It's Official

The New York Times has obtained a draft copy of a portion of the official history of the Iraq War. As it is 508 pages long, you may prefer to read their highlights here.

I will admit, I have only skimmed the original document thus far, although those immobilized by back injuries may enjoy a more thorough exploration :). Compiled from over 500 interviews and 600 other documents and reports, the history is a sweeping indictment of government planning from the moment the invasion ended and the reconstruction began. It further concludes that the White House was essentially fabricating numbers such as the size of the Iraqi force which had been trained. If you want to read more about the train wreck everyone outside the official mind has largely been aware of for the last few years, you have the links above.

This document should also serve as another nail in the coffin for the Bush legacy. As much as historians enjoy slaughtering sacred cows in the name of revisionism, it speaks volumes (pardon the pun)that Bush-appointed writers can find nothing but fiasco. As I've suggested previously, it's quite possible that President Bush's only hope for historical spin rides on the shoulders of his successor.

Big Science

The CERN Large Hadron Collider went live this morning outside Geneva, Switzerland. If you follow science, this is pretty exciting news. This particle accelerator hopefully has the ability to prove – or disprove – some of the many theories surrounding the world of physics right now. In particular, they’re hoping to discover a particle called a Higgs boson, a particle that’s predicted by a lot of theories but so far has remained undetected. Theoretically, the Higgs boson is the particle that makes up and gives other particles mass. It would be a big discovery.

The sad part of all this is that the United States was set to build an even larger, more powerful particle accelerator in Texas called the Superconducting Supercollider. Congress killed it because of its budget in 1993. It would have been a truly impressive machine. With the Iraq War costing $12 billion dollars a month, it’s hard not to be a bit wistful about the uses that money could be going towards. I’ve always been a huge fan of “big science” projects like particle accelerators and space probes. I can understand people who think there are better uses for that money, and they may be right: education, transit infrastructure, poverty, medical research. All that stuff is important.

But it’s just not as cool as slamming particles together at seven trillion electron volts.

Extinct Blog of the Day

Today's departed blog belonged to soldier Andrew Olmsted, whose blog ended when he was killed in Iraq on January 3rd of this year. His last post (pre-written, to be posted in the event of his death) was published by hilzoy over at ObsidianWings. I read his blog before his death and remember crying when I read his last post more than 8 months ago. I didn't know then that I'd ever have a blog, much less a feature whose confines allowed me to rediscover his writing. I learned more from reading his blog than from every embedded reporter I ever saw on NBC combined. Money quote(s):

What I don't want this to be is a chance for me, or anyone else, to be maudlin. I'm dead. That sucks, at least for me and my family and friends. But all the tears in the world aren't going to bring me back, so I would prefer that people remember the good things about me rather than mourning my loss. (If it turns out a specific number of tears will, in fact, bring me back to life, then by all means, break out the onions.) I had a pretty good life, as I noted above. Sure, all things being equal I would have preferred to have more time, but I have no business complaining with all the good fortune I've enjoyed in my life. So if you're up for that, put on a little 80s music (preferably vintage 1980-1984), grab a Coke and have a drink with me. If you have it, throw 'Freedom Isn't Free' from the Team America soundtrack in; if you can't laugh at that song, I think you need to lighten up a little. I'm dead, but if you're reading this, you're not, so take a moment to enjoy that happy fact...

I do ask (not that I'm in a position to enforce this) that no one try to use my death to further their political purposes. I went to Iraq and did what I did for my reasons, not yours. My life isn't a chit to be used to bludgeon people to silence on either side.

Fair enough. As he wished, I won't espouse my personal views about the Iraq War in this space, under his last words asking me to refrain from doing just that. But, I hope that he will excuse me if I do take this opportunity to remind people that through the Olympics, through McCain's attack ads, through Obama's vacation choice, through Paris Hilton's jail time and John Edwards' paternity issues, the Iraq War continues. Andrew's fate, while particularly public, was not particularly special, having been shared by 4,137 other American soldiers as of today. I think we owe it to them, not necessarily to call for troop withdrawal, or further commitment and involvement -- but to at least care. To think about the way forward. To realize that, in a democracy, our government's involvement is your involvement, and my involvement, and to think about what our roles are (however small) within that framework. To refuse to be bystanders.