Now we're getting silly.

Sometimes it seems like humans can’t live unless they are fighting over something. Today, I’m going to weigh in on a story that has been a big deal here in Japan and also over in Korea, the Takeshima/Dokdo debate.

I can already hear you thinking, “What the warm place is he talking about?” Well, that’s perfectly understandable since I sincerely doubt that this has made the US press.

Short version: There is a small chain of islets off the northern coast of Japan that are claimed as sovereign territory by both Japan and South Korea and are called Takeshima and Dokdo by each country respectfully. Who actually owns the islets has been a matter of hot and violent debate for years, but the current stink started a few months ago when the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science, and Technology (the Japanese like to get full mileage out of their ministries) came out with their new guidelines for middle and high school teachers. The most controversial change is that students are now to be taught that the Takeshima islets are part of Japan and the Korean claim is to either be ignored or refuted. As one might expect, this has royally cheesed off the Koreans, who don’t like the Japanese much to begin with, and they have officially recalled their ambassador to Japan.

Long version: Here’s a link to an AP story:
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/S/SKOREA_JAPAN?SITE=CTDAN&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

With all this fuss, you must imagine that these islets are pretty valuable. Full of natural resources ripe for exploitation or with plenty of room for urban development for an over populated country. Well, you’d be dead wrong. These islets, note that they’re not even called islands, can best be described as a pair of rocks that just happen to stick out of the water. The weather is horrendous most times of the year and the terrain is considered all but uninhabitable. The population consists of 2 Korean citizens who live there as part of that nations land claim, 37 Korean security guards to defend the islets (???why???), and 3 Japanese fishermen.

I’m sorry if this sounds like I’m imposing my culture on another, but this is a petty and ridiculous thing to fight over. The core issue is an understandable one however. From 1910 to 1945, Japan occupied South Korea and the Koreans are still angry about it. Wouldn’t you be?
What really ticks me off is the idea of dragging the schools into it. Revisionist history in social studies class is nothing new in Japan or anywhere else for that matter. Just look at any US history textbook in any public school. But to write an ending for a current event is a new low. Imagine if a US history text were to come out tomorrow and the last chapter read, “. . . and then President McCain continued President George W. Bush’s good work and won the war in Iraq without any significant loss of American life.” (Published by Murdoch Pub. Ltd. “We decide, you agree ARRRRR.”) The public outrage would be . . . minor most likely. Americans don’t really care what goes into their children’s textbooks.

OK, that was a depressing thought.

I’m going to stop writing now.

Gotta love the loopholes.

The FISA bill that the President will soon sign is a terrible idea. By protecting the telecom companies from civil lawsuits, it sends the clear message that the President of the United States is above the law. Considering that most of the big wigs at the Dept. of Justice sit at the pleasure of the President, it’s hard to say that he isn’t. But there is one argument against this bill that I’m not sure I buy.

I was watching Countdown via msnbc.com last night and one of the guests made the argument that the FISA bill shreads the 4th amendment. I’m not sure I agree. As a refresher, the 4th amendment is:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

As I understand it, the FISA bill legalizes and/or excuses the government spying on American citizens without a warrant. I haven’t read the bill, so I’m probably missing a lot of the details, but that is how it has been presented so that is what I will argue against.

The government listening in on your phone calls doesn’t violate the exact wording of the forth amendment. The spirit of it, heck yes, but the law is rarely concerned with the spirit. That’s the difference between Law and Justice. Verbal communication doesn’t fall under persons, houses, papers, or effects and the amendment only requires a warrant for those specific things. All four of those categories refer to physical objects, not information. “Persons” means the government can’t search your physical body or clothing. “Houses” is self explanatory. “Papers” refer to your personal records in an era when writing something down was the only way to record anything. “Effects” refer to your physical property such as the contents of your briefcase (In that era, this probably covered your slaves as well).

The big question is: Do spoken words fall under any of these categories? Houses: no. Person, not really because your words can’t be found by a physical search of your person. Papers, possibly, but the Administration’s argument will be that if it isn’t written down, it doesn’t count. Effects, that’s doubtful because you don’t own your words. Something I heard over and over again in school was how once something is said, it’s not private anymore. Under that logic, listening to someone’s phone call is not a search of their private records because words are definitively not private. (OK, yeah, I know that’s a load of rubbish, but that is what my generation was taught to believe in the post-columbine world.)

So the biggest sticker is in papers. If the government or their tele-toadies RECORD the call and play it back, then it becomes a “paper” under this amendment. So all they have to do is listen to the calls live and then prosecute under the 1st grader laws of evidence, “Teacher! Teacher! Johnny said a bad word!” (and yes, that’s the same Johnny who can’t read. What a little brat!) In the days of “You’re an enemy combatant because I said so. Off to Gitmo with ya!” this isn’t as crazy as it sounds.

It all comes down to the fact that we are using a 16th century rule book for a 21st century game. Therefore, the constitution ranks right up there with the Bible as a document that can be interpreted as just about anything. In today’s world, information is as tangible a commodity as bread or rice, something the founding fathers never could have imagined and hence did not plan for.

So the Bush administration is showing uncharacteristic intelligence by working their way around a constitutional loophole. That doesn’t change the fact that George W. Bush is a criminal and deserves to be hauled off to jail for the dozens of felonies he has, or has ordered, committed.

Dubya goes to Japan, part one.

W. is visiting Japan and (since it probably won't make the news state side) I'm here to capture all the fun and frolics.

It’s only natural that when a country hosts an international even that they want to show off their culture. Japan is currently hosting the G8 summit in Hokkaido. As such, the eight world leaders were asked to participate in the Tanabata tradition of writing a wish on a piece of paper and tying it to a tree. This tradition stems from the fact that Tanabata is the Star Festival and the words for “wish” and “star” are the same (hoshi) only written with different kanji. 欲しい and 星 respectfully. By the way, that was an excuse to see if the blogger software can handle Japanese writing.

So, what did the world leaders wish for? According to the Japan Times, the wishes were as follows:

England—PM Gordon “Not Blair” Brown. I will mock the other leaders, but not this one. July 7th may be Tanabata in Japan, but in the UK it is the anniversary of the London terrorist bombing. His wish was for an end to terrorism and a prayer for those who lost their lives in London. A class act.

Germany—Chancellor Angela “no amusing nickname” Merkel. She wished for a bright star to shine over the summit and for all nations to meet their responsibilities. A bit of a “take that” at the USA, which has a decades long reputation for signing treaties and accords, then using them to line the birdcage.

Japan—PM Yasuo “spell check says his name is Fu**er” Fukuda. The current PM has approval ratings below those of President Bush and is basically counting on this summit to save his job. He had a good chance here to show his intelligence and skill with the language (two things the Japanese apparently LIKE in their leaders) and he blew it by just writing one of his political catchphrases. “Learning from past wisdoms and creating new ones.” The spell checker may have been right.

USA—Still President George W. “I’m still allowed to touch things” Bush. This is a good one. I should point out that he wrote in English, it was translated into Japanese for the press, and that was retranslated back into English before the Japan Times published it. Why they didn’t just read the original, I don’t know. The Tanabata wish of Still President Bush: I wish for a world free from tyranny. Please insert your own joke about Jan 20, 2009 here: __________________________________________.

What a maroon!

All's fair in love and war records

OK, there’s nothing much in the Japanese press today except that gas prices have gone up another 10 yen a liter. Speaking of which, I was wrong about the translation of the gas prices I’m paying. 1 gallon is 3.78 liters not 4, my mistake. So I’m actually paying $6.77/gal, not $6.80. (Big !$#%ing deal!)

What I’d like to talk about today is Barack Obama and his decision to take the high road with regards to John McCain. Gen. Wesley Clark Ret. Made some long overdue comments yesterday regarding the logic of equating wartime presidential leadership ability with a military career that involved no wartime command duty whatsoever. Today, Next President Obama said that this was inappropriate, that Gen. Clark was not speaking on his behalf, and that he has no plans to attack the service record of John McCain.

This just goes to show that Barack Obama is simply a better person than John McCain. McCain’s service record is his main selling point, yet nobody is examining it that closely. The general idea is that you don’t attack the record of an ex-POW veteran with several impressive metals attached to his chest. That’s all well and good, but where was that logic 4 years ago when the GOP ripped John Kerry to pieces with false information about his war record?

The double standard extends to this election as well. One reason that nobody is attacking McCain’s record is it is equated as attacking his patriotism or attacking American troops in general. Again, that doesn’t stop the GOP from attacking Obama on the same issues, but what the hell. This is ridiculous of course. Examining his service record is just looking to see if he was any good at his job. It has nothing to do with courage, patriotism, or anything else. It’s about seeing if the foundation of the McCain campaign is strong enough to hold up the entire free world. Kinda important, donja think?

I don’t see what the problem is with looking at McCain’s background. It's ok to look at Obama’s background and experience and evaluate him as a potential POTUS but not ok to do the same to McCain. Why? Because he was in the military? The military contains the same crosscut of individuals as the rest of the population. I say from first hand experience, there are people in the military that I wouldn’t trust to run a cub scout den, much less a country (including some of the peoplewho ran MY cub scout den). Is it because John McCain was a POW? Well, I’m sorry if this sounds crass, but if you crash your plane behind enemy lines and are captured by said enemy then something went very badly wrong! And you automatically deserve to be the President of the United States solely because of that serious screw up. I’m sorry, but that doesn’t add up for me.

While we’re on the subject, would somebody please define the word patriotism or patriot for me? Over the last few years a patriot appears to have come to mean someone who never questions what they are told, a person who never disagrees with the authority figure, a person who proclaims the greatness of their flag and nation without knowing anything about its inner workings or history, a person who is proud of their ignorance, and most importantly a person who is a Republican. And not just a republican, a Bush/Rove republican. That can’t be right. If it is, then I am not a patriot and I am damn proud of it.

Getting back to the point, I just hope this impressive show of class by Obama doesn’t come back to haunt him. Not retaliating in kind when you are attacked and not stooping down to the lowest common level is seen as a sign of weakness under the modern political paradigm. This is a bad idea for the GOP. They are hearing the message “I’m going to be a nice guy while you attack me.” hidden in Obama’s message when they should be hearing, “. . . you wouldn’t like me when I’m angry.”