The Week That Was...

Well…here I sit looking back on this first week in February 2007 in delighted marvel at what has transpired! If you’re a news junky as I am and you revel in all things ugly and salacious then this week was your week, a news Super Chili Bowl of ingredients that when mixed together make for the tastiest of meals.

It all actually started the previous week when former New York City Mayor, Rudolph Giuliani announced that he intended to toss his "hat" in the ring for the two thousand eight Presidential race. The actual announcement came last week, but polls and real speculation stretched into Monday – Is Rudy too liberal for the Southern conservative base – he’s Pro Choice and in favor of gay rights. By the time the sun rose on Monday, there were plenty of news polls showing that Giuliani was actually running way ahead of long time Republican front runner John McCain. And surprisingly (to the oddly clueless news media) many conservatives said that they could vote for the independent minded former Mayor because of his amazing 911 performance. It really shouldn’t be a shock that many conservatives like myself, like Rudy. After all, the specter of terrorism still eclipses our nation. Unless in some miraculous bizzaro world, the Iraqis decide to stop fighting and pick up the “plowshares”, then security will be a major issue and Mayor Giuliani is the only candidate running that actually has a record of real leadership during a crisis – the nation’s worst crisis- and I suspect that if a nuclear device were to go off in anywhere in this country, abortion and gay rights will be the last thing on anyone’s mind! Anyway, as I said, being a news junky the “Giuliani, can he appeal to conservatives story” was a nice start to the week.

Not to be outdone by the former mayor, the newly minted Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi (the San Francisco treat!) decided that the Air Force commuter jet she uses to shuttle her back and forth between Washington D.C. to San Francisco was too small. In addition to that, her current “Wright Flyer” was unable to cross the country in one hop without refueling, and the inconvenience of having to make a stop along the way was just… well…too inconvenient for someone with sooo much important work to do for the poor and down trodden. After all she can’t be expected to travel back and forth without her staff, friends, and family! So, Ms. Pelosi requested a larger Military jet, a C-32, spiffily equipt with 42 business class seats, is the military equivalent of the Boeing 757 passenger plane. And you’ll be happy to know dear taxpayer, that just one of Ms. Pelosi’s magical mystery round trip flights will cost you a measly Three Hundred Thousand dollars. What a bargain! I seem to remember during last fall’s election some incessant grousing about saddling our children with a rather large budget deficit– hummm…

When questioned by the media about this highflying fiasco, Ms. Pelosi speculated that the Air Force itself was distorting the story because they were miffed by her stance against the perfectly good Iraq war and erstwhile Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld.

Listening to Speaker Pelosi’s “reasoning” causes the words “most ethical congress” to echo in my brain. After winning last fall’s election Ms. Pelosi promised that a new day had dawned and the new Democrat majority would shepherd in a new morality of the highest standards. Little did I imagine that when using the term “highest” standards she was referring to cost and altitude.

Not to be outdone by either the former Mayor of New York or the shiny new House Speaker–another government agency, NASA, decided it needed some attention, but then (too late) thought better about it, when the terms “twenty five thousand dollar bail” and “NASA Astronaut” were linked together in a sentence. As the bizarre news broke that the Orlando Police Department had arrested Space Shuttle Mission Specialist, Astronette, Lisa M. Nowak 43, on attempted murder charges! Seems that all the years of mission training have paid off as Nowak was caught with everything but the Space Shuttle’s Canadian Robotic Arm in her trunk. A comprehensive list of needed “mission” items, along with the items themselves – folding knife, pepper spray, rubber tube, latex gloves, BB gun, plastic bags, a list of e¬-mails from her target, six hundred dollars in cash, and I’m tempted to sing – “and a parrr-t¬ridge in a paare treeee,” but won’t - were shuttled the nine hundred miles to Orlando.

Like a snowball heading down Kilimanjaro, this gem of a tale gathered everything in its wake.
A day later details and wonderful terms such as “Astro-nut” and “Lust In Space” rocketed themselves into the headlines, as we found out that Mission Specialist Nowak, reacting to an affair between fellow Shuttle Pilot (with whom she was in love), William Oefelein, 41 and – 30 yr. old Air Force Capt. Colleen Shipman, drove nine hundred miles, (emulating NASA efficiency), wearing a diaper, (to save pitstop time), from Houston to Orlando to confront her rival at the airport. Dressed in disguise, Nowak, followed Capt. Shipman to her car and started attacking her. Shipman, somehow managed to get into her car but, Nowak, managed to pepper spray her through the car window! Despite having eyes toastier than an atmospheric reentry, Capt. Shipman, managed to get away and call police who were able to nab zero-gee stalker. WOW!

Now, sad and embarrassed, Nowak, is out on bail but, has to wear a Global Positioning System Ankle bracelet, for easy tracking. Wouldn’t it be a wonderfully ironic twist if it were discovered her Shuttle Mission was responsible for placing that particular Global Positioning satellite into orbit? All I know is that I can’t wait for the trial!

Even before the Ankle bracelet started transmiting - The piéces-de-résistance! As Thursday rolled around, not to be outdone by any government agency of any sort – Enter the many faceted Anna Nicole Smith – whose life is a mind numbing soap opera of nothingness. The Playboy playmate, wife - promised a mega-millions worth of money - from now dead 94 year old billionaire (at least he died happy) - J. Howard Marshall - transformed herself to a weight yo-yo-ing, reality show looney, that included her teenage son, Daniel, who died of a drug overdose shortly after she gave birth to daughter Dannielynn,-named sorrowfully after the afore mentioned son. Married to her lawyer, Howard K.-(not to be confused with Radioman-Stern), who claimed fatherhood, after another man, Larry Birkhead, claimed DNA-hood to the recently born daughter. Finally, deciding even she couldn’t take it anymore, by accident or intention, “offed” herself at age 39 in a probable drug overdose!

As of now no one is sure exactly how she died, but Coroner’s have preliminarily ruled out fowl play or physical illness, which most likely leaves drug overdose.

And if you thought you had heard it all, just before the kitchen sink goes wizzing by, the latest news is that Ms. Smith’s baby Dannielynn may not be the baby of either of the afore mentioned men. By Friday, another round of that popular game “Whose your Daddy" reared it's head as yet another “father” came out of the woodwork! Unbelievably, yet not - Ninety-four year old actress, Zsa-Zsa Gabor’s husband, Prince Frederick-Von Anhalt, (who appropriately enough is not really a prince), claims he’s had a ten year relationship with Nicole-Smith, and claims he's Dannielynn’s real father! It hasn’t occurred yet, but I’m anxiously awaiting for the Zsa-Zsa interview.

I have a fairly overactive imagination and I’m going to harness it now. How wonderful would it be if they gave the baby a DNA test and found out that THIS guy was the father!


And then turned out that Hillary had Nicole-Smith poisoned! Now THAT would be a news story!!
At any rate, this story isn’t over by a long shot so please put that kitchen sink down.
All I have to say is – “will somebody, anybody, please do a DNA test on the kid!”

On Saturday…not to be outdone by Rudy Giuliani, Nancy Pelosi, NASA, or the “Blonde tornado,”–(who actually CAN outdo any government agency). Coming full circle (ala Guiliani), the “articulate” and “clean” semi–black American, Barack Obama, standing upon the icy steps of the old Illinois state Capitol building, where in 1858, Lincoln delivered his now famous "House divided by two" anti- slavery speech, officially announced he'll be tossing his “Hat" into the Presidential sweepstakes. Which should have made for a dramatic moment but, after the preceding six days of tornadic joy, felt more like a light breeze blowing from the west.

Ironically, by the end of this wonderfully entertaining week, nothing of real consequence actually occurred. Mr. Giuliani and Mr.Obama, are just beginning their two year long rectal exams, Anna Nicole Smith’s timely demise, will, in the long run have no worldly consequence except to endlessly entertain the vacuously, gossipy pop-media culture. Finally, when you look up into the sky – that glinty spot you see at thirty thousand feet with a greenhouse, ozone destroying chemical trail behind it–is not Superman. Nope, there’s a chance (small though it may be) that glint is a rather large Air Force jet carrying our esteemed House Speaker and company as she cruises along with family and friends, to her next Global Warming conference.

So there you have it–THE WEEK THAT WAS!
Now can I do it? – okay, here it goes – “And A Paaar–triiidge in a Pare treeeeeeee!!

Iran Nukes Israel – Some Thoughts

Lately when thinking about Iran I can’t help but recall the classic dark comedy Dr. Strangelove, a fictional account about nuclear war with the former Soviet Union– the movie ends when a B-52 bomber pilot played by Slim Pickens is sent aloft on a nuclear bombing run to take out Moscow. Pickens gets to the drop zone, presses the bomb release button, but a glitch occurs and he has to head back to the bomb bay to manually release the nuke. But the only way to do that is to physically hop on the bomb and hit the release lever, which of course means he’s goin’ down with the monster! That’s one dedicated pilot! So there it is- Ol’ Slim plunging down to earth straddling the bomb like a bronco, swinging his cowboy hat in the air–“Yeee Haaaa-ing!” all the way to the ground! Great scene!

Now for not so great scene ¬– Imagine Iran finally has “the bomb” and those wacky Mullahs finally decide to take care of the “Zionists”, and launch a nuclear missile or multiple missiles toward Israel. Now what? With all the talk lately about weapons inspectors and treaties and sanctions and uranium enrichment, the one thing nobody in the media seems to be talking about is what happens if Iran should actually lob a nuclear missile toward Israel.

Well, lately I’ve been “Mullahing” that over, and there’s a lot and I mean A LOT to “mull” about. So let’s mull, shall we?

So Iran does the thinkable unthinkable and launches its “Zion buster” - now what?
It’s a given that the moment a missile departs its Iranian bunker, Israel and the U.S. will know about it – one must assume that by now Iran has Israeli intelligence’s undivided attention. Mossad being one of the world’s best intelligence agencies surely has a lot of assets focused in and around Iran as well as intense satellite observation so the moment the missile’s trajectory is figured out, which should take about a minute, immediate action will be taken. You have to imagine that before the missile even gets over its border the Israelis will launch one or more of their own “turban busters” which means that now there will be at least two nuclear strikes. So the minute a missile departs its bunker and sees it’s shadow there will be a lot more than six more weeks of winter to worry about. Nuclear winter is more like it.

What will be bombed? I’m going to assume that Iran won’t want to take out Jerusalem – the Dome of the Rock lying in a heap of radioactive rubble won’t play well to the rest of the Arab world, so I think the Iranians will want to take out a more strategic target – Tel Aviv. Nuking the capital and “decapitating” Israel’s government will play well in the Arab world – as well as France and Russia.

Israel, being forced to play nuclear ping–pong with Iran, will not be content with a tit-for-tat game. The question is, how many volleys will there be. You know that the Israelis already have a comprehensive target list. They’re going to want take out as many of Iran’s nuclear missile sites and processing facilities as they can, as well as military bases, information, and power centers. And for the added exclamation point Tehran will be whacked. Israel, having been handed the nuclear defense cover it needs, and with nothing left to lose, might well be tempted to “FedEx” a few more radiation gifts to Syria, and maybe a few into Saudi Arabia for good measure– maybe. In any case Israel will have the excuse it needs to “take care of business.”

Another concern is the main lynchpin which precipitated this nightmare – the Palestinians. Besides Israel, the people who should worry most about Iran are, oddly enough, Palestinians. There are over a million Palestinians who live in multiple refugee camps in and around Israel.

It’s a sure bet that a multitude of Palestinians will meet the same fate as the Jews. Are you listening Hamas? Hezbollah? Because the winds in the Middle East generally blow from west to east (just like here) you can add Jordan’s King Abdullah to the “annoyed” list. And depending on those winds and the size of the blast it’s a good bet that nuclear snowflakes will be wafting down from the skies over Jordan, and the recently beleaguered Iraq. With a large enough blast and strong enough wind Iranians themselves might enjoy some of their own fallout–which would conceivably contaminate the food and water supplies, which will cause more misery–not to mention a radiation crater that was once Tehran.

It won’t take long for the missiles to hit their targets -as there’s only about a 1,500 mile gap between the two nations about ten minutes should do it. After that - the whole world will know and soon after that, world economies could very well collapse – oil will go up to – well… any number you can think of - one hundred, two hundred dollars per barrel - keep going because you’ll need to take out a bank loan to fill your car! You can also kiss goodbye any stocks or 401K accounts you might own because world stock markets will crater as fast as the nuclear craters are created! This in turn will cause the price of everything to skyrocket. Imagine millions of people mobbing stores buying as much as possible before food prices “nuclearize” themselves! The word “UGLY” lies on the tip of my nasty adjective iceberg.

In the end, the Arab world will have achieved a pyrrhic victory. Though they won’t see it that way – I’m sure there are likely to be plenty of “leftover” radicals celebrating “the end of the Zionist entity!” With no more Israel to rail against, hundreds of thousands of their own dead, and very few safe places to live (in addition to Israel, most of their lands, will be luxuriating in a nice warm nuclear soap bath.) – What will they do?

Not having to worry about diplomacy anymore, any real allies the Arabs had before will
be a bit grumpy about providing them with any support. A few countries like Russia and China might very well take advantage of the end of Tehran, and in the chaos try to take control of any remaining Iranian oil fields! I’m betting that with the exception of North Korea, any remaining Arabs will have to toss a camel a pretty long distance to find an Ally.

If you would like a reliable warning sign of this impending doom I’ll give you one, one that would be difficult for a Vegas odds maker to keep in Vegas. The one thing those weaselly Mullahs know is this–if they should attempt to remove the “Zionist Occupiers”, they have to know that the favor will be returned. Meaning that much of Iran is going to become a glittering rockin’ and rollin’ disco ball of radioactive light!

Knowing that – here’s your sign – Watch the Mullahs. That’s it! When all those Mullahs decide to take a magic carpet ride for a sunbathing vacation in Indonesia, that’s your two minute warning–it’s time to start worrying!

After the nuclear shuttlecocks are launched–the one thing I know for sure is this–U.S. politicians will try as hard as they can to capitalize on the charred corpses in the desert. Democrats will blame Republicans, Republicans will blame Democrats. There will be a lot of banter about anti-Semitism. The media will blame all except itself. The U.N. will convene–there will be lots of speeches and yelling and finger pointing and enough resolutions to fill an encyclopedia. In the end, bloviating diplomats and politicians will outgas in unison “never again!” to anyone who will listen. And nothing of any real substance will be accomplished. Which means, politically, nothing will change.

Now to leave you with a bit of a silver lining: eventually world economies will come back, though nothing will be quite the same – the price of gas will eventually stabilize, but still cost over a hundred dollars a barrel. But, the one good thing that might come out of this nightmare will be that the U.S. Government might finally create a Manhattan project or provide major funding to private companies or people, to produce new forms of transportation fuel.

If we could create a super cheap renewable energy resource to run a car engine, that isn’t oil based, then we can have an economy that is un-reliant upon events in the Middle East. And if it turns out to be really cheap to produce, you’ll see an economic boom that could just about wipe out poverty in this country.

This will have another beneficial effect – suddenly Arab nations that have had single product economies (OIL)- which, are controlled by a few people keeping themselves wealthy and the rest of their populations poor, will find themselves with a “no product” economy. The Middle Eastern Arab world, if it is to survive at all, will be forced to produce a variety of “widgets”, which means they’ll need to have an educated populace to produce all those different widgets, which in turn will mean there will be other things to occupy their lives besides the will of Allah and the end of Israel. And wouldn’t that be nice!

Getting back to Dr. Strangelove and that scene –When thinking about Iran with nuclear capabilities–my mind replaces Ol’ Slim with some generic Mullah (I don’t know any Mullahs personally) straddling that nuclear bomb, and instead of a cowboy hat he’s batting the bomb with his turban yelling “Allah Ackbarrrr!”– as he plunges into Tel Aviv. – Funny visual…then again, not.