We made the pilgrimage to the Apple Store tonight. Not quite ready to pull the trigger yet. The Macintosh mini is a thing of beauty. Slightly larger than it seems to be in the pictures, but so beautifully small all the same. Talking to the sales people at the store, they have been told that Airport and Bluetooth cards will be options that they can add at the store. No timing has been announced as to when this will happen, but it does make the option of buying one now, sans wireless networking, a more palatable option. Undoubtedly it will be more expensive down the line, but you're not in the same situation as the backlit keyboards on Powerbooks where it is a build-to-order or not-at-all situation.

It is absolutely incredible how much stress a human being can take and still continue to function. I think that must have been the main point of the week long class I just completed on Survival Evasion Resistance and Escape (SERE). The other point was to teach us, and have us apply, some very important practical survival skills.

The instructors for SERE are referred to as “Cadre.� The Friday before school started the Cadre suggested everyone eat a very big breakfast before reporting at 0600 on Saturday. I had a large bowl of oatmeal and a peanut-butter and jelly sandwich. I would have eaten more had I truly known what was in store.

The first four days were spent in an outdoor classroom environment. This consisted of a covered concrete pad with metal bleachers surrounded by Alabama forest. We had classes and demonstrations in this area. We were divided into eight teams of five or six soldiers and slept with our teammates in improvised shelters that we constructed nearby. These were our “hole sites.�

The classes consisted of subjects such as shelter construction, fire building, edible plant procurement, signaling, tool and weapon making, wire-crossing, trapping game, and how to kill, clean, eat and preserve game. When we were not in classes we were applying the skills we had learned at our hole sites.

While the cadre were teaching classes they were also trying to simulate a Prisoner of War environment. They wanted to see how well our class bonded and how well we resisted efforts at exploitation. For example, they made the teams race against each other with an offer of extra food for the winning team. We recognized this as an attempt to cause fractures within the group and resisted by ensuring that every race ended as a tie. No one got any extra food but we retained group cohesion – something critical for survival at a POW camp. Read more about I Survived

A matter of timing makes yesterday's story about objectvity or the end of it very interesting. Today's inauguration coverage is rife with selected quotes from the President's upcoming speech. In years of old there would be a speech and ceremony and then coverage of it later. As time passed those being covered in the media discovered that by giving advance copies of speeches to the media they could make sure the message was out correctly. Now, even before the speech is delivered, and without knowing for certain it will ever be delivered, the morning news is filled with quotes. It is a great deal for the White House which gets an additional news cycle out of the deal, and a losing proposition for the people who get another day of inconsequential news coverage.

A grassroots (apparently) movement is afoot to make January 20, 2004 "Not One Damn Dime Day". The website got rolling when Jesse Gordon, a self-described 44-year old progressive activist, received an email with the basic suggestion. The protest suggests not spending any money on January 20th, Inauguration Day, in order to bring more attention to the view that the war in Iraq is "illegal and immoral."

Grodon says success would be getting President George W. Bush to acknowledge the protesters point of view.

Will it bring our troops home any sooner?

What will the protest really accomplish? I'm game for anything that will advance the question. The problem lies in defining a solution. A rapid withdrawal will likely leave the several factions of the Iraqis engaged in conflict with one another and strengthen the terrorist training camps and havens that exist today. Iraq is a quagmire and one we shouldn't be fighting. Owing in part to our misplaced aggression the people behind the September 11th attacks remain free.

I would like very much to bring our troops home. Too many, both Iraqi and Americans have died in bringing about the end of a tyrant's regime. The United States is engaged in trying to force a form of government on another country. It is a form that has served us well but not one that can be easily forced on another country. A key difference with the Declaration of Independence, is that in that historic document it was the people of a country establishing their own country and later government. Notably, even that dedicated group of people took more than a decade to form the foundation of the government we have today. Read more about A grassroots boycot