"Bush's Lost Year" - Link to great Atlantic Monthly article

[Rick Nebiolo]

The Atlantic came in the mail the day before yesterday and I had time to read the cover article Bush's Lost Year (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200410/fallows) by James Fallows. Registration may be required but it is worth it.

They also posted The Long Hunt For Osama (http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200410/bergen), another very good related article about wasted opportunity.

~ Rick

[andyfox]

I'm hoping Kerry reads this, as well as Fallows' earlier and excellent "Blind into Baghdad."

[Zeno]

What's funny is that I was going to post about this article, nothing worthwhile of course, but a post nonetheless. James Fallows also writes for that liberal rag, The American Prospect, a tree-wasting magazine dedicated to saving the human race by fair or foul means. Truly a despicable agenda.

Anyway, there are qualifiers stuffed throughout the article – aside from the sweeping assumptions that pervade the whole screed. But the article is worth reading and fairly well done.

The whiny tone is always bothersome to me. This is typical of the weepy-eyed left that are forever pointing out the storm clouds and the missed opportunities- so called – and almost always with the general tenor of the sky collapsing in, or the rules out of whack, and with humanity on the brink of doom, disaster, or some wasting disease. All journalistic Posh I say. It does sell copy though and that is why magazines exist –despite all the altruistic blather tossed out to the contrary by starry-eyed editors and owners.

Of course the same accusations can be tossed at the dunderheads that crusade on the right, flags and banners unfurled ready to march headlong into what every battle needs doing.

Of more import is the simple fact that despite all the blunders humanity is still dancing about this sorry ball of rock. The sky is, somehow, still overhead and the earth is still, for some odd reason, beneath our feet and Zeus is still on His mountaintop surveying all with furrowed brow and a quick eye on the fairest damsels. The mushroom clouds of doomsday have yet to cloud the horizon of humanity - much to my dismay I would like to add. But - Somehow, We are still Here. That says something. I would try to guess what, but I tarried to long at my task and I have to go and nail my sears vacuum cleaner to the wall. It’s time for my afternoon prayers.

Le Misanthrope

[Rick Nebiolo]

Agree "Blind Into Bagdad" was excellent. James Fallows has been a favorite of mine for many years. I don't think of him as leftest or an extreme liberal, but realistic and fair for the most part (with a leftward tinge /images/graemlins/grin.gif).

Anyway, I just Googled Fallows. His website had links to some of his old articles from Atlantic Monthly, but the link was bad for "The Fifty First State", regarding the consequences of winning a war in Iraq (it might be my DSL). Fallows wrote it in 2001. I have found memories of his reporting from the Far East (especially Japan) in the late eighties.

~ Rick