al-Zarqawi death means jack-shiite

First a little historical perspective:

Avoiding attacking suspected terrorist mastermind
"Updated: 4:14 p.m. PT March 2, 2004"

With Tuesday’s attacks, Abu Musab Zarqawi, a Jordanian militant with ties to al-Qaida, is now blamed for more than 700 terrorist killings in Iraq.

But NBC News has learned that long before the war the Bush administration had several chances to wipe out his terrorist operation and perhaps kill Zarqawi himself — but never pulled the trigger.

Then, why it doesn't matter that he's dead:

Steve Gilliard:

"One, we aren't fighting Lex Luthor. His deputy will take his place and the war will continue, worse than ever. We've crossed a corner into secterian violence, and despite the hype from Bush, Zarqawi was a minor player in the resistance and more showy than effective.

Two: The media will play this up as a victory for a few days, but within a month, Bush will; be cursing the US Air Force. Zarqawi was the last figleaf to hide the reality of Iraq, which is that we're fighting Iraqis, not al Qaeda, not Saddam loyalists.

When the war doesn't calm down, and the death squad activity means anything but, what will the Administration say then? Who will be the new boogie man? George Bush may see this as a break.

He won't for long."

Why Net Neutrality matters:

Silicon Valley Watcher-:

"Cox has been collaborating with Authentium since April 2005 to develop the security software suite.

Back on February 23rd Authentium acknowledged that their software is blocking Craigslist but it still hasn't fixed the problem, more than three months later. That's a heck of long time to delete some text from their blacklist. And this company also supplies security software to other large ISPs.

Craigslist has approached Authentium several times to get it to stop blocking access by Cox internet users but it has been unresponsive. Jim wasn't aware that Cox had its own classified ads service. 'That changes things, ' he said."

I'll be attending this convention next year:

Top Dems convene, drawn by bay blog / Daily Kos activists have gained clout:

"Las Vegas -- Two years ago, the first bloggers credentialed to cover the Democratic National Convention in Boston were treated as a novelty, guests at the restricted club where mainstream media reporters and politicians hobnob.

This weekend, in a sign of how new media is reshaping politics, some of the nation's top Democratic politicians are flocking to the first major offline convention inspired by a political blog, the Berkeley-based Daily Kos.

At the Riviera Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas, politicians, labor leaders and liberal interest groups are swooning before more than 1,000 'netroots' activists, mindful of the groups' ability to spread political buzz and raise quick cash."