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Everyone’s linking to this one, but what the heck — let’s dogpile. Rand Beers resigned from his position as a counterterrorism advisor in the White House just before the war on Iraq began. Not because he didn’t support the war; he did. Rather, he couldn’t take working for Bush.

Beers had been working in the NSC since the 80s; he replaced Oliver North as director for counterterrorism and counternarcotics. He worked for Reagan, Clinton, and both Bushes. He’s a registered Democrat but it would be hard to argue that he dislikes Republicans.

He’s now working for Kerry, because he feels that strongly about the mess Bush is making of our counterterrorism policy. Read the article.

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WISH 51 asks:

What are three genres that you’ve had limited exposure to as a gamer that you’d like to try or play more of?

Hard question, cause I’m not sure what limited exposure means. I’ll take it as “haven’t played a lot in.” Lesse.

Off the top of my head, I might say pulp, but I think the old Feng Shui games I’ve been in qualify. They were more Asian pulp, but pulp nonetheless. Dear old Clarice, British counter-terrorism expert, was pretty much a pulp character down to the quirky name for her gun. So OK, I‘ve played pulp.

I’d play to play in a good horror game. There’s one. It’s a pretty wide field, but I’d be happy with anything from the esoteric horror of Whispering Vault to the gnostic horror of Kult to the conspiracy-driven horror of Vampire. This desire is likely to be satisfied very shortly by an interesting Ravenloft game… which, come to think of it, is slated to have a pulp element as well. Would that all my desires were so readily satisfied.

OK. I‘m gonna give in and say pirates, and I swear I was thinking of this before I saw Ginger’s answers. I like pirates and I want to play in a good pirate game, preferably in the Tim Powers vein. Unknown Pirates, anyone? I’ll have to reread the UA rulebook tonight to see if there are possibilities in that direction. Man, Plutomantic pirates… the gold weighs you down but it buys you freedom. Intriguing.

The third is hard. I’d say conspiracy, but UN PEACE was a pretty conspiratorial secret history kind of a game. SF? I want to play in a good near-future game (OK, OK, I want to play in a Trinity game) but I can’t really say I haven’t had exposure to that given my freelance Trinity work.

So I’ll punt and steal Tim Hall’s final answer. Alternate Worlds it is. As long as I’m dreaming, let’s make the GM work a lot.