Hammer Mill Days

Well, anyway... why do we have to do the same thing every time? I mean, I know safety is important, but frankly we can't afford a spaceship at this point. Can't we just hitchhike to Neptune? Good god, man. Whatever happened to the spirit of adventure? We never used to be so risk averse. We used to bear to the left and take chances. Now look at us. (You can use a smoked glass lens, if you prefer.) We're worried about lack of gravity, lack of oxygen, exposure to radiation - what a bunch of wimps! The only one who's really not intimidated by any of this is the mansized tuber. (At least he hasn't said anything about it to me.) Fact is, we have to do these tours on the cheap, what with a recession on and all that. Money's tight, and our corporate label is even tighter. They don't even want to budget for us , let alone a ship to carry us in. Looks like we'll be relying on comped meals again. Ever try to get a free lunch on Uranus? Hah. Take it from me - it...

Obama's surge strategy is beginning to take shape, and it isn't encouraging for those of us who question this ongoing occupation (and who have questioned the war since the beginning). The Times of London quotes a U.S. commander as describing this action in terms of a "D-Day Moment", but in the context of a conflict that has lasted nearly twice as long as America's part in World War II, this would seem in relative terms more like a second. Also, rather than attacking the flank of the most powerful military force in the world, we are invading a battered, impoverished region of one of the planet's most miserable nations - a place where people struggle to subsist, and where large-scale conflict will likely result in a major displacement of the population, perhaps approaching the scale of what is now occurring across the border in Pakistan's tribal departments. I guess it's up to all of us to ask, how much more of this? We've been in Afghanistan for alm...