He Didn't Misspeak

Kerry didn't misspeak. He meant Bush and anyone with half a brain should have been able to figure that one out. There are other people stuck in Iraq besides the enlisted troops, some of which have college degrees. There are plenty of West Point graduates and members of Officer Training school, which by definition means they are smart and did their homework.

"You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you get stuck in Iraq," Kerry said.

Why does this have to be explained to the crew without a clue? The proof is in the pudding. Bush and company invaded another country supposedly looking for weapons of mass destruction, expecting to be met with candy and flowers and when that didn't pan out it left them trying to explain why we are still there and what we hope to accomplish besides killing more Americans for no good reason.

John Boehner had best rethink threatening a decorated veteran, why does the hardly ever right wing suffer from diarrhea of the mouth and lack of oxygen to the brain?

Before the president spoke, House Majority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) told John Gibson of Fox News that if Senator Kerry doesn't apologize "we're gonna beat him to death until he does."

What, the Senate is going to have a blanket party? For those of you without military service, a blanket party is when you cover an offending person with a blanket and do things to them that aren't allowed according to the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Think A Few Good Men.

As John Kerry pointed out and been conveniently overlooked, "the administration has a cut and run policy in Afghanistan and a stand still and lose strategy in Iraq." The truth hurts.

More smoke and mirrors from the crew without a clue. Distract, bombast and besmirch. Not, we made a mistake and we are going to do our best to fix it. It's always the other guys fault for the gang that doesn't want to hang.

It's All About The Timing

Hot on the heels of the articles about Karl Rove, from Salon (ad view or subscription req'd) we have this lovely gem about the money trail between appointed judges and politicians involved with their confirmation. And yes, some of it is illegal. You would think that a real judge would know better.

Fortunately some of the judiciary understand their purpose in the constitutional framework of this nation and continue to do their job.

The timing of this free article from the Wall Street Journal (aren't they sweet?) lays the groundwork for the upcoming mysterious Republican win. Since I live in the liberal state of California (our votes rarely matter on the national stage), most of the people I talk with believe there will be a change in government, but there is no reliable way for me to determine how the rest of the country thinks. I am of the belief that the country is ready for a change but that the current occupiers of power are unwilling to step down and will do what ever they determine necessary to retain their position.

I renewed my subscription to Salon because Adblock Plus prevented me from viewing the articles. I enjoy not seeing ads and banners but it was frustrating and prevented me from enjoying the great writing and snarky observations.

I also restored the Washington Post to its real name since Howard Kurtz quoted a whole paragraph of mine in Media Notes. Thank you. My opinion of the Rovian machinations is not hardened, Karl Rove has proven adept at installing a previously unsuccessful layabout to state and federal office. Like most people he wants to go out on a winning note. The problem is that once you get used to abusing power, it is hard to give up.

Due To Budget Cuts

IMG_0336, originally uploaded by BBelief.

The Army Corp of Engineers decided on the catapult method to rebuild bridge infrastructures.

Some people were not amused.


Random flickr blogging explained here.

Terror, Corruption and Stupidity

Heaven forbid that a candidate should win based on the issues facing the voters. Unfortunately that is no longer what running and serving in Congress means. It is all about the power.

If you are a Republican and can't win based on your merits, Karl Rove will rush money from the U.S. Treasury to buy off your constituents. He will use the resources of the Federal Government for political gain according to this article. The political machine has moved from shameful to illegal while embracing immorality in between. All in the pursuit of power. How Christian.

Really? The best thing that has happened to the Pentagon in the last 25 years? I think the boots in the ground might view it a little differently. What a boner.

Maybe al-Qaeda is being quiet because they are planning something and don't want us to know about it? Maybe they are sitting back and watching for the entertainment value, realizing that the election isn't really going to make a difference. Maybe they haven't received their orders from Karl Rove. Yet.

Idealogically Blinkered

Now that's a great turn of phrase. George Will is fine form this morning and it is hard to tell if he is still a conservative but there are a few clues. His article in Newsweek could have been written by any barking moonbat (and has, just not as eloquently) and over at the WaahPoo, with less than two weeks before the election, it has occurred to Mr. Will that voting might not be as efficient or as accurate as one might have hoped.

While I'm not fond of Duck! Cheney, the bloom has definitely come off the rose for Mr. Will.

In a recent interview with Vice President Cheney, Time magazine asked, "If you had to take back any one thing you'd said about Iraq, what would it be?" Selecting from what one hopes is a very long list, Cheney replied: "I thought that the elections that we went through in '05 would have had a bigger impact on the level of violence than they have ... I thought we were over the hump in terms of violence. I think that was premature."

He thinks so? Clearly, and weirdly, he implies that the elections had some positive impact on the level of violence. Worse, in the full transcript of the interview posted online he said the big impact he expected from the elections "hasn't happened yet." "Yet"? Doggedness can be admirable, but this is clinical.

Anyway, what Cheney actually said 17 months ago was that the insurgency was in its "last throes." That was much stronger than saying we were "over the hump" regarding violence. Beware of people who misquote themselves while purporting to display candor.

Cheney's either a liar (!) or delusional, either way it doesn't make a difference to the dead. And that's a no-brainer.

Speaking of no-brainers...

Having fixed Iraq and New Orleans, the federal government's healing touch is now being applied to voting. As a result, days -- perhaps weeks -- might pass after Election Day without the nation's knowing which party controls the House or Senate. If that happens, one reason might be HAVA, that 2002 bit of federal helpfulness.

By fixed, does he mean spayed and neutered?

Today's political climate -- hyperpartisanship leavened by paranoia and exploited by a national surplus of lawyers -- makes this an unpropitious moment for introducing new voting technologies that will be administered by poll workers who often are retirees for whom the task of working a DVD player is a severe challenge. Furthermore, an election is, after all, a government program, and readers of Genesis know that new knowledge often brings trouble. So we should not be surprised if, on Nov. 7, new voting machinery does what new technologies -- dams, bridges, steamships, airplanes -- have done through history: malfunction.

Now that is definitely the truth. The upcoming election is like being in a time machine and watching the Titanic leave on her maiden voyage or the Hindenburg approach in New Jersey. Not good.

I do have a bone to pick with one paragraph where he uses a false conclusion to justify the biggest mistake in this nation's history and then glosses over damage to the country for the last six years. What he thinks doesn't make any difference, is what brought us to the brink of economic, military and cultural ruin in the first place.

The lesson that should have been learned from Florida was: In Florida, as in life generally, one should pursue as much precision as is reasonable -- but not more. When, as very rarely happens, a large electorate, such as that state's 6.1 million voters in 2000, is evenly divided, the many errors and ambiguities that inevitably will occur during the marking of millions of ballots will be much more numerous than the margin of victory. That is unfortunate, but no great injustice will be done, no matter who is declared the winner in a contest that is essentially tied.

No great injustice will be done? Have you looked at the results of that "decision"? Did you read the article you just wrote in Newsweek? I think those idealogical blinkers kicked in for you again.

Bits and Pieces

YouTube is now BooTube. They are supposed to be removing the Comedy Central videos on Monday. I only watched clips, I'm not interested in paying iTunes to watch the whole show. If they remove the Keith Olbermann videos, Google will have paid a billion dollars for blue sky. I'm not really interested in a site with goofy videos, but then I don't America's Funniest Home Videos, either. How can choices expand and contract at the same time?

Soap operas and superheroes. I know that soap operas can be a little over the top but a superhero? Sheesh, what will they think of next? What's next, the Greatest American Hero? Hasn't that already been done?

Spiderman could have a new home, his own fortress of webitude if could get these guys to work for him.

Of course Michael J. Fox can take a hit, he's taken a big one on the chin and kept on fighting. Limpballs won't be able to knock him down and looks stupid even trying.

I don't want anybody controlling my judges, I want them fully independent of politics even though I know that's impossible. It seems I'm not the only one.

As much as I love tea, I am not going to pay $3 on a regular basis when I can make it at home, just the way I want it. If I was out, was thirsty and had money I didn't know what to do with, I would give it a shot.

First It Was Real Sex

That affected a candidate in an election, now it can be fictionalized and held against you. Modo finaly has a column with some bite. Lately she's been writing fluff, and uninteresting fluff at that.

Candidates around the country have been race-baiting, gay-baiting, Michael J. Fox-baiting and Hispanic-baiting. But now it has come to this: Republicans are novel-baiting.

Still trying to recover his balance, after slipping on a macaca and admitting he was a Jewish bubba, one criticized for using racist language, displaying a Confederate flag at home and keeping a hangman’s noose at his old law office, Senator George Allen of Virginia unleashed a vicious attack on Jim Webb Thursday night. He called him a fiction writer.

Senator Macacawitz, as he is now known in Washington,

She is too funny, slipped on a macaca. But my favorite is this one, she isn't any more fond of the Dark Lord than I am.

The Republicans’ usual trick — having Dick Cheney terrify women into thinking that terrorists will kill their children if they vote for girly Democrats — isn’t flying this year, so now the G.O.P. is resorting to more personal, and goofy, attacks.

This whole election cycle is turning into one big clustermuck. Whatever happened to debating the issues? The ones that actually affect the quality of life of your constituents? I've seen four year olds with a better grasp of public behavior and these guys are running for the Senate.

I guess the difference between men and boys really is the price of their toys.

Whee! Here We Go!

Civilization as we have known it is about to change. Our race to the bottom is in full swing and we are on our way to becoming just another big country on the map. All indicators are showing that the rest of the world is moving on without our help and who can blame them?

Economics and international finances are not my strong suit, but I am perfectly capable of reading and watching trends. If people invest their money somewhere besides America, no matter how hot the stock market looks, you will have less jobs, less money and less maneuverability. Then you go into survival mode and try to hold on to what you have which means that you don't expand and then you die.The housing market is in freefall without a parachute, and the effects are starting to be felt throughout the economy.

I would have a Guiness to ease the pain but it is too early in the morning and there seems to be a new formula. Besides, the problem won't go away with alcohol, it needs to be addressed by intelligent thinking and planning.

Oh look, it's finally occurred to the banks that they can't afford to repossess all those homes. They should have thought about that when they were writing the loans.

Too funny not to include. What kind of memory expert forgets the prosecutor had cross-examined her in a previous case?

Are we on our way to a Soylent Green, Gattaca or the Jigsaw Man experience? Since Duck! Cheney thinks it's ok to waterboard a terrorist suspect, it should only a short leap for the Dark Lord to endorse using prisoners to benefit society. At least the upper echelons (filthy rich and donate to the cause). He can always use the excuse that he didn't do it first and this way they won't really need stem cell research since it won't come from babies, but adults. I've always wondered why he didn't have a heart transplant, I guess they couldn't find a block of ice cold enough.

Blogging, Games and Names

I wondered why everyone was complaining about Blogger this week. It seems that Blogger was having problems that didn't affect Beta. I'm so happy I switched.

I'm also happy with Firefox 2. I had been running the release candidates for a while and now have most of my extensions enabled. I tracked down new versions of Colorful Tabs (I'm running the Cloudgnome theme and my close buttons work) and Blogger Web Comments. Now, if I could just get History Submenus enabled, the Fox would be a really smooth ride.

Jolly Roger over at Reconstitution has a couple of great posts up, I still can't comment there, the spam checker hates me and my computer. I give up after four tries now, I won't do the twenty tries like I used to. Maybe I've been banned but I seriously doubt it. Anyway, he has my new favorite name for the Decider. Domestic Enemy #1.

Oops, JR was leaving a comment here while I was typing this.

The Chimperor can't find his own ass with GPS directions.

but what if he uses the internets to reach The Google?

What does waterboarding feel like? This isn't dunking their head in a bucket of water to see how long they can hold their breath, it's like being pulled in by a riptide, tumbling over and over again, occaisionally seeing the shore or the sky, but not long enough to get a good breath without a mouthful of water. Domestic Enemy #2 should try it before he waxes poetic and thinks it is a no-brainer. I hear he wants to go hunting again. I hope it's for four legged animals this time.

My dad and I used to play Scrabble and I'm pretty good at it, but I play to see if I can make words, not points. So, when I saw that someone had scored 830 points in one game, I thought boy was he lucky, everything must have fallen into place for him and that's what happened.

This is the last time we set our clocks back in October. Unless you live in a state or territory that doesn't participate in Daylight Savings Time. We spring forward on March 11, 2007.

If there is a hell, I hope that the person who started the Palm Springs fire enjoys the roast.

The cakewalk that isn't, just keeps on taking. Since we don't like to remember history, we forget that during the American Revolution we kept fighting against all odds to remove the invaders from our shores. Does our hubris prevent us from understanding that other people feel the same way about their country?

F'shizzle. Dude, it's an airport, they are paranoid there.

Too Good To Pass Up

The wonders of YouTube enabled some enterprising soul to compile; Stay The Course, The Video and share it with the rest of us. Bush is going to be lost without his favorite phrase.

Fluff and Entertainment

Nathan Fillion is guest starring on Lost on November 8, supposedly playing Kate's husband. Flashback only, unless he turns out to be one of the Others. That would be cool.

Over on 24, the cast is getting larger and larger. Peter MacNichol, one of my favorites on Numb3rs is supposed to be on, along with Powers Boothe (as Wayne Palmer's VP) and Eric Balfour is supposed to be returning. 24 was the only show he was ever on that didn't get canceled. He's coming back as Milo, I wonder if he still does computers since Chloe is in a suit.

The trailer can be seen here. Once again it looks like another dynamite season but it is up against Heroes, a show I'm also very fond of.

Critical Thinking And The Lemmings

Reading stuff like this first thing in the morning makes me ill. It makes me wonder why I care so much about a nation of thoughtless lemmings who look at problems through a narrow scope and are incapable of envisioning the future unless it is a theory for their favorite tv show.

The myth of smaller government. When will people realize that the Republicans have spent us into debt for generations? From the false Department of Homeland Security to the Iraq war that we are losing to a stupid fence whose only purpose is to provide a positive slant for the upcoming elections.

Hello? The wear and tear on the cushions of used cars tell the story also. More weight equals more damage, both financial and physical.

Congress And The Troops

The real story. Who really supports the troops? Not just magnetic ribbons, faded and tattered flags, glorious speeches or photo opportunities in a flak jacket, but votes that affect active Military, the Reserves, the Veterans and their families. Is your representative doing their best to make sure that while our troops (sometimes over and over again) are fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them over here (isn't that this week's excuse?), that they are getting all the help they should be entitled to? Would you like to your representatives accountable?

Now you can find out courtesy of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America and the facts aren't pretty. They collected information on over 300 votes that affected them and found that a majority of Congress hasn't been all that supportive with 86 members scoring in the No Child Left Behind we must penalize you category.

Unfortunately I noticed with very little surprise that when it comes to supporting the troops, Republicans across the board finally discovered their love of small government and even smaller budget allocations. That's my current government; start wars without a plan, ask a few to give all and then penalize them financially, morally, and emotionally. Then wipe your hands and walk away.


Why is it that a Congressman can serve one term and have medical and retirement benefits but people who lay their lives and bodies on the line for their country have to come back and fight to have the government fix what they broke? It should be automatic. You get hurt fighting over there, we take care of you. They aren't mercenaries, they are our citizens who believe that fighting for this country is important and worthwhile. Who is Congress to tell them otherwise?

Have You Ever Wondered

Why orange juice (actually most food) tastes so bad after brushing your teeth? Every time it happens I wonder and now here's the answer.

Whether you are an adult? Really? Are you sure?

If you were easily manipulated by people and circumstances outside your control?

If maybe plastic surgery was going a little overboard? I wonder what they'll think of next?

Whether you should eat less bread? Interesting study, what you put between the bread is less harmful. At least, in this instance. Not that they hurry to point that out.

Maher Translates Rap

Into English for those of us who don't speak Ebonics.

Still Not Able To Drive

Which according to this latest report, might be a good thing. If we are going to need two earths in less than 50 years, we had better get that space program on the road. So to speak. Not only does it have to be viable but we also have to discover another compatible planet. I think it might be faster and more effective to try some type of dimensional space travel. Or, if things keep on going the way they are, we might solve the problem by blowing ourselves back to the stone age.

Anyway, I got the hard cast off yesterday and because I have proven to be a rational patient, I get to have a removable cast for the next four weeks while the bone adheres to the titanium rod. It still isn't strong enough to support me but is coming along quite well.

My poor leg and foot look so different. My calf still has some musculature, but not much. My big toe is about a quarter inch shorter than it used to be and the middle (where the piece of broken bone was floating around) and bottom of the foot are still numb. It feels very weird. I know my hand is touching my foot because my hand tells me so, but the foot is silent. So, still no driving until the removable cast comes off.

Four In The Morning

First thing in the morning and I had to call someone a moron. Dude from the right is so angry he can't think straight. He confused Jane Wyatt who passed away last night with Jane Fonda. Called her Hanoi Jane, accused her of meeting with the North Koreans (?) and hopes she burns in hell. Nice guy.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, we say goodbye with a heavy heart. I never watched Father Knows Best, I had one of my own, but she will always be Amanda Grayson to me. Journey to Babel was an episode that I heard about but didn't get to see until the reruns in the seventies. Thank you for your work, rest in peace. Ooh, Spock's mom was older than his dad. I?

Electronic voting machines might be hacked. Ya think? Hello, this is old news, the vote in 2004 was hacked, now maybe people will pay attention, but I doubt it. However the story gets out there is all right with me. Bush has been a little too sure that the Republicans were going to win the midterms, without a poll to support his gut.

The Scalito brothers were burbling this weekend. According to them it seems the news media and the general public don't understand what's going on because we don't have legal degrees and don't understand the boring details, we look at things too simplistically. Stick a sock in it, we can see what you're up to, and it isn't constitutional. It wasn't me gave the boy wonder the idea and the tools to suspend habeas corpus.

Say you're 23; no job, never been laid, never been kissed, never held a gir's hand and no immediate possibility of it in your future. Getting not one, not two, but 72 virgins in paradise for being a martyr sounds like a good option. Unfortunately.

With A Purposeful Grimace

IMG_3355, originally uploaded by smgenereaux.

And a terrible sound
He pulls the sptting high tension wires down

Helpless people on a subway train
Scream bug-eyed as he looks in on them

He picks up a bus and he throws it back down
As he wades through the buildings toward the center of town

Oh no, they say hes got to go
Go go godzilla, yeah
Oh no, there goes tokyo
Go go godzilla, yeah

Thanks and apologies to Blue Oyster Cult. History does show how nature points out the folly of man.

Random Flickr Blogging explained here.

Our National Character

Iraq, the debacle that keeps on giving...us more trouble, more deaths and no graceful way out. So this is the result when you go to a war that you planned to start and had no other plans after accomplishing your goal.

I did two years at a community college before I applied to Cal Poly. I was so focused on getting accepted, that when I did, I relaxed like the hard part was over. I was rudely disabused of this notion the next day when I walked into my Biology class and everyone was taking the midterm. Which I had forgotten. What a disaster that was. I just don't get the plant thing.

Well, I had to do a lot of extra credit to rescue my A. I even wrote a paper on the basics of cloning using E. coli bacteria. Turned out it was also an extra credit question on the final for even more points. My point, you might ask? I recognized I had screwed up and immediately sought options to improve my situation. I expect the same of my "leaders". Competent resolutions to difficult situations.

Even if you were warned ahead of time and disregarded all advice to the contrary. Even if you think you're right when all the evidence is stacked against you. Lying, hiding and passing the buck are unacceptable and childish attempts at cowardly avoiding the consequences of your actions.

In the eyes of the Bush administration and its foreign policy allies in Washington, Iraqi reconstruction and the march toward democracy are just a matter of time. All that's needed is for the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and the Iraqi armed forces to quell the sectarian violence. Put together the right alliances and the problem is solved, they believe. They see the answer to Iraq's problems in political terms.

But there are other aspects of Iraq that bother those of us who aren't as smart as the brilliant Washington thinkers who got us where we are today.

Some of us can't forget the prewar talk about weapons of mass destruction and Saddam Hussein's partnership with al-Qaeda, and how wrong the foreign policy elite were about that.

Then there was the rosy post-Hussein world portrayed by the Bush administration, in which Iraqis, liberated from the grip of fear and imbued with a deep and abiding respect for human rights and freedom, would be busy building a better future for themselves.

Well, we all know that didn't happen. I had this Saudi patient in the time between Aghanistan and Iraq. He explained to me about the three sects and that Hussein was what was keeping them from killing each other and if Bush proceeded at the current level of discussion and invaded Iraq, it would break into civil war and we wouldn't be able to stop it.

Now if this was baseball, Bush would be out. Strike one was brutal. It whipped by with such speed and force that it took out the catcher and the umpire. Supposedly, nobody (at least in this administration) could have known that terrorists would fly planes into buildings.

Strike two was a foul pop-up. We invaded Afghanistan in order to remove the Taliban, destroy al-Qaeda and capture Osama bin Laden. It looked good coming off the bat but it landed just to the right of the first baseline. Five years later, Osama's been forgotten (again!) and the Taliban are back and rested from the seventh inning stretch. Newsflash! Obama does not equal Osama, don't get sidetracked because it's an election year.

A series of foul balls have followed. Flying back from vacation to try and interfere in Terri Schiavo's life, letting the city of New Orleans drown on national television while you were on vacation, letting North Korea develop and test nuclear weapons while terror and instability are increasing across the globe in reaction to your posturing.

What should have been your third strike, is Iraq. Mishandled from the beginning and it looks like the end will be the same. There is not one part of Iraq that has been improved, that has benefited from our presence. Not one. There is very little of America that has benefited from your actions and there are many military families who are missing loved ones. Some permanently.

Why isn't it your third strike? Because you ignored and then changed the rules. The catcher was neutered during your first strike and the umpires were changed so strikes became balls.

Now all that's left is for you to declare the game over and yourself the winner.

Mr. Bush, you are our national character, and it doesn't look good.

Crossposted at Big Brass Blog.

Friday Fluff

What kind of car are you? I'm a Ferrari 360 Modena and a Mandarin! Did you know
One horsepower is the amount of energy it takes to drag a horse 500 feet in one second.
You can listen to thunder after lightning and tell how close you came to getting hit. If you don't hear it, you got hit, so never mind.

Talc is found on rocks and on babies.

The law of gravity says "no fair jumping up without coming back down."

When they broke open molecules, they found they were only stuffed with atoms. But when they broke open atoms, they found them stuffed with explosions.

When people run around and around in circles we say they are crazy. When planets do it we say they are orbiting.

Rainbows are just to look at, not to really understand.

While the earth seems to be knowingly keeping its distance from the sun, it is really only centrificating.

Someday we may discover how to make magnets that can point in any direction.

South America has cold summers and hot winters, but somehow they still manage.

Most books now say our sun is a star. But it still knows how to change back into a sun in the daytime.

Water freezes at 32 degrees and boils at 212 degrees. There are 180 degrees between freezing and boiling because there are 180 degrees between north and south.

A vibration is a motion that cannot make up its mind which way it wants to go.

There are 26 vitamins in all, but some of the letters are yet to be discovered. Finding them all means living forever.

There is a tremendous weight pushing down on the center of the Earth because of so much population stomping around up there these days.

Lime is a green-tasting rock.

Many dead animals in the past changed to fossils while others preferred to be oil.

Genetics explain why you look like your father and if you don't why you should.

Vacuums are nothings. We only mention them to let them know we know they're there.

Some oxygen molecules help fires burn while others help make water, so sometimes it's brother against brother.

Some people can tell what time it is by looking at the sun. But I have never been able to make out the numbers.

We say the cause of perfume disappearing is evaporation. Evaporation gets blamed for a lot of things people forget to put the top on.

To most people solutions mean finding the answers. But to chemists solutions are things that are still all mixed up.

In looking at a drop of water under a microscope, we find there are twice as many H's as O's.

Clouds are high flying fogs.

I am not sure how clouds get formed. But the clouds know how to do it, and that is the important thing.

Clouds just keep circling the earth around and around. And around. There is not much else to do.

Water vapor gets together in a cloud. When it is big enough to be called a drop, it does.

Humidity is the experience of looking for air and finding water.

We keep track of the humidity in the air so we won't drown when we breathe.

Rain is often known as soft water, oppositely known as hail.

Rain is saved up in cloud banks.

In some rocks you can find the fossil footprints of fishes.

Cyanide is so poisonous that one drop of it on a dogs tongue will kill the strongest man.

A blizzard is when it snows sideways.

A hurricane is a breeze of a bigly size.

A monsoon is a French gentleman.

Thunder is a rich source of loudness.

Isotherms and isobars are even more important than their names sound.

It is so hot in some places that the people there have to live in other places.

Sick And Funny

So, I'm surfing through my blogroll and Praxxus has a great video if you like it on the twisted side and need a laugh. He doesn't post as often as he used to, but always worth a visit.

Cool, there is hope that the earth can repopulate itself, not necessarily with humans, after everybody gets the bomb and as Omnipotent Poobah over at less idiots points out rather eloquently...

The more I look at the situation, the more I think that things are sliding rather rapidly to a new and different kind of Cold War. This time around, the MAD principle isn't going to work. Someone who's willing to fly the 6:45 flight to Chicago into a high rise won't give much thought to lobbing a nuke at their neighbors. The high-minded ideal that nukes are a danger of the past and that we'd passed the need for all that destructive power is dead too. Now, we'll find all manners of crackpot Amadenamacallits and Kim (You Make Me) Il Jungs ready to redecorate half a hemisphere with a well-placed nuke.

That was funny, in a sick sort of way. He has some great turns of phrase in the rest of the article also. Clear thinking with a good rationale. He's going on the blogroll.

The WaaPooh was slamming this morning. First up, it looks like over 600,000 Iraqi dead might be accurate. Now they are limiting the mortality data released to the UN. You only restrict what you want to cover up.

Can Bill Clinton be VP? There is some talk on the matter. He can't be elected again but he can succeed to the office. Like he would be in any emotional condition to serve under those conditions. Oh well, people have to do something with their time.

I always thought that speaking in tongues was involuntary, that the spirit just came upon you, because if you can control it then how much is spiritual and how much is wishing it so? Whichever it is, not allowed to do it here.

If the ignorant shouldn't vote then maybe these two should stay home. I wonder what happened regarding her voting in the wrong precint in the last election. Thank goodness she's past reproduction age. Meow. Wow, two new links in the blogroll, both in the O's.

A leftward slant... at Fox? Surely you jest. Thanks for the laugh.

Nothing In Particular

Last night I had two of the best tomatoes I have ever had. My tomato plant finally produced more than one red tomato at a time. I love heirloom tomatoes but it was late in the season when I started growing them and all OSH had left were Early Girls. Flavorful doesn't begin to describe the experience. I have about fifteen more left on the vine, hopefully it will stay warm for few days and they can ripen naturally. Next year I'm going to do several different varieties, this is so exciting.

I only got one meal out of the swiss chard but it was killer. Picked and cooked within a half hour. Magnificent. Next year I will have a better idea of what I'm doing. I love fresh food, don't you? I hated peas until I had some that were fresh picked and cooked, now I love the things.

In other unimportant news, Heroes rocks! I am fascinated by the storyline. I thought the show would be cheesy but it isn't. The characters are interesting and I'm beginning to see where it's going. I could be wrong since Tim Kring is a good friend of Damon Lindelof (Lost) and friends usually have some things in common. Devious storytelling is probably one of them. My favorite line from this week: Nicky's not here right now.

Everybody links to Keith Olbermann so I don't need to, but I hope that his being relatively famous will provide him some protection in the coming pogrom.

The invisibility cloak is coming closer to being a reality. The government should be swooping in at any moment and appropriating it for military use or for the new nobody but us gets to rule space program. Or the spooks will want it. That could be a pretty interesting fight, oh to be a fly on the wall during those conversations in the nut, I mean White House. But then that's why they won't let civilians have it. Too much potential for finding out the truth.

I have few new blogger beta hacks but I can't remember what they were, internal stuff I believe. You can now label all your old posts with the new label management system but it isn't perfect yet. I have quite a few posts tagged with the Bush label but it only shows seven, unless you click on the label and then you find quite a few more. This is a Blogger problem I'm not going to spazz on. What I would like is the ability to delete some of my labels and make subcategories to neaten it all up. Somebody will find a simple solution soon.

Update: Ask and you shall receive. You can now remove your labels on the manage post page. Yippee! But you can't correct spelling errors or change the capitalization, yet. Can subcategories be next?

I've been running the Firefox 2.0 RC3 for a few days and haven't had any major problems. I really like the spell checker, now if would only do grammar . Most of my extensions don't work and I'm surviving (I guess some of them aren't really necessary) but there are a couple I hope become functional soon. I want my unified Stop/Reload and Clear Cache buttons back, History menu so I don't have to open my sidebar (why do people like sidebars, they drive me crazy), Colorful tabs and Blogger Web Comment and I'll be pretty happy camper.

Advice on how to be a successful space tourist. Hmm, how would I be able to do what I want? How much privacy will there be?

Success! Finally

The inline comments hack is now working and they are peekaboo enabled. Click once and there you are, click again and it collapses. Just like the posts. You never leave the main page and the post pages have the comments already there, provided there are some. Hopefully someone will come up with a hack to post without going to blogger and it will be perfect.

This way it should be a little easier to track what's being said although I'm not fond of having to use javascript to get the job done. It adds to the loading time which is why I have as little as possible in my sidebars.

Thanks to Singpolyma for his hard work.

Megalomaniac In Chief

He is out of control, out of touch with reality and out of his flipping mind. He's worried about control of space when as a nation we can barely add and subtract successfully but we "feel" (please explain why young people cut themselves in an effort to feel) good about ourselves. Those Nobel prizes are going to become scarcer and scarcer the longer that no white child left behind is practiced.

Who died and crowned him the omnipotent ruler of the universe? How exactly are we going to deny space to other countries when our space program is so old and dilapidated that we can't even guarantee a successful blast off and then have to inspect the shuttle in space before they can return as if we could send a rescue team up if needed.

Did al-Qaeda develop a space program while we were invading Iraq under false pretenses? The Chinese are going to do exactly what they want and we will not have the power to stop them. The European Space Agency is coming along nicely and don't forget that Virgin guy. Bush can huff and he can puff all he wants but due to his overwhelming stupidity and shortsightedness the United States is becoming irrelevant. All talk and half assed action is what we have become good at.

He has signed the Military Commissions bill which gives him carte blanche to lock up anyone at will and then throw away the key. Now the FBI wants the ISPs to keep a record of their customers viewing habits which was preceded by Chertoff warning that people could learn to be terrorists by surfing the internet. How can anybody not believe that martial law is just around the corner?

Bush is not going to give up power willingly, it doesn't matter what the results of the upcoming elections are, he will find a way around it because he has two months before the new Congress is sworn in and his liberal use of recess appointments and signing statements shows a pattern of willful disregard for the legislative process.

Excuse me while I go brush up on my German, I will need to be able to plea for my life when America has her very own night of the long knives. I just ran this past my mom and when I started to read parts of this post she interrupted me and said "that sounds like Hitler". Well, she should know since she spent the first fifteen years of her life with that madman in charge.

Why does history keep repeating itself?

Oh, The Irony!

Is freeping unbelievable! How they ever managed to paint John Kerry as a flipflopper when these guys change positions faster than Bush changes his rationale for invading Iraq.

Apparently, the Left hates gays and believes that private sexual preferences belong on the front page.

Excuse me? Did I read that right? From the party that was so fixated on a blue dress and a cigar?

I know nothing about the alleged incidents of which Senator Craig (R-ID) is purported to be a participant. That is not the issue. The issue is the fluid attachment to truth and reality that the right seems to enjoy. For the last two elections "prevent the gays from getting married or have any rights whatsoever" has been front and center in the battle to control the country. Now, when it is obvious that some members of the Republican party prefer outies instead of innies, the righties are going to squeal foul?

These are the same people who wanted a President impeached for lying about having consensual sex with a woman over 21, which was a matter between him and his wife. Period. As long as she didn't kill him, it was none of the country's business. But that didn't stop the "moral" Republicans from investigating the minutiae of Clinton's life. Nope, not at all. Now they find it unseemly that someone might find it interesting, that a Senator who is alleged to swing both ways and then deliberately votes against his conscience, is hiding it from the public? Of course it's interesting. Heck, it's titillating.

Once again, the Left shows its obsession with sexuality, but it's really more than that. The Left obsesses over identity politics in all forms, and that obsession comes out in pathological terms. Rogers reveals this in his blog post, demanding that gay staffers on the Hill identify their orientation publicly, or else he will do it for them. Sexual identity is everything to him, and the concept of sexual privacy has no value to him at all. He wants to humiliate gays who prefer to keep their sexual activity private, forcing them to wear the virtual pink triangle against their will to experience obloquy and castigation.

Pink triangle for you, blue dress for us. Obloquy? Surely you jest. Did America really need to know about the details of a blowjob? The story was shoved down our throats and you guys salivated for more. As Gary Hart found out, you can't play footsie with someone who isn't your spouse and not expect to get caught. Eventually.

Suck it up, relax. It goes down easier that way.

Crossposted at Big Brass Blog

Nibbles And Tits

Ois it kibbles and bits? The morning started out with the depressing news that the Decider has officially (not-so cleverly disguised as another "antiterror bill) declared an end to the Bill of Rights. I wonder what signing statement he thinks he needs? Can martial law be far behind?

Whatever, did you know that lavender and tea tree oil seem to cause breast enlargement? I know that I have never heard that touted as a benefit before, but after reading this article on early puberty there should be some furious research by several enterprising souls.

Dr. Bloch collaborated with scientists at the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences in North Carolina to test the oils on human breast cells grown in test tubes. Lavender and tea tree oil had the same effect on the cells as estrogen.

Dr. Bloch speculates that the findings, which he is submitting for publication in a peer-reviewed journal, may explain the boys’ breast growth. He noted, however, that cells in a test tube are a far cry from humans, so the relationship of the essential oil to breast growth remains hypothetical.

I'll bet not for long considering a certain section of the populations preoccupation with big breasts.

Not on my table and definitely not in my stomach but isn't this one of the dumbest statements?

"Our evaluation is that the food from cloned animals is as safe as the food we eat every day," said Stephen F. Sundlof, the FDA's chief of veterinary medicine, who has overseen the long-stalled risk assessment.

Spinach included? How about the lettuce and the ground beef that have recalled recently? Let's not even go into the mad cow debacle and how there aren't enough inspectors. Food still has tranfats, deceptive labeling abounds, the corruption of the organic label by reclassification, etc. Nope, those of us who can read don't trust a word you say.

Since everything seems to be bad for you, I'm glad that I never gave up fish. I would eat sushi more often if I could afford it.

Dude, you've been fighting women for a long time, you shouldn't get paid for it, though I'm sure a few women wouldn't mind taking a swing at you.

Update: I found another really dumb statement, sheesh it's only been five years what were they waiting for?

To his credit, he asked me to explain the differences. I told him briefly about the schism that developed after the death of the Prophet Muhammad, and how Iraq and Iran are majority Shiite nations while the rest of the Muslim world is mostly Sunni. “Now that you’ve explained it to me,” he replied, “what occurs to me is that it makes what we’re doing over there extremely difficult, not only in Iraq but that whole area.”

Say it isn't so, the crew without a clue has missed another of the basics?

My dad was a Mason and I was always interested in becoming one. Then i found out my plumbing made me ineligble. I used to read a lot of historical fiction and one book was set just before and during the Revolutionary War with a woman as one of the heroes and she became a Mason, secretly of course.

So I'll bet you can tell how I feel about this article. If they really are trying to bring the Masons into the 21st Century with an open door policy, shouldn't that include women?

I find that an organization that has a separate branch for women is almost always a token program at best and patronizing at worst.

Besides, too many high pitched voices set me on edge.

If I've Told You Once

IMG_5854, originally uploaded by evilgod.

Duck! I've told you a thousand times. Get out of my seat!!

This week's entry into the Random Flickr Blogging project.

Interesting Times

Of all the people who have disappointed me politically in the last six years Sandra Day O'Connor tops the list. At the time the country needed her the most, she walked away. I realize her husband had Alzheimer's but the needs of the many sometimes outweigh the needs of the few.

Her resignation has swung the court in an untenable direction, led by those who would put their own beliefs ahead of the populace. The conservatives who like to have things both ways or as I like to refer to them, the do as I say not as I do crowd, are determined to remake America as the mirror image of Afghanistan under the Taliban and her timing on leaving the high court has increased the speed and boldness of their crusade against women.

When I hear Scalia say things like

"The Constitution very clearly forbids discrimination on the basis of race," Scalia said in response to a question by moderator Pete Williams of NBC. "It doesn't seem to me to allow Michigan to say we think it's good to discriminate on the basis of race when you want to make sure everyone is exposed to different backgrounds. We cannot use race as the test of diversity."

because his rationale is

During Sunday's debate, Scalia outlined his judicial philosophy of interpreting the Constitution according to its text, as understood at the time it was adopted. He reiterated that race has no place in school admissions, a viewpoint that put him on the losing side in 2003.

I feel chills run up and down my spine because using that logic makes me worth less than three fifths of a human being. While slaves fell under the Three-Fifths Compromise, women weren't included at all. We had to wait for the Nineteenth Amendment.

Since we have very little of the Bill of Rights that will be in force after the Decider signs the Military Commissions Act, the rest of them can't be far behind. Actually, I think the Military Commissions Act guts the Fourteenth Amendment and nobody is talking about that. Though I do find one small ray of hope

But during Sunday's debate, Scalia noted there were cases in which he and the ACLU agreed. They included rulings upholding flag burning and a 2004 opinion arguing that a U.S. citizen seized in Afghanistan in wartime could challenge his detention as an enemy combatant in U.S. courts.

One very small ray, I don't know how strong it really is.

When I was a little girl I just knew that the future would change all the restrictions I saw for women. I had faith that as time went on the world (the world did, America not so much) would become more accepting of women and their capabilities and it really looked like women would finally be considered equal. When Ms. O'Connor was raised to the Supreme Court I knew she would be a voice of calm and reason. I knew that in thirty years we would have parity. Boy was I wrong. We almost got there but now there are no longer any level voices left to keep the scales in balance. The past will become the future.

We are living in interesting times that I hope will not become a curse.

Crossposted at Big Brass Blog.

I Heart Rachel Ray

The very first time I saw Rachel Ray on tv I thought to myself "wow, major Heart Fire", which is a polite way of saying that the person exhibits a certain set of irritating symptoms which include but are not limited to: talking rapidly, quick movements, inappropriate or constant giggling or laughter, ill-considered speech, an inability to tolerate heat. On the bright side a Heart type person is warm, friendly and can be empathetic and there when you need them.

The Heart is considered to be the Emperor of the body, it rules how we see and interact with the world. The old saying that the eyes are the window to the soul is true in Chinese Medicine. Whereas the Liver is the General (control freak) of the body, the Heart is the ceremonial ruler, very rarely involved in the day to day activities but everything revolves and depends on the Heart. As Ted Kaptchuk loves to point out, the duty of the Emperor is to be in the right place at the right time. It's a long and fascinating lecture, but that is the gist of it.

Therein lies the secret of her success. Perhaps she's a star because that breakneck energy and interjection-riddled vocabulary are genuinely appealing, although if that's the case I may have to move to another, far more dour corner of the globe. I prefer to believe she's made it despite the relentless ebullience, that she connects because she understands that for a whole lot of people, getting dinner on the table is a major accomplishment. You work late, you take care of your kids, you have no time to shop. You contemplate choking down a solitary Luna Bar or picking up a supersize bucket of trans fats at the drive-through. Rachael Ray says there's another option, and with her chipper, can-do attitude, she demystifies cooking. If she weren't sugarcoated to the gills, her message would be almost too tough to take. Suck it up, she's saying. If I can do it, you can to it. Take one lousy half-hour and get a hot meal together, for yourself and for your family. A real meal, preferably the kind with some lean meat and fresh vegetables. No expensive equipment or specialty store ingredients; no fancy French terms or techniques. No excuses.

She used to get on my nerves too, but I got past it because most of her ideas work for me, they make my life easier and just because I can cook a gourmet meal with less than two hours notice doesn't mean I want to do it all the time.

But consider this: 66 percent of Americans are overweight or obese, while fast food and takeout consumption and portion sizes have ballooned. It's estimated that less than half of American families sit down to eat together every night. It doesn't take a genius to figure out how these things are related. So if the woman that Anthony Bourdain is not unjustified in referring to as a bobble-head can make dinner a little less intimidating, I can admit she may not be the antichrist. If she understands the vicissitudes of the dinner hour well enough to divide a recent tome into "Meals for the Exhausted," "Meals for the Not Too Tired" and "Bring It On! (But Be Gentle)," she can girlishly giggle herself all the way to the bank. And if, most important of all, a fair share of her recipes actually pass the taste test, she's welcome on my shelf any day.

Her tips about getting everything ready when you bring it home saves time in the middle of the week and that really is the heart of the matter. Anything or anyone that can get America to change its diet and allow families to spend time together is ok in my book. Suck it up four nights a week and you will even save money. Even with her frenetic schedule, I hear she cooks at home. There is something about us cooks, we prefer our own cooking.

What's That Saying?

Stupid is as stupid does? Who would have thought you would find someone so...clueless in Sausalito? When I first read the article title I thought what now, but TM has been studied extensively with patients hooked up to MRI machines. To say nothing of the fact that while you may be suggestible under hypnosis you still will only do what is in your basic makeup. In other words, if you wouldn't kill somebody during your normal day to day activities you won't kill someone under hypnosis. Sheesh, her kids must have a very restrictive home life.

Parent Susan Crittendon said the group has raised some concerns.

"Its the beginning of a whole new philosophy of life. They work by putting people in trances, and when you're in a trance you're more suggestible," parent Susan Crittendon.

For a parent passing judgement and trying to prevent others from doing something she doesn't approve of, she could at least do some research before making a fool of herself. Transcendental Meditation is not a religion and it is not a cult. It has been studied in western medicine and proved to have beneficial effects on a person's health. In addition to relieving stress and anxiety, it also lowers blood pressure.

I took a yoga class when I was at Cal Poly and had a calculus class afterwards. The morning of midterms the yoga instructor noticed we were pretty tense and she spent the whole class focusing us on our breathing and settling us down. When I went to take the test it was like the answers appeared like little pop ups as I read the question. It was one of my higher scoring tests.

She probably will object to these other methods of helping kids learn. The only blue light she trusts is the one for the KMart special and keeping a rhythm is probably the equivalent of the devil's work.

Bible Belt Thinking

Earlier this morning I was over at Mark's place and a quote from one of his posts started me thinking. Yeah, I know it's dangerous but I couldn't help myself.

Many years ago I worked at Universal Studios. I was temping and the union called me up and asked if I was willing to take a pretty stressful job. I needed the money so I said yes. I was one of seven people who sat in a little room and answered the extra phone lines that had just been installed to handle the flood of calls regarding the limited (at that time) release of the Last Temptation of Christ.

A few weeks earlier I had been working for a VP who lost her job (hence the temping) and was setting up her office for her new producing gig (I couldn't go with her because I wasn't a production secretary) and the phone rang. This nice man identified himself as the Rev. Wildmon and asked me if I was going to see the movie. I said no, it wasn't my sort of movie (Life of Brian was better). He said I should protest and help prevent the release of the movie. I told him don't see it and it will die of its own accord.

No such luck. So there I am sitting in this hot little room answering a phone that was literally ringing off the hook. Our job was to take down the city and state they were calling from. OMG! These people were to put it politely, nuts.

When the calls first started they said things like, "I want to protest about that movie." Which movie would that be? "That one about my Jesus" or "I don't know, my preacher told me to call." I get bored pretty fast when I'm dealing with stupidity so I start to egg the callers on, trying to find out if they knew why they were calling. They didn't, but their pastor told them it was important so they went home and dialed away. The same people would call over and over. I'm really good with voices and by the second day I recognized the serial callers, I can't believe the money they wasted, sometimes there were so many callers that the hold time was 20 minutes. And then they would call right back.

By the end of the first week I was taking about 700 calls a day. By the end of the second week international calls started coming in. Well, if you keep writing city and state or country, eventually the geography sinks in. It really is a belt. The calls were predominantly from a narrow band thru the United States and around the world, with the West Coast being an exception.

I was absolutely fascinated by this and would go home at night and look at my world map and mark in the new calls. The Bible belt circled the globe and was desperately trying to reshape the world because of a movie that was only going to be released in New York and Los Angeles for Oscar consideration. Nobody was going to see this movie except the critics and film buffs. Until they made it popular by giving it airplay and untold amounts of free advertising. Universal made a mint once you understand their accounting practices.

As time went on the calls became abusive. I was called names that no Christian should know much less let come out of their mouth. There was this woman from Florida who asked me if I had children. I said no. She said "that's a good thing because if you did they should be taken from you for your low moral character in working for a company like this."

After four weeks of this I'm pretty tired of it all and I end up in a discussion, which was broadcast on a radio station in Ventura, with a lawyer who finally tells me that the First Amendment should be repealed if movies like this can be made. I lost it and told him he was a quack that couldn't think straight and that the bar must have been very easy that year in order for him to have passed it, hung up and got a new job. There wasn't enough money in the world to put up with that crap.

So now it's almost 20 years later and they are still at it and their influence is growing. What bothers me is that people are still following without thinking, willing to give up everything that this country stood for in the foolish pursuit of religious fundamentalism.

Our Founding Fathers would be so unhappy with their offspring. The people who first settled in this country would be pleased in one way since they shared the same intolerant views but times are different now and the makeup of the country is different. If the Amish can live peacefully and according to their values in America, why can't the so called religious right? It isn't necessary for them to impose their views on the majority, we'll leave them alone if they leave us alone.

Must Of Killed Her

To have a compliment and Bill Clinton in the same sentence. Modo must find the devil she knows preferable to the one she doesn't, but then I'm no longer fond of John "Wormtail" McCain.

On a trip to Detroit to campaign for a Republican Senate candidate, Mr. McCain singled out Hillary for a shellacking on North Korea. “I would remind Senator Clinton and other Democrats critical of Bush administration policies that the framework agreement her husband’s administration negotiated was a failure,” he said.

The next morning on CBS’s “The Early Show,” he was asked why he would blame the Clintons for North Korea’s batty behavior.

It’s clear, after all, that the North Koreans are acting immaturely in response to W. acting immaturely. They want attention because the Bush administration inexplicably refuses to talk to them. And they know, in the pre-emptive world ordained by nutty Dick Cheney, that the best way to protect themselves from the fate of Saddam Hussein is to actually go nuclear, rather than merely fantasizing and boasting about it.

Unfortunately that is oh so true and if it continues to be improperly handled by the crew without a clue it could conceivably get worse with more infantile behavior on both sides.

But the Republicans love to blame Bill Clinton for everything, from the radioactive Congressional page explosion to the radioactive North Korean explosion.

Too bad about all those Republicans having to go to jail for ethics issues and now they have a morals problem. Poor widdle babies.

Mr. McCain told Hannah Storm that he “was responding to attacks made on President Bush by Mrs. Clinton, Senator Kerry, Senator Reid and other Democrats.” Hillary advisers noted that she was called “Mrs.” while the others were called “Senator.”

Just as the male Republican front-runner, known for a short fuse, must be careful how he attacks the female Democratic front-runner, the former first lady must be careful how she attacks the war hero.

Why? He should be tough, he's a veteran and a surviving POW. You shouldn't dish it out if you can't take it.

If she doesn’t respond forcefully, she’s not fit for the alpha chair in the Oval; if she responds too forcefully, the Republicans will try to paint her as an angry harridan who would nag us to death, or go all hypersensitive on us.

“It hurts her when she gets in a defensive crouch on her husband’s record,” a McCain adviser said.

Clearly, the missus does not think so. Billary has their 2008 war room running and finger-wagging. Just as they teamed up recently to punch back when Condi and Bush boosters accused Bill of being lax with Al Qaeda before 9/11, Hillary swiftly rebutted the charge that Bill was lax with North Korea, calling it “ridiculous.”

Privately, Hillary’s camp was not overly upset by the McCain swipe because it suspected he was doing the bidding of the White House and that he ended up, as one adviser put it, “looking similar to the way he did on those captive tapes from Hanoi, where he recited the names of his crew mates.” Besides, Senator Clinton does like to cruise on her husband’s coattails and remind Americans that the economy was exploding and the world wasn’t.

Now that was funny.

Hillary’s people think she’s better off tying herself to les bon-temps-roulez Bill years than Mr. McCain is tying himself to the war-without-end W. years. “It’s bad enough that he strapped himself to a broken Acme rocket on Iraq and the economy, now he’s strapping himself on North Korea,” said one. “People were enamored of his independence, but now he just seems like Bush’s windup toy, the obedient corporal.”

Linking to W. may become even more problematic if Republicans lose the House next month, and Democrats begin a lollapalooza of investigations into W.’s economic policies, Katrina management methods, Iraq military plan and Iraq reconstruction record.

But Hillary and her first lad have their work cut out for them in trying to take out a popular war hero, according to Mark Halperin and John Harris, authors of “The Way to Win: Taking the White House in 2008.”

“Our sense right now,” Mr. Halperin says, “is that McCain would beat any Democrat including Hillary Clinton, and Clinton would beat any Republican except for McCain.”

Naive schmuck that I am, I keep hoping for some other viable candidates. At one time I thought the first woman president was going to be Elizabeth Dole, until the Republicans had a brain fart and sent us down our current path to destruction.

Conspiracy Theory

Yup, I have one but it's for the future, not the past. As some of you know, I really don't believe that the November elections are going to help bring back America or its Constitution. Not that I believe the Democrats aren't going to make substantial gains in Congress, I do.

What I don't believe is that it is going to matter. One way or another, by hook or by crook, Bush and cronies will ensure that there is no change of the power structure in Washington. They just can't afford it.

I believe that possible strategies include altering results, prohibiting citizens from voting, disregarding election results, a new national security disaster and/or any other tactic up to and including declaring martial law. The latter should be very interesting.

Why do I believe this wacky scenario might come true? As stated above, they can't afford anything else. Congressional inquiries and the dreaded impeachment process loom large. Accountablity and responsibility have not exactly been the hallmarks of this administration, when things go wrong blame a Clinton. Planning hasn't exactly been their strong suit either, as has been evidenced from invading Afghanistan and letting Osama bin Laden slip free, to the debacle in Iraq in which the Iraqi people perceive us to be the invaders as their country devolves into civil war, to the destruction of the Gulf Coast by Katrina and the convenient levee breaches in New Orleans for some opportune voter reapportionment, to playing mucho macho with North Korea.

Bush came into office under cloudy circumstances, stayed in office under murky circumstances and is perfectly capable of ensuring his own little voter version of "stay the course" by using dire circumstances. Every time it seems he doesn't have a plan, his cronies benefit. Why they are in a panic now I just don't understand.

I look forward to being wrong.

Do Your Eyes Leak When You Read The News From Iraq?

Mine do. I can't help it and anyone who has known me in person would be very surprised because tears do not come easily to me. When I'm angry and frustrated, yes, but I can usually be detached when I'm reading.

Not so with the Iraq war and the casualty counts. We are losing young lives for no discernible reason and destroying yet another generation in the foolish pursuit of pride. We have accomplished what the Decider initially said was the goal. Capture Saddam. Check. Weapons of Mass Destruction. There weren't any, check. Engender a democracy. The Iraqis had their purple finger moment. Check.

Why are we still there? We aren't going to win the war on terror by causing more of it. Heck, because of current policies we are causing terror within the USA. When military families are afraid to open their door because they don't want to talk to the chaplain (imagine it was your family that waits for news) and the other military suit with him, that is terror perpetrated on those who are giving the most and only them.

This grief is not evenly distributed amongst all Americans, it is being suffered by an unfortunate few. With every deployment that a service member serves, their chances of dying increase. During the Vietnam conflict people volunteered to serve more than one tour, it wasn't forced upon them. Now we have active duty service members, the Reserves and the National Guard who are serving more than one tour. Some are up to three and four.

As long as just a few serve and pay the ultimate price, this war does not exist except as an abstraction to most Americans and that is just not right. Everyone should weep or have to swallow hard every time a service member dies. Otherwise, ir just doesn't matter, it is someone else's war, someone else's problem, someones else's loved one.

I wish I could be cold and dispassionate about Iraq, but after reading the latest stories of the fallen I now understand why my dad was so angry when I enlisted before the Vietnam Conflict was declared over. He knew that nobody cared except the people who were left to grieve.

Crossposted at Big Brass Blog.

The New TV Season

Is much better than last year. I am enjoying several new shows in addition to the old standbys (CSI, NCIS, Numb3rs, BSG, Lost, L&O,). I would like to watch Veronica Mars but can't find it online or iTunes. I don't have cable and I seem to be surviving pretty well.

iTunes has been very helpful, while CBS and ABC have great online viewing options but I haven't been as faithful to old shows as I am to my new interests. NBC forces me to pay iTunes because I won't use Internet Exploder and I use a Mac, but then I have the episodes to watch over and over again if need be.

Three new shows are on my new must see list. First up since it starts at the beginning of the week. Heroes. It is fascinating, the characters are interesting and I just like it. Wednesday scores with two new shows. From CBS we have Jericho, which up until recently sounded a little far fetched, now, not so much. This also has great characterization and an engaging storyline even though I am wondering where the people from the plane and the train went to, maybe those questions are answered in last night's episode which I still have to watch. Jericho actually introduces plot points that most shows would gloss over, like 24's (I can hardly wait for January!) nuclear explosion in the second season did. What would happen to all those planes in the air?

Lastly, we have The Nine on ABC. I like it. Dark, gritty and fascinating, just like the others (no not the ones from Lost). It continues on the path blazed by Boomtown in showing the same scenes from different perspectives. There's the truth and then there is what actually happened.

Hopefully these three shows will make it to the end of their storyline, unlike Kidnapped which I also enjoyed.

Umm, Yes I Do

Because you speak with either a forked tongue or you are talking out both sides of your...mouth.

On the radio, Rice asked rhetorically, "Does anybody really believe that somebody would have walked into my office and said, oh, by the way, there's a chance of a major attack against the United States and I would have said, well, I'm really not interested in that information?"

"I mean, it's just ridiculous," said Rice.

"Of course we knew that there were grave threats that were being -- that were in the intelligence during that period of time," Rice continued. "We were actively working with the FAA, working with other domestic agencies."

Rice claimed that "even though it appeared that this attack was likely to take place overseas, we were putting our forces on alert, we moved our ships out of port."

"We had a very active program to deal with what were nebulous threats but quite serious threats in this period," Rice said. "So the charge is just ridiculous."

Is that why September 11 happened and nobody knew what to do until after all the damage was done? Didn't she say no one could have anticipated that anyone would hijack a plane and fly it into a building? And where is that Osama been Forgotten again guy? I get confused since she uses the exact same excuse for whatever scenario is presented to her.

In regards to how many Iraqi people have been killed and the difficulty Ms. Rice has in conceptualizing hundreds of thousands why doesn't she try some simple math. The Iraqi people have lost over ten thousand people in sectarian violence since May. That isn't counting those we bombed, shot, raped or killed since we invaded their country in March 2003. Granted the numbers are higher now but they have always been up there, the US just decided not to count the Iraqi dead (they really didn't matter to the PTBs) until recently. I rather think that the Iraqi people have a better idea of what is going on in their country than you do. Speaking of which, Riverbend is missing and I trust her accounts a heckuva lot more than I do yours. I really don't want to add her to my RIP category but it isn't looking good because she seems to be a responsible type and it would have to be an extreme circumstance to prevent her from voicing her opinion.

Ms. Rice you should be concerned about her because she was supposed to benefit from this democracy that you keep babbling about, not have her life in utter ruins, unable to venture outside the home without proper dress and an escort. That would be a male family member, not the Secret Service.

Opposites Are Interesting

As the Foley scandal continues to deviate from investigating his predatory sexual instincts to who knew what and when, I find my favorite piece of snark in the WaahPoo.

Van Der Meid is the relative newcomer -- he came to the speaker's office after guiding the ethics committee's probe of then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.). Known by some as the mayor of the House, Van Der Meid has the institutional knowledge of the chamber's customs. He handles legal matters but has been known to intervene angrily on a shade of carpet or which paintings to hang on the Capitol's walls.

Meow! Meanwhile back in the heartland, Passion Parties are the new rage and the conversations at these women only events embarassed the male reporter. Locker room talk is nowhere near as graphic as women when they get started. One of the conversations was quite interesting because it shows a differing view of gays.

But they do loosen up a little, and begin cracking a few jokes about vibrators and talking about where to go for a bachelorette outing the next weekend.

Somebody suggests Shaft, a gay nightclub in St. Joseph. “I like it there. The gay guys know how to dance, they’re fun, and they don’t try to pick you up.”

So very true. I'm going to have do some research on that Pulsating Orbiter though.

Yesterday I saw two different headlines. The first one was "Are men smarter than women?" This was followed by "Men will delay emergency room visits for a good game." Hmm, I guess common sense wasn't a factor in the study.

How Little The Times Have Changed

When I was a little girl there were no dolls of color, which didn't really bother me because I thought dolls were boring (I had discovered books). I did have one doll and that was my Betsy Wetsy. I loved that doll. I had the one with the delay wetting feature and always used to set my dad up to be wet on until it mysteriously disappeared during a move.

I do know that I would have had the same reaction as the kids in this study, you can't help it when everything and everyone around you demonizes the color of your skin and you are made to feel ashamed because you don't have straight blond hair. Kids are smarter and more observant than they are given credit for, they just might not be able to express it as well. As has been noted before, kids say the darndest things.

Defending The Middle Class

Lou Dobbs posts a seriously good commentary about the war on the middle class and how and why we should fight back.

They've accomplished this through large campaign contributions, armies of lobbyists that have swamped Washington, and control of political and economic think tanks and media. Lobbyists, in fact, are the arms dealers in the war on the middle class, brokering money, influence and information between their clients our elected officials.

Yet in my entire career, I've literally never heard anyone in Congress argue that lobbyists are bad for America. In 1968 there were only 63 lobbyists in Washington. Today, there are more than 34,000, and lobbyists now outnumber our elected representatives and their staffs by a 2-to-1 margin.

According to the nonpartisan Center for Public Integrity, from 1998 through 2004, lobbyists spent nearly $12 billion to not only influence legislation, but in many cases to write the language of the laws and regulations.

Individual firms, corporations and national organizations spent a record $2.14 billion on lobbying members of Congress and 220 other federal agencies in 2004, according to PoliticalMoneyLine. That's nearly $6 million a day spent to influence our leaders. We really do have the best government money can buy.

That is almost funny except that while Congress may act like the Keystone Cops they have been as efficient as the KGB in eliminating positive routes of escape for the poor and middle class.

In both Republican and Democratic administrations, Congress has passed and sustained billions of dollars in royalty payments and subsidies to big oil companies; pushed through a corporate-written, consumer-crippling bankruptcy law; embraced the death of the estate tax; approved every free trade deal brought to a vote; and supported illegal immigration for the sake of cheap labor.

The party strategists and savants are telling us that fewer Americans will turn out to the polls than ever before, disgusted by a disgraced former congressman. But we don't have to wait for the midterm elections to begin to engage in our new political life.

That may be so, but voter interest is quite high, let's hope that talk translates into action.

North Korea, what a fine kettle of fish and it stinks. Imposing economic sanctions is going to do nothing but torque them off, as if we care. I actually do care but once again I'm in the minority. When you back a tired, hungry, anxious animal into a corner and then poke it, you can expect a blind unreasoning attack in an effort to get away. Nobody likes being backed into a corner. I don't care how many countries jump on board it won't make a difference.

What are people expecting? That North Korea will be properly chastened and deliver all of their nuclear materials to the DMZ and say we won't do it anymore? That is some crazy stuff the administration is smoking if they think that is going to happen. While I keep hearing that the explosion wasn't big enough to be viable, I'm thinking it was big enough for a suitcase bomb since North Korea sells everything it makes and no matter what sanctions are imposed, bad people will always want weapons.

Unfortunately, the writing has been on the wall for a while, I noticed it with my younger brother and teenagers are completely lost because it doesn't fit in with their world. I hardly ever use cursive because my hand cramps up and that is what keyboards are for, isn't it?

Five Years Later

And anything that goes wrong is still Clinton's fault. When is the GOP going to take responsibility for anything? They are quick to grab the credit for things that they did not set in motion but not so quick to say they made a mistake. Next thing you know Clinton will be responsible for Mark Foley's inability to comprehend that teenagers are tall children, not short adults.

Mr. McCain you should be ashamed of yourself. You say you want to be president. Here's a unique idea. Why don't you come up with a solution instead of blaming someone in the past for today's precarious political climate that was created by the current resident of the White House. Show some initiative instead of whining that it isn't the fault of the people who have been in power for five years. It might look more presidential.

Just a thought.

Lazy Tuesday

Well, it seems that relaxing environmental standards in America is just the tip of the iceberg, we are the world's dumping ground for products that are banned elsewhere. Why would anyone want to use a product that is banned in its country of origin? The Chinese won't use it so they export it to us? This is reminiscent of when we shipped bad baby's milk to Africa except now we are the end consumers of dangerous products. Who would have thought we would be treated like a third world country? And pay for it?

We might have to readjust our definition of sentience, elephants have been showing their dissatisfaction with their treatment and the deterioration of their environment. Makes one wonder about the whale and dolphin reactions.

All head injuries are serious but young people are even more at risk. Even a mild concussion can have permanent effects which include learning disorders and personality changes.

Medicine is starting to approach Star Trek with some innovative thinking. Nannites that can be swabbed onto a gaping wound or a tiny artery in the brain to control bleeding. What a concept.

The Mediterranean diet scores again. I like it because it tastes good (mainly during the summer) but now it is being recommended for Alzheimer's prevention. Bring on the fresh fish, with olive oil, vegetables and fruit. Yum.

TinTin's New Job

IMG_7382, originally uploaded by greendot.

As a radish inspector wasn't as exciting as her previous assignments for the Thunderbirds, but it was just as important. Every vegetable must be checked because the nefarious E. Co. Li had been systematically poisoning salad ingredients in an effort to destroy the Vegetables For Life Organization headed by Lady Penelope. Knowing that vegetables are good for you and that people were no longer eating them because they were scared, Alan and TinTin posed as a migrant family in order to check the operation from the ground up.

Random Flickr Blogging explained here.