A bit out of the loop

I took a few days off from reading the news for Thanksgiving. When I came back, Pakistan and India are at each other's throats, Bangkok's airport is under siege and Venice is under water.

Hmmm...

I had a little catching up to do. The first thing I looked into was the Mumbai terrorist incidents. Such a sad event looks like it was caused by extremists that have no real connection to the Pakistani government. However, given the complexity of Pakistan's history, some of the terrorists were trained by the Pakistani military or intelligence services. India's government has handled this relatively well, applying pressure on Pakistan to crack down on terrorism within its borders, the US has been pushing them in this direction for a while. Although, if India followed the US-route of attacking within Pakistan's borders sans permission, I doubt it would have the same result. Also, several of India's high-ranking security officials have stepped down in disgrace. Groups in western Pakistan aim for a cease-fire in order to free up Paki troops to secure the border with India. Both sides say they aren't gearing up for a war though. It should be interesting to see how this develops. In the meantime, reasonable people are pointing out that the targets of the attack weren't Indians so much as Westerners.

Thailand, Thailand, Thailand... what are we going to do with you, Thailand? From what I understand, these people who want a change of the democratically elected government took over the airport in Bangkok, armed to the teeth and are now in a stand-off with police? I wonder if the Republicans could rally and take LAX...

What?

Venice is experiencing some pretty crazy floods. The kind that God would have given Noah the heads-up on. Still, it looks about as bad as what we experienced in eastern Iowa this year.
Then, the DJIA drops nearly 680 points amid news that we have been in a recession since last December. OPEC is planning to cut production and try to level out oil prices at between $70-90 a barrel. Where was the idea of a "reasonable price" a year ago? President Bush is criticized for not doing enough about the AIDS epidemic in America as opposed to overseas (even when he does something good, it's not good in the right way.)

And to top it all off? My girlfriend's car door was frozen shut this morning, so she took my Volvo and I drove to work in her Sunfire... That's cool, didn't need my penis anyway...

I miss Thanksgiving. I slept in. I ate a lot. I didn't have to go to work. I was pampered. I come back to Des Moines for snow, cold, bad headlines and the job of lifetime...