Today’s batch of links from our national crisis:

• Fearful flight crews are refusing to let Arabs (or people who look like they might be Muslim) board flights at the last minute.
• President Bush feels he’s on a mission from God.
• Phil Zimmerman (of PGP fame) is having a hard time dealing with the fact that his software may be used by terrorists. I think it’s wrong for him to blame himself.
• A long-time BBC Middle East correspondent has written a detailed list of America’s activities in the region. There is no justification for the attack on September 11, but Arabs have plenty of reasons not to like us. The most disturbing thing about the article is that it’s far from comprehensive.
• Salon has yet another article on how the United States pumped billions of dollars worth of weapons and training into Afghanistan in the 80s, and then dropped it like a hot potato when the Soviets pulled out.
• The last Osama bin Laden interview by a Western journalist. (From Forbes. Link found at NowThis.com.)

I’m making a few small changes to the design of the site this weekend. My real goal is to better separate entries so that I can write longer, multi-paragraph entries that don’t run into the ones that surround them. The first thing I did was add the time posted to each entry and put up a link to a page just for that specific entry. I’m also planning on making a few more tweaks when I get a chance. If you spot any problems or have suggestions for improvements, please send email.

You know, one thing that I wished Bush had mentioned in his speech last night, and that I hope the White House is working on behind the scenes, is a plan to offer a carrot to those developing countries in the Islamic world that are willing to join us in taking a stand against terrorism. As Kevin Kelly mentioned in his essay the other day, one thing we must do to have long term success against the Islamic fundamentalists is show the world that it’s better to be a friend of the United States than an enemy. Bush’s speech focused on how bad it will be for our enemies, but did nothing to explain the benefits of being our ally.

I also wonder why we don’t present a “Get out of jail free” card to some of the states we currently classify as rogue states? Why not put the ball in Libya’s court and give them a chance to turn over a new leaf? Since it doesn’t look like Saddam Hussein is going anywhere, we could even offer some sort of deal to Iraq. By giving every country in the world a chance to take a stand against terrorism, we could gain a lot of credibility with people who are on the fence about America. And when countries refuse to do so, then we are more justified than ever in whatever actions we take to prevent them from sponsoring terrorism in the future.

It’s important to remember that a lot of the state sponsorship of terrorism that happened in the past had different roots and aims than what we’re currently seeing. Libya and Syria sponsored terrorism in hopes of achieving certain political goals, and the leaders of those countries have the same healthy fear of Islamic fundamentalists that we do. Just some ideas here.

A plea for tolerance from Rany Jazayerli.

I thought this was the best paragraph in the speech last night. A very nice turn of phrase:

We have seen their kind before. They’re the heirs of all the murderous ideologies of the 20th century. By sacrificing human life to serve their radical visions, by abandoning every value except the will to power, they follow in the path of fascism, Nazism and totalitarianism. And they will follow that path all the way to where it ends in history’s unmarked grave of discarded lies.

I thought Bush gave a good speech last night. He reassured the Islamic world that we aren’t out to get them, and he admonished Americans once again not to take their moronic impulses out on Arabs, Muslims, or people they think might be Muslims or Arabs. He also took a political risk by delivering an ultimatum to the Taliban, and setting an ambitious goal in our fight against terrorism (“Our war on terror begins with al-Qaida, but it does not end there. It will not end until every terrorist group of global reach has been found, stopped and defeated . . .”). His Presidency will be judged by how the United States does in meeting that goal. The Times of London gave his speech a positive review. For what it’s worth, I wasn’t impressed with Bush’s delivery except at a few points, but I’m never impressed by his delivery, so you may wish to discount that.

Microsoft has announced that they’re opening up Passport and Hailstorm. That’s good news for just about everybody.

The Good Easy environment for the Mac looks really interesting. It maps my own work habits pretty well. I read my email using mutt on my shell account for rc3.org. At work and at home, I have all the Unix tools I could find installed on my PC. I do most of my work at the command line or in Emacs, opening Outlook (which we use for email where I work) only under duress. I’d switch everything over to Unix, but the font support and browsers under Unix totally suck.

To read: Camp David: The Tragedy of Errors and these responses to the article.

Salon: what fighting in Afghanistan will be like, from a British special forces soldier who trained Afghani guerillas.