Cornucopia

Today's topic is "cornucopia," the Horn of Plenty. "Pete", I can hear you say (well, not really; it's just a figure of speech), "why such a dumb topic?"

Well, my theoretical (Ok, nonexistent) readers, because I have a lot to write about for a change. Some of it might actually be relevant, perhaps even interesting! I don't want to go too far out on a limb, though, so I'll stick with "one step up from coma-inducing."

Meeting Michelle Malkin

This evening I had the pleasure of briefly meeting Michelle Malkin at her book signing at the Borders Bookstore in my home town of Puyallup, Washington. I bought a copy of her book In Defense of Internment, which she was kind enough to sign for me.

Her autograph says "To Pete, God Bless America! Best, M. Malkin"

Here's a picture of the cover page (the photo doesn't look very good - I just took it freehand with my digital camera).

Ms. Malkin's book has generated a lot of controversy, since it defends an action, the internment of Japanese-Americans, by the U.S. government during World War II that has since been thoroughly denounced as one of the most egregious examples of outright racism in U.S. history.

My own second-hand knowledge of the events of that time have not lead me to view the internment positively. During my undergraduate and graduate school years, one of my professors, a man to whom I give the utmost respect, was a 3rd generation Japanese-American. This man held a doctorate in psychology, was an ordained minister, and was an amazing athlete, playing competitive sports well into his late 60's and 70's. During World War II, he and his family were interned, I believe in Idaho. His family lost essentially everything, including a prosperous business. The story was very tragic; although, my professor and his family did recover after the war, and in a testament to his courage and strength of character, he actually was able to turn the bad experience into a very good one.

So, my preconceived notions of the internment are that it was not good for our country. On the other hand, I don't think that racial profiling - or better yet, threat profiling - is a priori immoral or wrong. It seems clear to me that focusing security and intelligence efforts on more likely threats just makes sense. In a time of national emergency, like our current war against Islamic terrorism, directing our limited intelligence and national security resources against the most likely targets, rather than wasting effort on low-probability threats, is good planning, in my opinion.

As an senior engineer, what I do for a living is design large software systems and then manage the effort to build those systems. Part of managing projects is managing risk. I try to foresee those events that might derail the project, causing it to fail in some regard. Those events are risks to the project. Once I have a list of possible risks, I prioritize those risks by both likelihood of occurrence and impact to the project. As part of managing the project, I do my best to actively prevent the highest priority risks by taking preemptive action. On the other hand, I don't waste my time on low-priority (low probability, low impact) risks. Why? Because the high priority risks are the ones that are (by definition) the ones that are most likely to occur and the most dangerous. The low priority risks won't kill the project; the high priority ones very well may.

If one looks at national security from an engineering point of view, a good argument can be made that the U.S. government should use threat profiling for the exact same reasons. If threat profiling is used to identify the most likely and most dangerous risks, so that those threats can be dealt with before they are manifested, then it can be a useful tool.

All of this, of course, must be tempered by regard for individual rights. People are not engineering projects, and disregarding guaranteed Constitutional rights cannot be justified in any but the absolutely most dire circumstances. I don't think we've reached that point yet, but if we don't take our national security seriously, we very easily could. I don't think anyone wants to see that day come, so we ought to be focusing our efforts now, before it's too late.

I told Ms. Malkin that I am a fan of her blog - I am! - and that I had my own blog. She graciously asked about it and said she would check it out. It would be great if she did, but I'm certain that she's a really busy person, so I'm not expecting that she will. It was just fun to meet someone as well-known as her. She seems as intelligent and personable as you might think, based on her writing. I'm looking forward to reading her book, looking at the facts, and drawing my own conclusions.

Further Forgery Follies

The forgery firestorm continues today. Yesterday, I wrote a post pointing out some of the obvious problems with the alleged newly-discovered documents "uncovered" by CBS 60 Minutes II that claimed to show that President Bush had disobeyed a direct order to obtain a flight physical during his time in the Texas Air National Guard and had received preferential treatment from some of his superior officers. Others bloggers, Powerline, Little Green Footballs, INDC Journal, One Hand Clapping and their commenters did much of the original research pointing out the, frankly, rather obvious flaws in these documents that show that they are almost certainly forgeries.

The bloggers on the left (Kevin Drum, Daily Kos, etc.) continue to defend the legitimacy of the documents, as did Dan Rather tonight on CBS News. None of their arguments are the least bit convincing. The IBM Selectric Composer or Executive typewriter models (which is what they're hanging their hats on now) cannot create particular features of the documents in question. The "expert" CBS trotted out that supposedly vetted the documents is not knowledgeable on typesetting, word processing technology, Air Force document standards or other relevant subjects. No, he is a hired gun, an "expert witness" that is paid to testify in court on forgery and authenticity of handwriting. The forgery charges being levied against these documents rely on many, many other problems besides the signature on the documents. CBS appears to be digging deeper into the hole they've already dug. Dan Rather can't last much longer if CBS wants to maintain even a shred of credibility. I'm not sure they actually have any left.

In Memoriam

Tomorrow (today by now - it's getting late!) is the 3rd anniversary of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. My heart is kind of heavy as I think back on that horrible day.

Here on the west coast we first heard about the attacks early in the morning. I was lying in bed when my wife's alarm clock turned the radio on, and we heard a news report about a plane hitting one of the World Trade Center towers. My first reaction was that it must have been a small plane - a private pilot had somehow been incapacitated or something. A little while later, we heard that it was a commercial passenger jet, a 757 or 767 perhaps. That woke me up quickly, and I ran downstairs to our family room and turned on the television.

Just a few minutes later, I watched the second plane hit the other tower. I was in shock. It was unbelievable.

When the towers collapsed, I told my wife that as many as 20,000 or more might have been killed. I'd been to the WTC just the previous summer, and I knew how big those buildings were and about how many people worked in them. When it turned out that many people had escaped, I was somewhat relieved that my original prediction was much too high, but still, almost 3000 killed! Nothing, not even Pearl Harbor, had hurt America so badly.

So, I remember and pray for those that lost their lives that day. I pray for peace and comfort for their families.

Father in Heaven, give Your peace that passes all understanding to those that lost loved ones in the horrific attacks of three years ago. Remind them of Your love for them. Lift them up and aid them as they face their lives without the support, companionship and love of the ones that were lost to them. Place in their hearts a firm knowledge of who You are, Your goodness, strength and kindness, so that they understand and attain eternity with You, so that one day, they will see their loved ones again face to face.

Amen.

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