1. That the Baskin Robbins commercials are effective (I’m not debating whether or not they’re annoying)
2. That if you’re going to go out at night for ice cream and cake, you should make sure that you don’t have a headlight out
3. That if you do have a headlight out, and you get pulled over, you should make sure you that your registration doesn’t say September 2009, and that your insurance card isn’t from 2007
4. That Fresno PD can be very understanding
5. That ice cream and a slice of cake are much more economical than ice cream cake

There you have it. Knowledge is power, and power tastes like ice cream and cake (and cake).

But, I did buy this sweet potato at the grocery store several weeks back. I forgot that it was in the basket stand; by the time I found it, sprouts had already started. So, I decided to watch it grow (this is after a week or so).

The best part: it requires no water. Or digging. Or sunlight, evidently.

“Twitter is an important part of the City’s public outreach effort, so I’m excited to see so many citizens linking up with us in this way…I hope that more people will take advantage of technology like this to stay connected to City Hall.”

I was skeptical that the account would provide genuine connection—that it would be used as anything more than a public broadcast. I decided to test the waters with a series of questions about the growing number of chain drug stores popping up around town. Though they didn’t fully answer my questions, I was pleasantly surprised to receive responses.

I’ve had several interactions since—in fact, I seem to be one of only a handful of residents dialoging with the account, even with a list of almost 750 followers. Each interaction is more informative, and response more timely.

Case in point: After posting about dying trees in the neighborhood, I tweeted the link with a question about who to contact. I received a prompt reply; I also received a warning that funds are tight (my response). I called the next day, and on Friday received confirmation that the trees had been evaluated, and that corrective steps have been taken.

Win!

To Randy Reed, I offer kudos for embracing evolving tools for communication.

If you’re on Twitter, follow the City of Fresno.

When the towers went up in flames, I was at a Youth With a Mission base in Colorado, preparing an extended trip out of the country; needless to say, security at the airports was tight. I spent the next two months immersed in another culture, separated from the emotional turmoil felt back home.

I hope we never forget those who fell victim to such a horrible act of violence.

I also hope, however, that we learn to stop polarizing our communities, cultures, countries and everyday conversations. In war, or politics, or religion, or economics (or …) we seem bent on painting others as enemies—whether they’re 3,000 miles away, or right across the street.

That’s how I’d like to honor the victims of 9/11: by opening myself up to others’ perspectives, and acknowledging that even when we disagree, we can still be civil and respectful.

I have a long way to go. It won’t be easy. Anyone with me?

Either way, we’ll consider this a sign fail.

Con: I woke up with a food hangover. Yes, there is such a thing.
Pro: It was because Kim and I had an unbelievable meal last night, spanning almost four hours (more on that later).

Con: Because of the food hangover, I slept in.
Pro: I found coffee. Granted, it was at Starbucks, where they seem to brew it fairly regularly, but I’m not worried about such details.

Con: In trying to open the door to my office, I broke the key. In the lock. Our locks are stupid like that.
More con: The maintenance worker made it worse by jamming a screwdriver in the lock.
Pro: The jeweler across the hall has experience…um, breaking in to things?…and was able to open the door with a coat hanger. With a coat hanger.

Con: Because of the position of the key, I still have to foot a bill from the locksmith.
Pro: I work for myself, and have ruled that under such circumstances, a mid-morning beer is acceptable. (I’m not saying I’ve opened one, but it’s an option.)

Con: It’s now 10:29 a.m. I still have several hours before the Grizzlies game tweetup.
Pro: I have approximately two hours less until the pre-game festivities at Milano. That is, if Kendall will let me in after calling the restaurant out on TasteFresno and MindHub.

Today’s Father’s Day lunch looked to be no different; Kim’s brother started the discussion before lunch was served, by questioning their mother’s visits to the tanning booth (evidently, all the kids have been warned about the threat of skin cancer and forbidden to tan). That conversation died quickly, so it looked like we were in for a normal meal.

We talked about movies.

We talked about vacation.

We talked about work.

And that’s where we took a wrong turn. In discussing work, we learned that Kim’s brother is facing a potential furlough at work, after a series of layoffs. That led to a discussion about furloughs, and I tried to lighten the mood by saying that my company was considering furloughs (see, I own the company, and before last week I was the only employee…).

To that, Kim responded: “Screw your company.” She’s a bit jealous that we offer such perks as Call of Duty timeouts and afternoon margaritas.

Her mom, unusually quick on her toes, explained, “Kim, I think you already do.”

Evidently, I blushed.

I’ve copied one such email below, followed up by the response she received from Drew Brown, a correspondent for Stars and Stripes. It’s long, so in case you don’t feel like reading through everything, here’s my point: everything is filtered. Every news story we read (especially silly blogs) or watch on TV is limited to the perspective of a person—at best, it provides input from multiple people, but it still doesn’t tell the whole story.

Email forward:

The London Times reports…

What do you bet that when our troops all get sent home that our new President is going to take all the credit???? Ready for a shock? Below is an article from the London Times about our military. Interesting, it is! Our media coverage is shameful!

Winning Isn’t News!!

By INVESTOR’S BUSINESS DAILY

Iraq: What would happen if the U.S. won a war but the media didn’t tell the American public? Apparently,
we have to rely on a British newspaper for the news that we’ve defeated the last remnants of al-Qaida in Iraq.

London’s Sunday Times called it ‘the culmination of one of the most spectacular victories of the war on terror.’ A terrorist force that once numbered more than 12,000, with strongholds in the west and central regions of Iraq, has in over two years been reduced to a mere 1,200 fighters, backed against the wall in the northern city of Mosul .The destruction of al-Qaida in Iraq (AQI) is one of the most unlikely and unforeseen events in the long history of American warfare.

We can thank President Bush’s surge Strategy, in which he bucked both Republican and Democratic leaders in Washington by increasing our forces there instead of surrendering. We can also thank the leadership of the new general he placed in charge there, David Petraeus, who may be the foremost expert in the world on counter-insurgency warfare. And we can thank those serving in our military in Iraq who engaged local Iraqi tribal leaders and convinced them America was their friend and AQI their enemy.

Al-Qaida’s loss of the hearts and minds of ordinary Iraqis began in Anbar Province, which had been written off as a basket case, and spread out from there. Now, in Operation Lion’s Roar the Iraqi army and the U.S. 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment is destroying the fraction of terrorists who are left. More than 1,000AQI operatives have already been apprehended. Sunday Times (London) reporter Marie Colvin, traveling with Iraqi forces in Mosul, found little AQI presence even in bullet-ridden residential areas that were once insurgency strongholds, and reported that the terrorists have lost control of its Mosul urban base, with what is left of the organization having fled south into the countryside.

Meanwhile, the State Department reports that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s government has achieved ’satisfactory’ progress on 15 of the 18 political benchmarks ‘a big change for the better from a year ago.’ Things are going so well that Maliki has even for the first time floated the idea of a timetable for withdrawal of American forces. He did so while visiting the United Arab Emirates , which over the weekend announced that it was forgiving almost $7 billion of debt owed by Baghdad, an impressive vote of confidence from a fellow Arab state in the future of a free Iraq.

But where are the headlines and the front-page stories about all this good news? As the Media Research Center pointed out last week, ‘the CBS Evening News, NBC Nightly News and CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 were silent Tuesday night about the benchmarks ‘that signaled political progress.’ The war in Iraq has been turned around 180 degrees both militarily and politically because President Bush stuck to his guns. Yet apart from IBD, Fox News Channel and parts of the foreign press, the media don’t seem to consider this historic event a big story.

Copyright 2008 Investor’s Business Daily. All Rights Reserved.

Addendum: The reason you haven’t seen this on American television or read about it in the American press is simple–journalism is ‘dead’ in this country. They are controlled by Liberal Democrats who would rather see our troops defeated than recognize a successful Republican initiated response to 9/11. Media probably were holding ’til after coronation of BHO in order to give him credit. God bless our troops, God bless President Bush and God bless the U.S.A.

How many will you forward it to? We need to get it known around the country ASAP. Over 10 million people will have read this by February 1, 2009. With all your help we can reach well over 30 million worldwide. Thanks let the truth be known through the world!!

Response from Drew Brown

I really hate emails like this. They all purport to be based on some alleged news source, but most of the time they turn out to be bogus. This one, however, does refer to real events.

I’ve never seen this story. but a quick internet search revealed that Operation Lion’s Roar took place last July, so it’s a bit dated to say the least.

But quickly, the situation in Anbar has reversed itself dramatically, beginning at the end of 2006, early 2007. This occurred primarily because of what’s called the “Awakening” movement in Iraq, where Sunni tribesmen previously allied through convenience with al Qaida, turned against them, and more or less allied themselves with the Americans. The Americans permitted them to form paramilitary groups they referred to as “Sons of Iraq,” but which the Iraqis themselves generally called “Awakening Councils.”

There’s been a lot of reporting on why the Sunni tribes turned. The Americans like to claim that it’s because they were sick of al Qaida’s brand of violence and zealous interpretation of the Koran. More simply, however, it’s that the Sunni minority, which is about 20 percent of the population at most, began to realize that the Americans were their best protection against the Shiite majority in Iraq, which constitutes about 60 percent of the population, and which along with the Kurds, took control of the government in the 2005 elections.

The Awakening in Anbar happened to coincide nicely with Bush’s surge and the implementation of the Petraeus counterinsurgency strategy, the latter of which focused on protecting the Iraqi population, rather than trying to defeat al Qaida and other militants on the battlefield. The Awakening movement spread throughout other Sunni communities in Iraq that were previously al Qaida strongholds, including portions of Baghdad, Diyala province where I spent a good portion of 2007 and the area formerly known as the “Triangle of Death” south of Baghdad.

After the Anbar awakening, US and Iraqi security forces focused on securing Baghdad and then Diyala province. They retook Baqubah from the insurgents in June 2007. Covering this was my part of my first assignment for Stripes. After the loss of Diyala and significant in the Tigris River valley south of Baghdad, the insurgency more or less regrouped in the northern city of Mosul. For the latter part of 2007 and first half of 2008, Mosul was commonly referred to as al Qaida’s “last urban stronghold” in Iraq.

I was in Mosul in March 2008. It was still a dicey place. Insurgent groups — not only AQI, but others more nationalistic in outlook — were hitting US and Iraqi security forces pretty hard with bombs, but focusing mostly on the ISF. One of the soldiers I wrote about was killed there about a month after I left.

I don’t know much about the operation the TOL story describes, but I do know that Mosul is still a dangerous place. Things have stabilized somewhat, but I think it’s an overstretch to say that the offensive describe completely defeated or routed them from the city. We have reporters there frequently, and attacks still occur. Our reporter who was there most recently wrote very eloquently about how Iraqis want the Americans out of the city. So, everyone there is not friendly, holding hands and singing Kumbaya.

Fast forward to the present. Part of the deal for the Sunnis turning on AQI and forming these paramilitary groups to fight them was that eventually most of them would be incorporated into the security forces or given job training. By and large, these promises by the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government have yet to materialize. Just this week, there was an uprising in Baghdad by some of the Sunni paramilitaries because they felt the government was jerking them around. There were pitched battles fought between them and the Iraqi army and the Sunni paramilitaries largely fled into hiding, taking their weapons with them. While this was the most dramatic event, there have been numerous other reports of Sunni paramilitaries going into hiding and taking up arms against the government again.

The war in Iraq is by no means over. What is changing is the US role in it. The security agreement the Bush administration signed with al Maliki’s government calls for US forces to be out of the cities by the end of June — unless the Iraqi government asks otherwise. The combat role there will formally end by the end of 2010, although a force of an estimated 50,000 to 60,000 troops will remain as trainers and to carry out anti-terrorist raids.

Many reporters who’ve spent a lot of time in Iraq over the past six years believe that it’s really half-time right now. The real reckoning, they believe, is yet to come. Once US forces are out of the way, this school of thought holds that the Sunnis and the Shiites are going to eventually go at each other again in a full-scale civil war that could be worse than the events of 2005-2006. Large-scale ethnic cleansing could occur, and the country could be effectively partioned into Sunni-Shia-Kurdish zones.

Personally, I think a lot is going to depend on how the security forces respond. Will they stay together or will they splinter? There are many Sunni officers in the army, most of whom served under Saddam, while the rank and file is mostly Shiite. Will the army remain loyal to the idea of a single united Iraq, or will it become an instrument of oppression of the Sunni minority? This would cause a wholesale defection of Sunnis from the officer corps in my opinion. The police are relatively hopeless. They are dominated by Shiites and are largely partisan, many of them loyal to Muqtada al Sadr.

All of this reported in exhaustive detail and continues to be reported by both US and international news agencies. The NYT reported thoroughly on the recent Baghdad uprising and had a subsequent story about the threat of Sunni paramilitaries again joining with al Qaida.

If people aren’t informed, it’s their own fault. It’s not like the media is ignoring anything in Iraq or in Afghanistan, for that matter. And furthermore, I wonder if people who are sending around this crap, accusing the “liberal Democrats” and the “Mainstream Media” of hiding the truth are sending their sons and daughters to fight? I seriously fucking doubt it.

So I’m sitting here.

And I’m thinking.

And I’m wondering at what point it was decided that airplane seats should be built to fit the “average” person. Because, evidently, that person is four to six inches shorter than me, and evidently a bit…um…narrower.

Then again, maybe I’m cranky from only getting only two and a half hours of sleep. I’d take a nap if I could contort my body to fit this seat.