LONDON BOMBED AGAIN: I think I had another instance of disassociating from reality this morning when I got word of the latest round of terror bombings in my beloved London. Although I knew it had happened and had a cursory idea, I sat calmly answering emails and checking phone messages at my desk. Then I dug into the news and got that wave of nausea all over again. Luckily, no one was killed today. Whoever is running the operation picked amateurs to build and detonate the bombs because it was a lot of smoke and noise and little else. However, it plunged the capital back into chaos and the already crippled Underground just got a little more scary.

My favorite story of the day was the moronic bomber who apparently couldn't get his bomb to detonate, so he pulled out a gun (?!) inside the tube carriage and started shooting at the rucksack. The passengers chased him off the train and would have certainly beat him. I know I would have. The other three bombs (four all together - three Underground, one on a bus - chillingly like two weeks ago) fizzled as well. However, had they gone off, chances are dozens more would have died. What may bring this wave of bombings to a stop is that the bombers keep leaving behind extensive physical evidence...even more this time. There will be fingerprints, DNA samples and I bet there is some interesting CCTV footage of that terrorist being chased by the passengers. The call by the conservatives in the UK to create a list of people who "promote hate" (in sermons, websites, blogs, articles) is bit Orwellian for me.

This still doesn't put me off from going to London in the fall. I'll be on the tube ready to pounce on anyone fiddling inside their rucksack.

On another note, I actually had to hand it to Condi Rice today for standing up to the Sudanese government who tried to manhandle members of her staff and the press asking about the ongoing genocide in Darfur. She actually went to the camps in Darfur and met with women who had been raped by government militants while they were gathering firewood. More UN peacekeepers arrived in Darfur today as well. I'm glad to see America is finally paying a little more attention and that Condi has bit more conscience than I thought. If she's running for president in 2008, she just might get elected. Condi or Hillary? What a choice.

Comments

David Herrle said…
It's hard to synchronize conscience with politics, especially in foreign affairs. Sadly, conscience-abiding policy and action usually depend on strategy, alliances, and feasibility.

Beyond evil Sudan, Africa and other faction quagmires and political dirtholes need fundamental redemption rather than just continuous financial gifts (which usually go to the scum orchestrating the hell).

The guilt-ridden, millionaire rock stars (though probably sincere in their concern, for the most part) get to have global attention and applause and "aw, ain't they so kind" once in a while - but dumping guilt money into an insatiable beast's throat isn't working.

The lowly people still suffer, caught in the resin of oppression and "conscience". Sad, but true.

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