Gas and war

[Ed. note: I wrote this several days ago and forgot to post it, and today I paid $3.26/gal.]

I recently heard Seymour Hirsch interviewed on Fresh Air, and now I'm in the midst of reading his article in the New Yorker. In a nutshell, it's about how the current administration is concerned about the rise of Iran, which is primarily a Shia Islamist state. To counteract this, they're banding together with Saudi Arabia to fund Sunni groups (as a counterweight to the Iranian Shiites) -- but many of these Sunni groups are radical extremists (remember that Al Queda is Sunni). This is a gross generalization, of course, but it's quite frightening to think that we're now funding extremist groups that hate the US in an effort to tamp down the Iranian influence in the Middle East (the rise of which we brougth about by decimating the Iraqi Army, the primary counterweight to the Iranian Army). I feel quite confident that this president will go down as one of the worst in all history, and hopefully the toadies in his adminstration (like Rice, Gonzalez and the rest) will suffer the same fate. It's rather amazing to think that he squandered the greatest outpouring of world sympathy for the US in our lifetime (Sept. 11), made us one of the most reviled nations in the world and now will likely leave Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea in worse shape than when he took office. I wish Pelosi and the rest of the Democrats would get some backbone and cut off funding for these military campaigns. Finally, the Pentagon just admitted today in an official report that Iraq is in the middle of a "civil war" (in addition to continuing to act as a breeding ground for terrorists). We can chalk that up as another of Mr. Bush's achievements. It makes me sad for the future of the country, and I feel sad that Devon and other children will be dealing with the ramifications of these actions long after I'm gone.

Our friend Mayra and her fiance Brice are in town from Manhattan this weekend. They're getting married in August, and Walt and I have been debating about attending the wedding. Mayra and I met on the Wallenberg Fellowship, so she also knows Liza (who is another Wallenberger) and Keri (who wasn't a Wallenberger but who was my roommate in Jerusalem). We're having both of them over for dinner on Saturday along with Mayra and Brice. It should be a fun evening. Devon always loves having people over, and she'll be thrilled that Isaac and Mina are coming. We'll probably break out the tent and tunnel we got from Ikea and turn the living room into a kiddie playground. It will likely be a bit much for Mayra and Brice, though -- Liza has 5 neices and nephews, so she's used to it, but I don't think Mayra spends a lot of time with children. I guess it will either maker her run towards them or run away.

Devon is quite fascinated with the mechanic these days. Sadly, we've had to take the Toyota there twice in a week,so we've been visiting him a lot. The first time we went to drop off the car, she was in the car seat and yelled, "Mechanic! I want to see mechanic." We let her out of the car seat, and while she was a little afraid of Robert (the mechanic), she loved seeing his shop. Yesterday we had to go back to pick up the Toyota for a second time, and she made me take her out of the car seat again. We took two turns around the shop, and then we went by the stations to look at the tools. She was obviously itching to pick up some of the wrenches and other tools (they were very shiny and appealing) and was upset when I wouldn't let her. There is something about all of the equipment (and perhaps the cars, since she still likes to pretend that she's driving) that is really appealing. Jon's mentioned several times that he thinks she's a gearhead (or maybe he's just projecting, since clearly Aaron didn't inherit his love of cars, and Walt and Burke and I are all somewhat blase too).