Posted 3:39 PM by Floyd

This is an essay on whether the United States should invade Iraq.

I have seen three viewpoints on the proposed war:

• The idiotarian anti-war position
  
• The non-idiotarian pro-war position
  
• The non-idiotarian anti-war position
  

I am not particularly interested in the idiotarian, well, idiocies.
Last weekend I was hanging out with a bunch of bridge players
and one of them made a snide reference to the Bush administration.
He used the term "corporate hegemony." I'm not sure what the
corporate hegemony is that profits from a return to toenail polish,
kite flying and music playing, and to overthrowing dictators who use
poison gas on minority groups, but if it exists I'm fuck-all for it.
I presume such a hegemony would consist of be Revlon, an evil syndicate
of kite manufacturers, and the RIAA selling music to Afghanis, and
then trying to hack into the casette players of those listening to
pirated music.

Back to reality. The pro-war side needs no introduction; it is
represented by many in the blogosphere, and you can find their
links at the left.

The anti-war side amongst pro-war bloggers has fewer adherents. One is Steven Chapman; another is Ken Layne, who penned this dissent. I will quote two excerpts:

I've been disgusted and bored by this War on Iraq
talk, because it's a scam. Saudi Arabia knocked
down the World Trade Center and bombed the
Pentagon with jetliners full of civilians and
tried to send another jetliner into the White
House or the Capitol.

...

I'll take Saddam's version of an Islamic state
over Saudi Arabia anytime. Saddam doesn't fund
Jew-hating mosques in Virginia and California ...
he just pays $25,000 to the families of suicide
bombers in Israel. No Iraqis crashed jets into
the WTC and Pentagon last September.

Yeah, Iraq shouldn't have nukes and chemical
weapons aimed at Kuwait or Israel. But the Sept.
11 killers came from Saudi Arabia and Egypt. Our
pals. Our buddies. Our nightmare.

Removing the Sting

At the same gathering of friends our hostess took issue with the
argument that it was necessary to remove Saddam's capability to
use weapons of mass destruction (hereafter abbreviated WMD). She
said that this is hypocritical because we had our own WMD.

This had occurred to me as well, but I think it is a flawed argument.
One should not treat nations as though they were individuals who
are equal under law. It is one thing to say that person X should be allowed
to carry a gun but that person Y may not. (Many of the elite who
propound gun control have armed bodyguards, which is obvious hypocricy.)
It is something else entirely to say that nation X may have WMD
while nation Y may not. The United States has its problems, but invading
its neighbors or using chemical weapons on its own citizens is not one
of them.

I think it is entirely reasonable of the United States to attack
Iraq before it obtains WMD.


Saddam Insane?

One argument made by many is that it is important to remove Saddam
from power because he is insane, and will use WMD once he obtains them
regardless of the consequences. I think this is silly, and is due
to chauvanism by American patriots; their implicit reasoning is that
Saddam crossed the US, and who but a lunatic would dare to do that?

Saddam's country suffered badly as a result of his attempt to seize
Kuwait. But Saddam himself seems to be doing just fine; he has his
power and his wealth. When he seized Kuwait he had a reasonable
expectation that no one would complain. The Gulf War must have represented
a worst-case scenario -- and as I have said, he personally has not suffered.

Saddam did toss some missiles at Israel during the first Gulf War,
and that has added to his reputation for all-around battiness.
But this too was rational; Saddam attempted to enlarge the conflict by getting
Israel involved, thus pulling other Arab states onto Iraq's side.
It was a manifestation of a maxim of Donald Rumsfeld that Den Beste has
approvingly cited: When a problem is intractible, expand the scope
of the problem. Is Rumsfeld insane?

While I said above that I think it is appropriate for the US to
attack Iraq, I do not think it is necessary because I believe Saddan
to be a rational actor who has better things to do with his time
than to be nuked to his atomic constituents.


Until You Clean the Bedroom of Every Boy in America, You Can't
Have a New GameBoy Cartridge

In passing I shall object to another argument I have heard contra war:

There are lots of awful governments in the world. Why is the US picking
on Iraq?

This is like saying that because I can't feed all the hungry people in
the world, it is immoral for me to try to feed one or two. Why shouldn't
the US pick and choose which evil it chooses to extirpate?


The Two Q's: Iraq and Al-Qaeda

I don't think it is necessary to take out Saddam to prevent
an Iraqi military strike. Butis it necessary to do so to strike at Al Qaeda?

I do not find the evidence linking Al-Qaeda and Iraq to be convincing.
From what I have seen it consists of the following:

• An Iraqi intelligence official met Mohammed Atta in the Czech
  Republic.
  
  
  I don't find this convincing because it is a single visit. Maybe
  Atta asked for assistance and got turned down. If Atta met with
  Iraqis multiple times, or can be shown to have received money from
  them, that would be different.
  
  
• Iraq was training operatives to hijack planes (this from Indepundit. But in the same article we read
  
  

  
  None of the defectors were able to identify the "Islamic militants"
  specifically as members of Usama bin Laden’s al Qaeda organization
  

  
  
  

Then we have this statement, also from Indepundit's article.

But Prague wasn't the only opportunity for Atta to meet with Iraqi agents.
Atta also visited Syria several times between 1994 and 1999. It would not
have been difficult for him to make contact with Iraqi agents during that period.

It would not have been difficult for Atta to make contact with ... Syria.
Shall we therefore go to war with Syria?

All of this evidence is circumstantial. I have no problem with circumstantial
evidence in this context, because there is no practical way of obtaining
prrof of the strength necessary to convict a person of a felony in
an American trial. But -- Iraq is not a likely collaborator with fundamentalist
Islamic groups. It is a secular totalitarian society. Islam cannot
be used to strenghten Saddam's grip on power. So the circumstancial evidence
would have to be stronger to convince me.


The Axis of Evil

President Bush made a famous speech in which he stated that the US
would oppose countries which fostered terrorism, and he named three
nations specifically as an "Axis of Evil": Iran, Iraq, and North Korea.
At the time I thought, "kick ass." I was afraid that the US response
would be hobbled by legalistic objections and multicultural sensistivity,
so any pro-war speech made me happy.

But now that I think about the Axis of Evil, I think that while the
idea is sound, the implementation is lacking. In fact it was the
precise opposite of what was needed. If you want to make a list of
fundamentalism Islamic countries that have prodided money and bodies
for anti-Western terrorism, it's not hard: Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran.
The list proffered by Bush shows that he and his team are not interested
in making hard choices or offending anyone.

Why is Iraq on the list? Habit; they have been an American enemy before,
so why not now?

Why North Korea? In a sane world, one would try to imagine the name of the
country that Bush was mispronouncing. In our world it is an affirmative
action placement. Never mind that North Korea is viciously atheist
and probably knows less about Islam than someone who watched "Lawrence
of Arabia." North Korea is a thorn in the South's side, but free Korea
has twice as many people and about fifty times as much wealth; they
can handle it. But Bush can't offend people by making war on only Islamic
States -- note the immediate dropping of the word "Crusade" last September
when someone whined about how any Arabs who were alive in the year 1096
would be alarmed -- so North Korea was admitted in spite of their low SAT scores.


The Road to Riyadh?

I think Iraq is the wrong target, and would prefer to see the US go after
Saudi Arabia. Many bloggers have said that attacking Iraq is the first
step; once we have an oil source and an armed enemy out of the way, the
next step is the house of Saud. This will never happen. It is a
fantasy constructed by people who are pro-Bush and don't want to admit
to themselves that Bush has no interest in an Arabian regime change.

In the abstract, Iraq is an important step in a campaign in the Arabian
Peninsula. In a wargame, that is what the US player would do. But life
is not a wargame, and operations against Saudi Arabia will not take place
in a vaccuum. Saudi Arabia has been America's ally. Bush has given no
indication that this has changed.

Nations do not stab their allies in the back -- not by invading them
militarily anyway. The exception is when Hitler attacked Russia, and
even then he had spent twenty years foaming at the mouth about Bolshevism,
and two years in a partnership of spoils. Bush is not as ruthless as
Hitler; no democratically elected leader of a free country could possibly
be.

And even if it were somehow possible for Bush to attack Saudi Arabia, it
would be wrong. If we have a problem with the Saudis, then we need to
tell them that. And that is what Bush and his administration should have
been doing as soon as the Taliban collapsed. They needed to beat the drum
about the $200 million in Saudi money that went to Al Qaeda, about the
15 of 19 hijackers who were Saudis, about the hundreds of Saudis being
held at Guantanamo.

Instead George W wants to go to war with yesterday's news, and fellates
a Saudi prince at his ranch every month. This is not the road to Riyadh
-- or to victory over terrorism.

Posted 12:30 PM by Floyd

Stephen Green and Glenn Reynolds have been involved in a debate as to whether Sweden is poorer than Mississippi. Stephen looked up "purchasing parity power" in the CIA World Factbook and found that the average Swede ranks higher than a Mississippian, but lower than an Alabaman.

Here's a factoid I saw posted on Usenet by James Donald: Sweden's population has fewer major appliances on average than America's poor people. (I think this originally appeared in the Wall Street
Journal.)

Average Swede	Poorest fifth of Americans	owns
48%	60%	VCR
37%	60%	Microwave
31%	20%	Dishwasher
18%	50%	Dryer

Source US. Bureau of census, 1992, Euromonitor, 1991. (US figures rounded to nearest 10% because of lack of accuracy)

These figures strongly suggest that Sweden is considerably poorer than America. Washing your own dishes and hanging your laundry to dry is a waste of time. I can't think of a reason not to own a dishwasher or dryer other than not being able to afford them.

Posted 7:26 PM by Floyd

Andrew Sullivan linked to a Reuters story that appeared on Yahoo.
It's short and sweet; you need spend only twenty seconds reading it before you feel the urge to vomit:

(a photograph of the WTC ruins)

Recovery and debris removal work continues at the site of the World Trade Center known as "ground zero"
in New York, March 25, 2002. Human rights around the world have been a casualty of the U.S. "war on
terror" since September 11. REUTERS/Peter Morgan

Here is a letter I sent through
the Yahoo feedback form:

Re: http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story2&u=/020903/170/2673q.html&e=2

I realize that you do not generate or edit the news stories that appear on your site. Nonetheless you are responsible
for them to some extent, as without your cooperation they would be presented in Yahoo.

Now here is my complaint: I have an expectation that when I read an article labelled as news, that it does not contain
a snide, irrelevant, and false editorial message. I have an expectation that when I am shown the site of a mass murder,
that I shall not be preached to by some arrogant twit that making war on murderers -- and as a byproduct enabling Afghans
to enjoy kite flying, music, and personal grooming -- is somehow an attack on the world's civil liberties.

And I have an expectation that I'm not the only Yahoo customer -- excuse me, former customer -- who believes this.

A letter to Reuters comes later. After my hands stop shaking.

Update
Little Green Footballs had an article about this,
and someone pointed out in a comment that Peter Morgan was the photographer, not the caption writer, and almost
certainly had nothing to do with this. I changed the above text to read "A letter to Reuters ...". My apologies to Morgan.

Posted 5:46 PM by Floyd

I just realized that I had no email on my blog! What a barney I am. Well that has now been fixed.

Posted 4:41 PM by Floyd

It's time for some bridgeblogging!

I noticed that Matt Welch has mentioned Tim Cavanaugh on
his blog. A few months back Matt made an offhand reference
to "my bridge partner Tim Cavanaugh" and I sent him an email
which was roughly like this:

Hi Matt! It's cool that you play bridge. So do I. Do
you play a strong club? I play a cool strong club system
where like you open your second longest suit. And 1H - P
- 1S? It shows three! Do you want to, like, play some time?

I suppose it wasn't that bad, but you can imagine
my mortification when his reply said

No, I don't play bridge. I was just trying to be witty.

And then he changed his name to Mart Walsh and moved to
Phoenix. <rimshot>Which is why he complains about
the heat.</rimshot>



Back to bridge geekery. I played last week at the Santa
Clara Regional, which is the largest tournament in the
San Francisco Bay Area. It's held over seven days (ending
on Labor Day) at the Westin Hotel in a large room right
next to the Santa Clara Convention Center.

Wednesday I played a side game in the afternoon with my
friend Michael Sclafani. We had nothing special, say
a 53%. There was one cute defensive hand which I will
describe later.

In the evening I played in a one-session Swiss with my wife
Sherry, and Michael played with our friend Mike Cohen, who
was nice enough to come down from Marin. My wife and I missed
several slams. The two Michaels played well but we were at
dead average after the four matches.

Thursday evening I played with my friend Brian Kemper. I didn't
play well and we scored badly. At this point I was upset with
myself over my poor play.

Friday I played with Dan Voorhees, an expert player from Santa
Rosa. We were playing in a knockout with a couple from Sacramento,
Veronica and John McMurdie. Ronnie wants to win as many masterpoints
as possible (she has nearly 14,000) and therefore she plays as
many sessions as possible -- at regionals you can often play
three sessions a day. She must have unbelievable stamina
because after a few days of two sessions a day I am drained.

The knockouts were supposed to be four sessions, two on Friday
(1 and 7 p.m.) and then Saturday and Sunday morning at 9 a.m.
There was a Flight A and a Flight B event. Flight A drew 7
teams so they knocked it down to three sessions. We were in
a three-way with the best two teams in the event; one had
my friend Wayne Stuart and his partner Wafik Abdou from Bakersfield;
the other had some excellent players and was the multicultural
special (the players were Indian, Chinese, Polish, Iranian, and
Russian).

We played against Wayne/Wafik and had a good set. Then we went
to the other team's table where I played against Sri and Doug.
I hacked the play in 4S but otherwise we did well. Our teammates
had a good card and we were up about 10 imps in both matches.

In the second half Wayne and Wafik did well against us and bid
a game that was not bid at the other table. They gained 20 imps
to lead by 8. Unfortunately they were getting killed by Sri's
team, so all we needed to do was to hang on in our second half
and we did, winning by 8. All teams had won one match and it
was Sri's team and our team advancing on "ratio" (basically
we scored more imps than we gave away).

A peculiarity of three-ways: Wayne's team beat us by 8 and lost
by 60 or so. But they were only eight imps from advancing; if
Sri's team had beat us by a small amount, we would have two losses
and could not advance, even though the aggregate imp loss would
have been say -10 for us and -50 for Wayne's team.

In the evening we played Charlie James and his wife Andrea.
They were playing with some teammates from Hawaii. Here's
an elementary play problem from the first half:

x xx AKT98xx Jxx

I held this hand second seat, red on white. It went pass and
I opened 3 diamonds; it went all pass. LHO led the CK (A from AK)
and here was the dummy:

KT9xxx KQx QJ xx

LHO then switched to a trump. Plan the play.

Answer: Overtake and lead a spade. If you play a club another
trump will come back (even if trumps are 3-1 the remaining club
honors are split, so they can arrange to win in the hand with
trumps remaining). By leading a spade, you set up a club pitch
while there is still a trump to ruff the third club.

When I played this hand the spade ace was offside, but I had the
satisfaction of making the correct play.

We won by 18 and I left to get some rest. Saturday was going to
be a big day; I had to return at 9 for the final, and Dan and
I were to play pairs at 1 and 7:30. One good thing about knockouts
is that they are fast; I was able to leave around 10:30.

Saturday morning we faced Frank Bessing and Jennifer Jones from
Santa Rosa, and a couple from LA. They had beaten Sri's team in
the other semifinal. Dan and I were solid but our teammates had
a tough match, and we were 17 imps down. In the second half
we had another solid set, except that I pushed to four spades
when I could have settled for a partial and went down.

When we came back to compare I could hear the opposing player in
my seat say "I gave back our whole lead on one board". I knew
the hand he was talking about; they had bid to 6N at our table
and I had a potential trick in each suit. I worked out to pitch
the red queens and keep the long spade from JT9x, but that was
for just the overtrick. Our teammates had bid 7N, and my
counterpart had not worked it out. That was win 11, but the rest
of the card was not enough. We lost by 5. (Had I settled for
a partial on the hand I mentioned, we would have tied.)

I got some pizza from the snack bar. (You can tell pizza is going
to be bad if it's an oblong shape.) Then Dan and I started
a two-session pairs. We did well in the first session with a 61%,
but we each made a couple mistakes and could have had a crusher.
In the evening session I think the fatigue started to show, and we
had several bad boards for an average game. Still it was an exciting
run and some good experience for me.



Here is the most interesting play problem, from Saturday's first
pairs session:

4th chair at favorable, I held K9732 KT6 A74 Q7. The auction was
simple: 1D from partner, 1S by me, 2S, 4S. Here was the dummy:

AQJ A742 K865 64

LHO led the club 5 and RHO won the king and ace of clubs. Then
she played a third club (LHO appears to have started with five
clubs).

Let's say they had grabbed their two clubs and led a trump. I
would have pulled trump and led a heart from dummy, trying to
find RHO with QJ or any three. I use the 13th heart to shake
my diamond loser.

But when they give me a ruff-sluff I want to shed from my weaker
suit and try to find that suit 3-3. So I pitched a diamond from
hand and ruffed on the table. I cashed two more trumps and found
that RHO had started with Txxx of trumps, so she promoted a trump
trick for herself.

I played a diamond to the king, pulled a third round of trumps,
and played ace and a diamond. They broke so I had a heart shake.
(This is called the "rocket in a rocket".) Hearts were not 3-3 (RHO had Qx)
so I would have gone down left to my own devices.

The careful player will note that I can try to make five! The club
carding and the first two rounds of trumps tell me RHO is 4xx4.
If she has three diamonds she must be 4234. If the two hearts are
QJ I can make five as follows:

Club AK and ruff-sluff
AQ of trumps (RHO now has Tx)
Diamond K, A, ruff
Heart king and ace

Dummy has - xx x -, with the diamond high
RHO has Tx - - x
I have K9 T - -, with the heart high (as the QJ fell)

Now I lead the diamond. If RHO ruffs I overruff, pull
her last trump, and the HT is good. If she pitches I
pitch my good heart, and the lead is in dummy for a trump coup.



The most interesting defensive hand was on Wednesday afternoon
while playing with Michael.

I had Q875 QJ9xxx x AJ. Second chair, red on white, it went
pass to me and I passed. LHO opened 1D, partner passed, RHO
bid 1S, and I bid 2H.

LHO bid 2S and all passed. I led the queen of hearts and
found this dummy:

AJT4 AKxx JTx xx

Declarer covered and partner ruffed with the nine of spades!
Then he cashed three diamonds. On the third diamond declarer
pitched his heart loser and I shed two hearts.

Partner switched to a low club. Declarer played the ten
and I won the jack. At this point the hand is an open book.
Declarer started with K632 Txx xx QTxx.
Declarer is currently looking at K632 T - Qxx.
Dummy has AJT4 Axx - x.
I am holding Q875 QJ9 - A.

I considered cashing my club ace and leading a heart. Then
declarer can ruff a heart, finesse in trumps, ruff a heart,
and cash the king of spades leaving dummy with AJ of trumps
over me. Down one.

Instead I led the eight of spades. It went jack, outshow,
small. Declarer cashed the heart ace, ruffed a heart and
led a club. I exited with the seven of spades. Now the
position is

Dummy: AT4 x - -
Me: Q(7)5 J - -
Declarer: K6 - - xx

Declarer had no way to take four tricks and went down two.
In some variations I would take the last trick with the 5
while dummy still had the 4!

By the way, I have no idea why partner did not bid 3D
with 9 - AKQxxxx Kxxxx. If he takes a club hook we can
be +110, but then I would not have had the chance for
such an interesting defense!