Unknowns

Landlord, feuding with tenant,
climbs on roof and soaks him
with a bucket of water.

"Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know."

You no doubt recognize these words of profound wisdom. They were uttered by one of our known war criminals when he was a known known Secretary of Defense, one we apparently didn’t know we didn’t know (how excruciatingly awful he was). Now I don’t know where he is but I don’t know I don’t know (for sure, anyway). But I digress.

The reason I resurrected this marvelous quotation is because somehow it seems to me it has something to do with Obama’s new nuclear defense plan. As I understand it, we will not use nuclear weapons against countries that do not have nuclear weapons and have signed a nuclear treaty saying they will not have them. Under former President Bush and his minder, Dick the Slimy, we apparently reserved the right to attack anyone with nuclear weapons. Thus Obama’s new plan is regarded by many as an improvement that might help to deter those who might wish to have nuclear weapons, and also might make those who do have them think more carefully about having and using them. This is part of Obama’s strategy to someday have a nuclear-free world (almost surely a pipe dream, but a good one). The problem with this new plan is that it makes an exception for Iran. But Iran does not have a nuclear weapon and, as far as is known, is in compliance with existing rules about nuclear energy. The last I heard about this was that Iran does not have nuclear weapons, has no desire to have them, and there is no real evidence they are trying to produce one. Unfortunately, no one seems to believe this and even today you can hear important people say things that just assume Iran is going to have nuclear bombs. Here is a remarkable case in which we don’t know a known, we don’t know a known unknown, and in fact we don’t seem to know we don’t know. This, however, does not keep us from pretending that we know they are going to have nuclear bombs when we don’t in fact know that we know. If this is confusing, so is Obama’s new nuclear plan. It is not only confusing because of the Iranian situation, but also because when push comes to shove (if it ever does) we would use nuclear weapons anyway. Far be it for me to make sense out of this, but I guess by changing the Bush/Cheney threat to nuke everyone indiscriminately to nuke more discriminately is an improvement. If the rest of the world is as confused as I am they may believe this.

Another interesting question that has arisen has to do with whether or not using drones as we have been doing is legal. Being a more or less reasonable person I would have thought the legal status should have been determined before we began using them. But I guess this would be just as silly as expecting us to know whether or not drugs might be harmful before letting them on the market (it is, after all, the American way). Although I am not a legal expert (or even an expert), I should think that using drones to kill people in countries with which we are not even at war would be illegal. Of course in war lots of things are done that are illegal and nothing is usually done about it. We just acknowledge that, yeah, lots of things happen in war, and let it go at that. What I find of even more interest in this discussion of drone warfare is that no one even bothers to ask if it is moral. I guess the assumption is that if it is legal it must also be moral, but of course morality has little to do with it. Personally, I think using drones is both illegal and highly immoral, to say nothing about, arguably, cowardly and disgusting. It certainly has none of the glory of something like “Into the valley of death rode the four hundred.” Nor does it reflect the nobility of conflict as in “There is neither border, breed, nor birth, when two strong men stand face to face, though they come from the ends of the earth.” What passes for warfare now has nothing to do with what warfare was in the past. It is not really war, it is just mass slaughter in which “He who has the most toys wins.” I cannot reconcile myself to the thought of a few nerds sitting in Nevada guiding their drones around the world killing people at weddings and funerals (and occasionally someone who might clearly be defined as an enemy). I wonder if they sharpen their skills on videogames.

Do you think that now that Acorn has been shown to have been mistakenly and illegally accused of something they did not do they might be reinstated? Fat chance, Republicans will never allow an organization to sign up poor voters and would surely block any attempt along those lines. This is a classic case of “roviation,” whereby, in this case, an entire organization was slimed and maligned and forced out of business. Karl Rove has certainly left a legacy of which he, at least, is no doubt proud. He’s been sort of a non-violent Timothy McVay for a long time but never held accountable for his actions. Shame, remorse, guilt, compassion, fair play, truth, and conscience are all concepts foreign to those trained and influenced by Rove and his political strategies and techniques.

LKBIQ:
Lady you bereft me of all words,
Only my blood speaks to you in my veins,
And there is such confusion in my powers.
William Shakespeare

TILT:
Jerusalem artichokes are not artichokes and have nothing to do with Jerusalem.