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So for those who are really, really not reading the news, super duper, incredibly wanted, biggest butcher from Bosnia, Radovan Karadžić has been captured and is being prepared to stand trial in The Hague once his extradition hearings have concluded in Belgrade. Of course, there are a number of bizarre twists to all of this. For one, he was living in Belgrade, in the center, and working with an assumed alias. You can read all about this story everywhere as well as see the massive beard that Radovan was sporting to hide his true identity. What's even a good deal more amusing is the website: Dragan Dabić. This was the alias that Radovan was using in Belgrade and some smartass went and set up a website to appear as the good fake doctor's personal site. For everyone who thinks that this was Radovan's real site, let me emphasize that it most definitely was not. When you do a WHOIS lookup on the shebang, you see that it was registered July 22, 2008, which was one day after Radovan was taken in to custody. For those not good with math, this means it was registered yesterday. It's as fake a site as was Radovan's psychiatric care he was providing some people in Belgrade.       On another note, I have a request to make of all future war criminals that are most likely going to eventually stand trial before the ICTY which is: stating, "I am not guilty and I don't recognize the legitimacy of this court" is not original. It's so incredibly Milošević and most likely not even his to start with. I mean, yeah, we get it, you think you're not guilty and that this UN court is a sham. It doesn't matter because they're going to try you for genocide nonetheless and put you in their illegitimate jail. In the future, please just say, "Yeah, what Slobo said." or "Default Sentence #1. Default Sentence #2." when arrested and extradited. It would save me two redundant sentences in the news that I read and I need all the time that I can get as I'm a very busy man what with drinking tea, reading the news, sleeping, and waking up and all.       And for those interested, you can read a Croatian blog roundup of reactions to this event on Global Voices.

It's amazing what happens when you stop reading the US news for awhile. I for one, as you may have noted yesterday, am a fan of BBC News. They cover stories and events that just don't seem to make it in to the US coverage. This is ironic given that a lot of these stories deeply concern America and Americans, such as Corey Glass.       This name probably means nothing to anyone in the US and with good reason. Browsing, SF Gate, CNN, and the NY Times, I found no reference to this fellow. Ever. Who is he? He's an Iraq deserter trying to manage to maintain asylum up in Canada. He came up on the BBC in some of a point-counterpoint discussion as he is very likely to be deported in the next month or so to the US to stand trial.       This is something of a change from the 1960's where Canada allowed thousands of draft-dodgers to stay in Canada to avoid Vietnam. It is true that the situation is slightly different for this young guy in that there's no draft (yet), but I still feel for him. I know from when I was graduating high school, those armed forces recruiters will tell you anything to get you to sign up and they won't stop harassing you. Just watch Michael Moore's Bowling for Columbine if you want to see them in action. They're really horrid.       Undoubtedly, this guy was sold some line and then shipped off to Iraq, as, in theory, a reserve troop and he did the most logical thing that most of us would do in this situation; he ran the hell away from it. It doesn't excuse what he did, but it's pretty amazing that he could be put to death for this and also that we are hearing nothing about it here in the US. Liberal media? Yeah. Right.

I'm not really sure why I find the title appropriate, but I just do when it comes to the never-ending and relentless approach of the Bush administration. Someone comes out against the war, they get labeled as un-American. Someone tries to pull the troops out of Iraq and it's said that they're somehow betraying the mission when we all know that the "mission" was a load of crap in the first place with thousands of Americans and possibly hundreds of thousands of Iraqis dying for this. This just popped in to my head because of a bit I saw in the paper where Cheney was leveling these accusations at the Democrats for actually trying to come up with a plan for Iraq.       This is not news. What it is, is amazing to me because this is the same rhetoric, drum, horn, and whatever you want to call it that this administration has been using since they usurped power. It thoroughly blows my mind that it's been six years of this and even after a heavy defeat in Congress, they're still doing this and scarily some Americans still fall for it. Of course, with the stock market falling, interest rising, and a variety of other troubling economic signs, it might finally all be crumbling as it should. Unfortunately there will still be Senor Arbusto sitting there for the next two years with that stupid/crazed look on his face as he'll most blame the problems at home on something "nucular" that came out of 9/11.

Why We Fight was released in 2005, but I never got around to watching it. Like many films that have been fueled by the out of control, raging American War Machine, it's not the cheeriest of things to watch. But it is a good watch. I think that overall, for any liberally-minded American who keeps up with what is really going on and understands that this fight in the name of "freedom" is anything but, this film will rehash a lot of things that the viewer has already seen or known. For instance, there's one scene in an Iraq hospital with a child that I swear was in Michael Moore's Fareneheit 9/11.       For somehow who doesn't know about what's happening, this film is a great watch. It's very evenhanded and portrays both sides of the story as well as it can while still trying to guide the viewer to a conclusion and realization as I feel that any good documentary should.       I felt that I knew most of what they were going to cover, but still learned a few good tidbits such as the fact that we're constructing(constructed?) 14 army bases in Iraq. Then of course there is the constant tie in with Eisenhower and his warning of the military-industrial complex buildup. Amazingly, much like with An Inconvenient Truth I did not come away from this feeling completely blown out. There is the realization that just like the Romans, the USSR, and just about any attempt at an Empire, this will all crash at some point.       There was one striking quote that I loved in it which was from a farmer in Iraq who they asked if he knew what to expect when the invasion of US forces happened to which he said (and I might have it a little off), "How could we know what to expect? I'm an illiterate farmer. I take the cows out in the morning. I bring them back in the evening. That's all I do."