Just a quick shout out to all the Massholes I know and love who read this website from time to time. Hope you tie one on good tonight. I can only imagine the sloppy phone calls flying all over the New England area. The Red Sox made a comeback of epic proportions: returning from a 0-3 defecit with two extra-inning wins and clinching it on Yankee turf...

I'm not really a Sox fan -- I'm more of a Mets man: You Gotta Believe -- but I've never liked the Yankees. Seemed like rooting for Microsoft or something. Now I can only hope that the Astros don't take it tomorrow or else we'll hear nothing from the talking heads but "Texas vs. Massachusetts" in sports and politics. I don't know if I could take it, though I'm sure the Daily Show would do something great.

Cheers to you all!

Enjoy The Draft is a great satire site some friends of mine put together. If you actually want to register your opinion on the matter, you can head on over to NoIraqDraft.com.

For the record, in spite of what you might like to believe, if Bush is re-elected the chances of events leading to forced military service move from "possible but unlikely" to "frighteningly possible." This is not scaremongering; it's rational analysis.

I was talking to someone the other night who serenely insisted that it wouldn't happen because mothers would not allow it. Some say because it's currently politically unpopular, it would never happen. Others simply scoff at the very notion.

I think these people are (like the president) somewhat insulated from military and geopolitical reality.

Let's play a little game called "what if." What if North Korea starts lobbing artillery at Seoul? What if Iran is conclusively shown to be sending arms, fighters and possibly even non-nuclear WMDs into places like Fallujia and Sadir City? What if there's a coup in Saudi Arabia or Syria? What if the Russians decide to invade some of their former satelites and that triggers a wider conflict, perhaps including Pakistan?

The reality is, at the moment we ain't got shit to do. Training units are being called away from training new troops to fighting in the Middle East. Reservists are being forced to re-up. There's a major crisis of manpower, and without a change in plans and priorities, something's got to give.

Public support for warlike causes is historically remarkably easy to whip up. Let's not get carried away with how people "won't get fooled again." More than half of all Republicans (and close to 1/3 of Democrats) still think Saddam Hussein was behind 9/11, ok? It wouldn't even take another nation getting involved (as above) or an attack on US soil to stir up the pot. What if 35 young US solders (male and female) are captured on an unprotected supply run -- similar to the one that recently sparked a mutiny -- and then brutally executed/beheaded by Iraqi insurgients en masse?

That shit could happen any day now, but how 'bout if it happened right before Christmas; if it was all over the news through the new year as the saga drug out to it's final tragic bloody conclusion. Think that might sway some public opinion?

That would force the reality that we need to protect our supply lines -- Rumsfeld's pet theories of war notwithstanding, public opinion would demand we support our troops rather than leaving them exposed. Only problem is that means fighting the war like most generals initially requested, with 100 thousand more bodies to stand around holding guns and getting shot at. It would be either that or packing up and leaving, and if you think Bush is flexible enough to cut and run, you haven't been paying attention to his tempermet or his political advosors' willingness to exploit tragedy for their own ends.

It's a real thing; there really honestly could be a draft if we don't get our shit together here. One more time: NoIraqDraft.com.

What's At Stake

For anyone out there who thinks Bush and Kerry are just "two sides of the same coin," take a look at the page I've been working on for the past few days over on MfA.

P. Diddy ain't kidding when he rocks those shirts that say "Vote or Die." The stakes are high, especially for our future. The contrast is clear and the time to raise our voice is now.

A lot of people don't like their choices. It's not my ideal election either, but our future is at stake, and we better do something or quit bitching.

If you're smart enough to be concerned about your vote, you've proven yourself smart enough to cast it. And to be honest we need all the smart people we can get this time around. It's that big a deal. Seriously.

What's At Stake: pass it on.

The scrappy economist from Princeton lands a devistating combination, weaving together all the threads that make this such a worrisome issue for us tender youngins. Feeling the Draft:

Those who are worrying about a revived draft are in the same position as those who worried about a return to budget deficits four years ago, when President Bush began pushing through his program of tax cuts. Back then he insisted that he wouldn't drive the budget into deficit - but those who looked at the facts strongly suspected otherwise. Now he insists that he won't revive the draft. But the facts suggest that he will.
...
Mr. Bush's assurances that this won't happen are based on a denial of reality. Last week, the Republican National Committee sent an angry, threatening letter to Rock the Vote, an organization that has been using the draft issue to mobilize young voters. "This urban myth regarding a draft has been thoroughly debunked," the letter declared, and quoted Mr. Bush: "We don't need the draft. Look, the all-volunteer Army is working."
...
The reality is that the Iraq war, which was intended to demonstrate the feasibility of the Bush doctrine, has pushed the U.S. military beyond its limits. Yet there is no sign that Mr. Bush has been chastened. By all accounts, in a second term the architects of that doctrine, like Paul Wolfowitz, would be promoted, not replaced. The only way this makes sense is if Mr. Bush is prepared to seek a much larger Army - and that means reviving the draft.

Just so we know what the deal is here at the "liberal-lovin'" NYT, the guy they hired to explain Allen Greenspan is the only one with the prescience and courage to put two and two together. He's the econ man, and he's the only one bringing the heat. Once again, my hat is off.

Our Vision, Our Future

Billionaires for Bush, at it again. Great stuff!

As I was walking back from the grocery store tonight at about 10pm (just got home from work) with the makings of quesidillas and a quart of high life in my pack, I had the exhillerating little thrill: in two weeks it will be over, and my life will be my own again.

Yeah, I'll probably keep my job and I don't think you ever go back after getting this deep into the whole scene, but a little over a year ago I made a promise to the night -- the kind of promise another Josh in another time would probably have said he made to god or something -- that I would do whatever I could to try and turn this country around, to pull it off the rocks, away from the ledge and what have you...

Once I had a girl on rockey top
Half bear the other half cat
Wild as a mynx but sweeter than soda pop
I still dream about that

Rocky top, you'll always be
Home sweet home to me
Good ol' Rocky top
Rocky top Tennessee

Freedom, baby. It's coming soon. The Reading Rainbow song running strong through my blood: I... can do... anything...

Just want to point out with the emerging reality-based consensus against the Bush administration that my man Britt was blogging about the need for a politically-minded "reality based community" way back when.

That was always a central appeal of the Dean campaign and the core of why I thought (and still maintain) that he was imminantly "electable," and in many ways moreso than John Kerry. If Dean were the nominee, this "realistic empericism vs. blind faith" division would have been front and center for the past several months, rather than being a late (and possibly insigificant) spin in the media cycle.

They call it community plumbing; and you can all me a plumber. This software rules: it's got literally millions of dollars worth of engineering in it, and it's all been done by volunteers. Oh yeah, and it's the basis for the hottest little project in the poli-web.

I'm going to move this website to drupal after this damned election is over; a step upward and outward in projecting myself into the ether.

The really cool thing is that it will let you readers and friends make more of everything. I know so many people who are gifted writers and thinkers who should be recording and sharing more of their genius with the world. I've been thinking of moving to a different domain, because what I want to build is a community site and building a community site around what is essentially an egocentric "brand" is a little bit suspect. Likely I'll stick with OJ.com for a while and then transition the whole thing to something -- a resurrection of Axiomlab.org, perhaps? -- which is more supportive of communal effort. Then I can make outlandishjosh.com into pure personal journal, agenda, and aggregator of my other writings which are feed-able.

Any thoughts from those of you following along at home?

Look Out Your Window! What Time Is It? Awesome Time!!

Found via iTunes radio. It's good. I just listened to a guy play great old rock music, then talk about the great old rock music in language worth of Nick Hornseby, then get upset in a delightfully hipster-esque way about Ohio State loosing to Iowa. It's great. Now they're back to music.

Yeah; it is great. I've got to listen to good radio more often!

Wouldn't it be great if we could coax Neal Pollack out of retirement and do an interview with him or get him to write us an editorial or something? I miss that guy's sense of humor.