Mailbag Fun

This one came in from loyal reader KK:

The Force is strong in this one...

From The Pleiades mailbag
I've got a ton of these I've been sitting on so I'm going to have to exercise some editor-ship and pick the best:

- The Cost of Afghan and Iraq Wars. US$439billion is the number. That's a lot of dough.

- How some bloggers beat an advertising firm.

- This should go up in the Spacefreaks, but I'm here now so... Jupiter's new eye of storm.

- Stephen Colbert paying out George W. Bush at his party. In fact, this is so good, it's already made an entry in Wikipedia.

- The NYT take on Neil Young's new album:

Mr. Young is a Canadian citizen. But having lived in the United States since the 1960's, he sings as if he were an American. The title song of "Living With War" quotes "The Star-Spangled Banner," and the album ends with the choir singing "America the Beautiful."

The album's release is a high-tech, globe-spanning update of a topical song tradition that's much older than recordings: the broadside, a songwriter's rapid response to events of the day. "They had these songs that everybody knew the melodies to," Mr. Young said. "They'd just write new words, and the minstrels would be traveling around spreading the word. Music spreads like wildfire when you do it that way."

And so it goes.

On The Continuing 'War On Terror', The Afghanistan Front
I'm not being a smart-arse here. Some of the familes of the troops sent to the front are a little antsy about the information blackout. This was in the SMH:

The $270 million deployment will work in partnership with Dutch forces. Half of the soldiers will be tradespeople and engineers who will work on building reticulation programs, roads, flood mitigation and other infrastructure projects. The other half will be light infantry and cavalry to provide protection.

A 150-strong special forces task group was deployed to Afghanistan late last year, where it is fighting resurgent Taliban militants. Four Australians have so far been injured in battle.

But so little information is known of the whereabouts of the soldiers or the nature of their mission that several parents have expressed fears that the public does not appreciate the risks of the deployment, with one accusing the Government of keeping Australians "under the anaesthetised state of ignorance".

One father said: "How the hell are they going to be supported nationally by the general public if the general public don't even know that they're there? The term forgotten war springs to mind, and there's a few of them in our military history."

The man said he had to read the Chinese or American press or al-Jazeera to find out what his son was doing, because foreign governments were more forthcoming with information about the conflict in Afghanistan.

"I just get annoyed and frustrated at the short-sightedness of the commanders and the politicians for wanting to keep something like this so secretive," he said.

Another man said he appreciated the security issues associated with the special forces, but it was "alarming as a parent not to be able to be told by your own child where he's going" - a question he was able to answer for himself with a day's research on the internet.

"Why doesn't the Australian Government trust the people of Australia to know where their serving personnel are in fact serving," he asked. The father said he was "scared shitless" about his son, and "absolutely dread the knock on the door at night".

"It is concerning that their efforts - and it is a sacrifice even though they may not be injured or killed - may become as anonymous as the mission and down the track I think we may be doing them a disservice," he said.

As citizens, I think these people are entitled to their answers. "Need-To-Know-Basis-Only" leads to dumbing down the population. In that sense, the government is presumably working furiously hard to dumb us all down.
Remember, this is the same Army that brought you the fuck-up-and-cover-up at Cowra. :)

In The Eye Of The Beholder Part 216
A 75 year old man was arrested for being a nudist.

A QUEENSLAND police constable has told a court of his disgust at finding a 75-year-old male nudist with painted toenails on Sunshine Coast beach.
The nudist, Kenneth Wenzel, was originally charged under the Summary Offences Act with creating a public nuisance during a police swoop on nude bathers at Coolum's Third Bay Beach on July 27 last year.

The charge was later changed to wilful exposure, to which he has pleaded not guilty.

When asked in Maroochydore Magistrates' Court today about his personal thoughts on Mr Wenzel's nudity, one of the arresting officers, Constable Chad McAlister said: "It's disgusting."

Under cross-examination Const McAlister said he did not find naked men in changing rooms offensive because they were not in public view.

But as well as Mr Wenzel's nudity, his multi-coloured toenails increased his disgust, he said.

"When you look at him as a member of the public and as a police officer, its not acceptable (behaviour)," he said.

Mr Wenzel, who has been using the "unofficial" nude beach for around 30 years, said he believed there had been a change in legislation allowing him to sun bake naked at Third Bay because he had a reasonable excuse.

He said police had ignored nude bathers at Third Bay at Coolum and Alexandria Bay, near Noosa, for more than 25 years and both sites were listed in nudist magazine Bare Facts as "unofficial" nude beaches.

"I hold respect for the clothed people but there's very few clothed people I see on Third Bay beach ... I have my towel handy and I cover (if there is)," he said.

"It's an unofficial nude beach, a beach recognised as unofficial for many years by custom and police.

"(I believed I had a reasonable excuse) because there had been a change in the law and the correspondences with the authorities led me to the impression it was no longer an offence that warranted police intervention."

The magistrate has reserved his decision.

It's the attitude of the policeman that one finds really questionable. "Look at him, he's disgusting" doesn't make it a crime. In civilised society it really shouldn't. Because should I find the 'War On Terror' disgusting, I should be able to throw John Howard, Peter Costello and their lousy cohorts into the slammer; and clearly we just can't do that. And that's a travesty!