Last night they kicked off the Democratic National Convention…  And Terri, being the political junky that she is, had it going on multiple TVs in the house.  No matter where I went, there it was.

Lots of rousing speeches, lots of pundits, lots of arguing.  About what I’d expect.  But then one of the commentators on MSNBC made a very strange comment…

In referring to someone’s speech he said that it was “very scripted.”

It’s the Democratic National Convention.  They’ve been planning this for months if not years.  They’ve rented a venue, flown people in from all over the United States, arranged tons of press coverage.  They’ve got speech writers, and teleprompters, and a pre-recorded documentary on Teddy Kenedy.  Scripted?  You think?  Maybe?

These folks are politicians, not comedians.  It isn’t like they improvise all this stuff.  Of course it’s scripted.

There’s been a story going on CNN lately about lowering the drinking age to 18.  Now, I personally don’t really care all that much either way.  Folks will be stupid regardless of whether they’ve been drinking or not.  And folks will drink too much and be even more stupid regardless of their age.  So the idea that there’s some magic number that will prevent alcohol-ralted stupidity seems kind of silly to me.

I understand that people do tend to mellow out as they age.  It’s probably safer for a 50-year-old to be drinking alcohol than a 15-year-old.  They’re probably going to be more careful and responsible about the whole thing.

But that isn’t garonteed.  There are plenty of young folks imbibing responsibly, and plenty of older people being complete asshats.

But I do find it interesting that in the United States you are considered responsible enough to get behind the wheel of a car, which can make one hell of a deadly weapon if used incorrectly, at age 16.

And at age 18 a whole world of responsibility opens up…  You can get married, have sex, and raise a family.  You are allowed to change the course of this nation’s history with a vote.  You can enlist in the military to fight and die for your country.

And yet, somehow, you aren’t considered responsible enough to enjoy an acoholic beverage until age 21.

There’s a story over on Slashdot today asking whether US voters are informed enough about science…

For decades, educators and employers have worried that too few Americans are preparing for careers in science. But there’s evidence to support a new, broader concern in this election year: Ordinary Americans may not know enough about science to make informed decisions on key questions.

I think that’s kind of missing the point.  It’s like asking whether sea cucumbers are can write haiku.

No, US voters are not well-informed about science.  But they also aren’t well-infomed about the economy, trade relations, defense, the space program, healthcare, civil rights, international diplomacy…  The average US voter, from what I’ve seen, has very little idea what is going on in the US - and you can just forget about the rest of the planet.

I’m not just being sarcastic.  I’m not just ranting.  A good chunk of US voters still think Obama is a Muslim even after we’ve seen repeated stories complaining about his Christian minister.

Entirely too many people base their voting on whether they like the candidate.  Whether they could go have a beer with them.  Whether they’re folksy or friendly enough.  Whether they’d make a good next-door neighbor.

Far too few people actually base their voting on rational evaluation of the topics.  On which candidate is actually most likely to fix the problems that currently exist.  Which candidate is going to do the best job.

With Obama over in the Middle East right now there’s all kinds of political stuff on TV.  What I’ve been seeing a lot of lately is the McCain camp trying to score points in increasingly desperate ways, because the media is so wrapped up in Obama’s trip right now.  And one of the recent things I’ve been hearing an awful lot about is winning the war in Iraq.

McCain has gone so far as to imply that Obama would rather lose the war than the election.

I’m sure I’ve asked this on here before…  But Every time they start talking about winning the war in Iraq I always have to wonder…  What exactly does win mean?

First off, the only war that was declared was a war on terror.  Congress never declared war on Iraq.  So, technically, there isn’t anything to win in Iraq.  We’re at war with terror, not Iraq.  So we should really be focusing our efforts on Afghanistan at this point.  But a lot of the conservative folks are still very focused on Iraq.  They’ll admit that we need to put more troops into Afghanistan…but they’ll still insist that we have to win in Iraq.

And they never really explain what winning means.

We were originally told we were going to Iraq because of the WMDs…  But we never found any WMDs, and any kind of threat they may have once posed is completely neutralized at this point.  So…we won?

We were then told it was about getting rid of Saddam…  Well, he’s gone.  He’s been gone for years.  We found him, imprisoned him, put him on trial, and executed him.  So…we won?

We were told it was about bringing democracy to the country…  So we set up a nice little government and had elections.  And now their own democratically-elected government is telling us that we can leave.  So…we won?

And somewhere along the line Dubya actually flew out to an aircraft carrier and declared “Mission Accomplished!” in a terrifically scripted press event.  Which certainly sounds like a declaration of victory…

So, what are we fighting for now?  What are the victory conditions these days?  What does it take to actually win in Iraq?

I know there’s still all kinds of instability, chaos, violence…  But I’m really not certain that we can fix that militarily.  Seems to me that fixing an unstable country militarily is like trying to build a house by yelling at it.  You need diplomacy and economics to fix an unstable country.  You need to get a good, trustworthy government in place…  You need to make the citizens care about their government/nation…  You need to put people to work - get them to invest their own blood, sweat, and tears…  You need the people of that nation to care about its livelihood enough to make it work, despite the rough spots and difficulties.  And you can’t inspire that kind of caring at gunpoint.

Lots of folks like to point out that if we were to just up and leave today there would be chaos in the streets.  That everything we’ve worked for would just fall apart without us there to defend it.  I don’t think I really disagree with that statement…but I do think that it kind of points out why we can’t keep hanging around…

Unless the goal is to make Iraq the 51st state, we aren’t going to be staying there forever.  At some point we are going to leave.  And when that happens the Iraqi people need to be able to stand up on their own and take care of their own country.  We cannot be there forever to take care of them.  If the country is too weak to stand on its own, it will fall.  But that’s true regardless of how long we stay there.  We could be there another 10 years and still have a nation that’s too weak to stand on its own.  That isn’t a function of how long we stay there, that’s a function of how well the country is rebuilt.

And I’d say that we’re doing an absolutely craptastic job of rebuilding Iraq.

So, if we aren’t going to stay there forever…  And we acknowledge that it’s going to be rough when we leave, whenever that may be…  What does win mean?  What sign are we waiting for?  What goal is there that hasn’t been reached yet?

I’m really not being sarcastic or babbling just for the hell of it.  Sure, I think the whole Iraq thing was a mistake and we should get out as soon as we can…that’s true…  And I’m not terribly sympathetic to the conservative camp, especially when they start talking about winning the war…  So coming up with concrete victory conditions probably wouldn’t make me any more approving of the war or conservative politics.

But I really am genuinely curious…  What do they think we’re fighting for?  What is their goal?

Because, honestly, they don’t seem to know.  McCain keeps talking about winning in Iraq, but he never actually explains what that means.  All his assorted surrogates also talk about winning in Iraq, but never say what that means.  I’ve seen dozens of conservative experts and pundits and commentators say that we need to win in Iraq, but none of them ever say what that means.

Slashdot | DHS Official Considered Shock Collars For Air Travelers

“The Washington Times is reporting that the DHS wants to replace your boarding pass with a GPS-enabled shock bracelet. Plans for the device include subduing passengers remotely as well as onboard interrogation. There’s even a promotional video.” Perhaps Paul Ruwaldt (the official named in this story) has been watching “The Coneheads” a bit too much, or not actually flying enough. Expressing interest is not quite the same as ordering mass quantities, but it’s scary enough.

Wow.  A few years back I would have just lughed at this and assumed it was some kind of prank/hoax/spoof.  Unfortunately, this looks all-too real.  Apparently such devices really were considered.

I wonder why exactly they didn’t go with it…  Just how much opposition was there, and from who?

I can honestly say that I wouldn’t be terribly surprised to see something like this actually implemented in the not-too-distant future.