…so said Littlest Guy, who inherited a copy of ‘Command & Conquer:Generals’ when he got Biggest Guy’s old desktop. Somehow that’s both funny and deeply disturbing.
…so said Littlest Guy, who inherited a copy of ‘Command & Conquer:Generals’ when he got Biggest Guy’s old desktop. Somehow that’s both funny and deeply disturbing.
Not as disturbing as hearing “Hold on, I’ve got to get these nukes off first.” I suspect…
Just of out of interest, you’re not planning a retraction on the Jamil/Jamail Hussein story, or an admission that while you and the rest of the pro-war blogosphere were chasing this red herring, the situation in Iraq went from disastrous to catastrophic?
[NM: John Quiggin, you’re welcome to ask this question on the appropriate thread — which this is not. I’ll leave it to others to decide if this thread is substantive or not. 🙂
— Marshal Nortius “Big Tuna” Maximus]
What, pray tell, is the diff between catastrophic and disastrous….hilarious. Quiggin, get a life.
This post made me laugh heartily.
Why would I retract? I said I didn;t believe there was a Capt. Jamil Hussein – and there wasn’t. In addition, I’m dubious about the provenance of at least one of his stories, based on other (published and accessible) US media reports. And the AP, instead of engaging in any kind of open, testable inquiry – or allowing a neutral third party to do so – stonewalled and lied.
So what exactly am I supposed to retract?
A.L.
More than once, I’ve had to say: “Hang on a minute! My tanks are about to overrun Paris!”
More seriously, I’ve often wondered how generations of kids who played games like Civilization and other high-level strategy computer games has affected their ideas about foreign policy? If you’re a big Civ fan, you’re probably more likely to be a “hawk” (those French will backstab you any moment, and the UN is a royal PITA) – and to favor classically liberal economics.
I’ve always believed that the cartoons and video games I grew up with tend to display enemies as pure evil, and thus favor the conservative view of things: Gi-Joe, Rush n’attack, He-man, the A-team, Doom (sortof anti-military but in a let’s shoot first way. And were too simplified to real make you think about killing (ie doom).
Modern games do bring ‘costs of war’ dialogue in, but usually to make them seem more beleivable. Usually, this attempt is laughable (see Metal Gear:Solid), and the tactical strategy games like Civ are way too complicated for kids anyway.
Besides, war games are fun. They also sound a lot more exciting than the comparitive game “Let’s have a peace rally”, which i notice has not been designed yet.
oops, meant to say that a-team was anti-military
Tactical strategy games like Civ are way too complicated for kids? My 6 year old boy plays “Rise of Nations”.
Not well, but he can win on the easiest setting. All I do is cheat him a slug of resources at the start. He builds new cities, citizens, barracks (land, sea, and air), military units, upgrades, resource gathering, and then attacks the computer players. He even knows how to set up air defenses for his Wonders. I don’t think he’s particularly unusual. I do think you’d be surprised at how well young children can do in such simulations. I was. It’s far more a matter of interest than capability.
“I said I didn;t believe there was a Capt. Jamil Hussein – and there wasn’t.”
Absolutely! I’m with you one hundred percent! This statement of truth parallels Clintons “I did not have sex with that woman!”
We clearly owe a debt to the statement parsers, who can clearly make their statements *technically* true.
That skill is a very valued one in this day and age – just ask the Bush administration!
C’mon hypocracy, that’s lame even for you.
If they name a source, it’s to give the reports greater credibility. If the source hadn’t been named – “anonymous sources within the Iraqi police who are stationed on the other side of town tell us that…” – no one could complain, except at the poor quality of their work.
It’s not that complex…
A.L.
Oh Civ 1, I still keep it in an old laptop, though no time to play.
A quote from my five year old, after a beheading in one of the “Lord of the Rings” movies (during a recent all-day-all-three movies marathon on television)-
“Daddy, he broke his head off!”
Followed by my wife (while I was trying not to laugh at his grammer):
“Maybe he shouldn’t be watching this…”