So. Finally. LOS ANGELES : Former US president Ronald Reagan died at the age of 93 after a decade-long battle with Alzheimer’s disease, his office said. Reagan, a two-term president and former Hollywood star, died at his high-fenced home in the fashionable Bel Air section of Los Angeles shortly before 2:00 pm (2100 GMT) Saturday afternoon. Actually, Lime told me about this piece of news this morning, while browsing the net waiting for me to finish cooking. At the time, all I could spare attention to respond was. “Huh. Good. He screwed up America.” She didn’t say anything, but this …

Read this a long time ago, but it may perhaps be of interest. It’s an article at OpenDemocracy by Danny Postel, titled Noble lies and perpetual war: Leo Strauss, the neo-cons, and Iraq. Of course, I have some thoughts on this. But first, an excerpt:

Here’s an article on the reemergence of The New York Review of Books as a political force in American letters. It’s quite fascinating, from my point of view, and I shall have to pay closer attention to the magazine from now on. This and other links of late have come to me via the Arts & Letters Daily, which I state again is quite worth checking out… daily.

What’s the difference between a politician and an MBA? I don’t know, but I don’t trust either bunch.

I could write about any number of things here, from the wonderful meal that Lime prepared today, to the wedding I attended, to the film we saw tonight… but those things can wait till tomorrow, or the day after. For right now, what’s on my mind is what I saw on TV while we ate dinner. It was the Korean news, showing videos and new photos that are apparently from Abu Ghraib. The detainee death toll there now—this is death, not tortures—is 32 in Iraq in and 5 in Afghanistan. What now-released prisoners describe is horrifying, and seems to me …

Ada had a link up for an interview over at Sacbee with a marine who sees what he did in Iraq as war atrocities. His words are striking: Q: Did the revelations that the government fabricated the evidence for war affect the troops? A: Yes. I killed innocent people for our government. For what? What did I do? Where is the good coming out of it? I feel like I’ve had a hand in some sort of evil lie at the hands of our government. I just feel embarrassed, ashamed about it. While I’m at it, a similar digusted, guilty …

So it seems. Well, what do you think of that? Found the link at Secular Blasphemy.

Here are some very surprisingly clear photos of Iraq from a while back. Not all glory and honor and grand adventure, to be sure.

As if the North Korean dictatorship has any right to criticise.

The Catholic Church in America is making a huge, huge mistake, once again. Salon is carrying a story on how one Colorado bishop issued a warning to voters. What was his warning? That if you vote for someone who supports stem cell research, euthanasia, gay marriage, or abortion rights, you are not in a state of grace and you ought to refrain from taking Communion. What about supporting a war profiteer? Or someone who orchestrates the wanton destruction of a country? An administration that lies through its teeth for the very grounds of beginning a destructive war? An administration that …