[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

Heh. I was right last night; the troops are pushing towards Baghdad. It’s been a successful advance so far. Note the destruction of the dam in that last story; that was a definite coup, since there’s been some worry that Saddam would be able to flood the river valley and slow down advancing troops.

This is another point at which Saddam is likely to use chemical weapons if he has ‘em. Up till now there’s been no new convincing evidence that he does, but one of the BBC embeds filed a report that his troops found instructions to an Iraqi Chemical Warfare Officer. (John Simpson, at 11:11 GMT.) Not hard evidence, just the most relevant thing we’ve found so far. I don’t count the chem warfare suits, no. We have a bunch of those too.

[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

My exciting new weblog feature debuts in three days. But you won’t get the full monty until the 17^th.

[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

Josh Marshall discusses victory conditions today. I have a simple victory condition; the day Bush announces we’ve won the war, I’m gonna call the State Department and ask about getting a visa to travel to Iraq. If they recommend against it, I don’t think we’ve won.

This sets the war in the appropriate context, that of the War on Terrorism. As a standard, it willfully ignores the question of military victory, which will come far earlier — but since Bush has set the bar at a stable democracy in Iraq, I feel OK about waiting till it’s safe to travel there until I declare victory.

[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

Warped setting idea for Sorcerer: high school cliques. Remember, in Sorcerer the demons don’t have to be demons per se. So in this setting, the demons are the clique leaders — the cheerleaders, the quarterbacks, the people who control the lunch tables. The sorcerers are the new kids in school. They have a choice: they can suck up to the cool kids (Binding, Containing, and so on) or they can maintain their Humanity (the amount of time they spend with actually interesting people).

Disclaimer: this concept might make Ron Edwards turn green, I dunno. It is not intended to accurately model high school. Plenty of popular kids in high school were also interesting. Etc.

[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

Admire the conviction and dedication to free, independent press displayed by Al-Jazeera. When Baghdad questioned and expelled two of their reporters, they decided that they couldn’t keep correspondents in Iraq any more. So they aren’t. Their offices in the country will remain open. Beats Reuters.

[Population: One] <A HREF="http://popone.innocence.com/ar

I was reminded tonight to post a link to Jerry Pournelle’s comments on Empire. He was against this war, for reasons quite different than most; he’s fond of the Republic, and he believes that the war puts us firmly on the path to Empire. Here’s a little more.

I think it’s worth the time to read the thoughts of a military-minded man who has thought deeply about the politics of this matter. I don’t think Pournelle’s views on Republic and Empire are proof positive of anything; I just think they’re interesting. It’s good insight into the nature of aggressive wars such as the ones the neocons desire.