Which Party do you want in charge at the end of a war?

It’s likely that this coming administration will see the end of US involvement in both Iraq and Afghanistan. The Republicans would like you to believe that they, and not the Democrats are the party with the know-how to fight and win a war. And why not? They’re the ones always hanging around with weapons contractors and military people. But does the evidence actually support that assertion?

Fortunately, we have some 200 years of data showing the outcome of our major wars and military interventions. Lets take a look at the data and see who was in power when we won and who was in power when we lost:

Revolutionary War – Not applicable, predates the formation of our political parties.
War of 1812 – Democrats (Madison) – Territorial integrity maintained against the then superpower – Win
Mexican War – Democrats (Polk) – Got the whole southwest. Big Win.
Civil War – Republican (Lincoln) – Saved the Union. Big, big win.
Spanish American War – Republican (McKinley) – A nice little war. Win
WWI – Democrats (Wilson) – Win
WWII – Democrats (FDR) – Beat Hitler. Saved the world. Mega-win.
Korea – Democrats (Truman) – A tie? There’s no ties in baseball!
Vietnam – Republicans (Nixon) – Loss, despite what Sarah Palin may think. Our ‘national nightmare’.
Persian Gulf I – Republicans (GHW Bush) – Win. Everyone comes home. Another nice little war.
Afghanistan – Republicans (GW Bush) – In progress. No Osama.
PGII – Republicans (GW Bush) – In progress. No end in sight.

So nine major conflicts completed, with two in progress. The tally is:

Democrats 4-0-1
Republicans 3-1-0

If you’d like to argue that Korea and Vietnam don’t belong in their respective columns, save your typing. Korea is a non-issue as it was a tie, so it really doesn’t affect the outcome much. It could go into either column.
For Vietnam – Nixon promised both a secret way to end the war and victory with honor. He delivered on neither. The loss goes to the Republicans, who had six years in the driver’s seat.

Unless there’s a massive change in “hearts and minds”, both Afghanistan and Iraq will go down as Vietnam-type losses. And unless Obama decides to try and win it, rather than just get out of it, it’ll go down as Republican losses. PGII has been around for 5 years, Afghanistan for close to seven. That will drag down the Republican record to

Republicans 3-3-0

A .500 record? Unless you’re playing hockey or basketball, that’s not going to get you into the postseason. Also, it’s a 1-3 record for the last four wars. That’s terrible.

Point is – the Republicans are more likely to get you into a war. They are MUCH more likely to get you to LOSE that war.

Bolide (that is, a big rock) crashes into the Sudan.

Over the Sudan. It was about ten feet wide and possibly disintigrated in the atmosphere. Here’s the story:

http://www.planetary.org/blog/article/00001684/

The yield from that explosion was about 1-2 kilotons, as per the article. The Hiroshima bomb was ~15 kilotons by comparison. So, still a big boom.
And here is something that I think is excellently illustrated:

With the bolide we had time and place a day before the impact and thus far photographs have been few and far between – just one or two from telescopes before it hit the atmosphere. Statistically speaking, knowing the particulars beforehand, you would expect that someone would have had a decent camera pointed upward – even in the Sudan.

And yet we have all this UFO video / still images / anecdotal evidence. Which either means that (a) UFOs are so frequent, we have the worst space lane traffic this side of Coruscant or (b) its 99.99999999999999% garbage.

I don’t think we’re Coruscant. I’d have noticed the lightsabres by now.

Just an observation.

Which is Worse….?

I’m lying awake last night in bed, doing my regular insomnia routine. I should mention that these days I waver between agnostocism and theism. And lying in bed, sometimes the mind wanders to horrible things that normally get pushed so far aside I almost never think of them. So the question:

Which is worse – that there is no God or that we aren’t really conscious, thinking beings?

I should elaborate – in the former option we are full sentient beings, imbued with consciousness above and beyond animals. But when we die – thats it. We cease to exist. Even worse, in ceasing to exist, our recollection of what we are, that essence which makes us what we are is utterly destroyed, so from our perspective, we never existed. We are wiped clean.

And then there’s the other option. That we are simply chemicals and electricity, dominated by instinct, deluded by what appears to be consciousness, but is in fact just a chemical response. We are, in essence, very smart and socially sophisticated animals – no better or worse than dogs. When we die, we are nothing, but in this case, we aren’t losing anything because there was nothing there to begin with. Even this post about whether we are conscious creatures is part of the delusion.

Which is worse? Its a matter of semantics, in part. Compared to what the average religion offers – eternal life and/or reincarnation (depending on your faith), both of these are horrible alternatives. A faith-based answer would argue that this is the point of faith – to show that there’s more beyond just the physical realm and to explain what appears inexplicable – our apparant consciousness. But knowledge breaks down these obvious differences. We find chimps have the range of emotions we do, and other primates to have the same set of social complexity as tribal humans. Do they then have a soul? Or is the converse true – are we all bereft?

There is no data, and without data there’s no theorey. And that can make for some very scary late night thoughts. Does this mean I’m going to to running to church? Hardly. In this aspect, the religious right and I share a common thread, resistance to change for change’s sake. The singular difference is that I would be willing to change if the evidence were there to support such a change. Because the religious rely solely on immutable and dated texts and preachings, it is impossible for them to change and remain faithful to their doctrine. This, in my opinion is a failing of their philosphy.