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Well yet another Earth Day has snuck up on us and gone. Still the politicians are making vain promises of “if re-elected (or elected) I promise to do everything I can to make every day Earth Day…blah blah blah”. What a crock of shit. Politicians like that irritate the hell out of me. Environmentalists irritate the hell out of me as well.

Let’s face reality folks. Western civilization isn’t exactly environment friendly. This is especially the case during the evolution from the pre-industrial stage to the current “hi-tech” stage. Many third world countries are currently about to undergo this change. And since most environmentalists are also bleeding-heart liberals, I’d like to ask you this. Are you willing to let those starving children you claim to love so much starve because you think the emissions from their parents employer’s factory might be a little too dirty? How many wars have to start over bits of raw materials before those countries have the ability to manufacture goods?

In addition, to become environmentally friendly we’d have to change EVERYTHING that our society is. How much pollution did it take to create your car? How many trees fell to create your home? How many animals died for your leather jacket? How many test animals were tortured for that perfume/cologne you wear? Next time you go to the hospital remember how many monkeys your medicine was tested on first. Western civilization consumes resources…deal with it….hell civilization itself consumes resources. Even the BioDome required pollution to build.

Now don’t get the wrong idea here. I’m not saying let’s drive our vehicles down highways built over a botanical garden and toss oil and chemicals out the window. Go ahead and attempt to find cleaner ways to do things. Go ahead and implement recycling. Just understand that civilization does and always will create pollution and there is nothing you can do about it! And also know that people are going to do whatever is easiest and cheapest for them. If your environmentally sound idea isn’t easier and cheaper, it’s not going to get done, no matter how many trees you hug. Learn it, know it, live it, DEAL WITH IT!!!

But also keep in mind that the planet and mother nature has been around for quite a few millennia. Human Beings are only a very recent addition to the planet. And really during only a very short portion of our time here have we created pollution. If there is one thing that Mother Nature has taught us is that the planet can adapt. The planet changes, when something happens, it recovers and moves on. It has suffered asteroid, glaciers, volcanoes, magnetic reversal of the poles, drifting of the plates, mass extinctions. Yet it continues to move on and adapt and even create new life forms such as humans. I really think it’s rather arrogant to believe that the planet can’t recover from us as well. And like I said, we’ve been here a very short time, the planet works slowly over many a millennium. More than likely we have yet to even see the planets response to the activities of her human spawn.

Oh and here is something you’ll never hear environmentalists say or even listen to. A very large portion of the pollution is from the planet itself! Volcanoes, of which thousands erupt in some form each year, release all sorts of gases many of which are toxic and harmful to the planet.

Could it be that just as I said, the planet is capable of fending for itself and this is all just part of a new stage of planetary evolution of which the human race is destined not to be part of??? It’s something to keep in mind while your hugging your tree.

Ah, baseball season is upon us once again. It brings back memories. Fighting through traffic. Bribing a parking attendant half a years salary for a parking spot half the size of my vehicle. Sitting in a half empty ballpark, watching a rich owner buy his way to a World Series. Eating overpriced and under-flavored food cooked by kids who couldn’t get a summer job at McDonalds. Then we sit through hours and hours of a slow and interruption-laden game. Afterwards, we feel unfulfilled and stumble home without even so much as a buzz off the $300 we’ve spent on cheap watered-down beer. Aaaaaah, yes, it’s baseball, the great American pastime.

Fortunately, I remembered the above scenario and chose to forgo a trip to the ballpark. Instead, I sat down in front of my TV and for the first time since the baseball strike years ago, I watched a baseball game. And not just any baseball game, but my home team, the Minnesota Twins. I sat there, forcing myself to try to watch just one game. Hoping against hope that this game would provide me the same fulfillment that a hockey or football game provides.

It seemed like hours had gone by since the first batter left the dugout, and headed towards the plate. I started to wonder if I was developing bed sores. I think my couch has begun decaying. I wondered if my new TV had a half-life and how much longer it now had. Fortunately, these thoughts were interrupted by the first pitch.

And so the game went. I continued to be unfulfilled and felt something was lacking….perhaps it was my pulse….surely this game had lasted at least that long. And then something began to bother me. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was…it seemed to be eating away at my sanity. Then came a lull, as the next batter began what appeared to be a Herculean effort to walk to the plate.

However, in that lull I realized what was bothering me. Somewhere off camera there was a child. Surely not unlike any other child. It was probably dirty. It was probably short. It was probably completely oblivious to the fact that it had driven its parents crazy long ago. However, this child was also screaming…also not an uncommon activity for children. However, this child was screaming something…coherent, not quite recognizable but definitely something. And this child was screaming it over and over and over and over. You could barely hear him over the sound of the crowd snoring. But he was just loud enough to irritate the living shit out of you.

Once I heard it I couldn’t block it out. It kept coming and coming. It drove itself into my mind like a splinter. I covered my ears and it continued. That steady and staccato yell, following an tempo eerily similar to the tempo of my heart. It was like the drip of a faucet. In that instant I became a fanatical supporter of justifiable homicide, infanticide, abortion, rugby (if you’ve ever played you know what I mean) or anything else that could possibly have quieted this child.

Truly I was going mad. Where was that remote control?! My kingdom for the remote control!! Might I actually be forced to walk over to the TV and change the channel?!?! Oh, the humanity!!

Finally, I was saved. Approximately 3 nanoseconds before my head exploded, I heard another cry from the crowd. This time it was a man, clearly from another part of the crowd. His voice rang out strong and true, as if from god himself.

“SHUT THE FUCK UP KID!!!!”.

The child stopped….

Over the snore of the crowd, silence prevailed. Outside my window birds began to sing. The trees sprung back to life. Angels from heaven descended and begun to play “Stairway to Heaven”. Truly we were saved by that single brave soul. I almost wanted to buy him a beer…but then I thought “Wait!!…that’s my beer”.

Instead, with almost infinite happiness I found the remote control and turned off the game. I sat back and realized that for the first time, I had (almost) watched a baseball game and was fulfilled.

Ok, everyone else has been ranting and raving about it, so I may as well too…..no I’m not talking about Post-It Notes, I’m talking about the trouble in the Middle East. Unlike most nutcases with a soapbox, I’m not going to pretend I have the answer. I’m not going to tell you how it is. I don’t have the answers, and neither does anyone else. If they actually did, they’d be brokering a deal.

Instead I want to simply point out how stupid the leaders of the region nations are. This situation is quickly accelerating to a situation that spells disaster for all the countries in the region. I believe most people call it a worst case scenario? The entire regions heads quickly for a conflict everyone appears to want, with a result that everyone ultimately dreads.

Already the situation is very hot. However, it could get far hotter. While the leaders of the Arab countries privately know that a war is the last thing they want, the people of the surrounding Arab countries are pissed off. Fundamentalists have gotten them stirred up with religious fervor. The media of those countries have declared the plight of the Palestine’s the greatest threat to the Arab world….mostly to distract the populous from the unfair and corrupt leadership at home.

Really all it would take is a single symbolic action. Perhaps the death of a visiting dignitary, or perhaps even Arafat himself. This would start a downward spiral of no return.

Most likely it would start in Egypt. It’s press has been particularly extreme in it’s anti-Israeli propaganda. In addition, it’s military regime has bragged for years about their powerful military to justify HUGE defense expenditures. A major incident might cause the people of Egypt to force Hosni Mubarak into sending it’s forces to threaten the Gaza strip. These include some top-rate equipment including U.S.-made M-1A1 Tanks

In order not to be upstaged, Syria’s insecure and inexperienced President Assad, might feel compelled into sending it’s antiquated forces south to threaten the Golan Heights.

Then even the reluctant and almost pro-Israeli King Abdullah, of Jordan, would most likely be forced to send his relatively small number of armored units west to threaten the West Bank.

Even more unpredictable is the Hezbollah militia in Southern Lebanon, who have massed along the border with Israel. Past skirmishes have shown that they possess loads of Iranian-supplied bombardment rockets and are certainly not opposed to suicide tactics.

Now Saddam Hussein of Iraq in a desperate move to hold onto power would almost certainly want to get in on the action, requiring his forces to cross either Syria or Jordan to invade Israel. Neither Syria or Jordan is likely to allow this for numerous reasons. Therefore this would require Iraq to use the missiles and mass-destruction weapons they adamantly claim do not exist.

Iran, who basically runs Lebanon and who have been sponsoring the activities of both the terrorists and Palestine’s in Lebanon and Israel would probably find itself involved. They have tended to conduct such actions indirectly and hence may once again do so in this conflict.

Now, as a response to these moves, Israel would be forced to move it’s forces to its borders. These would probably require ending the activities against the Palestines, and thereby negating the reason for the movements in the first place. However, even though none of these countries might actually intend to do battle. Having this many troops and armored units with a long history of hatred for each other in close proximity is an almost certain recipe for disaster. War would almost certainly result, probably on the scale of the Israeli-Arab War of 1967.

Now it would almost certainly not be a repeat of the War of 1967. It might be worse. All signs indicate an Israeli victory, although in a conflict like this, the term victory would be a shallow term. If war broke out, Israel would be forced to activate its 425,000 reservists, which is a very large part of their adult population. This type of mobilization couldn’t last long. This would force Israel to conduct it’s operations very aggressively, thereby forcing the Arabs into retreat or simply decimate them such as in 1967.

Since 1967, the military balance has definitely shifted even more in the favor of Israel. Israel’s armored forces would most likely be outnumbered. However, they would also be in their element. They may not be effective against individual suicide bombers but they definitely know how to take on an opposing military army and rip it apart. The Israeli armored divisions are trained to be faster than their opponents. They outmaneuver and then use their superior gunnery to decimate their opponents armor. The Israeli Air Force has no serious challenge in the region. Military advisors estimate a 30-1 kill rate for the Israeli Air Force (they scored 80-1 against Syria in 1982). And in addition Israel is one of the largest producers and exporters of guided weapons, which they would not be reluctant to use in a conflict.

If we take a look at the Arab countries military it gets worse. Syria possesses very old and out-dated equipment. Jordan and especially Egypt, are dependent on U.S. aid to pay for their military expenses and daily bread, which they would lose if a conflict arose. In the harsh conditions of the Arab environment, hi-tech military equipment breaks down quickly without the support and maintenance of the U.S. companies that produced them. Iraq cannot seriously involve itself without revealing it’s longstanding farce of not possessing weapons of mass destruction. Really the only threat the Israeli military might not be able to counter would be the Hezbollah militia in Lebanon.

Now this may sound great for Israel so far, but the price in blood and destruction may be far more than what the Israeli population is willing to pay. Already the country seems evenly split between withdrawing to its 1967 borders and continuing the fight. Even if this potential battle resulted in a “victory”, they would have gained nothing they didn’t already have. While possibly gaining more land, this would only continue the current predicament as a result of the 1967 war.

While these reasons would compel any sane person to avoid a war like the plague, history has shown us that as a country, people can be rather insane. Especially in a religious turmoil such as exists in the Middle East. Here the leaders may even be compelled to act to save their own respective asses. Many of these leaders barely cling to power, as few respect their legitimacy since nobody elected them and few respect their competence.

However, even the most insane Arab has got to understand the implications of a war. The war of 1967 is still fresh in the minds of many Arabs. Even those born after the war understand. Also, another defeat like that would pave the way for Islamic fundamentalists to force their way into leadership of the defeated Arab countries.

So as each side of the conflict seems willing and almost desperate to settle everything in a battle royale, the ultimate and obvious result is something that even the most enraged person would dread…the rise of Islamic Extremists in national governments controlling a large portion of the world oil supply. And that is something even the US and their European allies can get behind.