No Mirrors in the Corridors of Power

It's a fact: there are no mirrors in The Whitehouse or Downing Street. You know how I know? Because if George Bush or Tony Blair looked at themselves in a mirror even once, they'd be out of Iraq and all over Zimbabwe like those cheap suits they seem to like so much.

Mugabe's actions are not those of a well man. Inflation is at 1700% and rising, life expectancy has fallen year on year to a World Record low of 37 years, emigration is at 20%, Industry is operating at 28% of capacity. AIDS infection hovers around 80%, with ~180K deaths leaving ~1.1M AIDS orphans, of whom ~160K are infected as well. (Figures from The Times)

His response to democratic reform is.....unilateral, to put if mildly. From destroying the homes of those who oppose him (Operation Murambatsvina) to beating his direct competition close to death (Morgan Tsvangirai), he has no regard for the consequences of his actions. The reasons for this are threefold; 1. He's a great big loony, 2. He cares little for the opinions of the outside world, 3. He knows that the outside world lack the gumption to do something about him.

So if there are crimes against humanity "allegedly" going on in Zimbabwe at the moment, where are the Leaders of The Free World? Where are the UN peacekeepers? When are we going to descend on Mugabe and remove him from power, like we did with Saddam in Iraq?

I'll tell you when. Never. And I'll tell you why. Because he hasn't got any Oil. And even if he did, the First World have a mental block about Africa. Africa is the land of brutal civil war, of famine, or disease, all the things that we in the First World want to avoid. The furthest we are prepared to go is to send aid and the occasional comedian to try and ease the suffering.

As Blair and Bush's premierships near and end, you might think they'd want to go out with a bang; do something worthwhile, memorable, something the people could get behind. A quick evisceration of Mugabe and his cronies and be home in time for tea and medals. The problem is that One Man and His Dog went to Iraq and got / are getting their fingers burned, so they are less likely to want to burn them somewhere hotter.

But Zimbabwe doesn't require Shock and Awe. Food and Medicine would do fine. All you need are some SAS / SEALS to blow him up, make it look like rebels and deny all knowledge. There are other ways to achieve change. I'd prefer the European "scalpel" approach to the American "M1 Abrams-up-the-ass! Woo! Get some!" approach. Hell, the CIA been pulling that shit for years. Wild Bill invented the OSS (and thus, indirectly, the CIA) to pull precisely that sort of shit. They can do it.

You could compare Mugabe to Hitler and Saddam Hussein. Go on, compare. The man even has a Hitler moustache, for Pity's sake! You remember Hitler? He was big in the Thirties and, unlike Mugabe, he had a War and everyone was invited. He has probably caused as many people pain and suffering as Saddam ever did. Just because he is starving them, not gassing them, doesn't make him a better person.

Mugabe's uppence will come. It's just a matter of time. The only questions is; how many people will be left in Zimbabwe to celebrate? Sadly, it will be typical that his time will be one of the last to run out. But all it takes is one bullet. Surely Team America can afford one measly 5.56 FMJ?

How to Stop America Invading You

Got Oil? English not your first language? Looking to expand your countrys technology base? Then the USA wants you! Dead.

So how do you stop the Redneck Army invading, short of waving Jesus flags? Simple. The solution is clear. Contaminate your Oil. With silicon. The advanced internal combustion engines of the infidels cannot process poor-quality gasoline. It's no use to 'em, can't use it.

So, if you've no usable natural resources, the only reason they've got to invade you is if you intend to get within one hundred years of them, technologically. And, between you and me, that's not really such a big deal to them. They just want your Oil.

Make their satellites work for YOU. Construct a huge oil contamination plant. Ship in huge quantities of silicon in yellow wagons with "Silicon" written on the roof. Be really blatant about pouring it into your oil. Smile for the cameras.

You are now free to abuse your womenfolk and develop dirty bombs in peace.

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Contaminated unleaded petrol blamed for causing thousands of cars to break down has been traced to a depot in Essex, a supplier has said.

Brave New World

I found the linked video on BoingBoing. It was created by Michael Wesch, an assistant Cultural Anthropology Professor at KSU. It goes into the way that Web 2.0, the advent of social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies, will affect how we live from here on out. It's a great piece of work.

However, there are cautionary elements in there, elements which the fatalist movie lover in me picked up straightaway. Every time we tag something, or add a link, or mail something to someone, a computer somewhere is taking notes. As the video says, we are teaching the machine and the machine is learning to think.

Now, where have we heard that before, children? Armed robot gunships, memetic polyalloy assassins, self-aware machines; naked Austrians? How long before Google responds to your search request with "I need your clothes, your boots and your motorcycle?" Suddenly, terms like "search bot" and "web spider" have a jackboot soundtrack.

Leaving aside the possibility of a self-aware, self-replicating web of killing machines, I like the way the shiny side of the web is going. I like that I can write this drivel and ignore the fact that no-one bar me will ever read it. It gives me a sense of empowerment, that somehow my writing this will add to the pool of human knowledge. But if Google, Yahoo, YouTube, Blogger, etc are really listening to everything I commit to the Ether, then I'm actually contributing to the eventual pool of human blood.

So, could the internet morph into a sentient entity? "Sentience is a by-product of the complexity required for the ability to self-evolve.", said the internet when I asked it¹. Now, the router tables that know how to get from every server in the world to every other server in the world do precisely this. When a broken connection is detected, the router re-routes data through alternate connections. When you buy things online, the site suggests other things you might like to buy.

From the Web 2.0 sites, a computer could determine the characteristics of the human race. Yes, based on what books we buy on Amazon. From there, it's not too far a leap to the point where it starts to alter the user experience. If you wanted to buy a book on World War II, the site might say, "Many customers decided not to buy this and bought a book about existentialism instead." or "You have been added to the Nazi sympathisers list".

We have some time. We have years of shared web nirvana in our future. But we would do well to consider that our utopia, our brave new world, may be but a veneer of fantasy over the grimy, pixellated reality of a machine world that is coldly and dispassionately shaping our lives through a web page².

Thank you for reading this post. Blogger is adding your name to the list.

¹ If the internet was self-aware, it would not have told me that the possibility exists. So, we're safe, for the time being.
² If you're getting Matrix overtones, that's fine. So was I.