Musings on Some Fallout From Persian Gulf III

Okay, I've been reading up on this whole mess of opinions on the rescued members of the Christian Peacemaker Teams in the wake of what some are calling a "rescue" and others a "release". I don't imagine that my own point of view is going to count for much one way or the other, but I'm going to put it out there on the web for consideration anyway since I have a spare moment.

Point One: Both the "rescue" and "release" camps are probably right. I wouldn't be surprised if it turned out the ex-hostages managed -- by strength of wit and will, with a bit of help from public opinion in Iraq and elsewhere -- to talk their captors into simply leaving them alone in the building that Coalition forces and others recovered them from, in the days after Tom Fox was killed. How their captors knew to time their departure so well as to ensure that no shots were fired in the rescue/recovery operation, I'll leave for others to either discover or explain. I have my own theories, but I have no evidence for any of them.

Point Two: the opinions held on the subject of the attitudes of the ex-hostages...there are a lot of people whom I'm holding in low esteem today, ranging from Charles Adler at the Ottawa Sun to Rex Murphy via the Globe and Mail. I see a lot of calls for a "thank you" or "apologies for the inconvenience" from the ex-hostages, calls that I'm not entirely sure ought to be spoken, much less heeded.

Why do I believe this? Because it risks adding up to demanding that the CPT personnel speak as hypocrites, or -- worse -- agree to renounce and denounce the philosophy and ethics that led them to take informed risks with their own safety. No one else's. They specifically asked not to have armed personnel risk their own safety for theirs.

I'm not saying I agree with the organization's philosophy on all points because I don't. But I'm not ready to condemn them for "walking their talk" either.

If this doesn't make much sense, so be it. I needed to vent.

Addendum: Some of you may be puzzled by my reference to the current goings-on in Iraq as "Persian Gulf III". My personal interpretation of history considers the Iran-Iraq War to be the First Persian Gulf War. Apparently, some who work on Wikipedia share my opinion on the subject.

Glacier Melts, What Might Follow?

james_nicoll found something else of interest to me today: a predictive mashup mapping tool to predict where the water will end up once the glaciers in, say, Greenland/Kalaaliit Nunaat, start going bye-bye.

Here's the link. The default setting's apparently 7 metres, but you can fiddle within a range of zero to fourteen metres' rise in sea level.

I note for the Ottawans reading this that we don't seem to be affected in any detectable fashion by such complications in the biosphere, even at the maximum. I'd imagine that our infrastructure, real estate markets and whatnot will be affected in some form or other...?