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Friday, August 29, 2003
You carry 27 pounds, what do you get? Another day older and deeper in debt
While my daughter lounges on Kaanapali Beach, I attended her freshman orientation (cuz I'm a good dad) to get her locker assignment, class schedule, and make arrangements with the athletic director for a place to store her helmet and shoulder pads (the girl's locker room not having lockers quite big enough). I also picked up her textbooks...all twenty-seven pounds of them. I know she won't be carrying all of them everyday, but jeez, 27pounds? That's almost a quarter of her body weight.
Of particular interest, to me anyway, was her reading list for freshman English:
Lord of the Flies
Cyrano de Bergerac
Cold Sassy Tree
The Color of Water
The House on Mango Street
Things Fall Apart
I'm pretty pleased with this list. Looks like we're a long way from the books I read as a freshman.
posted by tbogg at 11:24 AM
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Fight on, you mighty Couch Potatoes. You mighty spuds of Goucher...
Maybe if blobby momma's boy Jonah Goldberg had gone to a real college, he know what that thing is called:
PRIDE OF ITHACA [Jonah Goldberg]
As I'm sure you all already talked about, Cynthia McKinney's going to be a visiting professor at Cornell . Maybe she can get one of those mortarboard hat thingies made out of tinfoil.
Hmmmm. Let's see....
Cynthia McKinney:
Born in Atlanta, Georgia on March 17, 1955, Cynthia currently lives in south DeKalb County. She earned a B.A. in International Relations from the University of Southern California in 1978 and is currently working to complete her dissertation in international relations at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. In 1984, Cynthia worked as a Diplomatic Fellow at Spellman College in Atlanta. She also taught political science at Clark Atlanta University and later at Agnes Scott College, a women's college in Decatur, Georgia. Before being elected to Congress, Cynthia served on the board of the HIV Health Services Planning Council of Metro Atlanta from 1991-92.
Jonah Goldberg:
Goucher College.
Yes, I'm sure that Goucher is a swell school, but I don't think that they want their claim to fame to be as the school that educated the only thing that's been in Lucianne Golberg's vagina, and lived to tell about it....
posted by tbogg at 10:49 AM
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Free Read the Eschaton Four
How you going to keep them down on the farm...after they got a taste of that high-payin' blogging?
Corrente
posted by tbogg at 12:50 AM
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The similarities don't end with the name
Guess which little Iraqi is going to get his ass kicked everyday he goes to school for the rest of his life?
It's a fair bet this Baghdad baby won't run into anybody else in Iraq with the same name.
His parents named their six-week-old son George Bush, to show their appreciation for U.S. efforts to get Saddam Hussein out of power.
If the couple had had twin boys -- the other baby would have been named Tony Blair, because the father says both the U.S. and Britain liberated Iraq.
The boy's mom tells Associated Press Television News that all Iraqis hated Saddam's regime -- and that President Bush saved the Iraqi people from Saddam.
As the woman did the interview, little George Bush screamed in his crib.
[Insert your own joke here...]
posted by tbogg at 12:43 AM
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If we're going to start lynching Christians, can we start with tobyMac?
Focus on the Family's James Dobson plays the 'victim' card:
Chief Justice Roy Moore (search), who installed the 5,280-pound monument, said he was skipping the rally, the largest yet of the weeklong vigil, because he doesn't want supporters to make the fight about him rather than about the public acknowledgment of God the monument in the rotunda represented.
"I don't want people to lose sight of what this is about," Moore said. "What this issue is about is the acknowledgment of God and that issue has never been decided."
Christian evangelist and national radio talk show host Dr. James Dobson (search) led the rally instead.
"I came here to make a statement about what we all believe. We're in a great moral struggle of our own. It can be said that people of faith are being sent to the back of the bus -- and we're not gonna go there," Dobson said, comparing the struggle to that of Rosa Parks (search), which also took place in Montgomery.
I see that we have dropped the bar of oppression so low that you can't even slip an epistle under it. Dobson was also going to comment that he was "tired of being kept down by the man" until it was pointed out that he was the man...
And haven't we really heard a bit more about Alabama in the last few weeks than we really need to? I mean, c'mon...it's Alabama. We only allow them to remain a part of the Union to make Mississippi feel better about itself....
posted by tbogg at 12:32 AM
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Treason
Looks like Pat Buchanan is calling for the overthrow of our government:
If you don't like the decisions, they say, go pass a constitutional amendment. But that requires the approval of two-thirds of both houses of Congress and three-fourths of the states in seven years. And, who decides what the amendment means when it is ratified? The same justices of the Supreme Court.
By usurping powers never granted to it, the Supreme Court has imposed a revolution upon our nation. Congress has refused to resist it. Presidents have refused. It is time for a counter-revolution to overthrow this rule of judges and restore our Constitution. The Founding Fathers who overthrew a king, less odious and tyrannical, would have understood.
Pat would be the first one to man the ramparts , but he's got that trick knee, you see, and well, he wouldn't be much good in a fight, and besides he's more of a "big picture" guy....
posted by tbogg at 12:06 AM
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Thursday, August 28, 2003
Is your resume padded or are you just happy to see me
I was going to read this column from Focus on the Family's Stu Shepard until he wrote something that brought me up short:
Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore's Ten Commandments monument may be out of public sight, but the debate is not. One key question at the center of the controversy: When is it appropriate — or even necessary — for Christians to disobey a court order?
There are several reasons why the situation Moore finds himself in demands defiance of a federal court order, according to former United Nations ambassador Alan Keyes.
Say wha-?
" former United Nations ambassador Alan Keyes".
This is a common stunt by Keyes who has actually been addressed as "Ambassador" by those wholly-without-merit reporters over at Fox News, and Alan never corrects them. For the record:
Alan Keyes - Ambassador to the U.N. Economic and Social Council
...which is not quite the same as former United Nations ambassador Alan Keyes.
Calling him "ambassador is just as ludicrous as MSNBC calling his cancelled TV show: Alan Keyes is Making Sense. Here's a fairly amusing spin on the cancellation of Keyes show. See how many lies you can count. Here's one to get you started:
Dick Morris, widely considered the most influential political consultant in America, appeared on the show and, after calling a Keyes comment "brilliant," said, "There's a difference between talk-show hosts and people who know what they're talking about, and you just showed that."
posted by tbogg at 11:44 PM
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Justice delayed is ...just the way it's going to be around here.
Prosecutors Fight DNA Use for Exoneration
After seeing more than 130 prisoners freed by DNA testing in the last 15 years, prosecutors in Florida and across the country have mounted a vigorous challenge to similar new cases.
Prosecutors acknowledge that DNA testing is reliable, but they have grown increasingly skeptical of its power to prove innocence in cases where there was other evidence of guilt. Defense lawyers say these prosecutors, who often relied on the same biological evidence to convict the defendants before DNA testing was available, are more committed to winning than to justice.
The fight has become particularly heated in Florida, where prisoners will soon be barred from seeking DNA testing for old cases under a 2001 law that set an Oct. 1 deadline for such requests
Go read the whole article and then see if you don't ask yourself the simple question: Shouldn't the prosecutors job be to get it right?
posted by tbogg at 11:19 PM
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Twenty seven heads sharing four brains
Kathryn Jean Lopez, the Den Mother of The Corner is shocked that Al Franken had fourteen researchers for his book.
THE FOX NEWS LAWSUIT WAS RIDICULOUS [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
But so is this: Al Franken had 14 Harvard research assistants working on Lies.
Posted at 05:37 AM
But she apparently sees nothing wrong with The Corner employing, oh, twenty or thirty Not Ready For Big Media Players to crank out important stuff like this on a daily basis for The National Review:
LOOK FOR [Susan Konig]
my upcoming collection of short stories, Emily Dickinson Comes Out and other stories. Not yet published (like KJL's presidential hunk book) but ripe to be made into a major motion picture starring Ashton Kutcher as the mail man of Amherst.
Posted at 11:33 PM
SUSAN [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
That was so profoundly disturbing.
Posted at 11:32 PM
HERE'S ONE TO PONDER AS YOU TURN IN [Susan Konig]
My Life had stood -- a Loaded Gun --
In Corners -- till a Day
The Owner passed -- identified --
And carried Me away --
Posted at 11:31 PM
E.D. [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
Maybe it's the hour, Susan, and the fact I am still way behind where I should be work-wise [WHAT? WAS THAT COSMO WHO SAID "THEN SHUT YOUR BROWSER, LOPEZ?" NO, THE DOG'S IN MAINE, MUST HAVE BEEN JONAH'S ABANDONED COUCH], but that is such a relief.
Posted at 11:17 PM
KATHRYN: [Susan Konig]
If it makes you feel any more brainy (I know it does me), did you know that you can sing almost any Emily Dickinson poem to the tune of "The Yellow Rose of Texas"?
Try it:
Because I could not stop for Death --
He kindly stopped for me --
The Carriage held but just ourselves --
And Immortality.
Posted at 11:16 PM
I'M NOT PROUD [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
I really should have attended the Derbyshire school (can you imagine?). I discovered just now I have, instead of Derb's 20 memorizable poems (plus Psalm add-on), I have the lyrics to Air Supply, Mr. Mister, the Bee Gees...What clutters the mind! Something tells me that nothing clutters the Derb mind, it is all put to some constructive use--whether it be in one of his countless careers...somewhere, someday....(before the history of NRO is written, Derb will be a cult-hero/legend).
Posted at 11:05 PM
THE CHILDREN, AGAIN [Andrew Stuttaford]
Rule 1: When someone talks about 'the children' watch out for your wallet.
Rule 2: When someone talks about 'the children' watch out for your freedoms.
And now, it seems:
Rule 3: When someone talks about ‘the children’ watch out for your democracy.
According to the London Sunday Times (no link) Germany’s parliament is to consider a proposal which would give parents the right to cast additional ballots for each of their children below the age of 18. A Green parliamentarian interviewed by the Sunday Times compared the move to the campaign for female suffrage and added this:
“This is no joke because there are millions of little people living in our society today who often have more informed political views than adults who are currently being discriminated against simply on account of their age.”
Votes for these “little people?” Oh, pleathe. I think I am going be thick.
Who knew that the National Review was a Workfare project?
posted by tbogg at 10:31 AM
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We're looking for a few pouty-lipped, long-limbed supermodel types who look hot in wigs...
The CIA goes cheesecake when it comes to recruiting:
The CIA keeps a lot of secrets, but its opinion of ABC's "Alias" is not one of them.
The spy show's star, Jennifer Garner, said she has been asked to contribute to an official video promoting the government agency.
"It's not a commercial," she said. "It's a recruitment video (to show) university graduate students."
Chase Brandon, film industry liaison for the CIA, confirmed that the project was in the works.
Not that there is anything wrong with that. Or this. Or this.
Okay. She's hot, and if you sign up for the CIA you'll be working with women who look just like her.
Honest.
posted by tbogg at 10:18 AM
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"...beat him cross-eyed with a Louisville Slugger"
Local muscian and writer Buddy Blue isn't a big Toby Keith fan:
It's all been a great career move for many a loser passing off their desperation for publicity as he-man patriotism. Even the lead singer of the Marshall Tucker Band, a group so has-been that Wayne Newton thinks they're lame, managed to get his sorry mug back on national television by picking a fight with Maines. A real buncha tough cowboys, these fellas. Keith – he of the constipated baritone grunt and second-grade-level musical skills – led the charge, generating massive exposure for himself in the process, particularly on what Gore Vidal has pegged the 19th Century Fox News Network.
Now, I wouldn't deny Keith or any other reactionary moron the right to spray meanness, stupidity and guileless self-promotion wherever and whenever they choose. Freedom of speech is, after all, the American way. I'd even find their hyperventilating devotion to misery to be amusing theater were it not for the fact that Maines and every other public figure who speaks with even the slightest anti-Bush bent are subject to vilification and organized boycotts. That's not the American way.
Keith is in San Diego tonight, tickets are still available. The Dixie Chicks were here about four weeks ago, their concert was sold out three months in advance. You do the math...
posted by tbogg at 9:12 AM
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Take two Tom Clancy's and call me in the morning
War cheerleader Austin Bay proves that you can get a Ph.D. in English and Comparative Literature from Columbia University and still write.....well, crap:
Our unit reached the Euphrates at three that morning, a full hour ahead of the generals' war plan. As the lead vehicle plowed down the sand bank toward a line of river reeds, mortars moving behind the recon platoon fired two red flares, the flares hanging up there, high, burning hard and long, arcing beneath the winter clouds in the night air over the water. The flares were bright, almost dazzling, and we could see ourselves in outline, tanks, men, the river, the world with a hot red edge.
And that was the moment. We stopped, all of us, and to a man, as if we were the same guy, we pumped out a whoop and shout that for a second seemed to stifle the idling whine of tank engines.
The whoops quit, the flares died. We looked at the muddy river out there in the dark that wasn't total. Since we were so used to the high-speed racket of a tank attack, those first moments at the river felt still --so flat, perfect still-- the clouds, the wet air, the world stopped cold except for the slow, molten water.
But hesitating there, strung out along the river bank after our race in the south Iraqi desert, even as it happened --if you snapped to facts-- you knew the magnificent sense of peace and calm was mental sham. Radio chatter from brigade, the tank engines, the sonic crack of jet aircraft, though numb ears ignored them they persisted, and they are not the details of peace.
Yet the sensation of it, the stopping hard at the river with the killing behind us, that sensation was so decent, a change of immediate condition you knew was better, and if you've been dulled by the quality hammering you take driving cross-country in a sixty-ton armored can, a few seconds of stillness will fool you, bait you with enough fraud calm to get you believing in peace.
I don't know. Do I prefer "mental sham" or "fraud calm"?
In all fairness I shouldn't compare Bay to Clancy, that's cruel. Austin Bay is more like Special Olympics Hemingway.
He has my permission to use that as a jacket blurb....
posted by tbogg at 1:47 AM
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I am so smart my head hurts
Jeff Danziger
posted by tbogg at 1:11 AM
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Remembering the Grievous Angel
As a rule, tribute albums (CD's) generally suck. A few by-the-book covers by name acts to guarantee sales, an edgy remake or two by someone who should know better, and, bringing up the rear, a few more interpretations by second-tier acts that make you realize why they are a second-tier acts. That's why it was such a pleasure to come across a Return of the Grievous Angel a tribute to Gram Parsons yesterday, a CD I bought my wife a couple of years ago, and yet for some reason never listened to.
For those not familiar with Gram Parsons, one could safely say that he's the father of country rock. Without Parsons the Byrds would never have recorded Sweetheart of the Rodeo, and there might never have been any Eagles, Poco, Pure Prarie League, Uncle Tupelo, Jayhawks, or Whiskeytown, and we may never have heard of Emmylou Harris, which would have been a tragedy of epic proportions. Parsons died at the age of 26 having recorded only two solo albums, but he fathered a genre that lives today under the banner of alt-country or No Depression. He left us with songs like In My Hour of Darkness, She (a song I heard Norah Jones perform a few weeks ago), Hickory Wind, and Luxury Liner. For years, the Parsons torch was carried by Emmylou Harris who kept him the public eye just enough to allow later generations to discover him.
Getting back to the CD, suffice it to say that it is a piece of art that brings together Emmylou Harris (as producer & performer), the Pretenders, the Cowboy Junkies, Beck, Evan Dando, Steve Earle, Sheryl Crow, Elvis Costello, Lucinda Williams, Wilco, the incredibly underrated Raul Malo, Whiskeytown, and Gillian Welch for very straighforward versions of Parson's songs that are true to the spirit and understated eloquence of the originals. There's not a bad one in the bunch, although I'm sure someone would quibble over the Cowboy Junkies version of Ooh Las Vegas which is closer to the Cocteau Twins than the Flying Burrito Brothers.
You can read about Parsons here and make sure you take the time to read about the circumstances surrounding his funeral, which is both funny and weird.
Oh. And buy the CD through one of the left-wing America-hating fair & balanced blogs.
You won't regret it.
posted by tbogg at 1:03 AM
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If God didn't want them sheared, He wouldn't have made them sheep
Creepy televangelist D. James Kennedy invites you to Ft. Lauderdale to help reclaim America for Jesus, because, apparently, America used to belong to Jesus but he left the cake out in the rain, or something like that....Anyway:
Join D. James Kennedy, frontline Christian leaders, and hundreds of other Christians at Reclaiming America For Christ 2003, October 24-25 in Fort Lauderdale. This premier grassroots training event will give you the expertise and knowledge you need to speak out and make an impact!
Did I mention that it's going to cost you $150 to attend? Well, it's not like D. Jim is doing God's work for free, after all, the labourer is worthy of his hire (Luke 10:7).
So why should you attend? According to D. Jim, consider the alternative:
You are saying it is not the fault of the liberals. It is not the fault of the atheists, secularists, or the homosexuals, it is the fault of the church?
That is where I put the basic fault, the beginning fault. Now, once the nation is deprived of that Gospel message, many people do not have their lives changed, and they get involved in running pornographic theaters or molesting children, or doing a thousand other things, creating all of the other problems we have in this country. But why do these people do this? The reason they do it is because their hearts have never been changed.
"running pornographic theaters or molesting children"?
Decisions, decisions...so many debaucheries, so little time...
posted by tbogg at 12:06 AM
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Wednesday, August 27, 2003
I'm sure it's not the first time that she's been "late"...
I see that Ann Coulter's Coultergeist™ is still a no-show.
Meanwhile, here's Ann going off the rails and suspiciously prominent adams apple-deep into the swamp of her own fetid lunacy:
Liberals are hopping mad about the war with Iraq. Showing the nuance and complexity of thought liberals pride themselves on, they are excitedly restating all the arguments they made before the war – arguments which were soundly rejected by the American people, the U.S. Congress and the Bush administration.
Before the war, they said Saddam Hussein – their favorite world leader behind Jacques Chirac – was not a threat to America's interests in the region, was not developing weapons of mass destruction, and did not harbor terrorists. Now that we've taken the country and are uncovering mass graves, canisters of poison gases, victims of Saddam's weapons of mass destruction and colonies of terrorists, liberals are claiming the war created it all.
[snip]
But liberals are indignant for every day that we haven't turned a barbaric land into Vermont. They were willing to give Stalin 36 years for the awkwardness of his revolution. We have essentially imposed a revolution on Iraq – and liberals give us a month to work out the bugs. U.S. forces in Baghdad say that Iraq is well on its way to establishing American-style representative democracy and might even be holding its first free elections in less than a year. Within three years, the Iraqi people could be recalling their first governor.
Indeed, the war is going so well that now liberals have to create absurd straw-man arguments no one ever uttered in order to accuse the Bush administration of horrible miscalculations. Amid her sneering, PMS-induced anger toward the Bush administration, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd claimed the Bush administration was "shaken" to discover "the terrible truth: Just because we got Odai and Qusai, Iraqi militants are not going to stop blowing up Westerners." I'd love to see the quote where anyone in the Bush administration – anyone in the universe – said that.
Admittedly, Republicans were not mourning the deaths of Odai and Qusai the way Democrats were, but only a moron would think that killing these two monsters would mark the end of the war on terrorism.
As Monty Burns once said: "Get that Bedlamite to an alienist...."
posted by tbogg at 11:04 PM
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Okay. That leaves lemonade stands, Amway, Mary Kay, and selling stereo speakers out of vans in parking lots.
The US welcomes other countries to try their hand at free enterprise in Iraq...as long as it isn't one of the industries that we handed over to Bush contributors:
American officials here are preparing an order that for the first time in decades would pry open most Iraqi industries for foreign investment, opening a new lifeline for an economy starved of capital during Saddam Hussein's government.
The proposal, outlined in a memo by the top American civilian administrator here, L. Paul Bremer III, and circulated among the Iraqi Governing Council, is a step toward creating a relatively open economy in a region long protective of its domestic markets.
Aware of those sensitivities, the proposal excludes railroads, oil and natural resources, electricity, and water and sewage — areas that are either linked to national security or that might inflame national resentment if opened to foreigners.
Remember...when it comes to Iraq, we're not "foreigners". We are benevolent uninvited guests who aren't willing to just settle for taking the little shampoo bottles, bars of soap, or fluffy white monogrammed robes.
posted by tbogg at 10:30 PM
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Welcome to the Hot Links
World O' Crap
A blog name that I wish I had come up with. A lot of posts that I wish I had come up with also.
posted by tbogg at 10:11 PM
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The kindness of strangers
It would take hours to send emails out to all of the wonderful people who sent me their best wishes, prayers, and advice regarding my father, so let me just start by saying thank you to all the readers and fellow bloggers who have sent along their regards. The last few days have been hard, but we are all getting through it.
For the record, my dad had a stroke late Friday night and was immediately rushed to a trauma unit. When I left him at 2AM he was sitting up talking and had limited usage of his left side, including the ability to use his left arm and hand to hold, and drink, from a cup. Later that morning he was transfered to a different hospital by ambulance and it is now thought that he may have had another stroke on the way or after his arrival while he slept. Because of this, he has lost the complete use of his left side. There are a lot more details that I won't go into, but the good news is that there is a possibility that he may regain some of his abilities. We know that things will never be the same, never be normal again, so we just have to accept that this is the new normal.
It's been hard for me this week because my wife and daughter are in Maui, and so I come home each day to an empty house and my thoughts...and Satchmo the Wonder Basset (that's him snoring on the bed, right now). Your kind words have made this a lot easier on me. Thank you again.
I owe you.
Blogging will resume this afternoon or tonight. I got some stuff we need to talk about....
posted by tbogg at 11:19 AM
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Sunday, August 24, 2003
No blogging for a few days
In all likelihood I won't be blogging for a few days.
On Friday night at about 10pm my father had a stroke, and as we wait to see in which ways he will be impaired, for the first time in my life, words fail me.
I'll be back soon.
posted by tbogg at 11:07 PM
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Friday, August 22, 2003
A big dumb hero for a big dumb people
It's true. It's real. The Bush action figure is a genuine serious item and not, as you would fully expect, a joke, not a parody, not necessarily meant to be a gag gift you would give to your favorite rabid pro-military war aficionado to make them cheer and stroke the flag and sigh wistfully for a time when men were men and Uzis were legal.
There he is, all faux manly and squinty and artificially buffed up, his gull-wing ears toned down and the thin-lipped brow-furrowed monkey confusion so common to his scrunched little face apparently erased by expert doll craftsmen and/or a drunken 50-cents-an-hour sweatshop employee somewhere in China.
There he is, all fierce and makeshift macho and ready to be flown a handful of miles offshore to land on a carefully positioned photo-op aircraft carrier and make an entirely staged entirely bogus internationally embarrassing speech announcing the end of the Iraq war, hee hee suckers whoops sorry about all the dead U.S. soldiers and Iraqi civilians, every day, ever since.
Yeah. It's Mark Morford.
posted by tbogg at 1:27 PM
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"...loves long walks in Crawford, football, pretzels, and spawning. No freaks please."
Now we know what was packed into the flightsuit: a salmon:
President Bush said Friday his administration has helped bring about an increase in salmon populations in the Pacific Northwest while keeping a campaign commitment to affordable hydroelectric power for the region’s citizens.
“WE CAN have good clean hydroelectric power and salmon restoration going on at the same time,” he said to whoops of approval from a crowd assembled on a spot overlooking a Snake River dam.
Democrats, noting that experts believe the increased salmon runs throughout the region are mostly due to weather and tidal patterns in the Pacific Ocean, said it was ludicrous for the president to claim even partial credit.
“George Bush taking credit for increased salmon populations is like a sailor taking credit for the tides,” said Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., who is running for president.
Then again, this is a man who once said: "I know the human being and fish can coexist peacefully." Saginaw, Mich., Sept. 29, 2000
posted by tbogg at 1:23 PM
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You can call me Lou, or Louis if you're not into that whole brevity thing
Atrios points us to Dave at Quark Soup who has some questions about Barry Lynn:
In any case, listening to NPR I learned that Barry Lynn of Americans United for Separation of Church and State is Reverend Barry Lynn. What a disappointment -- this simply strikes me as the height of spin. It's not enough, apparently, that Barry Lynn is an American citizen disgusted with the extent to which religion has pervaded secular life or a concerned activist desirous of planting a stake in the battle of church-vs-state. No, we're supposed to note that Mr. Lynn is Rev. Lynn, and that, apparently, his prosteations(sic) are therefore to carry extra weight because, you know, he's one of them protesting against their very actions.
Like that's supposed to give extra weight to his thoughts.
Like...what a crok(sic).
Please -- PLEASE -- spin me no more. I'm spun out. Is anyone coming from an intellectually neutral perspective??
So let me get this straight...it's not okay for Lynn who is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ to use "Rev." but it's okay to talk to Reverend Jerry Falwell or Reverend Lou Sheldon?
Isn't this calling the kettle calling the crok pot black?
(Sorry...I couldn't help myself.)
I'm also interested in what would be an "intellectually neutral perspective"? If you can't be a believer and you can't be an atheist, whats left? Agnostics, the hedge-betters of theology?
posted by tbogg at 10:32 AM
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Three days worth of fines could imperil
Alabama's annual Montgomery Rickets Festival
Judge Roy Moore is facing fines and jail:
Moore was to be a central figure in a hearing before U.S. District Judge Myron Thompson on Friday, though it was not clear whether the chief justice would attend. He is the subject of a motion filed Wednesday by an attorney for the plaintiffs in the case asking Thompson to hold him in contempt for defying Thompson’s deadline of Thursday 12:01 a.m. to remove the monument from the public viewing area of the court building.
The judge has threatened to impose $5,000-a-day fines against the state if Moore left the monument in the rotunda. But after the eight associate justices of the Alabama high court ordered the marker to be removed, he could elect to punish Moore instead of the state taxpayers.
A state judicial inquiry board also was scheduled to hear accusations that Moore violated his oath by defying Thompson’s order. If the board finds that the complaint has merit, it will forward the matter to a judicial court and Moore would be automatically suspended until a decision is reached.
Meanwhile here's a profile of Moore by Joe Maxwell sent in by reader Kevin, that is so canine in it's worship of him, that it wins this week's covetted Lingua D'Ubaldi. Sample exerpts:
Thomas Jefferson once used the metaphor in a letter. Then the United States Supreme Court dropped it—"wall of separation between church and state"—into a religion-in-school ruling on Feb. 10, 1947.
"I was born on the next day," Roy Moore, chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, states, pausing for effect, his eyes like two pieces of dark, cold coal.
[snip]
Leaning back in his chair, Justice Moore twirls pince-nez between fingers that once pulled the trigger in Vietnam, where his college roommate died. Costly conflict is not new to this native Alabamian, who finds meaning far beyond "duty, honor, country"—his West Point school's motto—in the absolute God of the Bible.
"God is, will be, and has been," the still-fit West Point 56-year-old sighs.
His maroon tie, white shirt buttons, and gold belt buckle strike a straight military line, more even than the tilted scales of justice behind him. Though nationally his message is loud and divisive, at least within his chambers, all is quiet, orderly—almost reverential. Then a Ten Commandment clock—one of many Decalogue devices in his chambers—strikes noon.
"Holy, Holy, Holy" ... The rock table clock clanks out an entire verse of the hymn.
Justice Moore grins peevishly and points beside the clock to a worn green Living Bible with gold-leaf inscription: "Chief Justice Warren Earl Burger"—another gift.
For Justice Moore, words—especially of Scripture—are legally vital, keys to good or bad law, to be handled like prized power tools. He speaks in musical machine-gun spurts, followed by cavernous quiets, as if he is reloading; then another rat-a-tat-tat into the heart of some "vain thought," a quote from Romans 1 he uses to sum up the problems of today's judicial system.
The good folks at the Onion must be in awe of Maxwell. He is either craptastic or suckillicious, I can't make up my mind.
posted by tbogg at 10:04 AM
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President Whistle Ass
You've probably already heard about Sally Baron, but go read about her here.
When Sally Baron's family wrote her obituary, they described a northern Wisconsin woman who raised six children and took care of her husband after he was crushed in a mining accident.
She had moved to Stoughton seven years ago to be closer to her children and was 71 when she died Monday after struggling to recuperate from heart surgery. Her family had come to the question of what might be a fitting tribute to her.
"My uncle asked if there was a cause," her youngest son, Pete Baron, said.
Almost in unison, what her children decided to include in the obituary was this: "Memorials in her honor can be made to any organization working for the removal of President Bush."
"She thought he was a liar," Baron's daughter, Maureen Bettilyon, said. "I think his personality, just standing there with that smirk on his face, and acting like he's this holy Christian, that's what really got her."
Although I didn't know Sally Baron, I still think I know her.
posted by tbogg at 9:27 AM
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The vicarious thrill of a Bill Clinton blowjob
Rush is talkin' football here:
Limbaugh ''absolutely'' wants to work games. And would be now, he says, if ABC hadn't passed him over to pick comedian Dennis Miller for Monday Night Football. Miller was sacked last year to make way for John Madden. ''But if I had been chosen instead, and then Madden became available, I'd still be in the booth,'' Limbaugh says. ''It'd be a three-man booth.''
I don't know whether to make fun of the "3" (3 and a half?) or the "man". When has the Anal Cyst Kid ever been a man? Then there is this:
If Limbaugh leverages his ESPN role to eventually become a sportscasting force, he sounds like he'd be more reverential than Cosell. He suggests TV shouldn't be allowed more access to locker rooms or sidelines because ''you need to keep the mystique in the game. Some things happen (on the field) that fans ought not to know.'' When it comes to football's greats, he might not want to tell it like it is, either: ''I got a lot of people up there on pedestals, and there are some things I don't want to know. I want them to stay up there.''
Since he has George the Second up on a pedestal, does this mean that he wouldn't report it if Commander Codpiece got caught getting an extramarital hoovering? By someone other than Howard Fineman, I mean...
Actually, the thought of Wee Georgie getting his 'tiny' tongued is probably best left undiscussed and unthought of. I'm sure Laura feels the same way.
posted by tbogg at 9:05 AM
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Flood the Zone Friday
Today is Flood the Zone Friday (just like I said above). Go to Not Geniuses and get your marching orders. It'll only take a few minutes of your time and you'll feel so much better afterwards.
Remember. You're fighting for freedom.
posted by tbogg at 8:47 AM
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Thursday, August 21, 2003
The $poil$ of war
Jo over at Democratic Veteran points out where all the money is going in Iraq:
The contract to extinguish and repair the oil infrastructure of Iraq is the true gem of the reconstruction spoils. For starters it is a "cost plus" contract in which the government pays the total cost of work done, plus a profit. The Army Corps of Engineers predicts the total value will amount to $7 billion over two years with KBR taking 7% (about $490 million) as profit. The contract also gives KBR the right to produce and sell oil inside the country of Iraq. Remarkably, this was a closed-door handout granted to KBR without bidding.
Hmmmm. Where have I heard about this before?
I've been waiting for something to happen
For a week or a month or a year
With the blood in the ink of the headlines
And the sound of the crowd in my ear
You might ask what it takes to remember
When you know that you've seen it before
Where a government lies to a people
And a country is drifting to war
And there's a shadow on the faces
Of the men who send the guns
To the wars that are fought in places
Where their business interest runs
posted by tbogg at 5:01 PM
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How about a game of solitare?.......NO!
As pointed out by abnormally astute daughter:
They're doing a remake of The Manchurian Candidate.
I don't care if it has Denzel Washington, Meryl Streep, and Liev Schreiber.
Why?
Is there anything that they won't remake?
And it shouldn't make anyone feel any better that the new 'screenwriter" is the author of such crapfests as Mission Impossible 3 and the second Tomb Raider movie.
posted by tbogg at 4:26 PM
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Sorry
I probably won't get around to posting until tonight after spending the morning at my daughters new school.
The good news: she made the football team as the kicker.
The bad news: I think they want her to punt and do kickoffs, as well.
This should be.........interesting.
posted by tbogg at 12:22 PM
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Wednesday, August 20, 2003
Terrorism, war, diminished civil liberties, unemployment, a new Michael Bolton CD...
Haven't we suffered enough?
As the title ( Vintage) indicates, Bolton has discovered some more classic tunes that he will do his darndest to destroy, including:
1. The Very Thought Of You
2. All The Way
3. If I Could
4. A Kiss To Build A Dream On
5. When I Fall In Love
6. At Last
7. Smile
8. You Don't Know Me
9. Daddy's Little Girl
10. Summertime
11. What Are You Doing The Rest Of Your Life
Given his record, At Last should be particularly cringe-worthy....
The good news is that a new Beth Orton (mainly remixes) comes out the same day, as well as a new Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, for those of us who still miss the Jesus and Mary Chain.
posted by tbogg at 3:33 PM
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SoBig
It looks like my email address got picked up by the SoBig worm. If anyone is getting emails from me...it's not me. At least I don't think it's me....
posted by tbogg at 12:52 PM
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Using the Bush model
Mary Carey, who is running for Governor in California, must have picked up a few tricks from Karl Rove:
Porn actress Mary Carey, one of 135 candidates running for California governor, offered on Tuesday to go on a date with anyone offering her a hefty campaign contribution. But that is it, just a date,
Carey said she would offer a dinner date to anyone giving more than $5,000 (3,150 pounds) to her campaign that seeks to replace Gov. Gray Davis (news - web sites) if he is recalled by voters on October 7.
"As an independent, I don't have a large political party backing me," she said in a statement. "So I have to be creative and develop more unconventional methods of raising money."
Asked if the date could lead to a sexual encounter, campaign aide Jayson Helgeson replied: "I don't think so, that's not part of it. It's like a normal date."
Yeah. A normal date that costs $5000. Nobody would expect sex for that kind of money. Nope.
But it is just like the Bush re-election drive. Big donors, and the only one getting screwed is the public...
(Note the photo of Carey with Gary Coleman, where the caption lets us know that she's the one on the right. Yeah. I would have guessed that eventually...)
posted by tbogg at 10:42 AM
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"Do we say 'yee-haw' before 'Don't mess with Texas', or after?"
Texas takes the first step towards secession. Don't anybody stop 'em:
Students in Texas public schools will be required to recite a pledge of allegiance to the Texas flag beginning in the 2003-2004 school year.
A new Texas law mandates that students recite the Texas pledge after reciting the Pledge of Allegiance to the American flag.
At a convocation Wednesday for teachers in the Northside Independent School District, teachers were given a card that has the words to the Texas pledge.
"I think that we should respect our country and our state and we need to support our state by having the children say the pledge every morning," said Grady Evans, a teacher.
"It's one nation, so why should we pledge allegiance to the state? I don't know? I think it's dumb," said Sarah Ford, a Warren High School student.
The new law will also cut into school district budgets. Every classroom will be required to display the Texas flag.
For Northside ISD, which has 5,000 classrooms, the cost of purchasing flags at $10 a piece comes to $50,000.
District officials said teachers will be asked to display temporary Texas flags that were printed in the Sunday edition of the San Antonio Express-News until the district provides them with a real flag.
Here's the pledge:
"Honor the Texas flag, I pledge allegiance to thee, Texas, one and indivisible."
That's the best they could do? No: "hook'em horns"? No: "Redskins suck!"? No: "Oh, arid plains. Oh, smoggy skies. We honor thee, Texas, the armpit of Satan and home of Dr. Pepper"?
I am so disappointed...
posted by tbogg at 8:50 AM
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Tuesday, August 19, 2003
Rick Santorum screams "See! See! I told'ja...." in a high shrieky little girls voice.
Ah. Sweet vindication for Little Breedin' Ricky:
A man visiting acquaintances in the Yukon capital has been charged bestiality after allegations he sexually molested his hosts' family dog.
Police said they were called early Monday morning to a Whitehorse home where the man had been staying as a guest.
As they arrived, officers spotted the man driving away and discovered he was under the influence of alcohol, said Staff Sgt. Ray Fast.
James Allen Chase, 53, of Kelowna, B.C., made a court appearance Monday charged with bestiality, as well as impaired driving and driving over the legal blood-alcohol limit.
Chase was released from custody and scheduled to be back in court Wednesday.
Due to Canadian Privacy Laws, the dog's name was not released so we don't know if it was a female dog or a male dog. Cuz if it was a male dog, Santorum is going to hard to live with all day long...
posted by tbogg at 11:19 PM
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It's axiomatic, yo.
George Will is never an easy read. Apparently when he sold his small blackened vestigial soul to Beelzebub for a gig as a professional pundit and debate coach, he threw his ability to get to the point into the deal. So it was with great relief that reader Chris provided me with a simple internet tool that allows me (and now you) to read Will and actually be entertained. First we take Will's latest which reads like this:
This anniversary reminds us that America is not new to the business of regime change. Fifty years ago U.S. and British intelligence services -- the principal U.S. operative was Kermit Roosevelt, Teddy's grandson -- had a remarkably easy time overthrowing Iran's government.
It took just two months and $200,000, mobs being cheap to rent back then. It was so easy that, according to the late CIA Director Richard Helms in his just-published memoir, ``A Look Over My Shoulder,'' Roosevelt felt the need to sound a warning that Secretary of State John Foster Dulles did not want to hear.
Roosevelt said the coup succeeded because the CIA had accurately concluded that the Iranians, including most of the military, ``wanted exactly'' the result we were seeking. ``If we,'' said Roosevelt, referring to the CIA, ``are ever going to try something like this again, we must be absolutely sure that (the) people and army want what we want. If not, you had better give the job to the Marines!''
The shah's ``at least temporary control of the country'' lasted just a bit more than half of these 50 years. The fact that his control crumbled in 1979 under the assault of Islamic fundamentalists responsive to the Ayatollah Khomeini does not mean the coup was misguided or unavailing.
...and then we run it through Snoop Dog's Shizzolater to get this:
This anniversary reminds us that America is not new da business of regime change, know what I'm sayin'? Fifty years ago U.S. 'n British intelligence services -- da principal U.S. operative wuz Kermit Roosevelt, Teddy's grandson -- had a remarkably easy time overthrowing Iran's government."
It took just two months 'n $200,000, mobs being cheap rent back then n' shit. It wuz so easy that, according da late CIA Director Richard Helms in tha dude's just-published memoir, ``A Look Over My Shoulder,'' Roosevelt felt da need sound a warning that Secretary of State John Foster Dulles did not want hear."
Roosevelt be like da coup succeeded because da CIA had accurately concluded that da Iranians, including most of da military, ``wanted exactly'' da result we wuz seeking, know what I'm sayin'? ``If we,'' be like Roosevelt, referring da CIA, ``are ever going try something like this again, we gots be absolutely sho that (da) muthas 'n army want what we want n' shit. If not, yo' ass had better give da job da Marines!''
The shah's ``at least temporary control of da country'' lasted just a bit mo' than half of these 50 years n' shit. The fact that tha dude's control crumbled in 1979 under da assault of Islamic fundamentalists responsive da Ayatollah Khomeini does not mean da coup wuz misguided or unavailing."
See? Bet you didn't know Will be havin' da mad skillz, know what I'm sayin'?
posted by tbogg at 10:58 PM
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How did you guess that I'm not a supermodel?
According to the new Bush re-election website, we discover that President Asleep At The Wheel has locked up the coveted endorsement from PUPA*.
* Painfully Unattractive People of America.
posted by tbogg at 10:28 PM
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You can check out any time you like. But you can never leave.
Mo Dowd points out that Iraq is looking kind of quagmire-ish:
In yet another spun-up government document on Iraq, the White House listed 100 ways that things were going great in the 100 days we've been on the scene. The report burbled with gimcrackery about the "10 signs of better infrastructure" — days before an oil pipeline and then a water pipeline were blown up — and about soccer balls and science textbooks.
"Most of Iraq is calm, and progress on the road to democracy and freedom not experienced in decades continues," it said. "Only in isolated areas are there still attacks."
Even the Bush people, who tend to look at excruciatingly difficult problems and say no prob, were shaken by yesterday's carnage, which delivered a terrible truth: just because we got Uday and Qusay, Iraqi militants are not going to stop blowing up Westerners. Even if we get Saddam, the resistance will no doubt keep at it, hoping the dictator will enjoy the carnage from paradise.
"The dynamics have really changed," said an administration official on the reconstruction team. "Now we're dealing with a guerrilla war, not terrorism."
What ever made these people think that we could just waltz in there and these people would just roll over on their backs like a puppy? We are in their country and their region uninvited.
posted by tbogg at 10:13 PM
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How to describe the homoerotic tension between Sam and Mr. Frodo?
Our little Ben who has yet to lie with a woman (if you know what I mean and I'm sure you do even if he doesn't) has found the cause of rampant, out of control gayness in our society: reading about it. Yes, it's true. Reading about homosexuality can make you queerer than a Disney elephant. Says Ben:
Picture this: Your son goes to the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. The day before fall session begins, Billy tells you that he wants to major in English. It's not the most useful major, you think, but then again, it could be worse. So Billy returns to school with your blessing.
After finals, Billy comes home for vacation. You ask him what he learned this quarter. "I learned how to be gay," he answers. A stunned silence. "Yeah, I took English 317, Literature and Culture."
"You learned how to be gay in an English course?"
"Sure. The title of the course was 'How to be Gay: Male Homosexuality and Initiation.' It fit my schedule. And by the way, there's this guy named Jim I met. I know you'll love him like ... well ... another son.'
Such a scenario may sound far-fetched. It shouldn't. "How to be Gay" is a real course at the University of Michigan. The course description states: "This course will examine the general topic of the role that initiation plays in the formation of gay male identity ... In particular, we will examine a number of cultural artifacts and activities that seem to play a prominent role in learning how to be gay: (including) camp, diva-worship, drag, muscle culture, taste, style and political activism."
There you have it: read gay literature...turn gay. It's the same for movies. Remember that wave of gayness that overtook the country after innocent young men were tricked into going to see Top Gun thinking it was a testosterone-fueled war romp? Total gayness.
You know, I heard that playing softball makes women want to----
Oh. Never mind...
posted by tbogg at 9:43 PM
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Pure genius
Ezra and Matt over at Not Geniuses have a plan to use what Karl Rove provides and turn it against the Boy King*. Go here, read what they have to say, andd most importantly, participate. It's fun, it's easy, and it might just help save the country.
Isn't that worth a few minutes a week?
*Note to Boy King. This is what happens when you use a Flowbee.
posted by tbogg at 8:58 PM
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Fair & Balanced Bill and the 9/11 Orphan
Noam Alaska at Demagogue reminds us that Bill O'Reilly was lying (again) when he said that " all honest voices are welcome" at Fox.
You now, no matter how many times I read the transcript, I can't get over what a loathsome prick O'Reilly is. If there is a hell, it's comforting to know that O'Reilly will spend all of eternity neck-deep in a pool of liquid shit. It's even more comforting to know that he'll do it while standing on Tom DeLay's shoulders....
posted by tbogg at 3:10 PM
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Calpundit bashes transgendered gun apologist
Actually, he's just talking about John Lott, and he makes a great point at the end of the post: why does the media give this guy the time of day?
posted by tbogg at 12:13 PM
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Monday update
Soccer tournament championship game played at 8AM won 1-0. Temperature at game end 94 degrees.
Football? Currently in the athletic directors hands if the school will allow first female to even tryout. It's a private Catholic school, so who knows.
Waiting...waiting.....
posted by tbogg at 11:47 AM
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Unlicensed drinking and the destruction of private property
No. This isn't about the Bush twins.
Joseph Farah gets his tighty-whities in a bunch over the audacity of gay people demanding to be treated like...citizens:
bet you're beginning to wonder what this Stonewall Inn is and what the "rebellion" there was all about. Personally, I'm getting extremely sick of how this event has been twisted by some very twisted people.
Here are the actual events of Friday, June 27, 1969, as recorded in the New York Times, other newspapers and the accounts of the most famous homosexual chronicler, Martin Duberman, author of "Stonewall."
Police raided the Stonewall Inn on Christopher Street in Greenwich Village because of reports the establishment was selling liquor without a license.
As police began loading some patrons into a paddy wagon, a crowd gathered. Bottles, beer cans and garbage cans were hurled at officers. An uprooted parking meter was turned into a makeshift battering ram, blockading some of the police inside the bar and then setting it on fire.
Reinforcements were called out to rescue the police officers trapped inside, but the rioting continued for two hours with a total of 12 arrested. The disturbances continued for four successive nights.
Rebellion? Historic? Is that how our national leaders truly view this tempest in a teacup? A bar is raided because its liquor license is not in order. That must be the harassment. A few people are arrested. That must be the mistreatment. That touches off rioting and arson. That must be the courage.
I assume that Farah will also condemn these cowards who destroyed private property in the cover of night:
The Boston Tea Party was one of the most effective pieces of political theater ever staged. John Adams, no fan of mob action, wrote of the dumping of the tea: "There is a dignity, a majesty, a sublimity, in this last effort of the patriots that I greatly admire."
About 50 members of the political organization, The Sons of Liberty, boarded 3 ships in Boston Harbor. Some were dressed, not very convincingly, as Mohawk Indians. In a very orderly and quiet fashion, they plunked [sterling]9,659 worth of Darjeeling into the sea.
The Boston Tea Party was a protest of British tax policies. It came in the midst of a boycott of English tea during which the East India Company, which owned the tea, had seen its profits plummet in the wake of a boycott of tea in the colonies.
Why does Farah hate America?
posted by tbogg at 10:43 AM
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I guess it depends upon your definition of "gratuitous personal attacks"
O'Reilly:
Fox News has become the highest-rated news network on cable because we feature lively debate and all honest voices are welcome. We don't do drive-by character assassinations, and we don't denigrate opposing points of view by launching gratuitous personal attacks.
O'Reilly on C-SPAN2:
Before a crowd of 1,000 attendees, with the session televised live by cable's normally civilized C-SPAN2, Franken went on a rant against O'Reilly, accusing him of lying about his credentials. O'Reilly came back by calling Franken an "idiot."
From the Fox lawsuit:
Fox said in the suit that Franken flew into a rage near a table of Fox News personalities at a press correspondents' dinner in April and acted "either intoxicated or deranged."
It said Franken has become "increasingly unfunny."
"Franken is neither a journalist nor a television news personality. He is not a well-respected voice in American politics; rather, he appears to be shrill and unstable," the suit said.
Looks like O'Reilly is still a lying liar who lies.
posted by tbogg at 10:14 AM
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Faster Congressman, kill kill
Looks like South Dakota's Bill Janklow (R- Heavy Foot) has tied Laura Bush for the coveted Republican Runnin' With The Devil title:
A South Dakota prosecutor said yesterday it will likely be "several days" before he has a complete report on the Saturday crash in which Rep. William J. Janklow (R-S.D.) struck and killed a motorcyclist in a daylight accident at a rural intersection.
William J. Ellingson, the Moody County prosecutor, left open the possibility that the freshman House member -- who served 16 years as South Dakota governor -- could face charges in the death of Randolph Scott, 55, a Minnesota farmer and businessman.
"It is not believed at this time that the use of alcohol was involved," Ellingson said, though he is awaiting the analysis of blood samples taken from Janklow and Scott
[snip]
State court records show that Janklow got 12 speeding tickets in 11 South Dakota counties from 1990 to 1994 and paid more than $1,000 in fines, according to the Associated Press. He often drove 15 to 20 mph faster than legal speed limits and once was caught going 90 mph in a 65-mph zone. However, he has not been ticketed for speeding since October 1994, just before he was elected to his third term as governor.
As a hard-right Governor who has often preached about the virtues of personal responsibility, I assume that Janklow won't try and blame this on repeated listenings to Sammy Hagar...
posted by tbogg at 9:15 AM
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Sunday, August 17, 2003
Any way we can link it to Saddam?
Ann Telnaes
posted by tbogg at 10:09 PM
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"I'm going to keek a touchdown..."
Blogging will be light on Monday until evening.
The tbogg family has just spent the weekend at a soccer tournament in lovely Temecula, Ca. where my daughter played four games in temperatures ranging from 94 to 104 degrees. Unfortunately they won all four games and now I have to drive back up there tomorrow morning (leaving at 5:30) so that she can play in the finals.
After that, we have to immediately drive back to San Diego where she will be trying out for the football team at her new high school.
Don't ask.
I am so glad I only have one kid.
In the meantime, please check out all the wonderfully fair & balanced blogs to your left, especially the new ones who could use a little attention.
posted by tbogg at 9:59 PM
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August 17th: Rise of the Machines
It's not like the Terminator movies weren't trying to warn us. The machines hate us...
Houston:
An aspiring missionary doctor, who was voted by medical school classmates as the epitome of a good physician, was killed Saturday at Christus St. Joseph Hospital when an elevator malfunctioned, decapitating him, authorities said.
Hitoshi Nikaidoh, 35, of Dallas, a surgical resident at the hospital at 1919 La Branch, was stepping onto a second-floor elevator in the main building around 9:30 a.m. when the doors closed, pinning his shoulders, said Harold Jordan, an investigator with the Harris County Medical Examiner's Office. The elevator car then moved upward, severing the doctor's head, Jordan said.
Whidbey Island:
A man was killed Saturday when his long hair got caught in the amusement park ride he owned, pulling him up as high as 40 feet before he fell, back-first, onto a fence.
Doug McKay, 40, was the co-owner of Paradise Amusements, based in Post Falls, Idaho. He was spraying lubricant on the tracks of the Super Loop 2, a roller coaster-type ride at the Island County Fair on Whidbey Island.
The ride was in progress at the time, and McKay's hair got caught on a car full of fairgoers, said sheriff's spokeswoman Jan Smith. He was pulled between 25 and 40 feet into the air.
"It basically scalped him, and he fell and landed on the fence," Smith said.
I've noticed that pencil sharpener has....been...watching....me......
posted by tbogg at 9:39 PM
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Jeepers, Mrs. Cleaver, the economy sure looks swell...and you look lovely too
Neil Cavuto of Fox News (the Fair & Balanced one) takes time out from putting rainbow and unicorn posters up in his bedroom to tell us that the economy is just right as rain:
What could possibly make media and market types ignore good news like that? To hear my friend Greg Hymowitz, who runs his own hedge fund, tell it, the fear it won't last. "There's a good deal of concern about momentum," he tells me.
For the life of me, I don't know why, because I see a lot of momentum. I see corporate spending sizzling again. In the latest quarterly report card on the economy, business spending surged a startling 7 percent. Another government report showed growth in the services sector, the strongest since July 1997. Leading economic indicators have advanced three months in a row. Businesses are hiring temporary workers at a staggering rate, nearly 42,000 in July. Generally that's a good precursor to full-time hiring.
Gosh, everywhere I look, I see news that was supposed to be bad proving surprisingly good. They said the backup in interest rates would kill the housing boom, then I see housing starts last month surging 3.7 percent.
I see inventories that are low that have to be replenished, and workers who are super productive, who have to get help. Where others see a collapsing economy, I see a coiled spring. I didn't just think that. Numbers clearly tell me that; numbers like simple sales reports that show more than simple sales gains at places like Wal-Mart, Kohl's, J.C. Penney, Gap, Best Buy, and on and on.
Because when profitability is up and companies are squeezing every dollar in productivity they can get out their workers, why they can't wait to hire more people. Especially in a lousy labor market where the existing employees are both looking over their shoulders and looking to hang onto their jobs.
Prosperity is right around the corner!!!!!
posted by tbogg at 11:54 AM
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A light paddling about the face and neck
In a wasted attempt to seem fair & balanced, George Will takes on the neo-cons today:
Blair seems to think: Boston, Baghdad, Manchester, Monrovia -- what's the difference? Such thinking is dangerous. Blair's argument is true only if it is trivial: ``Ordinary" people choose freedom, democracy and the rule of law because those who do not so choose prove thereby that they are not ordinary.
But there are a lot of them in the world. Some of them are waging guerrilla war against American forces in Iraq.
Blair's thinking is Bush's, too. ``There is a value system that cannot be compromised, and that is the values we praise," says President Bush. ``And if the values are good enough for our people, they ought to be good enough for others."
But one must compromise in the face of facts, those stubborn things. It is a fact that not everyone is inclined to praise ``the values we praise." And not every society has the prerequisites -- of institutions (political parties, media) and manners (civility, acceptance of pluralism) -- of a free society.
Bush and Blair and many people called neoconservatives believe that moral objectives in politics are universally applicable imperatives. If so, then either national cultures do not significantly differ; or they do not matter; or they are infinitely malleable under the touch of enlightened reformers. But all three propositions are false, and antithetical to all that conservatism teaches about the importance of cultural inertia and historical circumstances.
and George doesn't disappoint me as he wraps it up:
The premise that terrorism thrives where democracy doesn't may seem to generate a duty to universalize democracy. But it is axiomatic that one cannot have a duty to do something that cannot be done.
posted by tbogg at 11:39 AM
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New to the Hot Links:
Let The Record Show
Go check it out....
posted by tbogg at 11:33 AM
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Friday, August 15, 2003
I'll leave you with this for the weekend
Some months ago I mentioned that it had been a long time since I had heard a CD that was excellent from start to finish. That most CD's these days were comprised of a few good songs and a collection of half-baked filler. From multiple people I got remarkably similar suggestions. One of them I mentioned some time back, Shivaree's I Ought To Give You A Shot..., which is truly original and outstanding.
Last week I found a copy of the other suggested CD. Rabbit Songs by Hem. With radio music playlists the way they are, you may never hear Hem on the air, which is a shame because Rabbit Songs is one of the truly extraordinary CD's to come out in years. Gorgeous instrumentation, arrangements that remind me of Good Old Boys-era Randy Newman filtered through Aaron Copland and performed by lusher sounding Cowboy Junkies. Don't be put off by reviews describing it as soothing, there is way too much to listen to here.
Do yourself a favor and track a copy down.
You can find Hem's website here.
Have a good weekend...
posted by tbogg at 10:34 PM
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Laugh it up, folks.
I would be remiss, on Fair & Balanced Friday, if I did not present the other side of the Al Franken/Fox Steel Cage Smackdown. Unfortunately, the best I could come up with is some loon named Lowell Ponte over at FrontPage, who actually makes Ann Coulter look vaguely rational. You really have to read the whole thing because it is so stridently over-the-top that it defies description. Here is a snippet, and remember, this guy is serious:
In 1975 Lorne Michaels hired Franken and partner Tom Davis as writers for a strange new TV show called “Saturday Night Live” (SNL). In his early years with SNL, Franken reportedly has acknowledged, he was “not addicted” but was a user of mind-altering drugs, including LSD and cocaine. They also performed on-air skits as “The Franken & Davis Show.”
Transcripts of those skits, which reveal Franken’s deepest core values, can be hard to find. A synopsis of one that aired October 21, 1978, during the show’s fourth season, reads: “Franken and Davis are International Communist revolutionaries, calling for the overthrow of the U.S. gov’t – they act out the campaign of two corrupt nominees for congress.”
In another, the transcript of a 1978-aired “Saturday Night Live” skit co-authored and approved by Franken includes this inserted message by an announcer: “’The Franken & Davis Show’ is brought to you by the International Communist Party: Sooner or later, you’ll be a Communist. And now…here’s Al & Tom.”
Yes, the Court Jester Al Franken would smile at this and say, “Laugh it up, folks. These are the jokes.”
But what if this fake ad had said instead: “brought to you by the International Nazi Party: Sooner or later, you’ll be a Nazi.” Would that be a laughing matter?
Socialist Adolf Hitler murdered 12 million people, including six million Jews, in his concentration and death camps. Soviet socialists murdered 17 million people by systematic starvation in the Ukraine alone. According to the Black Book of Communism, over the past 100 years Communist governments in Russia, China, Cuba, Eastern Europe and elsewhere have murdered at least 100 million human beings. (Most serious scholars concur.)
As the luminous P.J. O’Rourke has said, liberalism is just Communism sold by the drink. Because Al Franken’s socialist politics different only in degree from those of the late Soviet Union, he took delight in praising Communism repeatedly in his skits on “Saturday Night Live.” Laugh it up, folks. Sooner or later, you’ll be a Communist.
...and if you think that the Republicans would think this guy is a little too crazy from the heat to be a part of their team, guess again.
He makes me glad I'm on the side that I'm on.....
posted by tbogg at 4:30 PM
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"This is Apu Nahasapeemapetilon calling for Re-Elect Bush 2004"
The always fair & balanced Daily Kos points out that the US Republican Party is interested in creating jobs... just not here.
Go read it.
posted by tbogg at 11:42 AM
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Sid Speaks
...and I'm pretty sure he's not Atrios.
Salon carries a column (get the day pass) by Sid Blumenthal on the rise of the Feral Republicans™.
The same year that Hofstadter published his piece on "the paranoid style," an obscure conservative named John Stormer published the "carefully documented story of America's retreat from victory" in the face of the liberal-internationalist-Communist conspiracy. It was titled "None Dare Call It Treason." The book, timed to coincide with the 1964 presidential campaign, was turned into a bestseller by the John Birch Society, a far-right-wing group, which boasted that it had distributed 6 million copies within eight months of its publication. (To this day, the Birch Society sells Stormer's book on its Web site.)
Nearly 40 years later, in the summer of 2003, the bestselling book on the right was entitled "Treason," by Ann Coulter. "Liberals have a preternatural gift for striking a position on the side of treason," she wrote. " ... Everyone says liberals love America, too. No they don't. Whenever the nation is under attack, from within or without, liberals side with the enemy." Positioned discreetly next to her book on the New York Times bestseller list was a tiny dagger signifying bulk sales from unknown sources. Coulter's argument was a conservative perennial, down to the spirited defense of Joseph McCarthy. Both Stormer's and Coulter's works cited mounds of "evidence." Both warned ominously against liberal betrayal. The principal difference between "None Dare Call It Treason" and "Treason" was not in sophistication, nuance, erudition, persuasiveness, or literary quality, but in the expanded capacity of conservatives to disseminate the word far and wide through their own alternative media and in the elevation by the mainstream media of the extremist as entertainer.
(fair&balancedfair&balancedfair&balancedfair&balancedfair&balancedfair&balanced)
posted by tbogg at 11:13 AM
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The color of his skin...the yellow stripe down his back
Kevin at CalPundit makes a fair and balanced offer to Mickey Kaus, that Kaus will likely refuse:
Will Mickey read the Justice Department's lengthy account and come to the "obvious" conclusion: that Hanssen survived despite "weak performance [and] poor management skills" due to his skin color? After all, if this so patently obvious when it's a black guy, why isn't it equally obvious when it's a white guy?
Don't hold your breath, Kevin. Blair/Hanssen is so, like, two months ago. Star-struck Mickey is on the Arnold beat now....
posted by tbogg at 9:43 AM
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Blah3
...provides us with a list of Fair & Balanced blogs.
Jebus, that's a lot of fair & balanced.
posted by tbogg at 9:24 AM
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Getting your Bible shorts in a bunch
This week's Lingua D'Ubaldi winner was submitted by Jo over at Democratic Veteran (which you should be reading everyday). We take you now to Bible Shorts where it sounds like English, but it could be speaking in tongues (only God knows, and he ain't talkin'):
If we listen to the voice of God and turn according to His correction, we're not going to be forced to sit on the 'Naughty Mat' until we decide to be good, but rather, the very act of turning and acknowledging that the Lord's way is better than our own, and that His way is right while ours is wrong will already put us in a place where He is able to speak to us and work with us
This one is fun too:
We can do the right thing with the wrong heart and that counts for nothing with God yet with the right heart, we can offer but little yet God sees our intention was glorify Him and so, although it may seem to us that things have gone wrong, in reality, the Lord has been blessed.
?
God scratches his head and then goes to the refrigerator for another Zima wondering where he went wrong.
posted by tbogg at 9:12 AM
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Talkin' about fair and balanced
Jay Bookman of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution was refreshingly blunt in a recent live talk. Here's some of the better snippets:
Question from Decatur, GA: Fair and balanced! Fair and balanced! Fair and balanced!
Bring it on, Fox! I dare ya, ya scurvy dogs! Jay - do I qualify for a life-time membership in the Republican Party, now?
Jay Bookman: No. You also have to think that Ann Coulter is an astute political analyst
........................
Question from Decatur, GA: Not only is it telling that Fox went all whiny-baby on this, but look at their legal team. Lead counsel Dori Ann Hanswirth also represents the tabloids "Star" and "National Enquirer". Well, at least she's familiar with the type of "journalism" espoused by her client. Her firm, Hogan & Hartson, is one of the top-grossing D.C. lobbying practices. I thought O'Reilly looked down his nose on those outfits. Ah well, I guess it's not hypocrisy if you're a conservative.
Jay Bookman: Yes it is too.
In the mythology of the right, only whiny liberals would hire a trial lawyer and go running to the courts every time somebody looks at them funny. Well, I guess that makes O'Reilly and Fox liberal. Could have fooled me, though.
.........................
Question from Tulsa, OK: I saw the C-SPAN coverage of the Franken/O'Reilly rasslin' event. Alas, as opposed to the "fair and balanced" practices at Fox, C-SPAN does not let one debater hit the kill switch on the other debater's microphone. O'Reilly, stripped of his primary debating tool, didn't know what to do and had to resort to screaming "Shut up! Shut up!" at Franken. What a wuss.
Jay Bookman: Yup, the bully was stripped of his weapon, and the results weren't pretty. (Actually, I take that back. It was beautiful.)
..........................
Question from Atlanta, GA: Any time free speech is stomped on, especially under this administration, it is noteworthy; particularly since the FCC recently changed the media ownership rules to favor major players such as Fox News. I especially enjoyed the comment, "It's almost as if the DNA for big mouths and thin skins were on the same gene." These days third parties can usurp one's personal DNA and patent it for commercial development. We all need to be wary of corporate claims of ownership.
Speaking of Fox favorite Ann Coulter, isn't she the one who wrote that liberals should be shot?
Jay Bookman: She said something to that effect, yes. I think I ran into Ann while I was on vacation. The body shape was the same, but she had a rattle on one end and fangs on the other.
................................
Question from Atlanta, Ga: Now I know that I probably disagree with you on most any topic..."she had a rattle on one end and fangs on the other"..I don't even know the woman well enough to form an opinion, but I'll add you to the CCN pit bull crowd.
Jay Bookman: Coulter's new book, "Treason," argues that every liberal by definition is a traitor to this country. Sorry, I take that personally. Where she's concerned, I'll play by the rules that she sets. Read it for yourself, or try to, and if you still think I'm over the top, let me know.
Thanks to Tim for the link
posted by tbogg at 8:53 AM
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Fairly unbalanced President (sic) visits San Diego.
We extend a laurel and hardy handshake...or not:
Several hundred protesters, virtually all of them well-behaved, accused President Bush of everything from failed public policies to devil worship during a demonstration outside the San Diego Convention Center yesterday.
The crowd was loud but orderly, and also very creative. One man was dressed up as Pinocchio, except his fake long nose was attached to a mask of the president. Someone wore a T-shirt declaring, "A village in Texas is missing an idiot."
Just after 5 p.m., about 45 minutes before Bush arrived at the Convention Center for an evening speech and political fund-raiser, one group of protesters dangled a giant pink banner from an upper floor of the Hilton San Diego across the street.
"Bush, You Lied, You're Fired," the banner declared. A member of San Diegans Against Bush's First Illegal War said the banner represented a pink slip.
Just to be fair and balanced:
Bush supporters were almost impossible to find in this crowd. There was at least one, however. Her name is Delores Daw, a 65-year-old retired legal secretary who lives in Coronado. She showed up in a modest pink blouse and pink hat, declared her political allegiance to anyone who asked and endured any number of taunts and insults as a result.
She said she simply wanted to show support for the president, whom she praised for "making this country safer."
"I don't think President Bush is the sort of man who is a warmonger," she said. "He knows a lot more than I do."
How sad is that?
posted by tbogg at 8:10 AM
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Thursday, August 14, 2003
The point is accountability.
Bill O'Reilly is still popping a 'rhoid over Al Franken:
The main point here is that trying to hurt a business or a person because you disagree with what they say is simply unacceptable in America. And that message has been sent by FOX. There's a principle in play. Vigorous debate is embraced by us, but smear campaigns will be confronted. It is simply a joke for The New York Times to editorialize that fabricated personal attacks are acceptable under the banner of satire.
I wonder if The Times thought that Donald Sagretti (sic) was funny when he manufactured dirt to hurt Richard Nixon's political opponents. I guess The Times editorial board would be yucking it up if their pictures appeared on a book cover accompanied by the word "liar." Satire, my butt.
There's no question that many of the attacks launched against FOX personnel are designed to injury(sic) and demean. It's unfortunate, but in this country, if you're successful or famous, many courts will allow defamation, slander and liable(sic) to go unpunished. (my emphasis)
I think that we can all agree that once someone tells a lie, that person can rightfully be called a liar. And that someone who tells a lie about their lying would qualify as a "lying liar who lies". Here's our man Bill:
In February, O'Reilly gave a speech seemingly taking credit for winning a coveted Peabody award while an anchor at the tabloid TV show Inside Edition. After comedian Al Franken pointed out that the show never won a Peabody, O'Reilly retorted, in Mamet-esque syntax (O'Reilly Factor, 3/13/01): "Guy says about me, couple of weeks ago, 'O'Reilly said he won a Peabody Award.' Never said it. You can't find a transcript where I said it."
But on his May 19, 2000 broadcast, he repeatedly told a guest who brought up his tabloid past: "We won Peabody Awards. . . . We won Peabody awards. . . . A program that wins a Peabody Award, the highest award in journalism, and you're going to denigrate it?" (Inside Edition won a Polk Award, not the better-known Peabody, for reporting that was done after O'Reilly left the show--Washington Post, 3/1/01.)
But such gaffes don't stop O'Reilly from critiquing other journalists. In a profile in MediaWeek (2/8/01), O'Reilly declared that the Los Angeles Times was an abysmal paper, in part because "they never mentioned Juanita Broaddrick's name, ever. This whole [Los Angeles] area out here has no idea what's going on, unless you watch my show." (Broaddrick accused Bill Clinton of raping her in 1978.)
When former L.A. Times editor Melissa Payton pointed out that the Times archive contains 21 citations of Broaddrick's name, Catherine Seipp, who wrote the MediaWeek profile, summed up O'Reilly better than most: She chalked up her failure to check the claim to having been "mesmerized by O'Reilly's sheer O'Reillyness."
I want to be fair and balanced about this whole issue. There is documented proof that O'Reilly lied about receiving a Peabody award (in fact, it was a different award and it came after O'Reilly had left the show), and then lied about saying it. Any fair and balanced person would have to admit that this would categorize Bill as a "liar". You judge for yourself.
After all, I report, you decide.
posted by tbogg at 3:33 PM
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Dazed and confused
According to Drudge (I know) Robert Novak says that "Schwarzenegger thought Riordan too confused, disorganized to be gov" which reminds us of this:
"There's an old saying in Tennessee — I know it's in Texas, probably in Tennessee — that says, fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can't get fooled again." —George W. Bush, Nashville, Tenn., Sept. 17, 2002
Doesn't that just give you a warm feeling all over?
Me too.
posted by tbogg at 1:10 PM
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After we make him rich, we'll claim victory. That'll show him...
Tim Graham at The Corner:
FRANKEN AND FOX [Tim Graham]
Derb, I wonder if there isn't some element of calculation underneath the obvious silliness of the lawsuit against Franken. Stoking Fox controversies against liberal authors might help the network keep its conservative audience watching? Or, a more political plan: getting maximum exposure for Al Franken, whose political work is so overwrought, it can't help but highlight the off-putting aspects of the angry left...
Yeah. We'll make his book a bestseller while we flush that micron of credibility that we still have down the toilet for all eternity. That's the plan....
Fox: Smart As A Fox
Tim Graham: Dumb As A Box Of Hammers
posted by tbogg at 12:47 PM
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Is that a censer in your pocket or are you just happy to see Jesus?
Jim at Rittenhouse has some handy pick-up lines in case you happen to run across a hot Catholic.
Optional Rick Santorum pick-up line: "Snausage or Milkbone?"
posted by tbogg at 12:32 PM
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Now if we only had time to make some giant street puppets.....
Tomorrow is Fair and Balanced Friday, and how can you have a movement if you don't have a t-shirt?
Get yours here today.
Hurry, before one of the guys on Queer Eye wears one on TV and then everyone will be wearing them....
posted by tbogg at 11:54 AM
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Bob Marley died for your sins, mon...
Hundreds of Rastafarians came together last month in Jamaica, the birthplace of the movement, for the weeklong Rastafari Global Reasoning 2003. The official motto for the worldwide meeting, which centered on planning for the future and calling for greater respect, was "Rastafari Family United for Progress and Development."
While Rastafari certainly maintains a sense of family, it is not a unified bloc. Several subgroups and varying beliefs vie for the soul of Rastafari. These differences in theology, lifestyle, and behaviors all fit within the broad umbrella of Rastafari because, at its heart, it is an Afro-Caribbean identity movement—not primarily a religion with clearly defined, universally accepted dogma and doctrines. However, a growing movement within Rastafari is calling Rastas away from their New Age beliefs and idolization of Haile Selassie I—and to a Trinitarian, orthodox Christian faith.
As Caribbean churches have recently become more welcoming of Rastafarians, reggae music, and Afrocentrism, a greater rapprochement between Rastas and Christians has developed. Growing numbers of Rastas have entered Christian churches and taken Jesus as their Savior while continuing a dreadlocked Rasta lifestyle.
...and the ganja. Never forget the ganja.
Lou Sheldon must be recoiling in horror.
posted by tbogg at 10:08 AM
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Shabat shabat...buh buh buh buh buh buh buh buh buh-bye
Perhaps in anticipation of Mel Gibson's The Passion: Lethal Weapon 666, noted talk radio shrieking harpy and Internet porn star, Laura Schlessinger is abandoning the faith that has sustained her for about five years or so, give or take.
With 12 million Americans tuning in daily, controversial syndicated radio-show host Laura Schlessinger — known to all as "Dr. Laura" — is arguably the best-known Orthodox Jew in the United States.
Rather, she was.
In a shocking if little-noticed revelation, Schlessinger — who very publicly converted to Judaism five years ago — opened "The Dr. Laura Schlessinger Program" on August 5 with the confession that she will no longer practice Judaism. Although Schlessinger said she still "considers" herself Jewish, "My identifying with this entity and my fulfilling the rituals, etc., of the entity — that has ended."
[snip]
Schlessinger began her August 5 program by noting that, prior to each broadcast, she spends an hour reading faxes from fans and listeners. "By and large the faxes from Christians have been very loving, very supportive," she said. "From my own religion, I have either gotten nothing, which is 99% of it, or two of the nastiest letters I have gotten in a long time. I guess that's my point — I don't get much back. Not much warmth coming back."
Schlessinger even hinted at a possible turn to Christianity — a move that, radio insiders say, would elevate her career far beyond the 300 stations that currently syndicate her show. "I have envied all my Christian friends who really, universally, deeply feel loved by God," she said. "They use the name Jesus when they refer to God... that was a mystery, being connected to God."
Faced with the prospect of Ms. Schlessinger coverting to Christianity, leaders of all the major Christian churches cleared their throats, went inside the house and pretended they weren't home.
God had no comment either...as usual.
posted by tbogg at 10:01 AM
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Headlines the First Lady wishes would go away.
Bush, Sodomy, and Marriage
Hey, I didn't read the article. The headline was enough for me....
posted by tbogg at 9:30 AM
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Contrast and compare
This is bad:
The Pentagon wants to cut the pay of its 148,000 U.S. troops in Iraq, who are already contending with guerrilla-style attacks, homesickness and 120- degree-plus heat.
Unless Congress and President Bush take quick action when Congress returns after Labor Day, the uniformed Americans in Iraq and the 9,000 in Afghanistan will lose a pay increase approved last April of $75 a month in "imminent danger pay" and $150 a month in "family separation allowances."
The Defense Department supports the cuts, saying its budget can't sustain the higher payments amid a host of other priorities. But the proposed cuts have stirred anger among military families and veterans' groups and even prompted an editorial attack in the Army Times, a weekly newspaper for military personnel and their families that is seldom so outspoken.
This is worse:
WHITE HOUSE DUCKS ISSUE
A White House spokesman referred questions about the administration's view on the pay cut to the Pentagon report.
Unbelievable.
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