Month: August 2013

Hello again painting fans.

This week I will be with the painting of the Holbrook service station. The photo that I will be using is seen directly below. I will be using my usual acrylics on an 8×8 gallery-wrapped canvas.

When last seen, the painting appeared as it does in the photo directly below.

Since that time I have continued to work on the painting.

I’ve continued to work on the structure.  It now appears with its banded windows, further enhancing the width.  Note that the door is partly obscured by the left side column.  The underside of the overhang is now shadowed as well as the corresponding portion of the facade.  The shadows continue on the right side foreground.  Out in front, the sign’s shadow now appears in gray as well.

The current state of the painting is seen directly below.

I’ll have more to show you next week. See you then.

Earlier paintings in this series can be seen here.

Look, I’m not going to pretend that the Obama administration hasn’t made some serious missteps here, nor will I deny that they look really bad. But, President Obama found an escape hatch that will allow him to delay any military response. In asking for congressional authorization (that he doesn’t believe he needs, legally) without calling for Congress to immediately reconvene, he’s bought himself a week, which will allow us to gets some results from the United Nations.

The inspectors were heading to The Hague with blood and urine samples taken from victims of the attack, as well as soil samples from areas where the attacks took place. They were due to deliver the sample to the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons on Saturday afternoon.

The samples will be divided so each can be sent to at least two separate European laboratories for testing, according to United Nations officials, but experts said the testing would not be completed for several days at the earliest.

As I said yesterday, the administration is out on a limb with their allegations and their intent to strike Syria, and they need to at least find out what kind of chemical agent was used and how it was delivered before they even pretend to have proven their case. Right now, Vladimir Putin is completely comfortable saying things like this:

On Friday, President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, Syria’s patron, argued that it was “simply utter nonsense” to believe Syria’s government would launch such an attack and challenged the United States to present any evidence to the United Nations.

“I am convinced that it is nothing more than a provocation by those who want to involve other countries in the Syrian conflict, who want to gain the support of powerful members in international affairs, primarily, of course the United States,” Mr. Putin said in his first public remarks since reports of the chemical attack emerged. “I have no doubts about it.”

Putin’s right about one thing. The U.S. ought to provide their evidence rather than simply asserting that they have it. But, in asking for congressional approval, the president has bought himself an excuse for inaction which will give him a window to bolster his case or back down if the case can’t be bolstered.

He has, however, opened himself up for the same kind of humiliation that David Cameron suffered in the the UK. Much of the president’s party is opposed to unilateral action, and the Republicans love to oppose the president. If the administration doesn’t provide more irrefutable evidence, Congress probably won’t approve a strike anyway.

Maybe the president would be okay with that.

It’s a strange day indeed when I find myself on the same page with U.S. military leadership, yet it seems even US military leaders are not keen on attacking Syria, and appear to share some of my concerns.

Apparently Obama, the Nobel Peace Laureate, is determined to start a war, has no coherent goal, no coherent strategy, and is not listening to his military experts.

Close your eyes, close your mind, man the torpedos and damn the consequences. Full speed ahead to Iraq 2.0.

Unintended consequences…no coherent strategy…

Former and current officers, many with the painful lessons of Iraq and Afghanistan on their minds, said the main reservations concern the potential unintended consequences of launching cruise missiles against Syria.

Some questioned the use of military force as a punitive measure and suggested that the White House lacks a coherent strategy.

From the Director of Operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff prior to the invasion of Iraq:

…retired Lt. Gen. Gregory S. Newbold, who served as director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the run-up to the Iraq war, [noted] that many of his contemporaries are alarmed by the plan.

More unintended consequences…

Marine Lt. Col. Gordon Miller, a fellow at the Center for a New American Security, warned this week of “potentially devastating consequences, including a fresh round of chemical weapons attacks and a military response by Israel.”

“If President [Bashar al-Assad] were to absorb the strikes and use chemical weapons again, this would be a significant blow to the United States’ credibility and it would be compelled to escalate the assault on Syria to achieve the original objectives,” Miller wrote in a commentary for the think tank.

No less than the Chairman of the Joint Chief’s of Staff is warns against attacking Syria…

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, has warned in great detail about the risks and pitfalls of U.S. military intervention in Syria.

“As we weigh our options, we should be able to conclude with some confidence that use of force will move us toward the intended outcome,” Dempsey wrote last month in a letter to the Senate Armed Services Committee. “Once we take action, we should be prepared for what comes next. Deeper involvement is hard to avoid.”

“this is going to be a full-throated, very, very serious war”

The recently retired head of the U.S. Central Command, Gen. James Mattis, said last month at a security conference that the United States has “no moral obligation to do the impossible” in Syria. “If Americans take ownership of this, this is going to be a full-throated, very, very serious war,” said Mattis, who as Centcom chief oversaw planning for a range of U.S. military responses in Syria.

Not only no coherent strategy, it appears there is no coherent goal, and Obama is not listening.

“What is the political end state we’re trying to achieve?” said a retired senior officer involved in Middle East operational planning who said his concerns are widely shared by active-duty military leaders. “I don’t know what it is. We say it’s not regime change. If it’s punishment, there are other ways to punish.” The former senior officer said that those who are expressing alarm at the risks inherent in the plan “are not being heard other than in a pro-forma manner.”

Booman recently posted an article titled ‘High Confidence’ Won’t Cut It. In it, he quoted the U.S. Government Assessment of the Syrian Government’s Use of Chemical Weapons delivered on August 21 as saying:

Our high confidence assessment is the strongest position that the U.S. Intelligence Community can take short of confirmation.

Oh. “I see,” said the blind man to his deaf wife.

Oh.

We are now thoroughly down Alice’s rabbit hole.

Nothing new, apparently.

White House threw secret ‘Alice in Wonderland’ bash during recession.

It was the tea party the Obamas just couldn’t resist.

A White House “Alice in Wonderland” costume ball — put on by Johnny Depp and Hollywood director Tim Burton — proved to be a Mad-as-a-Hatter idea that was never made public for fear of a political backlash during hard economic times, according to a new tell-all.

“The Obamas,” by New York Times correspondent Jodi Kantor, tells of the first Halloween party the first couple feted at the White House in 2009. It was so over the top that “Star Wars” creator George Lucas sent the original Chewbacca to mingle with invited guests.

Nice.

Really nice.

Read on for more.

Much more.

Our high confidence assessment is the strongest position that the U.S. Intelligence Community can take short of confirmation.

This sentence reeks of the carefully modulated dishonesty expressed by so many high-ranking PermaGov hustlers of the past decade or so.

Two come to mind immediately. On 3/12/13, the following colloquy occurred during a hearing on illegal NSA surveillance by the Senate Intelligence Committee. Director of National Intelligence James Clapper was the witness.

SEN. RON WYDEN (D-Ore.): “This is for you, Director Clapper, again on the surveillance front. And I hope we can do this in just a yes or no answer because I know Senator Feinstein wants to move on. Last summer, the NSA director was at a conference, and he was asked a question about the NSA surveillance of Americans. He replied, and I quote here, `The story that we have millions or hundreds of millions of dossiers on people is completely false.’

“The reason I’m asking the question is, having served on the committee now for a dozen years, I don’t really know what a dossier is in this context. So what I wanted to see is if you could give me a yes or no answer to the question, does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?”

Director of National Intelligence JAMES CLAPPER: “No, sir.”

SEN. WYDEN: “It does not?”

DIR. CLAPPER: “Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertently perhaps collect, but not wittingly.”

SEN. WYDEN: “Thank you. I’ll have additional questions to give you in writing on that point, but I thank you for the answer.”

Later on, after his cover was successfully broken by the ongoing fuss over the whole Snowden affair, Clapper said on the air to Andrea Mitchell:

I responded in what I thought was the most truthful, or least untruthful manner, by saying no.”

And from the boss of all truth-sliders, the inimitable Donald Rumsfeld:

From a Press Conference at NATO Headquarters, Brussels, Belgium, June 6, 2002

Now what is the message there? The message is that there are no “knowns.” There are things we know that we know. There are known unknowns. That is to say there are things that we now know we don’t know. But there are also unknown unknowns. There are things we do not know we don’t know. So when we do the best we can and we pull all this information together, and we then say well that’s basically what we see as the situation, that is really only the known knowns and the known unknowns. And each year, we discover a few more of those unknown unknowns.

It sounds like a riddle. It isn’t a riddle. It is a very serious, important matter.

There’s another way to phrase that and that is that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. It is basically saying the same thing in a different way. Simply because you do not have evidence that something exists does not mean that you have evidence that it doesn’t exist. And yet almost always, when we make our threat assessments, when we look at the world, we end up basing it on the first two pieces of that puzzle, rather than all three.

And there it is:

The earlier, known/unknowns claptrap got all the attention but the real truthiness nugget was “…the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.”

He may as well have stated “The absence of proof of guilt is not proof of innocence.”

“Innocent until proven guilty?” Not a trace left of that idea. In fact, even worse is the distance that we have traveled from its opposite. Even “Guilty until proven innocent” no longer applies. Now? Now it’s “The absence of evidence is not evidence of [its] absence” and its necessary corollary, “The presence of evidence is no thus no longer proof of its existence.”

People are clamoring for “proof” of Assad’s forces’ guilt in this chemical attack, but they are asking a government that has clearly stated its intent to respond to any and all questions in the “most truthful/least untruthful” manner possible.

“The absence of proof of guilt is proof of innocence?”

It used to be, but not anymore I guess.

“Guilt or innocence by decree” is what we now have.

Scared yet?

You ought to be.

We are in Queen of Hearts Land, now.

The players all played at once without waiting for turns, quarrelling all the while, and fighting for the hedgehogs; and in a very short time the Queen was in a furious passion, and went stamping about, and shouting `Off with his head!’ or `Off with her head!’ about once in a minute.

Alice began to feel very uneasy: to be sure, she had not as yet had any dispute with the Queen, but she knew that it might happen any minute, `and then,’ thought she, `what would become of me? They’re dreadfully fond of beheading people here; the great wonder is, that there’s any one left alive!’

She was looking about for some way of escape, and wondering whether she could get away without being seen, when she noticed a curious appearance in the air: it puzzled her very much at first, but, after watching it a minute or two, she made it out to be a grin, and she said to herself `It’s the Cheshire Cat: now I shall have somebody to talk to.’

`How are you getting on?’ said the Cat, as soon as there was mouth enough for it to speak with.

Alice waited till the eyes appeared, and then nodded. `It’s no use speaking to it,’ she thought, `till its ears have come, or at least one of them.’ In another minute the whole head appeared, and then Alice put down her flamingo, and began an account of the game, feeling very glad she had someone to listen to her. The Cat seemed to think that there was enough of it now in sight, and no more of it appeared.

`I don’t think they play at all fairly,’ Alice began, in rather a complaining tone,’ and they all quarrel so dreadfully one can’t hear oneself speak–and they don’t seem to have any rules in particular; at least, if there are, nobody attends to them–and you’ve no idea how confusing it is all the things being alive; for instance, there’s the arch I’ve got to go through next walking about at the other end of the ground–and I should have croqueted the Queen’s hedgehog just now, only it ran away when it saw mine coming?’

`How do you like the Queen?’ said the Cat in a low voice.

`Not at all,’ said Alice: `she’s so extremely–‘ Just then she noticed that the Queen was close behind her, listening: so she went on, `–likely to win, that it’s hardly worth while finishing the game.’

The Queen smiled and passed on.

`Who ARE you talking to?’ said the King, going up to Alice, and looking at the Cat’s head with great curiosity.

`It’s a friend of mine–a Cheshire Cat,’ said Alice: `allow me to introduce it.’

`I don’t like the look of it at all,’ said the King: `however, it may kiss my hand if it likes.’

`I’d rather not,’ the Cat remarked.

`Don’t be impertinent,’ said the King, `and don’t look at me like that!’ He got behind Alice as he spoke.

`A cat may look at a king,’ said Alice. `I’ve read that in some book, but I don’t remember where.’

`Well, it must be removed,’ said the King very decidedly, and he called the Queen, who was passing at the moment, `My dear! I wish you would have this cat removed!’

The Queen had only one way of settling all difficulties, great or small. `Off with his head!’ she said, without even looking round.

`I’ll fetch the executioner myself,’ said the King eagerly, and he hurried off.

Alice thought she might as well go back, and see how the game was going on, as she heard the Queen’s voice in the distance, screaming with passion. She had already heard her sentence three of the players to be executed for having missed their turns, and she did not like the look of things at all, as the game was in such confusion that she never knew whether it was her turn or not. So she went in search of her hedgehog.
The hedgehog was engaged in a fight with another hedgehog, which seemed to Alice an excellent opportunity for croqueting one of them with the other: the only difficulty was, that her flamingo was gone across to the other side of the garden, where Alice could see it trying in a helpless sort of way to fly up into a tree.

By the time she had caught the flamingo and brought it back, the fight was over, and both the hedgehogs were out of sight: `but it doesn’t matter much,’ thought Alice, `as all the arches are gone from the side of the ground.’ So she tucked it away under her arm, that it might not escape again, and went back for a little more conversation with her friend.
When she got back to the Cheshire Cat, she was surprised to find quite a large crowd collected round it: there was a dispute going on between the executioner, the King, and the Queen, who were all talking at once, while all the rest were quite silent, and looked very uncomfortable.
The moment Alice appeared, she was appealed to by all three to settle the question, and they repeated their arguments to her, though, as they all spoke at once, she found it very hard indeed to make out exactly what they said.

The executioner’s argument was, that you couldn’t cut off a head unless there was a body to cut it off from: that he had never had to do such a thing before, and he wasn’t going to begin at HIS time of life.

The King’s argument was, that anything that had a head could be beheaded, and that you weren’t to talk nonsense.

The Queen’s argument was, that if something wasn’t done about it in less than no time she’d have everybody executed, all round. (It was this last remark that had made the whole party look so grave and anxious.)
Alice could think of nothing else to say but `It belongs to the Duchess: you’d better ask HER about it.’

`She’s in prison,’ the Queen said to the executioner: `fetch her here.’ And the executioner went off like an arrow.

The Cat’s head began fading away the moment he was gone, and, by the time he had disappeared; so the King and the executioner ran wildly up and down looking for it, while the rest of the party went back to the game.

And here we are.

Nice.

WTFU.

Here comes Hillary.

Alice all growed up!!!

Watch.

AG

To the community at the Frog Pond who left me such beautiful and warm comments regarding my post about my daughter, or who read and shared that post, thank you all. They mean more to me than you can ever know. You guys here are by far the best blog community on the innnertubes.

Muchas Gracias, Obrigado, Domo Arigato.

It is telling that no one in the Republican leadership criticized the Department of Justice’s new guidance that relaxes their attitude about marijuana. Maybe they are distracted by more pressing matters, but they do not ordinarily pass up chances to take shots at the administration. Their silence is especially surprising because the DOJ guidance fits into a pre-existing narrative that the GOP has been pursuing around the selective enforcement of the law. They didn’t like it when the administration stopped defending DOMA in court, or when they went to war in Libya without congressional authorization, or when the DOJ made a new guidance not to deport DREAMers.

By passing up a chance to amplify their message that the president is a tyrannical lawbreaker, the GOP is demonstrating that they don’t want to get on the wrong side of the marijuana debate. Call it the power of Generation X asserting itself.

In assessing the administration’s case against the Assad regime, I am of two minds. The first is based on my own personal assessment of the motives and integrity of key administration figures, and the second is based on my assessment of how the world at large assesses their motives and integrity.

I’m satisfied that John Kerry and President Obama believe that they have sufficient proof to express high confidence in the regime’s culpability for the attacks. But I do not believe they have even come close to proving their case to the wider world that has not forgotten Colin Powell’s presentation in front of the United Nations in which he presented trumped up evidence against the Iraqi regime.

The evidence that the administration claims to have has not been shared or explained in a compelling way.

The body of information used to make this assessment includes intelligence pertaining to the regime’s preparations for this attack and its means of delivery, multiple streams of intelligence about the attack itself and its effect, our post-attack observations, and the differences between the capabilities of the regime and the opposition. Our high confidence assessment is the strongest position that the U.S. Intelligence Community can take short of confirmation.

Here is the introductory summary that Secretary Kerry provided during his presentation of the evidence:

We know that for three days before the attack, the Syrian regime’s chemical weapons personnel were on the ground in the area, making preparations.

And we know that the Syrian regime elements were told to prepare for the attack by putting on gas masks and taking precautions associated with chemical weapons.

We know that these were specific instructions.

We know where the rockets were launched from, and at what time. We know where they landed, and when. We know rockets came only from regime-controlled areas and went only to opposition-controlled or contested neighborhoods.

And we know, as does the world, that just 90 minutes later all hell broke loose in the social media. With our own eyes we have seen the thousands of reports from 11 separate sites in the Damascus suburbs. All of them show and report victims with breathing difficulties, people twitching with spasms, coughing, rapid heartbeats, foaming at the mouth, unconsciousness, and death. And we know it was ordinary Syrian citizens who reported all of these horrors.

This would all be very compelling if the United States government still maintained even a small bit of credibility on the international stage, but that is sadly not the case. If they want to convince people, they need to show us the evidence that the Assad regime began mixing chemicals three days before the attacks, and show us the explicit orders, and show us the gas masks, and show us how they know that rockets were used and how they know where and when they were launched and where and when they landed.

I understand that some evidence is being withheld to protect sources and methods, and that’s legitimate up to a point. But their argument so far is really still relying on people to trust them because they aren’t Bush and Powell. That’s enough, perhaps, for domestic consumption, but it is not enough for the global audience.

It should be noted that, despite all the rhetoric, the American intelligence community has only expressed “high confidence” in their case. That is the highest grade they can give themselves short of certainty, but it isn’t certainty. If they won’t show more of their work, the world is not even going to have “high confidence” let alone certainty that the United States is justified in attacking the regime. And I’m setting aside, for the moment, that the world could very well be convinced that the Assad regime is guilty and deserving of punishment and still not agree that the United States should deliver the punishment in the absence of a broad consensus rooted in international law. Without the approval of the UN Security Council, NATO, the Brits, the Arab League, or even Congress, the need for certainty is much greater.

I don’t think the administration in lying, and I think they are probably correct in their assessment, although I also believe it is possible that they are wrong. But it’s not me who matters. They haven’t even come close to satisfying the world that they’ve made their case. They need to do more work.

Larry Sabato takes an objective look at the state of play in upcoming Virginia elections for governor, lieutenant governor, and attorney general. Right now, a clean sweep for the Democrats is looking quite possible, with only the attorney general slot rated as a toss-up. Terry McAuliffe has a consistent and significant lead in the polls and E.W. Jackson is a hopeless loon. Incumbent Governor Bob McDonnell’s legal troubles are also dragging the GOP ticket down, and Sabato paints some interesting scenarios if McDonnell is indicted:

What happens if McDonnell is indicted? There will be a strong push to have him resign, and some Republican officeholders have quietly made it known they will support such a move. If McDonnell gives into the pressure, then Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling (R) will become the interim governor. One might think that a new, clean Republican governor would help Cuccinelli’s prospects. Yet Bolling despises Cuccinelli and deeply resents being pushed aside for the Republican nomination by the attorney general.

If he becomes governor, Bolling will have three options: He can endorse McAuliffe outright (there have been friendly words and gestures between the two), he can remain neutral (which also helps McAuliffe), or he can give his open or covert assent to a gubernatorial write-in effort. Chuckle all you like, but Bolling is much easier to spell than Murkowski, and both McAuliffe and Cuccinelli have lousy favorability ratings. Any such effort would have to be well funded, and Bolling would have to make clear he would serve if elected. Disproportionately, a Bolling write-in campaign would likely help Cuccinelli by draining many anti-Cuccinelli votes from McAuliffe; this is a key reason why Bolling might not do it.

The mention of “Murkowski” refers to Alaskan U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski who lost the Republican nomination to a crazy tea bagger but won reelection in the general election as a write-in candidate. As to Sabato’s last point, that a Bolling write-in campaign would mainly drain votes from McAuliffe, I am not so sure about that. Whenever two Republicans are on the ballot against one Democrat, I like the odds. It’s true that a lot of Bolling’s strongest supporters are going to back McAuliffe out of spite, but a lot of disenchanted Republicans would bite the bullet and vote for the Cooch rather than vote for Bill Clinton’s smarmy bag man.

Max Fisher’s nine questions about Syria you were afraid to ask is well worth reading if you don’t feel like you’ve got a firm grip on what’s been going on there. I had only minor quibbles, but overall I think he explained the conflict very concisely and also made some prognostications that are, sadly, going to be accurate.

I suppose we could try to fill in any blanks. Do you know anything about Syria that you’d like to share? Have any questions? We can figure it out.

The administration made a judgment that there is no doubt that the Assad regime carried out the chemical attacks near Damascus on August 21st, and they announced that judgment to the world. Nonetheless, the British Parliament was not satisfied with the evidence. Or, at least, many members of parliament were unconvinced. Perhaps others simply didn’t want to get their country entangled in a civil war. But one thing is now clear, the case that has been presented to the public is not good enough. That puts the administration in a bad place, but they were hasty and they will now pay the price for that.

With news that President Obama could order unilateral strikes as soon as the United Nations weapons inspectors leave on Saturday, I’m concerned that the administration is getting ready to be hasty again. I hope they have some way of knowing what the inspectors are discovering about the nature of the chemical that was used, as well as the delivery system. We supposedly know a decent amount about what kinds of chemicals the Syrians have in their stockpiles, and we know what kind of artillery pieces they use. If we attack and then discover that neither the chemical agent nor the weaponry match what is in Syria’s inventory, we are going to look very bad.

I understand the importance of the principle the president is trying to uphold, and I’d like to be able to support him. But he’s way out on a limb right now. He doesn’t have support from the British, from NATO, from the United Nations, or from the Arab League. One reason is that people have difficulty believing that we can strike Syria in a very limited way and then walk away even as Assad remains in power and on the offensive on most fronts of the civil war. Another reason is the evidence presented so far is paltry.

The president wants to keep his word that the use of chemical weapons would be a game-changer and have severe consequences. I understand that. But patience is warranted here. With time, he can build a stronger case or avoid compounding an error if the administration’s initial judgments are wrong. If the UN inspectors provide evidence consistent with an attack by the regime, then most people will be satisfied that Assad deserves punishment. That’s the minimum prerequisite for an action that lacks all traditional modes of support.

Personally, I would rather sacrifice some of Obama’s credibility by doing nothing than by doing something in error or that leads to a deep morass. But, assuming that the administration feels compelled to keep its word and uphold the taboo on the use of chemical weapons, they still need to have a much better dossier than they’re presenting right now.

They need to relax a little bit. Don’t rush. If they are right, the case will get stronger.