Scott Bradford: Off on a Tangent

Remembering ‘Black Tuesday’ (and the ‘Right of Return’)

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Today was the anniversary of one of the most vicious conquests in history—the fall of Constantinople (and the Byzantine Empire) to the Ottomans on May 29, 1453.

On this day in 1453, the conquerers were extraordinarily brutal. Historian Steven Runciman notes that the Muslim soldiers “slew everyone that they met in the streets, men, women, and children without discrimination. The blood ran in rivers down the steep streets from the heights of Petra toward the Golden Horn. But soon the lust for slaughter was assuaged. The soldiers realized that captives and precious objects would bring them greater profit.” (The Fall of Constantinople 1453, Cambridge University Press, 1965, p. 145.)

What’s incredible about this, if you ask me, is the Muslim double-standard. One of the central arguments of the Palestinian side of the Israeli/Palestinian conflict is that Palestinians who left (willingly, mostly) during the foundation of modern Israel should have a ‘right of return’ to come back to the property they abandoned in the 1950s. Okay; I’m willing to entertain that notion. But then the Christians descended from those who left the Byzantine Empire when it fell to Muslim invaders in 1453 have a ‘right of return’ too. Turnabout is fair play, right.

Read more about this history, and its modern context, via this informative entry at Jihad Watch.

Firefox Download Day 2008

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I blogged last week about the Haiku Code Drive 2008, which was a cool way to support a great open source project but, as much as I love Haiku, it’s not a production product today. If you’re looking for a way to support an open source project that provides an immediate benefit (without opening your checkbook), then maybe Firefox Download Day 2008 is for you instead.

Firefox, of course, is the excellent open source web browser from Mozilla and it has been my primary web browser for some time. It’s fast, reliable, standards-compliant, extensible, and compatible with almost every platform you can imagine (even really obscure ones). For a few months now, I’ve been using betas and release-candidates of the upcoming Firefox 3, which will be released in the coming weeks.

So how does the Firefox team intend to celebrate Firefox 3 (and get some media attention)? By attempting to set a world record for downloads over a 24-hour period! Click the link, pledge your support, and when the release date comes give it a download (or six) to help them set the record.

The Martian Flagpole

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While it’s not one of the main topics I usually write about, I’ve always loved space exploration (too many hours watching Star Trek: The Next Generation as a kid). I follow the exploits of NASA, the ESA, the RFSA, and other space-faring agencies—public and private—with great interest.

The big news from space this week is that the Phoenix Lander has successfully landed on Mars (and you thought the big news was the toilet failure on the International Space Station). Mars is a particularly interesting planet, in that more than 50 percent of attempted missions to Mars end in failure—a much higher failure rate than you find in missions to any other planet or body in our solar system. Personally, I think somebody is shooting them down . . . but that explanation usually gets incredulous looks from the people I share it with.

Regardless, parts of the blogosphere are already noticing a curious feature in some of the photos being sent back from Mars by the lander. In browsing the gallery at the Phoenix Lander web site, I noticed the same curious feature (here and here). From a distance, it looks like a flagpole. Closer in, it looks either like a rock formation drastically different from those that surround it . . . or, dare I say, something artificial. Whatever it is, it doesn’t match its surroundings, and it has already gotten the attention of curious scientists (and space-watchers) around the world.

Scott McClellan Tells All

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The big news in political circles this morning is the new book by former White House Press Secretary Scott McClellan which paints a not-so-pretty portrait of President Bush, especially related to the Iraq war and Hurricane Katrina. This is notable, in my opinion, in that it is the first book (that I’m aware of) accusing Bush of intentionally misleading the public in the lead-up to the Iraq war by somebody who was actually in a position to have known what was going on. All such books previously have been conjecture-based hatchet-jobs by the political opposition.

I have no reason to doubt that McClellan is telling the truth—or, at least, what he believes to be the truth. Having said that, I must be perfectly clear that nothing I have read so far regarding McClellan’s book changes my opinion about the war in Iraq, since using a propaganda machine to sell the war with bad data does not mean that Iraq didn’t violate 17 U.N. Security Council resolutions (they did) or that military force was not justified (it was). Further, even if McClellan’s book is 100 percent accurate, lying to the public is not an impeachable offense any more than me lying to you would be a criminal act. Immoral, yes, but not criminal—unless, of course, the president had been under oath (he wasn’t).

So, despite the left-wingers salivating over this ‘evidence’ with which the president can supposedly be impeached, please, calm down and read your Constitution. McClellan’s revelations may rightfully cause outrage, and may be politically devestating for Bush (and for the Republican Party), but remember to keep it all in perspective—and remember that bad arguments and bad decisions don’t necessarily discredit our entire enterprise in Iraq.

Feeling Better (FINALLY); Mario Kart Wii!

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I’m finally starting to feel a bit better, which is good because I think I just bankrolled Vicks’ existence for the next six-months-plus. As many of you know, I generally shy away from medicines since they generally just treat the symptoms (which, in many cases, actually help to kill the virus). But, after the first week or so, I gave in and have been ingesting a steady diet of chicken soup, Dayquil, and Nyquil.

Let me state, for the record, that the phenylephrine decongestant they’ve put in most medicines to replace the now-tightly-controlled pseudoephedrine (in a classic example of ‘punish everybody for the sins of a few’ syndrome) doesn’t work even half as well. It is worth the annoying trip to the pharmacy counter to get your hands on the old-fashioned stuff, even if you ludicrously have to show ID and be entered in a database for it. Nyquil D, most especially, was the only thing that let me sleep and stay somewhat sane over the last week.

Anyway, we actually left the apartment for part of the afternoon today, including a trip to Target where we picked up Mario Kart Wii. That should keep us occupied for a while now ;-). And I should be getting back into a regular pattern of posting now that I’m conscious again.

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Posted in: Life

Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.