You're kidding, right? - by Jon

Read the story here. Executive summary: The U.S. military was caught using the same quotation in two different incidents that occurred 11 days apart, from two respective unnamed Iraqi sources. According to CNN,

[The 24th of July's] news release said: "'The terrorists are attacking the infrastructure, the ISF and all of Iraq. They are enemies of humanity without religion or any sort of ethics. They have attacked my community today and I will now take the fight to the terrorists,' said one Iraqi man who preferred not to be identified."

The July 13 news release said: "'The terrorists are attacking the infrastructure, the children and all of Iraq,' said one Iraqi man who preferred not to be identified. 'They are enemies of humanity without religion or any sort of ethics. They have attacked my community today and I will now take the fight to the terrorists.'"

When it comes to the American penchant for optimism, I'm slowly moving past "aw, isn't that cute?" country and into "holy living fuck, just give it up"-ville. For the benefit of anybody reading this who lacks a 4th grade education, let me provide the Reader's Digest version of events: They're making shit up. Any quote you read in a newspaper from an 'unnamed Iraqi source" is from Bob. Bob's a Corporal in the Nebraska Army Reserve who's trapped in a basement somewhere near Basra. If Bob wants food or water, he has to churn out press releases to rally the troops and keep the wimmens at home's spirits high. Just last week, they gave Bob his first pencil: Before that, he had to scrape his stories into his arm using a sharp stick, and walk 10 miles to his command post to use the photocopier. Only 5 more years of this, and Bob gets to go to college.

And everybody in America is split into two groups: The people who know this and pretend not to know to save their asses, and the people who know this and pretend not to know to save the first group's asses. How long before somebody just comes out and says it: "Hey, President Bush? We know things are pretty shitty in Iraq. Can we just leave the country in turmoil, while Bob still has all of his original organs where they're supposed to be? Please?"

Okay, so far, I've laid blame on the Bush Administration for creating the bullshit, and the American people for not setting the White House on fire again because of it. Who's left?

Oh, yeah, the news media. Hey, CNN, I've got an idea for you. Why don't you try some investigative reporting? Right now, you're printing stories about how you managed to read some Army bulletins and found a discrepancy. That's fantastic; I'm really happy your reporters can publish quotes from other peoples' work. But do you think you could maybe, I don't know, FIND OUT WHO'S RESPONSIBLE FOR THIS? It's kinda your raison d'etre. It's like I'm reading the bulliten board at Ms. Jenkins' kindergarten class. "Hey, look, deceit and corruption at the highest levels of government, resulting in the deaths of tens of thousands of people! Hey, look, a bake sale on Tuesday! Neat!"

Is anybody else worked up about this, or is it just me?

Jonathan Thompson, Campus Celebrity? - by Jon

So, I got the following email from one of the editors of the Queen's Journal:

"Salut Jon,
We would indeed appreciate some of your input for the upcoming issue. We're asking campus celebrities such as yourself to answer a few questions and including the surveys in the frosh supplement.

Questions are:
Program/Year?
Where did you live first year?
Best part of first year?
Worst part of first year?
Advice for incoming frosh, in a sentence?
Any regrets that new frosh should avoid?

Sorry for the short notice, but you know how it is in this crazy world of publishing. I'm off to bark orders at reporters,

Ed in Chief
Queen's Journal"

Here's my response:

"Dear editor,

Campus celebrity? That's awesome! I've always said I wanted to be known at Queen's as something other than "unidentified black male suspect". Survey results to follow,

Program/Year? MA History I (Formerly Arts '05)

Where did you live first year? - Not in residence! All the cool kids are FYNIRS (First Year Not in Residence Students).

Best part of first year? - My HIST 121 class, where my instructor would utter such gems as "Well, that's like comparing 'getting high' and 'Thursday afternoon.'"

Worst part of first year? - I was studying for my December PSYC 100 exam, and because I didn't have time to make dinner I ended up eating cold ravioli out of a can, and drinking Sprite. And I remember thinking to myself, "Well, this is it. This is what your life has become. Way to go."

Advice for incoming frosh, in a sentence? - If you take PHED 103 - Introduction to Attack Dog Training, don't wear steak sauce as deodorant.

Any regrets that new frosh should avoid? - It took me until third year to realize that there's a big difference between "good" marks and "good, considering how little effort I put in" marks. Get in the habit of kicking academic butt early, and you'll be laughing when your friends are getting their med and law school rejections. Except, then they won't be your friends anymore, because you're being such a huge jerkhole."

No wonder people find me inspiring.

Also, where the hell is Ian? I haven't heard from that guy in a while.

El Lofto Magnifico, or How Ian Got His Groove Back - by Jon

Anything Ian says about our golfing trip today is a lie. I'm just posting first so the truth hits the streets before the bitter, angry, booze-filled lies.

I was unfortunately unable to get my shit together on the course today, so I shot an embarassing 95. That's right, a full 16 strokes more than my performance last week. For those of you who don't golf, having a terrible game is not unlike a bout with sexual impotence: You spend a lot of time bemoaning your equipment, then you find yourself uttering more often than you'd like, "well, shit, it worked last week..."

Ian, on the other hand, was playing reasonably well. He beat me by a fair bit, even though I was too disgusted with my dysfunction to pay attention to his score, as well. My official story to explain my poor play on the links is that since Ian is leaving Durham Region soon for the forseeable future, I didn't want his last memory of golfing with me to be one of a senseless beating.

Oh, and Scotty died. I poured a bit of scotch out on my lawn, but the hurt just wouldn't go away. RIP, buddy.

This is Zero-Echo-Niner, over and out.

Humans are unbelievable... - by Jon

Headline: Coach allegedly paid player to hit boy.

When I first scanned this headline, I made a guess as to what the news story might be about. I figured some overzealous hockey-dad type must have given one of his players a little extra incentive to injure an opposing player, and take him out of the game. Pretty low, but possible, right? I mean, couldn't you just see some asshole coach yelling at his team's enforcer, "Put a check on number nine! I want him out of the game, now!"

So I clicked on the link. Turns out we're not talking about hockey, that bastion of sports violence, but T-ball, that bastion of adorably uncoordinated pre-schoolers. According to an accusation, some hyper-competitive coach didn't want to give playing time to an 8-year old boy on his team who was mentally disabled, so he paid one of the boy's teammates $25 to hit the boy with a baseball in the head. League rules apparently dictated that each player was to play for at least three innings, and Coach didn't want to lose.

Sometimes I despair the species. I think that it's very important for children to participate in sports; they're a great way to learn discipline, teamwork, leadership, not to mention that kids need to have fun. But at what point does it make sense to rig a T-Ball roster by assaulting a child? A mentally disabled child, at that? I mean, this is a sport where the ball is propped up on a freaking pole for children too young to master hitting a moving spheroid, so that they can enjoy a sport. This coach, if guilty, really needs to be kept away from children.

Man, I wish I could file this under "so sad, it's funny."

By Way of Introduction - by Jon

I figured I should post something before Ian points out that my laziness was why the old Irish Bull bellied-up.

I am a terrible blogger. Seriously, check out my old blog here if you don't believe me. There's something just... I don't know, delicious about seeing a 7 month old headline post about how someone is going to blog more often. I just can't keep up with it, for several reasons:

1) Most of my creative energies go towards Golden Words, a weekly humour newspaper published at Queen's University at which I seem to have accidentally climbed the ladder to "editor". When people ask me if I blog, I usually say something along the lines of "I blog each week to 9,000 people, biznatch!". Then they point out that "biznatch" isn't a word, and newspapers are by definition not blogs. I usually respond with unwarranted insult to their family lineage.

2) I work for a government agency that sucks up quite a bit of my time. I can't really talk about it, but I will give you a few solid hints: I protect our country from tourists and visiting American businessmen, and I have a nifty uniform and stamp. Oh, and an ulcer the size of a basketball. Give up? If you answered "Health Canada", don't hold your breath waiting for the Prize Patrol to come to your door: You will probably die.

3) Aren't all blogs pretty self-indulgent? I mean, doesn't this all start from the assumption that I have something unique and insightful to say, or that my life is so goddamned interesting that it deserves publishing on the interweb? Am I so vain?

The answers to this and much more as The Irish Bull develops. In the meantime, this is Zero-Echo-Niner, over and out.