rebuild.

"We are under Russian invasion and Russian occupation right now," he said. "I want the world to know that Georgia never, ever will reconcile with ... occupation."

The description 'emotional' doesn't begin to cover the Georgian president's answers this morning.

Georgia has signed the agreement. Now it's on Russia. The thing is this, however: Russia and her parent, the Union of the Soviet Socialist Republics, and notorious for breaking/ignoring agreements, cease-fires and settlements alike.

UPDATE: A Russian armored Column is located 15 miles outside of Tbilisi. On the move?

Out For The Morning

Duties call. Send links and general comments. Yes, even you, Guest-known-as-'me.'

By the Way

The Russian-Georgian-Ossetian-Abkhazian conflict is a tribal war, just like any such conflict on more southerly continents and should be called such. Oh the technology is more advanced and the political intrigue, strategy and subterfuge are far more elaborate, but one look at the history and you can figure it out that this conflict is fundamentally like any tribal power-grab; for example, say, that which occurred in Kenya. And, already, there are more dead bodies than was so for the Kenya conflict--the result of more efficient methods of killing. So the next time you here someone refer to "those savages in Africa murdering each other for a tribal power grabs," be sure to point to the Caucasus.

We all have the potential to be savages.

Just sayin'.

Where Are The Anti-Warriors?

I see no reports of them marching in front of the Russian Embassy in DC.

No Code: PINK.

No International ANSWER.

Antiwar.com talks about the Russia-Georgia conflict, but only to criticize the actions of the Bush Administration and hint that the war isn't "all Russia's fault."

What gives?

UPDATE: Surely the anti-warriors will be up-in-arms (so to speak) about this!

TBILISI, Georgia - Russia ordered a halt to the war in Georgia on Tuesday, after five days of air and land attacks that sent Georgia's army into headlong retreat and left towns, military bases and homes in the U.S. ally smoldering. Georgia insisted that Russian forces were still bombing and shelling.

Despite the televised order by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, Russia launched an offensive Tuesday in the Kodori Gorge, the only part of the breakaway region of Abkhazia still under Georgian control, sending in tanks, armored personnel carriers and artillery.

Because War is Not the Answer!!!! Putin Medvedev (same thing) Lied! More Georgians Died! I'm sure that the human shields are headed to Abkhazia as I type this.

Rogue State (UPDATED)

Ralph Peters says, Meet the New Russia, Same as the old Soviet Union.

IT'S impossible to overstate the importance of what's un folding as we watch. Russia's invasion of Georgia - a calculated, unprovoked aggression - is a crisis that may have more important strategic implications than Iraq and Afghanistan combined.

We're seeing the emergence of a rogue military power with a nuclear arsenal. [SNIP]

This is the "new" Russia announcing - in blood - that it won't tolerate freedom and self-determination along its borders. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin is putting it bluntly: Today, Georgia, tomorrow Ukraine (and the Baltic states had better pay attention).

Georgia's affiliation with the European Union, its status as a would-be NATO member, its working democracy - none of it deterred Putin.

Nor does Putin's ambition stop with the former Soviet territories. His air force has been trying (unsuccessfully) to hit the new gas pipeline running from the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean. The Kremlin is telling Europe: We not only have the power to turn off Siberian gas, we can turn off every tap in the region, any time we choose.

Peters goes on to (correctly) lambaste the initial reactions of Barack Obama and George W. Bush. On John McCain's reaction seemed commensurate to the situation.

Peters also wonders why the West seems caught off-guard by Russia's actions.

Any soldier above the grade of private can tell you that there's absolutely no way Moscow could've launched this huge ground, air and sea offensive in an instantaneous "response" to alleged Georgian actions. [SNIP]

[The Russians] managed to arrange the instant appearance of a squadron of warships to blockade Georgia. And they launched hundreds of air strikes against preplanned targets. [SNIP]

Make no mistake: Moscow intends to dismember Georgia.

Peters turns his rant-guns to the MSM and then points to the alleged fecklessness of the Bush Administration:

Just as Moscow has reverted to its old habit of sending in tanks to snuff out freedom, Washington has defaulted to form by abandoning Georgia to the invasion - after encouraging Georgia to stand up to the Kremlin.

Reminds me of 1956, when we encouraged the Hungarians to defy Moscow - then abandoned them. And of 1991, when we prodded Iraq's Shia to rise up against Saddam - then abandoned them. We've called Georgia a "friend and ally." Well, honorable men and states stand by their friends and allies. We haven't.

I think Ralph Peters is an intelligent man who has knowledge far and away above my level, along with the ability to apply that knowledge to reality. So I'm wondering how he thinks that the US could act effectively to defend Georgia while we're in Iraq and Afghanistan. Wouldn't one of these endeavors ultimately get the short end? Wouldn't some entity be abandoned?

As I've said in a few places, there are no good choices for the US in this matter--and that's sometimes the way it is.

UPDATE: Responses proposed:

America must hit where it hurts: Russia’s international prestige, an obsession of Mr. Putin’s. To begin with, we must do everything possible to see Russia’s membership in the Group of 8 industrialized nations be suspended (something the Republican presidential hopeful John McCain called for even before this crisis).

Once the fighting is over, America must step up its campaign for NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine. Should European countries reject the idea, America could designate them “major non-NATO allies,” along the lines of Israel and Pakistan. This would involve more American military trainers in Georgia, intelligence-sharing, joint exercises and other steps, if not a full pledge by Washington to defend the country in case of attack.

Would being booted from the G8 really hurt Russia? And if both Ukraine and Georgia are voted into NATO, what happens if Russia ignores this, remains in Georgia and moves on to Ukraine? Will the EU members of NATO change its complacency spots? More than likely they will expect the US to act, then criticize us while our troops are dying and theirs are chillin' in the rear echelon. (Disclaimer: I'm an REMF myself.)

To paraphrase Darkstar: All. Bad. Choices.

(Thanks to Hot Air)

President Bush to Russia: End This

The POTUS says what all other observers have figured out: Russia wants Georgia back.

(Thanks to Hot Air)

Obama Kogelo School Update: Waiting for the Mail Man

Don't you hate snail mail anymore?

The paperwork for the non-profit should be here today. In the meantime, the site--obamaschool.org--exists is being worked on as we speak. (If you go there right now, however, you'll only get the password-protection screen.)

As soon as I receive the paperwork and get the site up, we'll resume actively taking donations to modernize Senator Obama Kogelo Secondary School.

UPDATE (11:20 AM PDT): Fedex delivers! More later today.

PREVIOUSLY:

California Says 'Obama-Kogelo School Non-Profit Approved!'
School for Kogelo Update and Book Gift
Save Obama School: The Funding
Obama Kogelo School Update: Non-Profit Done!
Save Obama School: The Site and The Non-profit
Saving Obama School
Raising A Village

Russia and Georgia: Regaining What Was Lost (UPDATED: Russians Almost Take Out Saakashvili)

Georgia backs down but Russia doesn’t; Georgia wants America and NATO to step in.

The Russians want regime change--Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin compares Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili to Saddam Hussein and is angry that the US is ferrying 2000 Georgian troops home from Iraq after Saakashvili recalled them.

Russia had little to fear from NATO when considering the launch of an invasion on its former vassal state; it has Europe over a barrel (HT Rick Moran; read that, too).

Armed with wealth from oil and gas; holding a near-monopoly over the energy supply to Europe; with a million soldiers, thousands of nuclear warheads and the world’s third-largest military budget, Vladimir Putin believes that now is the time to make his move.

(Take note on the oil issue, US Congress.)

Kagan says that this war isn't really about South Ossetia--that Saakashvili’s real crime against Russia is being “president of a small, mostly democratic and adamantly pro-Western nation on the border of Putin's Russia.”

Georgia is owed protection from the US, says Big Tent Democrat at Talk Left. From that assertion, one supposes that there will be no anti-war movement spearheaded the Left this time. I guess War sometimes Is the Answer.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy goes to Tblisi and to Moscow, presumably to talk sense. Sarkozy seems to have a winning personality without being spineless, but that won’t stop this, because, for Russian, it’s all about the runaway slave states.

In all the reports and blog posts I’ve read on the topic in the past few days, one name is conspicuously missing: Dmitrij Medvedev—the Russian President. I guess we know who is wearing the pants in that marriage, as if there was any doubt.

More to follow.

UPDATE: War for Oil? Powerline:

News reports indicate that Russia may have tried to bomb the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline, which runs through Georgia. If so, the bombs missed, and flow of oil through the pipeline was not interrupted. The BTC pipeline runs from the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean coast of Turkey; note Russia to the north and Iran to the south.

The pipeline is capable of pumping the equivalent of 1 million barrels a day and is the only oil conduit in the region not in Russian control. Back in 2002, when the pipeline was being built, Russia was adamantly against its construction.

For these reasons, it would be of enormous strategic benefit to Russia if it could reassert dominance over Georgia, or merely have an opportunity to demonstrate to Turkmenistan and Azerbaijain that any means of getting their petroleum products to market independent of Russia may be unreliable. These issues are a key subtext to Russia's conflict with Georgia and Georgia's desire to join NATO, and otherwise seek protection from the West.

(Thanks to Roger Kimball; read that, too. It's about Russia and Georgia and McCain and Obama.)

UPDATE: Russians take Gori while President Saakashvili makes a narrow escape from the city and, possibly, from Russian bombers (just seen on cable news).

UPDATE: Saakashvili at WSJ (HT: MTheads):

This invasion, which echoes Afghanistan in 1979 and the Prague Spring of 1968, threatens to undermine the stability of the international security system. [SNIP]

This conflict is about the future of freedom in Europe.

All Cold Warrior eyes are on the Caucasus region. Believe it.