Stephen Colbert's speech at the White House Correspondent's Dinner:
Speech
Dang! What a man...
Steve
Sunday, April 30, 2006
Dang..Missed it..
Somehow, I missed my invitation to the White House Correspondent's Dinner. Sounds like it was a lot of fun. President bush had a comedy routine where he mispronounced the word "nuclear" and got corrected by a look alike double.
CNN is all over the President's bit with his other self. What you're not seeing on CNN is the routine that Stephen Colbert performed after that. When Don Imus mentioned the "Blue dress" in front of the Clintons it became national news. So far this morn, NBC hasn't mentioned Colbert once.
Joseph Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame, were there, and so was a Doobie Brother...wearing a kilt.
...Colbert complained that he was “surrounded by the liberal media who are destroying this country, except for Fox News. Fox believes in presenting both sides—the president’s side and the vice president’s side." He also reflected on the good old days, when the media was still swallowing the WMD story.
Addressing the reporters, he said, "You should spend more time with your families, write that novel you've always wanted to write. You know, the one about the fearless reporter who stands up to the administration. You know-- fiction."
Here"s E&P with their take...Damn, I wish I hadn't overlooked my invite...Bush was "Not Amused"...
Editor and Publisher
CNN is all over the President's bit with his other self. What you're not seeing on CNN is the routine that Stephen Colbert performed after that. When Don Imus mentioned the "Blue dress" in front of the Clintons it became national news. So far this morn, NBC hasn't mentioned Colbert once.
Joseph Wilson and his wife, Valerie Plame, were there, and so was a Doobie Brother...wearing a kilt.
...Colbert complained that he was “surrounded by the liberal media who are destroying this country, except for Fox News. Fox believes in presenting both sides—the president’s side and the vice president’s side." He also reflected on the good old days, when the media was still swallowing the WMD story.
Addressing the reporters, he said, "You should spend more time with your families, write that novel you've always wanted to write. You know, the one about the fearless reporter who stands up to the administration. You know-- fiction."
Here"s E&P with their take...Damn, I wish I hadn't overlooked my invite...Bush was "Not Amused"...
Editor and Publisher
Friday, April 28, 2006
Vengence is Mine...
With the advent of DNA testing, over 100 people...People who were convicted and sentenced to death by the Courts of our land...Over 100 people have been found to have been wrongly convicted and sentenced to die. Convicted of crimes they did not commit.
Can you say, "Innocent" boys and girls?
For myself, I do not want any government killing people on my behalf. Put them away until they die. Sure it cost money but so does an execution. About the same in today's society...and locking people up instead of killing them does something else...
It takes away the possibility of misuse by our government.
Prosecutorial misconduct has been dicovered time after time in cases of this sort. Pressure on the American Justice system is exerted from many directions, but the most heinous is the pressure to convict someone at all costs from within.
There is no question that we have executed innocent people in America...No Question, whatsoever.
But there's more to this than just innocence and wrongful killing...Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia says that the condemmed can suffer immensely as they die. It's just fine with him.
A good god fearing man, apparently, Justice Scalia. He and the other conservative judges laughed about methods of killing prisoners as they sat in deliberation on the bench of the highest court of our Nation.
The recent Bush appointees laughed along. amused that there are laws against cruelty that prevent certain methods being used to kill a stray mongrel dog but those same methods can be used to execute a human.
Our Conservative Justices seem to like the idea of Torture.
Bastards!
Peace,
Steve
High Court Justices Clash Over Executions
Can you say, "Innocent" boys and girls?
For myself, I do not want any government killing people on my behalf. Put them away until they die. Sure it cost money but so does an execution. About the same in today's society...and locking people up instead of killing them does something else...
It takes away the possibility of misuse by our government.
Prosecutorial misconduct has been dicovered time after time in cases of this sort. Pressure on the American Justice system is exerted from many directions, but the most heinous is the pressure to convict someone at all costs from within.
There is no question that we have executed innocent people in America...No Question, whatsoever.
But there's more to this than just innocence and wrongful killing...Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia says that the condemmed can suffer immensely as they die. It's just fine with him.
A good god fearing man, apparently, Justice Scalia. He and the other conservative judges laughed about methods of killing prisoners as they sat in deliberation on the bench of the highest court of our Nation.
The recent Bush appointees laughed along. amused that there are laws against cruelty that prevent certain methods being used to kill a stray mongrel dog but those same methods can be used to execute a human.
Our Conservative Justices seem to like the idea of Torture.
Bastards!
Peace,
Steve
High Court Justices Clash Over Executions
Thursday, April 27, 2006
Ask me a Question
Do you believe President Bush misled the nation in order to go to war with Iraq?
Yes
94%
No
5.9%
Not a scientific survey but 87,377 MSNBC viewers have voted in this poll... MSNBC is not exactly a Liberal organization.
America has very grave questions about this war. Why are we there...Really?
What are our goals in Iraq?
How will we accomplish them..What's the plan, exactly?
How successful have we been so far?
How long is this going to take?
I would answer those questions with, "Goals? What goals?...Plan? What plan?...Success? What success?...and Who the bleep knows?
The only way the public will find out is for Congress to have an open and honest discussion about Iraq. One in which some substance bubbles to the top..Not something idiotic like,
"Liberals just want to cut and run."
Well just what, exactly, do the Conservatives want to do? What American goals will be achieved by sacrificing the health and lives of another thousand American warriors?
Do you like seeing Cindy Sheehan out and about? Think America will be better off with one thousand more Cindy's?
Ready to volunteer to be one?
That is the question that all of us have to answer regarding war:
A bill is now in Congress to debate this question....
Bart Gordon has signed it...Lincoln Davis has not. Harold Ford Junior has not signed it.
Why not?
Here is the full list of Tennessee Representatives who do not want Congress to discuss the Iraq war.
Bill Jenkins (R-01)
John Duncan Jr. (R-02)
Zach Wamp (R-03)
Lincoln Davis (D-04)
Jim Cooper (D-05)
Marsha Blackburn (R-07)
John Tanner (D-08)
Harold Ford Jr. (D-09)
Here's the list for the entire country...Call em!
Open Debate
Peace,
Steve
Yes
94%
No
5.9%
Not a scientific survey but 87,377 MSNBC viewers have voted in this poll... MSNBC is not exactly a Liberal organization.
America has very grave questions about this war. Why are we there...Really?
What are our goals in Iraq?
How will we accomplish them..What's the plan, exactly?
How successful have we been so far?
How long is this going to take?
I would answer those questions with, "Goals? What goals?...Plan? What plan?...Success? What success?...and Who the bleep knows?
The only way the public will find out is for Congress to have an open and honest discussion about Iraq. One in which some substance bubbles to the top..Not something idiotic like,
"Liberals just want to cut and run."
Well just what, exactly, do the Conservatives want to do? What American goals will be achieved by sacrificing the health and lives of another thousand American warriors?
Do you like seeing Cindy Sheehan out and about? Think America will be better off with one thousand more Cindy's?
Ready to volunteer to be one?
That is the question that all of us have to answer regarding war:
Is this such a grave threat to the future of our country that my child should die for it?
A bill is now in Congress to debate this question....
Bart Gordon has signed it...Lincoln Davis has not. Harold Ford Junior has not signed it.
Why not?
Here is the full list of Tennessee Representatives who do not want Congress to discuss the Iraq war.
Bill Jenkins (R-01)
John Duncan Jr. (R-02)
Zach Wamp (R-03)
Lincoln Davis (D-04)
Jim Cooper (D-05)
Marsha Blackburn (R-07)
John Tanner (D-08)
Harold Ford Jr. (D-09)
Here's the list for the entire country...Call em!
Open Debate
Peace,
Steve
Wednesday, April 26, 2006
I like to Ride my Bicycle, I love to ride my Bike,
So what do you do if you're the Prez and you have the country running perfectly?
I mean the National debt is through the roof (more than all the other presidents combined) but your very good friends, the Saudis and the Chinese are happy to hold your markers...no need to worry about them being Dictators and Communists.
The war in Iraq is going so well, you're thinking that you need another one in Iran. And just to show what a great person you are, you're thinking of breaking the greatest taboo in world history...first use of a nuclear weapon against a sovreignnation, whose biggest transgression was to not be conquered by Iraq when your Daddy was backing Saddam.
I mean Iraq is well in hand, right? Infrastructure levels are still below prewar levels, American troops are being dismembered and killed on a daily basis, and the local Al Queda guy seems to have his own TV show.
And your immigration plan is working well, too. You cut the resources out from under the border patrol so millions of mexicans got though, stopped the immigration authorities from enforcing the laws against employing illegal workers so your business buddies could rack up big time, and now you get to use it as a campaign issue about how you're going to take charge and fix a problem you caused in the first place.... Cool!
Now you're going to investigate the problem with gas costing so much that it now eats over 20% of the income of nearly a third of the population of America. This shouldn't take too much time...All you have to do is have Cheney drop off the minutes of his "Energy Task Force" on his way through town between hunting trips.
(Memo to self: Give Shooter back his copy of "The Most Dangerous Game"...I'm solving problems so fast I don't have time to read it, anyway)
And the environment is toast anyway so there's no need to worry about that one...you can use gas prices to authorize the EPA to suspend air quality rules, too, now that you think about it.
The people cheer your accomplishments wherever you go.
(Did you like the one that said... "Impeach the Bastards"?):
So with things going so well, what do you do? You take a little mountain bike ride, all peaceful like, out in the wilderness:
President Bush woke up early and rode his mountain bike along the Clara Burgess Trail to the top of Murray Hill, which affords a spectacular view of the Coachella Valley and Little San Bernardino Mountains.
The trail is considered strenuous for riding, with a 500-foot elevation gain. The total round-trip was a little more than 7 miles.
“He said it was a pretty tough terrain, but he enjoyed it,” Press Secretary Scott McClellan said...
There's a little problem with President bike boy's ride on the morning after Earth Day:
...Jim Foote, acting manager of the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument, said the Clara Burgess trail is also among those monument managers ask people to avoid part of the year to prevent disrupting endangered Peninsular bighorn sheep.
The trail is one of about 10 in the monument under a “voluntary avoidance” program. People are asked to stay off the Clara Burgess trail from Jan. 1 to June 30 during the sheep lambing season, he said.
Hey! You're the President...You wanna wipe out a species or two in the name of having a good time...Well no one's gonna stop you. And actually, how much damage can your little bike cause, Disregarding the eight big black SUV's that followed along the dirt road behind you?
I mean the National debt is through the roof (more than all the other presidents combined) but your very good friends, the Saudis and the Chinese are happy to hold your markers...no need to worry about them being Dictators and Communists.
The war in Iraq is going so well, you're thinking that you need another one in Iran. And just to show what a great person you are, you're thinking of breaking the greatest taboo in world history...first use of a nuclear weapon against a sovreignnation, whose biggest transgression was to not be conquered by Iraq when your Daddy was backing Saddam.
I mean Iraq is well in hand, right? Infrastructure levels are still below prewar levels, American troops are being dismembered and killed on a daily basis, and the local Al Queda guy seems to have his own TV show.
And your immigration plan is working well, too. You cut the resources out from under the border patrol so millions of mexicans got though, stopped the immigration authorities from enforcing the laws against employing illegal workers so your business buddies could rack up big time, and now you get to use it as a campaign issue about how you're going to take charge and fix a problem you caused in the first place.... Cool!
Now you're going to investigate the problem with gas costing so much that it now eats over 20% of the income of nearly a third of the population of America. This shouldn't take too much time...All you have to do is have Cheney drop off the minutes of his "Energy Task Force" on his way through town between hunting trips.
(Memo to self: Give Shooter back his copy of "The Most Dangerous Game"...I'm solving problems so fast I don't have time to read it, anyway)
And the environment is toast anyway so there's no need to worry about that one...you can use gas prices to authorize the EPA to suspend air quality rules, too, now that you think about it.
The people cheer your accomplishments wherever you go.
(Did you like the one that said... "Impeach the Bastards"?):
So with things going so well, what do you do? You take a little mountain bike ride, all peaceful like, out in the wilderness:
President Bush woke up early and rode his mountain bike along the Clara Burgess Trail to the top of Murray Hill, which affords a spectacular view of the Coachella Valley and Little San Bernardino Mountains.
The trail is considered strenuous for riding, with a 500-foot elevation gain. The total round-trip was a little more than 7 miles.
“He said it was a pretty tough terrain, but he enjoyed it,” Press Secretary Scott McClellan said...
There's a little problem with President bike boy's ride on the morning after Earth Day:
...Jim Foote, acting manager of the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument, said the Clara Burgess trail is also among those monument managers ask people to avoid part of the year to prevent disrupting endangered Peninsular bighorn sheep.
The trail is one of about 10 in the monument under a “voluntary avoidance” program. People are asked to stay off the Clara Burgess trail from Jan. 1 to June 30 during the sheep lambing season, he said.
Hey! You're the President...You wanna wipe out a species or two in the name of having a good time...Well no one's gonna stop you. And actually, how much damage can your little bike cause, Disregarding the eight big black SUV's that followed along the dirt road behind you?
Tuesday, April 25, 2006
Knothole
I have always said that the incentive to deal with impending environmental disaster never comes soon enough. The reason is because there are conservatives loose in the world. As a species, we will never do what must be done to prevent a collision course with climatic events...it would require too much personal sacrifice for too many greedy people.
I liken societies course to throwing a handfull of marbles at a knothole in a fence. The longer we wait, the smaller the knothole becomes and fewer and fewer marbles will get through to the other side. As small as it is now, that knothole is shrinking at an ever increasing rate as the climatic engine revs up in response to human activity.
We are the Stooges...loading a truck with stolen jugs of moonshine whiskey while it sits on the hill above the house containing everything we hold dear. Jug by jug, we load it well beyond the capacity of the parking brakes until the truck starts to roll, un-noticably slow at first then picking up speed, as the stooges whine and moan and scream as they watch in buffoonish horror as the truck crashes into the house, it's destructive force tragically magnified by the burden of cargo the Stooges couldn't live without.
I have a very low opinion of conservatives, as most of you know. They have an incredible capacity to lie, not only to others, but to themselves. Some of them are waking up, connecting a few dots, and crapping in their pants as they realize that "Liberals" have been absolutely right all these years. Why didn't they listen?
This from a conservative voice:
No serious person can deny the overwhelming scientific evidence that the world's climate is changing dramatically for the worse. Conservative skeptics, however, argue that the science isn't clear enough to pinpoint the degree to which human activity is responsible. Even if that were true, given the staggering magnitude of the stakes, it is wildly imprudent to wait for a level of certainty that may never come, or come too late.
Tim Flannery, an Australian scientist and former global-warming skeptic, says there is no way to account for the temperature rise outside of human activity. In his book The Weather Makers, Flannery writes, "Skepticism is an indispensable element in scientific inquiry, but when the intention is to mislead rather than clarify, we have not skepticism but deceit."
There's much self-deceit about global warming among us conservatives. To take this stuff seriously would mean confronting the fact that we cannot continue living as we like. It would mean dealing like grown-ups with the real possibility that we are condemning future generations to excruciating hardship because we refuse our duty to stewardship.
Well, Duh!...here's the rest:
USA today
I liken societies course to throwing a handfull of marbles at a knothole in a fence. The longer we wait, the smaller the knothole becomes and fewer and fewer marbles will get through to the other side. As small as it is now, that knothole is shrinking at an ever increasing rate as the climatic engine revs up in response to human activity.
We are the Stooges...loading a truck with stolen jugs of moonshine whiskey while it sits on the hill above the house containing everything we hold dear. Jug by jug, we load it well beyond the capacity of the parking brakes until the truck starts to roll, un-noticably slow at first then picking up speed, as the stooges whine and moan and scream as they watch in buffoonish horror as the truck crashes into the house, it's destructive force tragically magnified by the burden of cargo the Stooges couldn't live without.
I have a very low opinion of conservatives, as most of you know. They have an incredible capacity to lie, not only to others, but to themselves. Some of them are waking up, connecting a few dots, and crapping in their pants as they realize that "Liberals" have been absolutely right all these years. Why didn't they listen?
This from a conservative voice:
No serious person can deny the overwhelming scientific evidence that the world's climate is changing dramatically for the worse. Conservative skeptics, however, argue that the science isn't clear enough to pinpoint the degree to which human activity is responsible. Even if that were true, given the staggering magnitude of the stakes, it is wildly imprudent to wait for a level of certainty that may never come, or come too late.
Tim Flannery, an Australian scientist and former global-warming skeptic, says there is no way to account for the temperature rise outside of human activity. In his book The Weather Makers, Flannery writes, "Skepticism is an indispensable element in scientific inquiry, but when the intention is to mislead rather than clarify, we have not skepticism but deceit."
There's much self-deceit about global warming among us conservatives. To take this stuff seriously would mean confronting the fact that we cannot continue living as we like. It would mean dealing like grown-ups with the real possibility that we are condemning future generations to excruciating hardship because we refuse our duty to stewardship.
Well, Duh!...here's the rest:
USA today
Sunday, April 23, 2006
Sunday Sermon
In the Genesis myth, God kicks Adam and Eve out of Eden for knowing too much. See, this talking lizard seduces Eve into eating a fig or some grapes, and the grapes are magic and they make Eve smart, only they don't really because she gives some to Adam so he gets smart too, and that wasn't real smart if you think about it.
Eve coulda had it all.
She shoulda stopped for a second and made a plan... See what happens when you don't make a plan? Eve got herself and her man kicked out of Paradise and that stupid Lizard became a quadruple amputee and gave a bad name to all his descendants who were forevermore called "Snakes".
It seems like Religion has been at war with knowlege ever since, and has acted as the Scotty McLellan for figs and grapes, blaming the whole incident on "Apples" which are from Tajikistan anyway, and are getting a bad rap from the FundXtians. (Islam blames it on bananas, did ja know?)
I blame it on the lack of a "Plan".
"So you're gonna get all this knowlege and you have no idea what you're gonna do after you get smart?" someone, maybe the lizard, shoulda asked Eve after a grape or two when she was only a little bit smart and before she ate so many that she got too smart for her own good and got Adam involved in the whole thing. The Lizard got burned, too, by this lack of planning, and has been dodging garden hoes ever since. Eve got Adam involved in a sewing operation to make clothes out of leaves after she pointed out to Adam that they were nekkid.
"I'll be Damned!" said Adam, in one of the great understatements in all of history.
I don't remember what the moral was supposed to be when they told me that story in Sunday school, but here's the one I've come up with:
"Knowlege isn't much good without a plan."
I keep hearing that the Democrats don't have a plan. Well, that's not true but wait just a minute...How about telling me what the Republican "Plan" is?
Ha, I thought so.
See, a "Plan" implies that some thought has been given to some imaginable "Future" and this "Plan" thing is the method by which we can achieve it. Here is the Republican "Future":
1."They" get filthy rich, mostly by stealing your tax money.
2. Everybody else works for sub-minimum wage to make "Them" happy.
3. The Constitution? What Constitution?
4. Put the United States so deep into debt that it can never ever recover.
I think that's about it...Everything else seems to flow from Republicans being able to do what they want, and Laws apply to everyone else.
Some DINO's (Democrats In Name Only, such as Joe Leiberman) think this is a fine plan.
Some others think that America used to be a force for Good in the world...They seem to like that idea and want America to be loved, once again, not just by the rest of the world, but by it's own people.
Howard Dean is the Chair of the DNC and has laid out an agenda that can do just that. Other Democrats are offering similar ideas. Dean's six point plan:
1. Raise the minimum wage
2. Create a fair system of government that serves Middle Class America, not just the rich
3. Reduce the power of Lobbyists, create a complete ban on lobbying "gifts"
4. Protect our ports, inspect all cargo coming into the United States
5. Fix Medicare
6. Transition out of Iraq, the greatest Presidential disaster in the history of America
Another Democratic plan :
(1) making college education affordable for every American;
(2) holding a summit to fix the budget;
(3) achieving energy independence in part by switching to a hybrid economy;
(4) creating an institute on science and technology to spur American innovation;
(5) universal health care.
And from John Kerry:
1. Tell the truth.
2. Fire the incompetents.
3. Find Osama bin Laden
4. Secure our ports and our homeland.
5. Bring our troops home from Iraq.
6. Obey the law and protect our civil rights
"Tell the Truth?"...What are they trying to do? Bring our system of government down in ruins? Well no, but they ARE trying to bring the NeoCon Republican system of controlling the United States government for their own purposes to an end.
Peace,
Steve
more
Eve coulda had it all.
She shoulda stopped for a second and made a plan... See what happens when you don't make a plan? Eve got herself and her man kicked out of Paradise and that stupid Lizard became a quadruple amputee and gave a bad name to all his descendants who were forevermore called "Snakes".
It seems like Religion has been at war with knowlege ever since, and has acted as the Scotty McLellan for figs and grapes, blaming the whole incident on "Apples" which are from Tajikistan anyway, and are getting a bad rap from the FundXtians. (Islam blames it on bananas, did ja know?)
I blame it on the lack of a "Plan".
"So you're gonna get all this knowlege and you have no idea what you're gonna do after you get smart?" someone, maybe the lizard, shoulda asked Eve after a grape or two when she was only a little bit smart and before she ate so many that she got too smart for her own good and got Adam involved in the whole thing. The Lizard got burned, too, by this lack of planning, and has been dodging garden hoes ever since. Eve got Adam involved in a sewing operation to make clothes out of leaves after she pointed out to Adam that they were nekkid.
"I'll be Damned!" said Adam, in one of the great understatements in all of history.
I don't remember what the moral was supposed to be when they told me that story in Sunday school, but here's the one I've come up with:
"Knowlege isn't much good without a plan."
I keep hearing that the Democrats don't have a plan. Well, that's not true but wait just a minute...How about telling me what the Republican "Plan" is?
Ha, I thought so.
See, a "Plan" implies that some thought has been given to some imaginable "Future" and this "Plan" thing is the method by which we can achieve it. Here is the Republican "Future":
1."They" get filthy rich, mostly by stealing your tax money.
2. Everybody else works for sub-minimum wage to make "Them" happy.
3. The Constitution? What Constitution?
4. Put the United States so deep into debt that it can never ever recover.
I think that's about it...Everything else seems to flow from Republicans being able to do what they want, and Laws apply to everyone else.
Some DINO's (Democrats In Name Only, such as Joe Leiberman) think this is a fine plan.
Some others think that America used to be a force for Good in the world...They seem to like that idea and want America to be loved, once again, not just by the rest of the world, but by it's own people.
Howard Dean is the Chair of the DNC and has laid out an agenda that can do just that. Other Democrats are offering similar ideas. Dean's six point plan:
1. Raise the minimum wage
2. Create a fair system of government that serves Middle Class America, not just the rich
3. Reduce the power of Lobbyists, create a complete ban on lobbying "gifts"
4. Protect our ports, inspect all cargo coming into the United States
5. Fix Medicare
6. Transition out of Iraq, the greatest Presidential disaster in the history of America
Another Democratic plan :
(1) making college education affordable for every American;
(2) holding a summit to fix the budget;
(3) achieving energy independence in part by switching to a hybrid economy;
(4) creating an institute on science and technology to spur American innovation;
(5) universal health care.
And from John Kerry:
1. Tell the truth.
2. Fire the incompetents.
3. Find Osama bin Laden
4. Secure our ports and our homeland.
5. Bring our troops home from Iraq.
6. Obey the law and protect our civil rights
"Tell the Truth?"...What are they trying to do? Bring our system of government down in ruins? Well no, but they ARE trying to bring the NeoCon Republican system of controlling the United States government for their own purposes to an end.
Peace,
Steve
more
Saturday, April 22, 2006
Saturday Funnies (Earth Day Edition)
No more lost wetlands, eh? Damned amazing!
From the United States government website we learn these amazing things that they are doing to save the environment...
But wait...there's a little more to this story brought to us by the truth tellers of America...No, not the media, silly...Our comedians.
" The Bush administration says they want to declare all golf course water hazards as protected wetlands. It's part of their plan to save restricted country clubs." --David Letterman
And the air is not cleaner. That's simply a lie. Was has happened is that the EPA doesn't measure air quality nearly as effectively any more. The sampling rate has plummeted.
It's kinda like the "Texas Miracle" in education...never happened. They cooked the test scores then and they're cooking the results now.
The stupidest thing I saw this weekend was a man being interviewed by CNN as he pumped gas into his vehicle. He was complaining about gas prices as he pumped and pumped and pumped.
"The government just isn't doing all it can to find enough oil," he said. That was the quote shown on TV. Well I can double the amount of gas available. Yep, me personally. The man who was complaining was pumping gas into his Chevrolet Suburban, a monster SUV that gets 15 miles to the gallon if you're careful.
What a twit!
Peace,
Steve
Bigger
The Bush Administration is focused on achieving meaningful results - cleaner air and water, and healthier lands and wildlife habitats.
The nation's air is much cleaner today than it was in 1970 and progress will continue.
The trend of annual loss of wetlands has been reversed.
Restoration and redevelopment of abandoned industrial sites is accelerating.
President Bush is meeting his commitment to reduce the National Park Service maintenance backlog.
From the United States government website we learn these amazing things that they are doing to save the environment...
But wait...there's a little more to this story brought to us by the truth tellers of America...No, not the media, silly...Our comedians.
" The Bush administration says they want to declare all golf course water hazards as protected wetlands. It's part of their plan to save restricted country clubs." --David Letterman
And the air is not cleaner. That's simply a lie. Was has happened is that the EPA doesn't measure air quality nearly as effectively any more. The sampling rate has plummeted.
It's kinda like the "Texas Miracle" in education...never happened. They cooked the test scores then and they're cooking the results now.
The stupidest thing I saw this weekend was a man being interviewed by CNN as he pumped gas into his vehicle. He was complaining about gas prices as he pumped and pumped and pumped.
"The government just isn't doing all it can to find enough oil," he said. That was the quote shown on TV. Well I can double the amount of gas available. Yep, me personally. The man who was complaining was pumping gas into his Chevrolet Suburban, a monster SUV that gets 15 miles to the gallon if you're careful.
What a twit!
Peace,
Steve
Bigger
Friday, April 21, 2006
biggerGreat Moments in Irony...The answers
Did you know who said these?
"I will have no part in the creation of a constitutional double-standard to benefit the president."
Bill Frist
"No man is above the law, and no man is below the law -- that's the principle that we all hold very dear in this country."
Tom DeLay
Isn't Freedom of Speech wonderful?
Peace,
Steve
"I will have no part in the creation of a constitutional double-standard to benefit the president."
Bill Frist
"No man is above the law, and no man is below the law -- that's the principle that we all hold very dear in this country."
Tom DeLay
Isn't Freedom of Speech wonderful?
Peace,
Steve
His lips are moving...Again
Hard core Conservatives are so stupid, sometimes, I can't believe they remember to breathe.
How in the heck can 33% of Americans still have a positive opinion of George W. Bush or any other Republican, for that matter? Check out Mallard Filmore in the comics to see what republican humor looks like and you can see how gullible they are.
I was asked, yesterday, if there were any Republicans I liked and I said, sure...Barry Goldwater and Everitt Dirksen...And I should add that in retrospect, Dwight Eisenhower was a great man, even though he failed to stop the ascension of the corporatists taking over his party.
Republicans have gotten more servile to their corporate masters since those guys were around. War is merely a business opportunity and that's OK because no rich Republican children are going to get shot at, anyway. Halliburton misplaces more money than it would take to deal with the Mexican immigration problem and nobody mentions it.
(It's just bidness, you understand...No hard feelings. Sorry you guys gotta get dumped on. The President is in trouble right now...It'll all blow over after the elections and you guys can get back to work on trimming the shrubberries.}
And has one Republican told Cindy Sheehan they are sorry that they bought into the pack of lies that got her son killed?
George Bush lied to America and got us into war. Lied to me and lied to You...The bald faced lies are still up on the Whitehouse website and there's a reason. The Conservative base is so stupid and intractable...incapable of personal reason...that by continuing to tell the same old lie, conservatives think it is true.
Here is the White house web site in question...See how many lies you can pick out, boys and girls. See how you feel about the Bush Administration's justification for war now?
Whitehouse web site
Let's do this the easy way...Item one is partly true and item number 8 is completely true. the rest of the statements are essentially false.
But things went so well in Iraq that Bush is careening headlong onto a war with Iran, and it seems like nothing is going to stop him.
the Iranians don't want a war, by the way. They keep trying to talk about things with Bush, but a diplomatic solution doesn't serve their purposes...Which at this point boil down to preventing a Democratic takeover of Congress...the only thing that will prevent George bush from being impeached and thrown out of office.
Hey...Just so you'll know...The Cheney administration has an arms dealer friend on the ground in Iran to make sure that there are no secret communications between the United States Ambassador to Iraq and the Iranian government. Cheney and Bush seem to be doing everything possible to produce a war in Iran.
(Our Ambassador to Iraq turns out to be a really wonderful and wise man...How the hell did Bush appoint him? They're slipping...happened to Capone, happened to Gotti, happened to Hitler...They all mess up in the end.)
Drum
Courage,
Steve
How in the heck can 33% of Americans still have a positive opinion of George W. Bush or any other Republican, for that matter? Check out Mallard Filmore in the comics to see what republican humor looks like and you can see how gullible they are.
I was asked, yesterday, if there were any Republicans I liked and I said, sure...Barry Goldwater and Everitt Dirksen...And I should add that in retrospect, Dwight Eisenhower was a great man, even though he failed to stop the ascension of the corporatists taking over his party.
Republicans have gotten more servile to their corporate masters since those guys were around. War is merely a business opportunity and that's OK because no rich Republican children are going to get shot at, anyway. Halliburton misplaces more money than it would take to deal with the Mexican immigration problem and nobody mentions it.
(It's just bidness, you understand...No hard feelings. Sorry you guys gotta get dumped on. The President is in trouble right now...It'll all blow over after the elections and you guys can get back to work on trimming the shrubberries.}
And has one Republican told Cindy Sheehan they are sorry that they bought into the pack of lies that got her son killed?
George Bush lied to America and got us into war. Lied to me and lied to You...The bald faced lies are still up on the Whitehouse website and there's a reason. The Conservative base is so stupid and intractable...incapable of personal reason...that by continuing to tell the same old lie, conservatives think it is true.
Here is the White house web site in question...See how many lies you can pick out, boys and girls. See how you feel about the Bush Administration's justification for war now?
Whitehouse web site
Let's do this the easy way...Item one is partly true and item number 8 is completely true. the rest of the statements are essentially false.
But things went so well in Iraq that Bush is careening headlong onto a war with Iran, and it seems like nothing is going to stop him.
the Iranians don't want a war, by the way. They keep trying to talk about things with Bush, but a diplomatic solution doesn't serve their purposes...Which at this point boil down to preventing a Democratic takeover of Congress...the only thing that will prevent George bush from being impeached and thrown out of office.
Hey...Just so you'll know...The Cheney administration has an arms dealer friend on the ground in Iran to make sure that there are no secret communications between the United States Ambassador to Iraq and the Iranian government. Cheney and Bush seem to be doing everything possible to produce a war in Iran.
(Our Ambassador to Iraq turns out to be a really wonderful and wise man...How the hell did Bush appoint him? They're slipping...happened to Capone, happened to Gotti, happened to Hitler...They all mess up in the end.)
Drum
Courage,
Steve
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Great Moments in Irony
Great moments in Irony..
Here are some really fun quotes...Guess who?
"I will have no part in the creation of a constitutional double-standard to benefit the president."
"No man is above the law, and no man is below the law -- that's the principle that we all hold very dear in this country."
The most indicted and convicted Presidential Administration in history was Ronald Reagan's. This usually comes as a surprise to people who naturally think Nixon holds that record. Reagan, in spite of the deep levels of corruption and serious jail time for his buddies, is about to be surpassed by George Bush, in spite of the tremendous advantage the republican party has in controlling the presidency, congress, and the Supreme Court. At the present time, every single investigation into Bushista misconduct is being blocked or derailed by Bush operatives.
The greatest fear of the Bush cabal is not another 9-11. They would consider that a godsend, actually. No, it is a Democratic takeover of one or both houses of Congress in the coming elections. Karl Rove is changing job titles in order to get him further from public scrutiny as he starts the final campaign in what will probably be known as the dirtiest election campaign in American history.
It has to be dirty...it's all Karl's got to work with. That's why Illegal Immigration is such a big deal all of a sudden. Karl needed a new enemy to be afraid of. "Mexican Terrorists" ...
One that doesn't have WMD's this time... the last enemy Karl picked seems to be fighting back. A manufactured "enemy" is necessary for Karl to have any chance of staying out of jail after November, because he simply cannot run on the Bush record. Even two years ago it was horrible but the Dems were unable to come together enough to make ther case. This time they may not even have to.
In 2004 historians were polled as to the "worst" presidency in history...84% called Bush a failure by historical standards, with only 10% calling his Administration a success.
Now they are calling Bush, "The Worst President in history!"
Very High praise, indeed!
Courage,
Steve
Rolling Stone magazine has the best reporting on this.
The Worst!
Here are some really fun quotes...Guess who?
"I will have no part in the creation of a constitutional double-standard to benefit the president."
"No man is above the law, and no man is below the law -- that's the principle that we all hold very dear in this country."
The most indicted and convicted Presidential Administration in history was Ronald Reagan's. This usually comes as a surprise to people who naturally think Nixon holds that record. Reagan, in spite of the deep levels of corruption and serious jail time for his buddies, is about to be surpassed by George Bush, in spite of the tremendous advantage the republican party has in controlling the presidency, congress, and the Supreme Court. At the present time, every single investigation into Bushista misconduct is being blocked or derailed by Bush operatives.
The greatest fear of the Bush cabal is not another 9-11. They would consider that a godsend, actually. No, it is a Democratic takeover of one or both houses of Congress in the coming elections. Karl Rove is changing job titles in order to get him further from public scrutiny as he starts the final campaign in what will probably be known as the dirtiest election campaign in American history.
It has to be dirty...it's all Karl's got to work with. That's why Illegal Immigration is such a big deal all of a sudden. Karl needed a new enemy to be afraid of. "Mexican Terrorists" ...
One that doesn't have WMD's this time... the last enemy Karl picked seems to be fighting back. A manufactured "enemy" is necessary for Karl to have any chance of staying out of jail after November, because he simply cannot run on the Bush record. Even two years ago it was horrible but the Dems were unable to come together enough to make ther case. This time they may not even have to.
In 2004 historians were polled as to the "worst" presidency in history...84% called Bush a failure by historical standards, with only 10% calling his Administration a success.
Now they are calling Bush, "The Worst President in history!"
Very High praise, indeed!
Courage,
Steve
Rolling Stone magazine has the best reporting on this.
The Worst!
Tuesday, April 18, 2006
Practice?
Some of the best stuff out there comes from the comments.
Here's Gordon:
Sam said:
Jim said:
Steve said:
Oh Wow, Man...Nixon was like the Sixties, I think...Don't you remember?
Peace,
Steve also said
Here's Gordon:
As for abstinence, it may be a bit backwards, but as near as I can tell the best way to practice it is to get married. Have some kids, live a normal, over-busy life, and any sexual relations beyond a quick hug and tickle are to be treasured and recorded.
Well, maybe not recorded.
And why do we need to practice it? Sex should be practiced, but not doing it is pretty easy to get right.
And your take on Judas was fine. I wonder when the other "lost" gospels will be discovered. Talk about not toeing the party line! Not that any of this will make any difference whatsoever. Its not about history, facts, or even alternate views. Its much more about being spoon-fed, and a nice set of comfortable beliefs.
Sam said:
I have been waiting to see exactly when we would start seeing the type of propagana that wins elections. I knew it would come.... so it has started, 1) around Easter weekend, and, 2) 6 1/2 months before the elections. I wonder why this timing.
I have been in the home of a Southern Baptist who was told that they need to learn about other religions and so they read a book they were given by their pastor that says Unitarianism is a cult.
So... these people (and there are so many of them) are not the target of a campaign of reason. We can't say to them... OK folks, the Republicans have now started their Nov. campaign, and they are going to make you temporarily forget about the war and supply-side economics, they are going to remind you about gay marriage for 6.5 months.
Jim said:
Honestly, I can't remember when it was this bad, I'm not sure Nixon was this bad , maybe he was and I just don't remember...
Steve said:
Oh Wow, Man...Nixon was like the Sixties, I think...Don't you remember?
Peace,
Steve also said
Chastity Now!
Chastity Now!
That is what our dear leader and his administration wants taught to the school children of America. Aside from the fact that there is no study that shows abstinence instruction does a damned thing to reduce STD's or preteen pregnancy or any of the other problems associated with "non-abstinence", there is the sheer hipocrisy of the situation. Al Franken made fun of the Abstinence crowd in one of his books where he asked Republican leaders to give examples of their own experiences with "abstinence"...Doesn't appear that there were any.
Now, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced guidelines for organizations applying for grants for abstinence-only education programs.
this is your government in action, folks...Morons!
thinkprogress.org
If we are going to get Teenagers to practice abstinence, they must have adult role models....We need role models for abstinence. Hmm...Just who exactly is the General talking about as our models for "Chastity"?
"Convincing single adults to remain abstinent won't be an easy job. There aren't many positive role models for them to emulate. What we need is a chastity posterboy, and I think you're the man for the job. You're successful, a bachelor, and a tireless advocate for abstinence-only education. You're perfect. You'll be a fabulous posterboy.
We'll start out with a national tour, hitting local news shows and editorial boards, service clubs, chambers of commerce, senior centers, and college campuses. At each stop, you'll discuss how much you value your virginity and how rewarding your chastity has been to you."
Closeted
Peace,
Steve
That is what our dear leader and his administration wants taught to the school children of America. Aside from the fact that there is no study that shows abstinence instruction does a damned thing to reduce STD's or preteen pregnancy or any of the other problems associated with "non-abstinence", there is the sheer hipocrisy of the situation. Al Franken made fun of the Abstinence crowd in one of his books where he asked Republican leaders to give examples of their own experiences with "abstinence"...Doesn't appear that there were any.
Now, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced guidelines for organizations applying for grants for abstinence-only education programs.
this is your government in action, folks...Morons!
Abstinence curricula must have a clear definition of sexual abstinence which must be consistent with the following: “Abstinence means voluntarily choosing not to engage in sexual activity until marriage. Sexual activity refers to any type of genital contact or sexual stimulation between two persons including, but not limited to, sexual intercourse.”
...Throughout the entire curriculum, the term “marriage” must be defined as “only a legal union between one man and one woman as a husband and wife, and the word ’spouse’ refers only to a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or a wife.” (Consistent with Federal law)
thinkprogress.org
If we are going to get Teenagers to practice abstinence, they must have adult role models....We need role models for abstinence. Hmm...Just who exactly is the General talking about as our models for "Chastity"?
"Convincing single adults to remain abstinent won't be an easy job. There aren't many positive role models for them to emulate. What we need is a chastity posterboy, and I think you're the man for the job. You're successful, a bachelor, and a tireless advocate for abstinence-only education. You're perfect. You'll be a fabulous posterboy.
We'll start out with a national tour, hitting local news shows and editorial boards, service clubs, chambers of commerce, senior centers, and college campuses. At each stop, you'll discuss how much you value your virginity and how rewarding your chastity has been to you."
Closeted
Peace,
Steve
Monday, April 17, 2006
It's Starting...
The Republican campaign to keep Bush and Cheney from being impeached has started. By that, I mean that if the Republicans lose their majority in the House of Representatives, Bush and Cheney are in trouble...Even more so than they are now.
The GOP is already harping on Gay marriage, flag burning, and abortion as the big issues in the campaign. They will try to make so much noise on these issues that no one will be able to ask questions like:
"Is gay marriage a bigger problem to America than a President who lies to us in order to start a war which he will be incompetent to run?"
I haven't heard this yet but I think that if polls show them really far behind before the elections this fall, Cheney will resign.
Right now, polls show the President with a 63% negative rating which is phenominal. That is in Tricky Dick Nixon range. Just to remind you, Slick Willie Clinton not only never had those kinds of negatives, but he had beter than a 60% approval rating at the time he was being impeached... And if Bill Clinton could have run again...He would have won easily.
The worst thing Al Gore ever did was to put Joe Leiberman on the ticket instread of embracing Clinton.
The second worst thing Al did was turning into a pussy during the Florida recount scandal. Gore won Florida by every objective study, the only difference in the outcome is in the size of the victory...a few hundred, a couple of thousand, or 29,000...And none of these studies accounts for the tens of thousands of likely Democratic voters that were purged from the records and not allowed to vote. So I'm thinking...
How would things be different if Gore had been recognized as the President? I would like for you folks to add your own in the comments but Here's a few ideas for starters:
No tax cuts for the rich..the National debt is at least $2,000,000,000,000.00 less and President Gore has not borrowed more money from foreign governments than all the Presidents in history before him..
Iraq is a boring news item from time to time, much like Lybia... Iran has a nuclear program?
9,000 American fighters don't have brain injuries.
15,000 American fighters are not missing arms and legs.
2,500 American fighters aren't dead, and Cindy Sheehan is that kooky but nice lady who lives down the street somewhere in America. You and I don't know who she is.
The very idea of selling off American Park Service land to developers in unheard of, except in the very sick minds of certain unscrupulous developers.
Some kind of domestic partner arrangement for gays and lesbians has become common and is no big deal except in the screaming rants of fundamentalist ministers...only heard as background noise in a far less hateful American mainstream.
America is leading the world in environmental salvation. We aren't doing quite as much as we need to but steps are definitely being taken to reduce human caused climate change.
The idea of the President violating any provision of our Constitution is an outrage.
The right to privacy is sacred. Your phone conversations are none of the government's business and the left breast of Lady Justice is artfully pleasing and not porn.
Abortion would be safe, available, and rarer than it is now.
Reinstating the "Fairness Doctrine" in American journalism is being discussed.
Your local FM radio station is not owned by a corporate conglomerate in another state. You have not heard a song by Air Supply in months and certainly not three times today already.
The whole world isn't wondering, "What happened to America?"
They still like us.
And Lastly...
President Gore would have actually read the Presidential Daily Briefing entitled...
"Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States."
Peace,
Steve
The GOP is already harping on Gay marriage, flag burning, and abortion as the big issues in the campaign. They will try to make so much noise on these issues that no one will be able to ask questions like:
"Is gay marriage a bigger problem to America than a President who lies to us in order to start a war which he will be incompetent to run?"
I haven't heard this yet but I think that if polls show them really far behind before the elections this fall, Cheney will resign.
Right now, polls show the President with a 63% negative rating which is phenominal. That is in Tricky Dick Nixon range. Just to remind you, Slick Willie Clinton not only never had those kinds of negatives, but he had beter than a 60% approval rating at the time he was being impeached... And if Bill Clinton could have run again...He would have won easily.
The worst thing Al Gore ever did was to put Joe Leiberman on the ticket instread of embracing Clinton.
The second worst thing Al did was turning into a pussy during the Florida recount scandal. Gore won Florida by every objective study, the only difference in the outcome is in the size of the victory...a few hundred, a couple of thousand, or 29,000...And none of these studies accounts for the tens of thousands of likely Democratic voters that were purged from the records and not allowed to vote. So I'm thinking...
How would things be different if Gore had been recognized as the President? I would like for you folks to add your own in the comments but Here's a few ideas for starters:
No tax cuts for the rich..the National debt is at least $2,000,000,000,000.00 less and President Gore has not borrowed more money from foreign governments than all the Presidents in history before him..
Iraq is a boring news item from time to time, much like Lybia... Iran has a nuclear program?
9,000 American fighters don't have brain injuries.
15,000 American fighters are not missing arms and legs.
2,500 American fighters aren't dead, and Cindy Sheehan is that kooky but nice lady who lives down the street somewhere in America. You and I don't know who she is.
The very idea of selling off American Park Service land to developers in unheard of, except in the very sick minds of certain unscrupulous developers.
Some kind of domestic partner arrangement for gays and lesbians has become common and is no big deal except in the screaming rants of fundamentalist ministers...only heard as background noise in a far less hateful American mainstream.
America is leading the world in environmental salvation. We aren't doing quite as much as we need to but steps are definitely being taken to reduce human caused climate change.
The idea of the President violating any provision of our Constitution is an outrage.
The right to privacy is sacred. Your phone conversations are none of the government's business and the left breast of Lady Justice is artfully pleasing and not porn.
Abortion would be safe, available, and rarer than it is now.
Reinstating the "Fairness Doctrine" in American journalism is being discussed.
Your local FM radio station is not owned by a corporate conglomerate in another state. You have not heard a song by Air Supply in months and certainly not three times today already.
The whole world isn't wondering, "What happened to America?"
They still like us.
And Lastly...
President Gore would have actually read the Presidential Daily Briefing entitled...
"Bin Laden determined to attack inside the United States."
Peace,
Steve
Sunday, April 16, 2006
biggerSaturday, April 15, 2006
It ain't necessarily so...
Ok, most of you know how much I like to poke fun at people who throw their religion around like a bludgeon. Most of them have no real understanding of their own religions, preferring instead to march to the beat of some master drummer who manipulates them to his own purposes... Hilarious and tragic at the same time.
Bubbling to the surface at this moment is the "Newly discovered" Book of Judas. Nothing new about it, nor its discovery. it has been around for, well, every bit as long as all the other biblical books but since it is so "inconvenient" for the organized christian sects it has been swept into the vault until recently, due to its highly uncomfortable picture of Judas and Jesus scheming together to confront the authorities in the events that led to Jesus's execution.
The book of Judas is just as valid as any other gospel, but while it tidies up a lot of questions about the events leading to the cross, The book of Judas ruins the cherished plot line. Organized religion loves nothing more than a villian, and to take away their most prized human villian would ruin the simpleness of their tragedy and screw up passion plays all over Christendom.
If Judas did not betray Jesus, Milton's grand purgatorial scene of Judas's eternal damnation is highlighted as the transparent lie that it really is for anyone who actually thinks about it anyway.
I like what Judas says about Jesus, who becomes much more intelligent when seen through the eyes of the Judas gospel...much more the protagonist as opposed to the hapless victim...The revolutionary in full plot as the righteous underdog.
For me, a more believable figure, tragic in a scheme gone wildly wrong. Judas's suicide, a reaction to the seeming failure of their life's mission and the devastating loss of his best friend.
Of course this will be rejected out of hand by church leaders, who will celebrate the resurrection of jesus tomorrow, instead of today as their bibles actually indicate...Late this afternoon actually.
But this is a really fun celebration no matter how incorrect or distorted. I get high on life and chocolate bunnies and laugh at people who will alter their schedule to see a sunrise once a year, thinking it is more special than the others.
I see every single one of them as a miracle.
Peace,
Steve
Further reading
...the word Easter is derived from an ancient Teutonic goddess of fertility named Estere whose feasts were celebrated in the spring by her pagan adherents. Typically, the Estere celebration occurred in April at which time the pagan goddess demanded sacrifices from her followers.
Going back even further into antiquity, Easter can also be traced to the ancient goddess Ishtar, and is associated with the deification of women goddesses...
Easter history
Bubbling to the surface at this moment is the "Newly discovered" Book of Judas. Nothing new about it, nor its discovery. it has been around for, well, every bit as long as all the other biblical books but since it is so "inconvenient" for the organized christian sects it has been swept into the vault until recently, due to its highly uncomfortable picture of Judas and Jesus scheming together to confront the authorities in the events that led to Jesus's execution.
The book of Judas is just as valid as any other gospel, but while it tidies up a lot of questions about the events leading to the cross, The book of Judas ruins the cherished plot line. Organized religion loves nothing more than a villian, and to take away their most prized human villian would ruin the simpleness of their tragedy and screw up passion plays all over Christendom.
If Judas did not betray Jesus, Milton's grand purgatorial scene of Judas's eternal damnation is highlighted as the transparent lie that it really is for anyone who actually thinks about it anyway.
I like what Judas says about Jesus, who becomes much more intelligent when seen through the eyes of the Judas gospel...much more the protagonist as opposed to the hapless victim...The revolutionary in full plot as the righteous underdog.
For me, a more believable figure, tragic in a scheme gone wildly wrong. Judas's suicide, a reaction to the seeming failure of their life's mission and the devastating loss of his best friend.
Of course this will be rejected out of hand by church leaders, who will celebrate the resurrection of jesus tomorrow, instead of today as their bibles actually indicate...Late this afternoon actually.
But this is a really fun celebration no matter how incorrect or distorted. I get high on life and chocolate bunnies and laugh at people who will alter their schedule to see a sunrise once a year, thinking it is more special than the others.
I see every single one of them as a miracle.
Peace,
Steve
Further reading
...the word Easter is derived from an ancient Teutonic goddess of fertility named Estere whose feasts were celebrated in the spring by her pagan adherents. Typically, the Estere celebration occurred in April at which time the pagan goddess demanded sacrifices from her followers.
Going back even further into antiquity, Easter can also be traced to the ancient goddess Ishtar, and is associated with the deification of women goddesses...
Easter history
Friday, April 14, 2006
biggerHis Lips are Moving...
Ya know...I think the President could do a lot to reverse his job approval ratings. I mean , when roughly 63% of the American public not only doesn't like you but also thinks maybe you should be impeached or censored or something, you got a p.r. problem you maybe oughta deal with.
This is a common and fairly straight forward problem politicians and businesses deal with all the time.
Take the Ford Company for instance. When their cars and trucks started falling appart, they did the only thing an American Corp should do...Ran a massive ad campaign letting everyone know that "Quality is job 1" at Ford and they do job number 1 just as well as they build cars and trucks. The American car buying public immediately responded by making a foreign car the number one seller in the United States.
See how it works?
So Bush gets called a "LIAR" just for a little thing like, you know, telling a whopper...Just so's he could wipe out a sovereign Nation that wouldn't let his buddies operate their oil pipeline.
When a newspaper actually put down in black and white what everyone with an IQ above a turnip already knows... and so do the turnips... the President's flack called for an apology:
Yeah, but it is absolutely true!
True Dat
Come on, guys...Let's get that Ad program revved up, how 'bout it.
"Honesty is Job 1!"
Peace,
Steve
*****
In the interest of informing the American people, WhitesCreek Journal brings you this highly informative and relevant bit of information...See...That's what someone in my position does, you see...Informs. When something pops up on my radar screen that has the potential to be, well, really informative, and possibly a bit pruriently interesting, I feel it's my duty, what with the job I selflessly do for Truth, Justice, and American Gossip..I fell like it's my duty to report it.
Anne Coulter, right wing Republican wingnut, bitch.. Is...was...possibly might have been, or still is...
A Man!
She/He/Whatever got in trouble for voting in the wrong Congressional Distrct in Florida. The manner in which she did such a thing turns out to be a felony. Well, when they checked her voter's registration card, guess what? Rather than check the box that says she's a female...
Which would be perjury if she is not actually a female, you know...She left that part of the form blank.
Ann Coulter's a man?
Well, All I have to say to that is, "Tee Hee!...snicker...Har! Har! Har!"
Da Juice
This is a common and fairly straight forward problem politicians and businesses deal with all the time.
Take the Ford Company for instance. When their cars and trucks started falling appart, they did the only thing an American Corp should do...Ran a massive ad campaign letting everyone know that "Quality is job 1" at Ford and they do job number 1 just as well as they build cars and trucks. The American car buying public immediately responded by making a foreign car the number one seller in the United States.
See how it works?
So Bush gets called a "LIAR" just for a little thing like, you know, telling a whopper...Just so's he could wipe out a sovereign Nation that wouldn't let his buddies operate their oil pipeline.
“We gave him (Saddam Hussein) a chance to allow the inspectors in, and he wouldn’t let them in. And, therefore, after a reasonable request, we decided to remove him from power.”
“If there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is,”...
“By the way, any time you hear the United States government talking about wiretap, it requires – a wiretap requires a court order,” Bush said. “Nothing has changed, by the way. When we’re talking about chasing down terrorists, we’re talking about getting a court order before we do so.”...
When a newspaper actually put down in black and white what everyone with an IQ above a turnip already knows... and so do the turnips... the President's flack called for an apology:
“The lead in the Washington Post left the impression for the reader that the President was saying something he knew at the time not to be true,” McClellan said on April 12, 2006. “That is absolutely false and it is irresponsible, and I don’t know how the Washington Post can defend something so irresponsible.”
Yeah, but it is absolutely true!
True Dat
Come on, guys...Let's get that Ad program revved up, how 'bout it.
"Honesty is Job 1!"
Peace,
Steve
*****
In the interest of informing the American people, WhitesCreek Journal brings you this highly informative and relevant bit of information...See...That's what someone in my position does, you see...Informs. When something pops up on my radar screen that has the potential to be, well, really informative, and possibly a bit pruriently interesting, I feel it's my duty, what with the job I selflessly do for Truth, Justice, and American Gossip..I fell like it's my duty to report it.
Anne Coulter, right wing Republican wingnut, bitch.. Is...was...possibly might have been, or still is...
A Man!
She/He/Whatever got in trouble for voting in the wrong Congressional Distrct in Florida. The manner in which she did such a thing turns out to be a felony. Well, when they checked her voter's registration card, guess what? Rather than check the box that says she's a female...
Which would be perjury if she is not actually a female, you know...She left that part of the form blank.
Ann Coulter's a man?
Well, All I have to say to that is, "Tee Hee!...snicker...Har! Har! Har!"
Da Juice
Wednesday, April 12, 2006
Take Me Out...
Dick Cheney threw out the first pitch at the Washington Nationals baseball game yesterday to a wildly cheering crowd.
Well, actually they didn't cheer all that "wildly"...And actually they didn't cheer at all...And actually, what they did was boo. The Vice President of the United States was enthusiastically booed by a crowd of baseball fans. Loudly enough that the Fox Television producers tried to mute the sound of the crowd.
Think about it...there he was... alone on a hill, the man with the foolish grin was keeping perfectly still...As people showed him how much they love him...
Not!
...But nobody wants to know him,
They can see that he's just a fool.
And he never gives an answer .....
But the fool on the hill,
Sees the sun going down.
And the eyes in his head,
See the world spinning around.
Well on his way, his head in a cloud,
The man of a thousand voices, talking perfectly loud.
But nobody ever hears him,
Or the sound he appears to make.
And he never seems to notice .....
But the fool on the hill,
Sees the sun going down.
And the eyes in his head,
See the world spinning around.
And nobody seems to like him,
They can tell what he wants to do.
And he never shows his feelings,
But the fool on the hill,
Sees the sun going down.
And the eyes in his head,
See the world spinning around.
And then there's this verse:
...He never listens to them
He knows that they're the fools
They don't like him
The fool on the hill
Weird, huh? And then he threw the little white ball into the dirt and walked away. This was one of the few things the man on the hill has done in which nobody got hurt. No lawyers were hit in the face.
Peace,
Steve
Watch him and listen
Well, actually they didn't cheer all that "wildly"...And actually they didn't cheer at all...And actually, what they did was boo. The Vice President of the United States was enthusiastically booed by a crowd of baseball fans. Loudly enough that the Fox Television producers tried to mute the sound of the crowd.
Think about it...there he was... alone on a hill, the man with the foolish grin was keeping perfectly still...As people showed him how much they love him...
Not!
...But nobody wants to know him,
They can see that he's just a fool.
And he never gives an answer .....
But the fool on the hill,
Sees the sun going down.
And the eyes in his head,
See the world spinning around.
Well on his way, his head in a cloud,
The man of a thousand voices, talking perfectly loud.
But nobody ever hears him,
Or the sound he appears to make.
And he never seems to notice .....
But the fool on the hill,
Sees the sun going down.
And the eyes in his head,
See the world spinning around.
And nobody seems to like him,
They can tell what he wants to do.
And he never shows his feelings,
But the fool on the hill,
Sees the sun going down.
And the eyes in his head,
See the world spinning around.
And then there's this verse:
...He never listens to them
He knows that they're the fools
They don't like him
The fool on the hill
Weird, huh? And then he threw the little white ball into the dirt and walked away. This was one of the few things the man on the hill has done in which nobody got hurt. No lawyers were hit in the face.
Peace,
Steve
Watch him and listen
Tuesday, April 11, 2006
Why?
"Hey Dad...What's the big deal with George Bush leaking?"
"Well... son, everyone seems to be missing the point, arguing about whether it was or wasn't illegal. The bottom line is that it was a scumbag thing to do."
"Why?"
"Well... President Bush was trying to talk Americans into letting him start a war in Iraq and he gave us all kind of reasons for it. Now we know that none of them were true. Saddam never had anything to do with 9-11, he didn't have Weapons of Mass Destruction, he didn't have any "Mobile Biological Weapons trailers, and he wasn't on his way to having nuclear weapons."
" Remember President Bush's scary litlte "Mushroom Cloud" speech?
"Yeah?"
"Well... at the time George Bush was telling his boogieman stories, his flunkies were making a big deal about some documents that they said proved that Saddam was trying to buy uranium yellow cake from the country if Niger, and had these aluminum tubes that were going to be used to process it into a bomb...but it wasn't true. None of it was. And not only that, but lot's of people knew none of it was true and said so, and by pointing out that the President of the United States was a lying S.O.B. who was gonna screw things up royally and get a bunch of good American sons and daughters killed, these people who should have been called patriots were given another name by the President's people...Enemies!"
"Who were they?"
"Well...A bunch of British scientists pointed out that Bush's mobile weapons labs were actually gas generators for weather balloons (they had sold the danged things to him in the first place). An American named Scott Ritter pointed out that he had led the United Nations team of inspectors who had decided that there was no way Saddam could hide any WMD's from them, and they were actually inside Iraq when Bush said he was going to start bombing Iraq because Saddam had thrown the inspectors out of the country. Several American metallurgists said the aluminum tubes could never be used to make weapons grade uranium, and a loyal Republican named Joseph Wilson said he had been over to the Middle East and that the documents that Bush claimed proved Saddam was trying to buy uranium were, in fact, forgeries."
"I've heard of Joe Wilson"
"How about Valerie Plame?"
"The CIA lady?"
"Exactly."
"So?"
"Well...This is the part that shows what true scumbags the Bush and Cheney really are. George Bush and Dick Cheney already knew that they were making their case for war with information that was bogus. Bush was trying to talk Americans into send their children off to war, and some of them were going to die, and he was telling lies to do it. See, if you say something you believe is true and it turns out later not to be true, you are mistaken, If you say something to get your way, and it turns out later that it isn't true, and it also turns out later that you knew it wasn't true at the time...You are a liar!"
"Well...Joseph Wilson committed a brave act. He said to America, 'President Bush has said something that is not true and he knows it, and if you believe him, Americans will die for the wrong reason.'"
"Well...So President George Bush was caught in a lie, but that wasn't the most scumbag thing that he did. Caught in a lie, President Bush got back at Joe Wilson by ruining the career, not of Joe Wilson...Bush is much too cowardly to try that...he ruined the career of Joe Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame. And then he made it look like Dick Cheney did it...And Dick Cheney made it look like Scooter Libby did it...And Scooter Libby got arrested for lying to a Federal prosecuter trying to make it look like he DIDN'T do it...But they all did it."
"President Bush lied. Vice President Cheney lied. Scooter Libby lied. Joe Wilson told the truth."
A couple of hundred thousand people died...Some of them were the children of people like Cindy Sheehan, who still asks the same question that we should have been asking before we ever went to war...
"Why?"
Why did we go to war?
Why didn't we stop it?
Courage,
Steve
"Well... son, everyone seems to be missing the point, arguing about whether it was or wasn't illegal. The bottom line is that it was a scumbag thing to do."
"Why?"
"Well... President Bush was trying to talk Americans into letting him start a war in Iraq and he gave us all kind of reasons for it. Now we know that none of them were true. Saddam never had anything to do with 9-11, he didn't have Weapons of Mass Destruction, he didn't have any "Mobile Biological Weapons trailers, and he wasn't on his way to having nuclear weapons."
" Remember President Bush's scary litlte "Mushroom Cloud" speech?
"Yeah?"
"Well... at the time George Bush was telling his boogieman stories, his flunkies were making a big deal about some documents that they said proved that Saddam was trying to buy uranium yellow cake from the country if Niger, and had these aluminum tubes that were going to be used to process it into a bomb...but it wasn't true. None of it was. And not only that, but lot's of people knew none of it was true and said so, and by pointing out that the President of the United States was a lying S.O.B. who was gonna screw things up royally and get a bunch of good American sons and daughters killed, these people who should have been called patriots were given another name by the President's people...Enemies!"
"Who were they?"
"Well...A bunch of British scientists pointed out that Bush's mobile weapons labs were actually gas generators for weather balloons (they had sold the danged things to him in the first place). An American named Scott Ritter pointed out that he had led the United Nations team of inspectors who had decided that there was no way Saddam could hide any WMD's from them, and they were actually inside Iraq when Bush said he was going to start bombing Iraq because Saddam had thrown the inspectors out of the country. Several American metallurgists said the aluminum tubes could never be used to make weapons grade uranium, and a loyal Republican named Joseph Wilson said he had been over to the Middle East and that the documents that Bush claimed proved Saddam was trying to buy uranium were, in fact, forgeries."
"I've heard of Joe Wilson"
"How about Valerie Plame?"
"The CIA lady?"
"Exactly."
"So?"
"Well...This is the part that shows what true scumbags the Bush and Cheney really are. George Bush and Dick Cheney already knew that they were making their case for war with information that was bogus. Bush was trying to talk Americans into send their children off to war, and some of them were going to die, and he was telling lies to do it. See, if you say something you believe is true and it turns out later not to be true, you are mistaken, If you say something to get your way, and it turns out later that it isn't true, and it also turns out later that you knew it wasn't true at the time...You are a liar!"
"Well...Joseph Wilson committed a brave act. He said to America, 'President Bush has said something that is not true and he knows it, and if you believe him, Americans will die for the wrong reason.'"
"Well...So President George Bush was caught in a lie, but that wasn't the most scumbag thing that he did. Caught in a lie, President Bush got back at Joe Wilson by ruining the career, not of Joe Wilson...Bush is much too cowardly to try that...he ruined the career of Joe Wilson's wife, Valerie Plame. And then he made it look like Dick Cheney did it...And Dick Cheney made it look like Scooter Libby did it...And Scooter Libby got arrested for lying to a Federal prosecuter trying to make it look like he DIDN'T do it...But they all did it."
"President Bush lied. Vice President Cheney lied. Scooter Libby lied. Joe Wilson told the truth."
A couple of hundred thousand people died...Some of them were the children of people like Cindy Sheehan, who still asks the same question that we should have been asking before we ever went to war...
"Why?"
Why did we go to war?
Why didn't we stop it?
Courage,
Steve
Monday, April 10, 2006
We have seen the Enemy...
So what do you do, as a Fundamentalist Christian with an Apocolyptic vision of the future of the world, when you wake up one morning, look in the mirror, and realize that in the puppet show at the end of time, the part of Satan, is played by...You?
Did Adolph Hitler ever question himself? Does George W. Bush? Does Bush think that he is destined to be the one to end the world?
So the good news in all this is that the damned nuclear weapon doesn't actually work?
http://www.nukestrat.com/us/afn/B61-11.htm
Did Adolph Hitler ever question himself? Does George W. Bush? Does Bush think that he is destined to be the one to end the world?
After ten years and tens of millions of dollars spent on developing the B61-11, the Bush administration is now trying to persuade Congress that the solution to the unsatisfactory mission capability of the B61-11 is to build yet another modified bomb
So the good news in all this is that the damned nuclear weapon doesn't actually work?
The B61-11 "cannot survive penetration into many types of terrain in which hardened underground facilities are located. Given these limitations, the targeting of a number of hardened, underground facilities is limited to an attack against surface features, which does not does not provide a high probability of defeat of these important targets."
http://www.nukestrat.com/us/afn/B61-11.htm
Lost?
I can't find it...Looked all over but it just isn't there and I am really worried.
Where is America's Outrage?
President Bush is obviously lying...again.
"We are seeking a diplomatic solution...The only military preparations currently underway are normal defense activities."
We've heard this before.
The Bush Administration is considering a bombing campaign against Iran. They are also considering using the great abomination of our time, nuclear weapons.
Fellow Americans, there aren't any Iranians at the gates of America, and we can do plenty of uncalled for damage with plain old ordinary weapons of mass destruction that we already have loaded in the bomb bays of our tactical and strategic planes of war.
There can only be one reason Bush would consider starting another war in the most abominable manner possible...America has woken up to the Bush Administration as the great evil of our time.
But we aren't expressing it as we should. It is time!
It is time to be Outraged!
The investigations into the CIA leaks have narrowed to Bush himself. His leadership is not just inept but devastatingly destructive of everything that makes America America. Our economy is about to run up against the credit card limit, Bush has borrowed more money from foreign goevernments than all other presidents in history. Our schools are troubled. The environment is cascading into world crisis. The only thing rising faster than the cost of healthcare is the cost of secondary education, and Healthcare is a disaster.
The rest of the World now hates America, not because of what we are, so much, but because of what we are not, even though it is well within our power to be...The moral leader of the world.
We no longer stand for truth and justice and fairness. But we can...and we should.
It is time to be outraged, people. Now is the time for courage! Let your outrage be known. Let it be known that you think starting another senseless war would be moral suicide in the World's eyes.
And ours, too.
Courage,
Steve
Where is America's Outrage?
President Bush is obviously lying...again.
"We are seeking a diplomatic solution...The only military preparations currently underway are normal defense activities."
We've heard this before.
The Bush Administration is considering a bombing campaign against Iran. They are also considering using the great abomination of our time, nuclear weapons.
Fellow Americans, there aren't any Iranians at the gates of America, and we can do plenty of uncalled for damage with plain old ordinary weapons of mass destruction that we already have loaded in the bomb bays of our tactical and strategic planes of war.
There can only be one reason Bush would consider starting another war in the most abominable manner possible...America has woken up to the Bush Administration as the great evil of our time.
But we aren't expressing it as we should. It is time!
It is time to be Outraged!
The investigations into the CIA leaks have narrowed to Bush himself. His leadership is not just inept but devastatingly destructive of everything that makes America America. Our economy is about to run up against the credit card limit, Bush has borrowed more money from foreign goevernments than all other presidents in history. Our schools are troubled. The environment is cascading into world crisis. The only thing rising faster than the cost of healthcare is the cost of secondary education, and Healthcare is a disaster.
The rest of the World now hates America, not because of what we are, so much, but because of what we are not, even though it is well within our power to be...The moral leader of the world.
We no longer stand for truth and justice and fairness. But we can...and we should.
It is time to be outraged, people. Now is the time for courage! Let your outrage be known. Let it be known that you think starting another senseless war would be moral suicide in the World's eyes.
And ours, too.
Courage,
Steve
Saturday, April 08, 2006
The Price of War
....the airline placed Private Eisenhauer's coffin in a cargo warehouse with crates and boxes stacked high around it. There was no ceremony, no flag over the coffin.
..."To glance over and see your child's casket on a forklift is not really the kind of thing you want to see,"...
The rest of this story
..."To glance over and see your child's casket on a forklift is not really the kind of thing you want to see,"...
The rest of this story
Thursday, April 06, 2006
biggerVampire II
When I was a little kid, my Dad and Mom took me to the Drive in. Knowing what I know now, I suspect that they had been to the drive in on previous occaissions without me, but there I was in the back seat.
Up there on the big screen was an old house, all shadowy in black and white, and a Butler who kills someone who showed up at the door after having car trouble, and then the Butler cuts off the head of the guy he just killed and pours the blood into a coffin and this scary looking man in a tuxedo and a black cape morphs into being alive inside the coffin and the Butler helps the scary man to stand up and then you know the vampire has returned because nobody drove the right kind of wooden stake in its heart the first time around and now some people are gonna get their blood sucked until somebody shows up and does it right this time, and it's probably gonna be some guy in a grey suit who works hard in his government job and does it proudly because he is just that kinda guy and he'll save us all from the vampire in the end but it'll be rough and scary for a while, and I'm hiding in the floor of the car in the back seat by now and I don't ever know how the movie comes out but I think the good guys won, but I'm not sure and maybe one day the vampire will come back and there may not be enough garlic in the whole world to save us but we think things are ok and try to sleep for now but I'm not sure we can...
Allegorically speaking, the vampire is really the evil that resides in the human race. It lives in the big house and seems to have a lot of money and expensive things but it never seems to be happy unless it is sucking the life blood out of some poor soul who just needed some help with a flat tire...And it is because the Vampire never thinks it has enough money or silver candlesticks because, even though the Vampire has more than it can ever ever use, there are still silver things left in the world that aren't his and he wants them.
And the Vampire will always want things that don't belong to it. And the Vampire will always want more.
And the man in the grey suit will have to kill it again...and again...and again...in order to save his Country.
And now you know why the little kid in the back seat didn't sleep well last night, because there's always some stupid butler around who is willing to serve the Vampire, and the only way to keep the Vapire from coming back is to kill the Butlers, too.
And that is why I am only partly happy about Tom Delay going down in flames. The Democratic party will dance around and be happy while the butlers of the world go about their business of serving evil and calling it good.
Vampires can't survive in the light of day. If you let the Butler keep you in the dark, you'll never kill the Vampire. Remember that as you watch the news. Ask yourself:
Who does this Butler serve...the Vampire? Or the light of the Sun?
So enjoy your celebration, progressives, but get back to sharpening those wooden stakes as soon as you can.
Courage,
Steve
Up there on the big screen was an old house, all shadowy in black and white, and a Butler who kills someone who showed up at the door after having car trouble, and then the Butler cuts off the head of the guy he just killed and pours the blood into a coffin and this scary looking man in a tuxedo and a black cape morphs into being alive inside the coffin and the Butler helps the scary man to stand up and then you know the vampire has returned because nobody drove the right kind of wooden stake in its heart the first time around and now some people are gonna get their blood sucked until somebody shows up and does it right this time, and it's probably gonna be some guy in a grey suit who works hard in his government job and does it proudly because he is just that kinda guy and he'll save us all from the vampire in the end but it'll be rough and scary for a while, and I'm hiding in the floor of the car in the back seat by now and I don't ever know how the movie comes out but I think the good guys won, but I'm not sure and maybe one day the vampire will come back and there may not be enough garlic in the whole world to save us but we think things are ok and try to sleep for now but I'm not sure we can...
Allegorically speaking, the vampire is really the evil that resides in the human race. It lives in the big house and seems to have a lot of money and expensive things but it never seems to be happy unless it is sucking the life blood out of some poor soul who just needed some help with a flat tire...And it is because the Vampire never thinks it has enough money or silver candlesticks because, even though the Vampire has more than it can ever ever use, there are still silver things left in the world that aren't his and he wants them.
And the Vampire will always want things that don't belong to it. And the Vampire will always want more.
And the man in the grey suit will have to kill it again...and again...and again...in order to save his Country.
And now you know why the little kid in the back seat didn't sleep well last night, because there's always some stupid butler around who is willing to serve the Vampire, and the only way to keep the Vapire from coming back is to kill the Butlers, too.
And that is why I am only partly happy about Tom Delay going down in flames. The Democratic party will dance around and be happy while the butlers of the world go about their business of serving evil and calling it good.
Vampires can't survive in the light of day. If you let the Butler keep you in the dark, you'll never kill the Vampire. Remember that as you watch the news. Ask yourself:
Who does this Butler serve...the Vampire? Or the light of the Sun?
So enjoy your celebration, progressives, but get back to sharpening those wooden stakes as soon as you can.
Courage,
Steve
Wednesday, April 05, 2006
Sympathy for the Devil
With Tom DeLay going down in self pitying flames blaming everyone but his own deeply corrupt self, one must wonder at the folks who have been marching lockstep with the most openly hypocritical regime in living memory. I chatted with a fiercely republican friend yesterday, having joke after joke at his expense. Usually he comes back with some memorized talking point laughing at his own cleverness and the fact that His party won...But not now. As unassailable evidence builds and builds making the case that his Party is nothing more than a pompously cufflinked organized crime syndicate, I wonder what he will do?
How does he feel as he faces the fact that god is NOT on his side? That his precious W is actually not even a very good liar?
My friend spent a very profitable lifetime selling insurance. His smile is photographically beaming but false and his eyes give him away. He is worried. He is beginning to feel a guilt that his Sunday piety will not erase.
At some level I feel a kind of pity for my friend and hundreds more like him, but I do not forgive him. I am angry at him and can bestow my own forgiveness when he rises off his knees and helps us fix this mess we are in due to his intellectual laziness and self delusional righteousness.
These people have harmed my country and my countymen. Only their own penance can save them.
Do they have the courage?
Steve
******
Here is a very good piece in similar vein from Darksyde at Kos.
An excerpt:
.
kos
How does he feel as he faces the fact that god is NOT on his side? That his precious W is actually not even a very good liar?
My friend spent a very profitable lifetime selling insurance. His smile is photographically beaming but false and his eyes give him away. He is worried. He is beginning to feel a guilt that his Sunday piety will not erase.
At some level I feel a kind of pity for my friend and hundreds more like him, but I do not forgive him. I am angry at him and can bestow my own forgiveness when he rises off his knees and helps us fix this mess we are in due to his intellectual laziness and self delusional righteousness.
These people have harmed my country and my countymen. Only their own penance can save them.
Do they have the courage?
Steve
******
Here is a very good piece in similar vein from Darksyde at Kos.
An excerpt:
.
..Of all the people that unwittingly facilitated the Republican Culture of Corruption of which DeLay has come to represent, and the string of astonishing GOP failures stemming from the White House, perhaps the grass-roots religious-right deserve the most sympathy. I'm talking about the ordinary guys and gals. Most of those hard working folks were expertly handled by religious opportunists and misled into supporting some of the most immoral politicians ever to disgrace the halls of power. Their eyes and hearts were drawn skyward by the smooth political operators while their collective pockets were then picked by neoconservative policy...
...But it takes tremendous courage to question one's very identity. And it is likely humiliating to confront the possibility that trusted comrades in faith have so cleverly played them like a harp, played them with their deepest, personal spiritual beliefs...
kos
Tuesday, April 04, 2006
I see the Light
If you've been to WhitesCreek Journal Global Headquarters, you know that I love a good storm. The storm viewing room, which doubles as the bedroom, has a glass front facing Southeast over the gorge. The ridge behind the house is a little over 500 feet above us, but we are still roughly 250 feet above the class two rapid below which signals the end of the whitewater canoe and kayak run for the four creeks that come together a mile and a half upstream. When we have a good electrical storm it can be as one house sitter called it, "A religious experience."
It is a glorious thing to see a soaring bald eagle from above. It is interesting to look down on an Army Air helicopter violating FAA regulations as it hovers up the creek with incredible noise reverberating back and forth from wall to wall in the gorge. But friends I'm here to tell you, when Zeus hurls that ionized javelin past your bedroom window in the middle of the night, you can see it with your eyes closed and go from a soundly sleeping repose to standing at attention straight up in a waterbed in point oh, oh, two seconds...faster if you weren't sleeping all that soundly.
Everybody in the valley got woken up by the storm early Monday morning. And everyone I talked to remembers the one big strike. You know...the one where the blinding light and the horrendous boom occur at the same time. I remember one more blinding flash. It happened after I reset the breaker to our well pump and tried to throw the pressure switch to get the water back on. Just to be sure, I did it again with the same result. It took a minute for my eyes to adjust back to the predawn dark.
We have water in reserve for coffee but nobody got a shower that morning. Two hundred and thirty feet down a little hole in the ground is a glob of blackened copper windings that used to be individual wires inside the well pump. The little wires have now been joined in molten matrimony and have sworn to never pump water for me again.
This would be exactly the time that my mother in law had arrived to spend a month with us.
One well service company says they can get here as early as Thursday.
Courage!
Steve
It is a glorious thing to see a soaring bald eagle from above. It is interesting to look down on an Army Air helicopter violating FAA regulations as it hovers up the creek with incredible noise reverberating back and forth from wall to wall in the gorge. But friends I'm here to tell you, when Zeus hurls that ionized javelin past your bedroom window in the middle of the night, you can see it with your eyes closed and go from a soundly sleeping repose to standing at attention straight up in a waterbed in point oh, oh, two seconds...faster if you weren't sleeping all that soundly.
Everybody in the valley got woken up by the storm early Monday morning. And everyone I talked to remembers the one big strike. You know...the one where the blinding light and the horrendous boom occur at the same time. I remember one more blinding flash. It happened after I reset the breaker to our well pump and tried to throw the pressure switch to get the water back on. Just to be sure, I did it again with the same result. It took a minute for my eyes to adjust back to the predawn dark.
We have water in reserve for coffee but nobody got a shower that morning. Two hundred and thirty feet down a little hole in the ground is a glob of blackened copper windings that used to be individual wires inside the well pump. The little wires have now been joined in molten matrimony and have sworn to never pump water for me again.
This would be exactly the time that my mother in law had arrived to spend a month with us.
One well service company says they can get here as early as Thursday.
Courage!
Steve
Sunday, April 02, 2006
Changing Time
Time doesn't change much, actually. Clocks do. This morning most of my clocks have changed themselves. The one on my wrist needs a little work but the one down in the corner of my computer screen thinks it's Spring forward time now.
I don't like it.
Way back in the old days, I could get up at my usual time, a little before daylight, and have an hour or two by myself, just me and the world, before the demands of family life and society would take over. There was time to enjoy the morning light, soft in Spring and pastel colored...Maple red and Tulip Poplar green between fading Sarvis berry blossoms and the yellow Dogwood buds announcing an impending pop into white bloom.
And, geez, at the bird noise.
Before they screwed up the clocks, I had plenty of time for those morning walks which sometimes turned into hikes...And do you realize that if you walk into the woods and be still for a few minutes, the animals will forget about you and go about their business? They have things to do and you get to watch. Only you don't because your government has banned Free time in the morning.
They call it "Daylight savings time" which illustrates as much as anything how stupid Americans are. Let me let you in on a little secret your government is hiding...Today is going to be the same length no matter what the clock says.
We aren't saving a damned thing.
You can't save Daylight, people! You gotta use it as it flies by.
Now go outside and breathe the morning air. (I've already had a hike today, just so you'll feel jealous)
Peace,
Steve
*****
I can't put my finger on exactly why I like this picture. In a couple of months, this momma is going to beat the crap out of her baby and make it leave home forever, but for now, all is good.
Close to Momma
Redwing
I never knew that those little red thingies on a blackbird's wings could flap all by themselves. They flare out and vibrate during a territorial display, as this shot demonstrates. Cool, huh?
I don't like it.
Way back in the old days, I could get up at my usual time, a little before daylight, and have an hour or two by myself, just me and the world, before the demands of family life and society would take over. There was time to enjoy the morning light, soft in Spring and pastel colored...Maple red and Tulip Poplar green between fading Sarvis berry blossoms and the yellow Dogwood buds announcing an impending pop into white bloom.
And, geez, at the bird noise.
Before they screwed up the clocks, I had plenty of time for those morning walks which sometimes turned into hikes...And do you realize that if you walk into the woods and be still for a few minutes, the animals will forget about you and go about their business? They have things to do and you get to watch. Only you don't because your government has banned Free time in the morning.
They call it "Daylight savings time" which illustrates as much as anything how stupid Americans are. Let me let you in on a little secret your government is hiding...Today is going to be the same length no matter what the clock says.
We aren't saving a damned thing.
You can't save Daylight, people! You gotta use it as it flies by.
Now go outside and breathe the morning air. (I've already had a hike today, just so you'll feel jealous)
Peace,
Steve
*****
I can't put my finger on exactly why I like this picture. In a couple of months, this momma is going to beat the crap out of her baby and make it leave home forever, but for now, all is good.
Close to Momma
RedwingI never knew that those little red thingies on a blackbird's wings could flap all by themselves. They flare out and vibrate during a territorial display, as this shot demonstrates. Cool, huh?
Saturday, April 01, 2006
Picture of "----You"
My! Don't we live in an interesting world?
A charming little story arose out of the visit to a Boston Catholic church by that paragon of eclesiastic virtue, Antonin Scalia, known to his close associates as "Yo, Tony!"
So Tony Scalia is a Supreme Court justice, right? and his vote counts more than yours so you better suck up or pay big, right? Well Tony goes to this church for mass and mabe some confession, just like the mobsters do after they whack someone.
You know the drill...Do something bad, go to church, confess all, make a big donation, receive absolution, and reload, right?
Tony loves guns, is afraid of being recorded, and thinks orgies are a fine way to let off some steam. He got his picture taken making a little Italian finger sign for...well, the same thing the finger sign usually means. Just to be sure the photographer knew what the sign meant, Tony said, "F--- You" at the same time, to make sure there was no missing his meaning. So we got a good christian man saying "F--- You" in church and this good christian man happens to be a Supreme Court Justice, so the reporter thinks this might be a news item.
"Aw, shucks," said the right wing mouth pieces. "Tony didn't actually mean 'F-u'," and it doesn't matter if he did because he's a god fearing Republican and he gave W the Presidency back in 2000. See? It's OK if a Republican does it.
So now comes the burning question of the moment: Who's the bad guy in this picture?
...The guy who say's "F-U" in church or the guy who takes a picture of the guy who says "F-U" in church who was working for the church but now he isn't because they fired him for printing the picture of the guy who said "F-U" in church while he was making an Italian sign for "F-U" in church?
Why, the messenger, of course.
Peace,
Steve
A charming little story arose out of the visit to a Boston Catholic church by that paragon of eclesiastic virtue, Antonin Scalia, known to his close associates as "Yo, Tony!"
So Tony Scalia is a Supreme Court justice, right? and his vote counts more than yours so you better suck up or pay big, right? Well Tony goes to this church for mass and mabe some confession, just like the mobsters do after they whack someone.
You know the drill...Do something bad, go to church, confess all, make a big donation, receive absolution, and reload, right?
Tony loves guns, is afraid of being recorded, and thinks orgies are a fine way to let off some steam. He got his picture taken making a little Italian finger sign for...well, the same thing the finger sign usually means. Just to be sure the photographer knew what the sign meant, Tony said, "F--- You" at the same time, to make sure there was no missing his meaning. So we got a good christian man saying "F--- You" in church and this good christian man happens to be a Supreme Court Justice, so the reporter thinks this might be a news item.
"Aw, shucks," said the right wing mouth pieces. "Tony didn't actually mean 'F-u'," and it doesn't matter if he did because he's a god fearing Republican and he gave W the Presidency back in 2000. See? It's OK if a Republican does it.
So now comes the burning question of the moment: Who's the bad guy in this picture?
...The guy who say's "F-U" in church or the guy who takes a picture of the guy who says "F-U" in church who was working for the church but now he isn't because they fired him for printing the picture of the guy who said "F-U" in church while he was making an Italian sign for "F-U" in church?
Why, the messenger, of course.
Peace,
Steve
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