40 Years On, My Lai Massacre Recalled

Associated Press
March 17, 2008MY LAI, Vietnam -

Lawrence Colburn returned to My Lai on Saturday, March 14, and found hope at the site of one of the most notorious chapters of the Vietnam War.

On the 40th anniversary of the massacre of up to 500 unarmed Vietnamese villagers, the former helicopter gunner was reunited with a young man he rescued from rampaging U.S. Soldiers.

On March 16, 1968, Colburn found 8-year-old Do Ba clinging to his mother's corpse in a ditch full of blood and the bodies of more than 100 people who had been mowed down. Nearly all the victims were unarmed women, children and elderly.

"Today I see Do Ba with a wife and a baby," said Colburn, a member of a three-man Army helicopter crew that landed in the midst of the massacre and intervened to stop the killing. "He's transformed himself from being a broken, lonely man. Now he's complete. He's a perfect example of the human spirit, of the will to survive."

Colburn, 58, now runs a medical supplies business north of Atlanta. He, Ba and hundreds of others are gathering this weekend to remember the My Lai massacre, a grim milestone that shocked Americans and undermined support for the war, which ended in 1975 with the fall of Saigon to communist troops.

Buddhist monks in saffron robes led the mourners in prayer Saturday outside a museum that has been erected to remember the dead. An official memorial program will be held on Sunday.
Among those coming to pray was Ha Thi Quy, 83, a My Lai survivor who suffers from anger and depression four decades after the slaughter. Soldiers from the Army's Charlie Company shot her in the leg and killed her mother, her 16-year-old daughter and her 6-year-old son.

Her husband later died of injuries from the massacre and another son had to have an arm and a leg amputated after suffering gunshot wounds that day.

Quy only survived because she was shielded beneath a pile of dead bodies.

"The American government should stop waging wars like they waged in Vietnam," Quy said. "My children were innocent, but those American Soldiers killed them."

Seymour Hersh, the journalist who exposed the massacre, said he sees parallels between My Lai and a more recent story that he has he reported on, the 2005 images of torture from the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq. But he says the public furor unleashed by My Lai was far greater.

"It's stunning how much impact My Lai had and how little impact Abu Ghraib had," Hersh said by telephone from Washington. "We'll have to leave it to historians to figure out why."
On that morning 40 years ago, Colburn flew over My Lai on a reconnaissance mission with pilot Hugh Thompson and crew chief Glenn Andreotta. After several runs over the area, they realized that unarmed civilians were being slaughtered by U.S. troops on the ground.

The members of Charlie Company were a "search and destroy" mission, trying to track down elusive Vietcong guerrillas, whose tactics had depleted the company's ranks.

The company's Soldiers began shooting in My Lai that day even though they hadn't come under attack. It quickly escalated into an orgy of killing.

Thompson landed the helicopter between the villagers and the marauding troops. While Colburn and Andreotta covered him, Thompson persuaded the members of Charlie Company to stop shooting.

The angry and frustrated troops had found themselves in a bewildering war where it was impossible to distinguish friend from foe, said Stanley Karnow, an American historian who wrote "Vietnam: A History."

Their actions shocked the American public, who had preferred to think of U.S. troops as heroes making the world safe for democracy, Karnow said.
Colburn and Andreotta, who died later in the war, found Do Ba after the shooting stopped.
"He was still clinging to his mother," Colburn said.

Ba's aunt raised him in My Lai. When he turned 18, he moved to the former Saigon, now known as Ho Chi Minh City, where he is married with a 14-month-old daughter and works at an electronics factory.

He and Colburn were first reunited at the 2001 dedication of a new school in the village. At that time, Ba was single, haunted by memories of My Lai and eager to start a family.

So much has changed since the day they first met, Ba said. The United States and Vietnam, former enemies, have become allies and developed a booming trade relationship.

"I'm glad the United States and Vietnam have become friends," Ba said. "But I still feel hatred for the Soldiers who killed my mother, my brother and my sister."

From The Onion...

Funny where it sticks pins in the puffery of novelist's egos...yet sad because so much concerning Retard America's lack of interest in reading is true. And I think I'll drop a few thoughts later on reading...or, more accurately, the death of reading.

Novelists Strike Fails To Affect Nation Whatsoever
March 15, 2008

LOS ANGELES—The Novelists Guild of America strike, now entering its fourth month, has had no impact on the nation at all, sources reported Tuesday.
The strike, which scholars say could be the longest since 1951, when American novelists may or may not have voluntarily committed to a six-month work stoppage, has brought an immediate halt to all new novels, novellas, and novelettes from coast to coast, affecting no one.

Nor has America's economy seen any adverse effects whatsoever, as consumers easily adjust to the sudden cessation of any bold new sprawling works of fiction or taut psychological character studies.

"There's a novelists strike?" Ames, IA consumer Carl Hailes said. "That's terrible. When is it scheduled to begin?"

The strike kicked off last fall when the NGA announced it had hit a roadblock in negotiations with the Alliance of Printed Fiction and Literature Producers, failing to resolve certain key issues concerning online distribution, digital media rights, and readers just not getting what writers were trying to do with a number of important allegorical devices.

After a press conference at the Massachusetts home of NGA president John Updike—who called the strike an attempt by novelists "to give both the sublime and mundane alike their beautiful due"—members of the guild began picketing their studies, desks, and libraries and refusing to work on any further novels until the APFLP and the American reading public agreed to their demands.

So far, sources say, no one has attempted to cross the picket lines, most of which are located in private homes. However, unconfirmed reports indicate that at least one novelist may be breaking the strike by writing under the pseudonym "Richard Bachman."

"We must, as a people, achieve a resolution to this strike soon," novelist David Foster Wallace said at a rally Monday at Pomona College in Claremont, CA, where he is a professor. "The thought of this country being deprived of its only source of book-length fiction is enough to give one the howling fantods."

"I thank you both for coming," he added.

While the strike has been joined by an estimated 250,000 novelists—225,000 of whom have reportedly stopped in the middle of their first novel—it has done no damage to any measurable sector of the economy, including bookstore chains, newspapers, magazines, all major media, overseas markets, independent film studios, major film studios, actors, editors, animators, carpenters, those in finance or banking, the day-to-day lives of average Americans, or anything else anyone can think of as of press time.

A report published last week by the University of Pennsylvania Annenberg School for Communication found that the strike has thus far had an economic impact of approximately 0.00 to 0.01 percent. In addition, consumer habits remain unaffected, with 0 percent of those polled saying their reading habits had changed "significantly," 0 percent saying they had changed "somewhat," and an additional 0 saying they had changed "slightly." A significant number of respondents reported no reading habits.

Although some initially worried that the strike could affect Hollywood by limiting material for television or film adaptation, fears were quelled when studio executives announced in January that they would continue optioning comic books and graphic novels.

The publishing industry itself, which many believed to be most vulnerable, has nonetheless managed to weather the crisis. Publishers have reissued new editions of early, pre-union novelists—such as Robert Louis Stevenson and Jane Austen, both of whom have previously established successful track records—and have seen no no change in monthly sales.
Some members of the public attempted to express concern over the prospect of the strike going on much longer.

"If this situation is not brought to a halt soon, it could have serious ramifications for, you know, literary culture, I guess," said Kyle Farmer, a Phoenix-area real estate consultant and avid golfer. "It would be tragic if we had to go a whole year without a new novel from Kurt Vonnegut or Norman Mailer," he added, unaware that both authors died in 2007.

No high-profile, red-carpet, star-studded telecasts of the PEN/Faulkner Awards, the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction Awards, or the Man Booker Prize Awards were affected by the strike, since no such telecasts have ever existed.

Out of Sight, Out of Mind

WASHINGTON — Fewer people know how many U.S. troops have died in the war in Iraq, even as public attention to the conflict has gradually diminished, a poll showed Wednesday.
Only 28 percent correctly said that about 4,000 Americans have died in the war, according to a survey by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center.

That's down from last August, when 54 percent gave the accurate casualty figure, which was about 3,500 dead at the time. In previous Pew surveys dating to 2004, about half have correctly given the rough figure for the approximate number of deaths at the time.

In the new poll, around a third said about 3,000 U.S. troops have died while about one in 10 said 2,000 deaths. Fewer overestimated the number of casualties: about a quarter put the figure close to 5,000.

Exit polls of voters in presidential primaries and many national surveys have shown the economy has displaced the war in recent weeks as the public's choice as the nation's top problem.
Iraq was the most avidly followed news story for most of the first half of 2007, but it has not been the most closely watched story in any week since mid-October, according to a Pew survey of people's interest in the news. The portion of news stories on the war has dropped in recent months as well, according to a study by the Project for Excellence in Journalism, a nonpartisan group that evaluates news coverage.

The Pew poll was conducted from Feb. 28-March 2 and involved telephone interviews with 1,003 adults. The margin of sampling error was plus or minus 3.5 percentage points.

Hey Big Spender

I think I know what I'm going to do with my stimulus package money from Dubya ( received the letter today letting me know that kiss in the mail will be coming soon).

I'm going to put it towards and hour with Eliot Spitzer's prostitute. (Have you seen her picture? Smoking hot)

I just have to know what a $4,000 piece of pussy feels like.

Or maybe I'll send it as a donation to Ralph Nader's campaign.

Perhaps I'll donate it to IAVA. They are getting results.

Update on the Hooverville Cats

Well...all the cats have survived the worst of winter. And we had a really bad winter. In fact, the ones I was sure were not going to make it are thriving. The scrawniest of them have fattened up and are active...no more listlessness. I still feed them twice a day every day and have added some more boxes for shelters.

And some of them have taken to my dog. She merely tolerates their presence. The gray cat (the poor, sad, severely inbred one) is in love with my dog...follows her around the yard and stands up to hold on and rub her face all over Kelly. Kelly responds my grunting and trotting away...with an adoring cat following close behind. My poor pooch. She's dismayed over the utter lack of terror she's able to strike into this legion of felines.

The city animal control still hasn't done a goddamned thing. No surprise there. It took more than a dozen calls from me over several months to get them to send out someone to do something about the dog these trashy neighbors had a few years ago...a dog they left outside, just like the cats, in all weather, 24/7...but without even mobility. They kept it chained by the neck to the porch railing.

With the really bad weather this past weekend (torrential, prolonged rain and very high winds) I let some of the more skittish of the cats hang out in my basement for the night. And one of the friendlier ones got to come in and sleep on my couch while my Russian and I watched movies. The cat curled up behind my head on the back of the couch and purred until she fell asleep. I may have to adopt her as my own if I can't find someone else to do it...and if I can get Kelly to stay calm around her. The dog still gets upset if the cats come inside.

I Guess There are Worse Hobbies

Man Creates Radio Station For Cats Only

PHOENIX -- When you leave for work in the morning, do you ever worry your pets will get bored while you’re away?

A Valley man has dedicated a good portion of the past seven years to make sure his cats stay entertained.

Nohl Rosen of catgalaxymedia.com has created an online radio station for cats only.
He said the idea came to him seven years ago when he felt his cat Isis seemed bored. He put in a CD to see if Isis would be entertained. “The music started, Isis laid down, relaxed, and Cat Galaxy was born," said Rosen.

Rosen’s studio is based out of his home. He broadcasts to cats every morning and night for two hours each.
He makes sure nothing gets on the air that has not been cat-approved.
“We have to throw away the human way of thinking that everything is meant for humans. Cats, I think, know what they want to hear," said Rosen.

The station has daily features such as Meow Mixing Monday, Tuesday Night Cat Club, Wednesday Night Cat Attack, Thursday Night Purr Party, and Friday Night Feline Frenzy.
If you are one of the three million people who have visited his Web site over that past seven years, you may have noticed that Rosen has been off the air for the past couple of months.
"We lost our assistant station manager just after New Year's this year," said Rosen, referring to his cat, Jade, who passed away. "So, it was a big loss, it hit us hard and we are just now getting back into the groove again," said Rosen.

He and the rest of his cat staff said they are ready to move on.

Cat Galaxy is celebrating its seventh season. Rosen said he doesn’t make any money and he is just doing it because he loves it.

======================

I don't know about you....but I find it disconcerting that cats have a radio station. Everyone knows that cats are constantly planning and scheming and plotting the downfall of man. This radio station will allow them to organize and pass messages.

Mute Button

I believe this: If one is going to boast that they do not watch TV, then they can't do it while spending long periods of time on a website boasting such nuggets of wisdom such as "I sucked 39 black cocks!" and "What's your favorite Rush song?"

Seriously, I just get annoyed when I see someone boasting online (specifically someone you know spends a lot of time blogging) that they do not watch any television in an attempt to make themselves seem intellectually superior.

If you are going to brag about how little television you watch...then you'd better be out saving the world with all that free time. Or, at the least, building a better you.

You'd better be:
Performing volunteer work
Reading books
Taking classes
Exercising
Spending time with family

doing something constructive for yourself or your environment...something enriching, something useful.

Not fingerfucking around on the interwebs. That's just another way to piss away the days. It's replacing one simple leisure activity with another.

Thanks a lot, Soo Chee!

Because of your misheard lyrics post....I've had this song stuck in my head for days.

Days!

Out in the street!
Out in the playground!
On the dark side of town!

TAKE THAT, BITCH!



I think we've all had an encounter or three just like this.

This is one happy freakin' dog.

Springsteen, Young join anti-war soundtrack
Sat Feb 23, 2008 12:30pm EST

NEW YORK (Billboard) - Bruce Springsteen, Neil Young and Pearl Jam have contributed tunes to the anti-war soundtrack for a documentary about a U.S. soldier paralyzed in Iraq.

The 30-song, two-disc album "Body of War: Songs That Inspired an Iraq War Veteran" will be released March 18 via Warner Music's Sire Records label. All proceeds from the sale of the album will benefit Iraq Veterans Against the War.

"Body of War" focuses on Tomas Young, an Army soldier paralyzed upon arriving in Iraq. It will open on March 13 in Austin, Texas, and expand nationally in subsequent months. Talk show veteran Phil Donahue directed the film with Elaine Spiro.

The album was put together by Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder, who composed the first single, "No War," specifically for the film. Pearl Jam's live version of Bob Dylan's "Masters of War" also graces the soundtrack.

Springsteen contributed "Devils & Dust," and Neil Young "The Restless Consumer." Other tracks include "Yo George" from Tori Amos, "Son of a Bush" from Public Enemy, and "Bushonomics" from Talib Kweli & Cornel West.

An Oldie and Moldy....

Originally posted at the other place on 12/13/05.


The Vengeful Dog Walker: A Short Play in Two Acts

I am sometimes petty. And from time to time I can be vindictive.

I was looking at satellite photos of New Orleans tonight and was checking out the post flood condition of the neighborhood where I lived some years ago when I was reminded of my sometime vindictive nature...

Dramatis Personae: Me, My dogs Jake and Kelly, Redneck Asshole

Act I
Redneck asshole lived just around the corner from me. He was fanatical about the care and appearance of his lawn. One day, while walking my dogs past his house, my puppy Kelly happened to wander about 6 inches onto the lawn of Redneck Asshole to sniff at something. Redneck Asshole happened to be on his front porch and exploded into an apoplectic rage complete with red face and near incoherent screaming. Even though I apologized and scooped up Kelly before she could perchance evacuate onto the pristine grass...the rage continued with the threat to kill me and my dogs with his shotgun.

I said nothing more.

Act II
I let six weeks pass.I bought a plastic spray bottle of Round-Up Grass and Weed Killer.I began walking my dogs late at night while wearing a sweatshirt with one of those pouches in the front for your hands. Except instead of my hands...I concealed the grass killer inside.

As I walked past the abode of Redneck Asshole each night I would casually spray the poisons from inside their hiding place and onto the lawn of our villain.I did this every night for 10 days. I surreptitiously examined the damage. I spied Redneck Asshole working to repair the huge swaths of brown, dead grass that slashed through his prized lawn like saber scars.

Over the next few days he had to reseed, resod, whatever the hell a person does to bring an immaculate lawn to fruition. I drank in his obvious anger like sweet nectar.I let two months pass and I did it again. And again. And again.

At least five times each year for the next three years.Jake and Kelly were also complicit. Since I worked nights I would feed them a huge dinner in mid afternoon...ensuring they'd be percolating all night and eager to use their vast leavings to further sully the lawn of Redneck Asshole.

Looking back, I'm a little embarrassed by my behavior...my inability to let go a simple verbal transgression. Had I not moved after three years I probably would have continued.I feel no guilt though. None. In fact, I still laugh about watching this guy worry over his ruined lawn.

I wonder how many character defects this post points to?

I would like to thank the following women for easing my transition into puberty. Each of them helped serve as an anchor...and a focal point during a confusing time.

Wonder Woman
Catwoman (Julie Newmar and Eartha Kitt. Lee Meriwether not so much)
Jamie Sommers, The Bionic Woman
Batgirl...because even good girls wear leather

SAT Question

Carson Daly is to television as:

1) Bologna is to sandwiches

2) Beige is to colors

3) Jay Leno is to comedy

4) Missionary position is to sex

5) All of the above and then some

Bueller....Bueller....Creationists....

Ben Stein Wins Intelligent Design Money
by Gary Stix


Ben Stein Wins Intelligent Design Money
Feb 15, 2008
Ben Stein was the goofball host of the cable show “Win Ben Stein’s Money.” A Christian University in southern California has just announced that it is honoring Stein for his upcoming movie that makes the case for taking intelligent design seriously. The press release, issued today, declares: “Ben Stein Wins Money from Intelligent Design Community.”

Stein is scheduled to receive from Biola University the Phillip E. Johnson Award for Liberty and Truth, named after a well-known creationist. “The award,” according to the release,” recognizes Johnson’s pivotal role in advancing our understanding of design in the universe by opening up informed dissent to Darwinian and materialistic theories of evolution.”

The release does not mention how much Ben Stein won, but it does cite Stein’s upcoming movie “Expelled: No Intelligence Allowed:” “In his new movie “Expelled,” Stein wonders whether humans were designed by an intelligent being or whether we were simply the result of an ancient natural accident. In his search for an answer, he discovers an elitist scientific establishment that punishes the scientific proponents of Intelligent Design because they reject some of the claims of Darwin’s theory of evolution. ‘Big science in this area of biology has lost its way,’ says Stein. ‘Scientists are supposed to be allowed to follow the evidence wherever it may lead, no matter what the implications are. Freedom of inquiry has been greatly compromised, and this is not only anti-American, it’s anti-science.’

“In light of Stein’s contribution to the pursuit of liberty and truth, particularly as it relates to the field of Intelligent Design, he is being honored with the 2008 Johnson Award.
...

...

Perhaps more egregious than the movie is Stein’s contention in his writing that "Darwinism, perhaps mixed with Imperialism, gave us Social Darwinism, a form of racism so vicious that it countenanced the Holocaust against the Jews and mass murder of many other groups in the name of speeding along the evolutionary process."

===============================

I like Stein's droll sense of humor...and I was hoping this was some form of joke. But it appears not. Stein has taken up the banner of junk science for the cause of conservative ideology.

the previous posts wouldn't take pictures for some reason...so here are some pics of the little hobo cats I'm caring for...(so you can see why I want to look after their welfare)

My dog doesn't know what to make of them. She's not aggressive towards them at all...more like she thinks they are mobile squeaky toys. She's stepped on a few of them while trying to play with them.

And yeah...on a few of the sub-zero nights...I let them crash in my pad. Most slept on a blanket I put in the back hall...but the gray one helped herself to my bed.

I May be About to Do Something Unethical

I've mentioned my trasherrific neighbors before...the screaming matches at all hours...the wading pool stuffed with adults and beer cans.

Now there's a new situation...one in which I'm considering some direct involvement. They have a history of getting animals then neglecting them. They used to keep a dog chained by the neck to their back porch...no food, no shelter...in all weather and the poor thing would howl and cry and bark all night every night. Finally...enough neighbors called the police on noise complaints that the cops made the city Animal Officers do something about it.

Well...last year these fine people decided it would be a good idea to get a couple of cats. They didn't have them fixed and let them roam freely in their yard. Those cats had a litter...a few months later some of the growing kittens had their own litters...there are now three generations of increasingly inbred cats running around.

They are kept outside to fend for themselves. No shelter...in all weather...and we've had a brutal winter this year. These people "own" the cats...but the herd of them are spreading out to include the yards of all the surrounding houses as their territory. And a few found their way under my back porch. They were burrowing into some old leaves as a rudimentary shelter and insulation from the cold. They were lethargic and emaciated and, I was pretty sure, on the verge of dying.

So...I've started a sort of Hooverville...and a soup kitchen. I bought a few cat shelters (the kind that normally are used an indoor playpens) and lined them with old clothes to at least provide protection from the elements...and I've been supplying them with food and water every day. It's like a little camp set up under my porch. Now almost the whole herd comes over to eat, drink and sleep. And they are no longer on the edge of death...even the skin & bones kitten I was sure was going to die is looking good. The cats spend their days in their own yard and their nights under my porch.

OK. So I have called Animal Control on these people...twice. I reported it as a case of animal neglect. They said they would send out an investigator. This was two months ago. I've sent follow up mails to the agency...none have been answered...hooray for city workers. I can't even call the police to have them force action...I checked. I called the local precinct and spoke to the officer who handles Quality of Life issues. He told me to call animal Control again. Sigh.

What I'm thinking of doing that is so unethical...is stealing the cats and finding homes for them. I already have a few people interested in taking one. Their owners obviously don't care about them...but they aren't exactly the kind of folks you can approach with something like this. One of them already screamed at me when she saw me tossing snacks to the cats over the fence. She got hyper-defensive..."What, you think I can't look after my pets?!?!" To which I succinctly replied "Fuck off." Yeah...we are on that kind of terms (I'm certain they know it's me who has called the cops on them in the past).

If they even notice that some of the cats are missing...they'll probably think they just ran away...or died. If they even care.

I hate to have to do it this way. I mean...it's stealing.

What do you think? Is this an Ends justifying the Means situation?

Christ...I just don't understand some people. Why get an animal if you are only going to make its existence miserable?

Here are some pics of the cats:

I Love When Someone Makes My Point for Me.

See previous post...

Yet another person who got angry with me because they were convinced something I put in my blog was ALL ABOUT THEM...fired off an angry mail, etc, etc, etc.

(Should a membership there come with a free tinfoil hat to keep out the radio waves?)

Yet another woman who wrote a long series of posts about being betrayed by a man.....only to write a few days later about wanting to get together with another...complete with clucking hen choir.

Same woman writes goodbye post because she can no longer be on Alt after SUCH A BETRAYAL...only to decide she's going to stay after all! Oh the love! Oh the cycle of self-destructive behavior!

Sigh...it's getting so that you can barely avoid the crazies.

The Lady Doth Protest Way Too Fucking Much

At what point does having a helpful opinion to offer cross over into being judgmental?

And should you just let a person you see as a tragedy-in-waiting just crash and burn?

I ask because...

It's almost a stereotype to be found on BDSM websites...profiles, blogs, etc. Every female submissive has to loudly proclaim how stong they are. To the point where they OVERSTATE the point about how wonderfully strong they are (with the type of strength rarely defined).

But...

What happens when you know a person who claims this strength is really a basket case? Someome who paints a picture of themself that's not quite accurate...and you've seen their other, less stable face.

There have been at least eight instances of this for me. I've received e-mails from some women regarding things in my blog...things that to the other 99.999999% of my readers were benign.

I've received extremely angry letters...some to the point of incoherency. I honestly don't know what they were trying to say.

But my point here is...some of these women are houses of cards emotionally. Some slight trigger tripped them...something they saw written in my blog, something they most likely read into what I was saying...and sent them off the deep end.

Is someone this emotionally fragile ready for a BDSM relationship? What happens when they physically engage?

I received one letter (several really) from this women on alt...I wish I had saved it. It was the longest e-mail I've ever read. All in one letter she went from wanting to do me harm...to begging for my forgiveness and everything in between, It read like textbook Bi-Polar Disorder. I was disturbed...but I also felt sorry for her. She was obviously unstable. So, in one of her own posts in which she was complaining about some potential dom who broke off contact (he probably figured out she needed psychatric help) ...so I gently suggested that maybe she take some time off and reasses her needs, etc, etc.

Hoo boy. That led to another e-mail about how I had "devastated" her...and a coterie of clucking hens on that blog post laid into me...bleating about how I was so judgmental and so on.

So I said "Fuck it." You can't help those who can't realize they require it...and have a support group of (strangers) overly protective pals.

I do feel sorry for whatever men hook up with these basket cases though. I'll probably wind up posting their stories in my News of the Weird selections.

It's not just me, right? You all see the Tragedies in Denial as well...right?

The Yawn that Roared

(CNN) -- Former Sen. Fred Thompson on Tuesday ended his run for the presidency, coming off the heels of a disappointing third-place finish in South Carolina's GOP primary and heading into the showdown state of Florida next week.

=======================

Wasn't Thompson supposed to be the next Ronald Reagan? A "real conservative" who was going to energize the party? All that "will he or won't he?" run stuff seems a little silly in retrospect. All that buildup and the only payoff was repeated clips of The Hunt for Red October. Media pundits must get paid by the word (or cubic foot of hot gas).

He swept in like a lazy old man and left like a sleepwalker.

He Had A Dream

I wonder about this past weekend.

I wonder how many kids shot down other kids in the cities...on or near a street named Martin Luther King, Jr Boulevard.

At The Movies

A few films I've seen recently...

1) The Orphanage (El Orfanato)

A foreign language film from Spain produced by Guillermo del Toro. It's about a woman (and family) who buys the orphanage in which she grew up to re-open it as a school for handicapped children. Strange things begin to happen...her sickly child begins to talk to unseen people...things go bump in the night...a strange woman appears and a series of murders years before is slowly revealed.

It's basically a ghost story but with much deeper subtexts of love and loss. And it works on both levels. There's a minimum of gore (only one scene really) and at least a half dozen moments that will make you jump. But there's a general overall creepy feel to the movie that makes the story more disturbing than at first glance...particularly as more and more plot points are revealed.

If you saw and enjoyed Pan's Labyrinth or The Devil's Backbone...you'll definitely enjoy this one. The same themes of human cruelty and bittersweet loss pervade it.

2) Sunshine

A sci fi film by Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, 28 Days Later) about an international group of astronauts and scientists (Cillian Murphy and Michelle Yeoh) on a mission to re-ignite our dying sun by firing a massive fission bomb into its core.

Sounds like standard sci fi fare, right? It differs though in visual style. Boyle has a distinctive look that sets this film apart. It's possibly one of the finest looking films of the genre since 2001: A Space Odyssey.

The story has the genre standards of mission failure and how the crew adapts to survive and save themselves and continue their mission in the face of almost hopeless odds. Where it takes a twist or two is when they seek out another spaceship that had the same mission as theirs but disappeared. They detect a slight signal from it and proceed to try and salvage some parts so they can complete their own job. Things get a little creepy then.

The story also interjects the aspect of the crew's mental states...when they know that some of them will die...and how it hits each of them. Some react in a resigned way, some heroic...some almost have mental collapse...some angry...and at least one decides that perhaps they shouldn't succeed at all...that maybe it's god's will they are going against.

If you like above average sci fi with an emphasis on the human rather than the technological...you'll like this film.


===========================

I find that my patience for that other blogging site is wearing thin. I keep trying to make the best of what it is...because, you know, it is what it is. (or something) But it's becoming increasingly more difficult to avoid the vast annoyances.

And that's too bad. Because I really like some of my acquaintances from there. And I love seeing them riff on my silliness. There are some truly funny people there who take some black humor and just run with it.

And then there are the gems. Those are the people who have sent me private messages about certain posts...offering help, etc. I had someone from there send me a huge package of photography materials when I was first encouraging my brother to take it up as a hobby for both our benefit. This person sent rolls and rolls of film, frames, photo albums. I almost cried with gratitude. They didn't have to do that. And wouldn't take no for an answer. Someone else offered to send me several old cameras they no longer used. Yet another person offered to perform fund raising for my work so my Iraq vet won't have to move out for lack of money.

They didn't have to do that...they are just a few people who care.

Unfortunately, they are vastly unnumbered by the scuzzy assholes, the preeners, the attention whores, etc...who seem to multiply exponentially. It's nearly impossible to cruise the blogs now without major annoyance.

At best...I guess I can beat a tactical retreat into my own blog and only read those who come to me.

I'm just tired of the silly attempts at manipulation. Particularly of the ranking lists...that long standing bone of contention for some and Holy Grail for others.

For fuck's sake...I hate going through the daily lists of new bloggers looking for interesting new posts (and possibly people who haven't been tainted) only to find that a certain few bloggers have been there before me...leaving little messages not related to the posts but rather to get the attention of people who can provide them with an increase in their unique comment counts. It's always the same two people. Always the same two messages no matter what the blogger has written an an intro. "Hi, nice blog! ~wink~" or "Hi, welcome to the blogs!"

Alt really should dump that whole ranking system. Maybe it would relieve my sore eyes of of cruising past boring blogs designed as nothing more than comment catchers. Christ...some of them sound like five year old children. "Why is the sky blue? Why is grass green? What's your favorite heavy metal song?"

Maybe if they dampened the child-like bloggers...the rest of the adults would act like...grown ups?

==============================

I'm feeling so beaten down over there that I can't even raise the energy to call someone on plagiarism. I became suspicious when someone had a few things in their blog that seemed too polished...and sure enough...found they had been lifted whole from a web site. I couldn't be bothered to bring up ethics when weighed against the shit that would be raised...because the person was a popular, front page face. And we've all seen the shit caused by slavish devotion to personality even in the face of evidence there, right?

==============================

That site is what it is. A blogging section on a hook up site. Maybe I created too large of a series of expectations for it. No, that's not exactly correct. When I first joined...I learned a lot. The earliest group of people spent a lot of time writing great pieces. Then came the rankings system...thrust upon a population overrepresented by fragile egos and over sized egos...and the rest is history.


It just gnaws at me that a lot of great writers who put out fantastic, emotional, enlightening posts...get overlooked...no, more than that...shunted aside in the stampede every time some Pretty Young Thing arrives on the blog scene and cyberly shakes her tits. The herds of horndogs are usually comprised of all the same dumb fuckers. Sigh...but at it's heart it is a dating site...and I got to expect that most of the population (being male) will flock to where they believe the pussy is.

I guess I'm just disappointed that only a small percentage of the population can rise above that.

====================================

Whatchagonnado?

Steven Seagal: Lord of the Cheese

It's a Sad State of Affairs....

when Geraldo Rivera starts making sense.

I was kinda hoping when Billo's bellowing commenced he wouldn't be able to turn it off...and his head would go like that guy in the movie Scanners.

It's ain't exactly the Lincoln-Douglas debates...but it's entertaining in a guilty pleasure sort of way.

More Video Difficulties

Allegedly...one can load video directly from their computer to these posts. In reality...it does not work for me. I figured out the YouTube thingie (thanks to Trinity) but I'm still baffled by the inability to load my own film clips.

You see...I received a digital camcorder for x-mas and have been making short film bits. I was hoping I could also use this as a visual diary...maybe show some parts of Boston, etc.

I don't know...the goddamned clips just won't show up after I load them into the post.

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year to one and all...

Dear Fellow Alters and Ex Alters:

Could you do me a favor? If you are linked to me and use any permutation of my handle there in the link...could you please change the name to something else?

I checked my site meter for the first time in a long time today...and discovered that in this month alone I've had a dozen different visitors lead to my blog here via a google search on my alt handle. It's probably sandard members wanting to take a look at my profile and finding this blog because the same handle is listed on some blogs here as a link name.

Thanks.

(p.s. I'll do the same if you like since some of my links use your alt handles. I also had two google searches that lead to my blog here that were searching for some of your alt handles)

Future Serial Killers of America, Unite!

Mike Huckabee's kid...what a winner:

"...one of his sons was involved in the hanging of a stray dog at a Boy Scout camp in 1998. The incident led to the dismissal of David Huckabee, then 17, from his job as a counselor at Camp Pioneer in Hatfield, Ark. It also prompted the local prosecuting attorney— bombarded with complaints generated by a national animal-rights group—to write a letter to the Arkansas state police seeking help investigating whether David and another teenager had violated state animal-cruelty laws. The state police never granted the request, and no charges were ever filed."

Hoo boy.

Oh Mike, Mike Mike....as personable as ye may be...you are looking more and more like a sociopath and/or poorly informed, willfully ignorant, back-country rube. You do not believe in evolution...want Christianity to be brought into all public life...once said that AIDS patients should be quarantined like plague victims (a good ten years after the contagion mechanism was identified).

And now it's revealed you gave birth to a future serial/spree killer. Good job, Mike. Pray for him. See how much that does for you.

Mike Huckabee: My least favorite Republican of the day.

The Top Seven Rejected Toys of 2007

The Ted Kennedy's Liver Beanbag Chair.
Made from genuine donkey hides and utilizing a unique stuffing system comprised of hot air and pork. May be used as a flotation device.

The Ann Coulter Home Genetics Testing Kit.
Now you can finally determine beyond a doubt if your seXXy lover is truly seXY. Comes complete with mouth swabs, depilatory and mock turtleneck. Appropriate for all ages and indeterminate genders.

The Bill O'Reilly Brand Falafel Flavored Loofah.
Whether you are sexually harassing subordinates or just kicking back being a douchebag, now comes the perfect tool for clumsy self pleasure. Perfect for the dirty, old man in your life. Costs: an undisclosed amount, your dignity.

The Pastor Ted Haggard Game of Non-Gay Life.
Now you too can live the life of a powerful and influential man teetering on the precipice! It's the classic battle of good v. evil! "Yay, Tommy! You have rolled a 144 and have won acceptance into Pray the Gay Away Camp! Sit out three turns and be welcomed into the cleansing light of Jesus!" "Oh no, Jimmy! You rolled triple sixes! You're condemned to a life of cock sucking and meth abuse!"Warning: May cause hypocrisy. Appropriate for: no one.

The Mike Huckabee AIDS Patient Concentration Camp Play Set.
Warning: May leave an oily taste in the mouth and cause uncomfortable shifting and back-peddling. Made in China, sired in ignorance.

The Lil' Hillary Future Shrew Costume Extravaganza Dress Up Playset.
Comes with seven pantsuits, a nutcracker, a mask with faces on both sides and a velvet pouch for your playmate's "jewels." Warning: may cause insane cackling and voice changes to sound more "southern negro."

The Willard Mitt Romney Pander Bear.
Cozy up your cuddly constituent! Comes with magical underpants and two mates. Costs: next to nothing because it's made by illegal immigrants.

Rudy Can Fail

I just love Rudy Ghouliani's new TV ad...the one wherein he lisps on about how the only way to deal with terrorists is to stand up to them. Really? As opposed to...what? Laying down in defeat? The inference is deafening.

And the ad goes on with Rudy managing to again to link his name to Ronald Reagan's (this time around every republican candidate not only has to puff up and display their Christ credentials...but also compete to see who is most Reagan-like. Call it Bushie blowback). Rudy recalls misty-eyed how those savage Iranians, quaking with stark terror, released the embassy hostages within an hour of Reagan taking the oath of office. As if somehow...by the simple act of being elected...a republican dealt ISLAMOFASCISTS a serious defeat!

I'm positive the Iranians were living in fear of a craggy, Grecian-formulaic old man and ex B movie actor and capitulated immediately rather than face his elderly wrath. That makes much more sense than the notion that they held the hostages to the final minutes of Carter's time in office as a way to humiliate the peanut farmer. Or that the invasion of the country by Iraq might have made them more receptive to dealing with the USA. I'm impressed with Rudy's ability to not only rewrite history...but to sell the people what they think they want to buy.

Yesterday Senator Mitch McConnell was my least favorite Republican of the Day...today it's the ever ethical Rudy Ghoulani.

“Unfortunately, most of our friends on the other aisle are having a hard time admitting things are getting better; some days I almost think the critics of this war don't want us to win. Nobody is happy about losing lives but remember these are not draftees, these are full-time professional soldiers."

---Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY)

I guess The Senator thinks it is OK to have sent these kids to their deaths because they signed up for the service.

Senator, you are wrong, dead wrong. When your nation's young men and women take a sacred oath to defend their country and volunteer to live a sometimes harsh and unpleasant life and do and live through unpleasant things...you, as a national leader, made damned sure you only send them into harm's way to make that ultimate sacrifice as a last resort. You don't support their use in a bankrupt foreign excursion over and over while voting against veteran's benefits expansions. And you sure as shit don't toss out casual statements trying to shine that turd and downplay the deaths of these kids. It's callous and cruel. And wrong.

Maybe if the good senator had not gone the draft deferment for law school route during the height of Vietnam and gone another way...he'd have an inkling of what purposeful sacrifice means. Instead he has the typical mindset of the conservative chickenhawk.

Up yours, senator.

Far be it from me (well, not really) to look down on other people's fetishes....because heaven knows...I've got some that would make people blanche, scratch their heads and perhaps even shudder.

But that doesn't mean I can't be befuddled by some...or find them a bit...icky. Or comical.

Check this out:

http://www.blimpboyadventures.com/index.html

Rock Chicks Kick Ass

It's a Wonderful Life Without Rupert Murdoch

...a funny little piece with Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry making social commentary by riffing on a classic film...

DAMN IT, JIM! I'M A DOCTOR, NOT A VETERINARIAN!!

I would hate to be around when the kitties experience pon farr.....

Court: Blogspot Blogger May Remain Anonymous

lawsuit intended to unmask the blogger known as “Orthomom” has failed, preserving a closely guarded secret of the online world.

Former Lawrence School Board trustee Pamela Greenbaum, once a frequent target of commenters on the site, filed suit against Google, which hosts the Orthomom blog, seeking the blogger’s name. Her intent, she said, was to file a lawsuit directly against the writer of the blog, who she claimed had called Greenbaum a bigot and anti-semite.

New York State Supreme Court Justice Marcy Friedman disagreed, writing in an eight page decision dated October 23, 2007, that, “The relief sought by Greenbaum, on the eve of a school board election, would have a chilling effect on protected political speech.” The judge also found that a commenter on the blog, not the blogger, had used the term bigot which, in any event, the judge found, was protected speech.

Some bloggers say that Google stood up for the privacy of their users this time, as opposed to another recent case in India that made news. The blogger called Orthomom herself sees things a bit differently, writing a piece on the court ruling in the Jewish Star (my emphasis):
If it hadn’t been for a tip from a concerned reader, the case quietly filed against Google by Pamela Greenbaum to have me unmasked might have been over before it started. One day I’m happily blogging along between carpool runs, the next I’m looking for a good First Amendment lawyer. And it was a good thing I managed to procure once, as I soon found out that Google, Inc. was not prepared to do much in the way of defending me against the false and frivolous claims presented by Ms. Greenbaum and her attorney.

Orthomom adds that the US Supreme Court had ruled before that anonymous free speech must be protected. “It is crucial to the free exchange of ideas, whithout any fear of reprisals or retribution for holding opinions that are potentially unpopular,” she says.

I know why the caged Sushi sings....

A while back Soo Chee made a comment (I think it was on alt) about how she's amazed (and not in a good way) that she has a blog in a place where the topics of interest are so sparse....and used an amusing example.

I feel ya. I'm finding it more and more difficult to post anything there. The only thing keeping me there is the fact that I like a lot of people who post ...although that number is shrinking quickly.

When I signed on earlier...the first post title I saw was about someone detailing the 24th black dick they sucked. Sigh. Maybe some people would find an OCD afflicted black cock fetishist interesting....not me.

The lack of quailty bloggers is uninspiring...and a lot of posts just suck the life from me.

So Mr Black Cock Fetishst...rock on with your bad self. Thank you for degrading the quality of the place with your unflushed toilet of a blog.

Maybe I'll go find some video footage of Sleestaks for the sushinator.

I've opened up another blog here....one for just my pictures. I figured i'd create a space to collect my photos in one spot.

http://wickedcoolpictures.blogspot.com/

Janeane OWNS this bitch!

Gotta love Fox News...even their morning coffee chat shows are vitriolic conservative circle jerks. The only network where the fluffy morning crew beats the war drums. I'll bet they regret this interview. I'll also wager the irascible whatever-his-name-is has never retracted his statements.

An Obscene and Vulgar Clown.

The president visits with wounded soldiers and Marines...and still can't wipe away his smirk.

You Can't Stop the Music (or break the spirit)

I wish I had written this.

it's from Keith Olbermann's Special Comment on his show last night. Every once in a while he delivers long editorial speeches that are really something.


SPECIAL COMMENT
By Keith Olbermann
Anchor, 'Countdown'
MSNBC
updated 9:42 p.m. ET, Mon., Nov. 5, 2007


It is a fact startling in its cynical simplicity and it requires cynical and simple words to be properly expressed: The presidency of George W. Bush has now devolved into a criminal conspiracy to cover the ass of George W. Bush.
All the petulancy, all the childish threats, all the blank-stare stupidity; all the invocations of World War III, all the sophistic questions about which terrorist attacks we wanted him not to stop, all the phony secrets; all the claims of executive privilege, all the stumbling tap-dancing of his nominees, all the verbal flatulence of his apologists...

All of it is now, after one revelation last week, transparently clear for what it is: the pathetic and desperate manipulation of the government, the refocusing of our entire nation, toward keeping this mock president and this unstable vice president and this departed wildly self-overrating attorney general, and the others, from potential prosecution for having approved or ordered the illegal torture of prisoners being held in the name of this country.

"Waterboarding is torture," Daniel Levin was to write. Daniel Levin was no theorist and no protester. He was no troublemaking politician. He was no table-pounding commentator. Daniel Levin was an astonishingly patriotic American and a brave man.

Brave not just with words or with stances, even in a dark time when that kind of bravery can usually be scared or bought off.

Charged, as you heard in the story from ABC News last Friday, with assessing the relative legality of the various nightmares in the Pandora's box that is the Orwell-worthy euphemism "Enhanced Interrogation," Mr. Levin decided that the simplest, and the most honest, way to evaluate them ... was to have them enacted upon himself.

Daniel Levin took himself to a military base and let himself be waterboarded.
Mr. Bush, ever done anything that personally courageous?
Perhaps when you've gone to Walter Reed and teared up over the maimed servicemen? And then gone back to the White House and determined that there would be more maimed servicemen?

Has it been that kind of personal courage, Mr. Bush, when you've spoken of American victims and the triumph of freedom and the sacrifice of your own popularity for the sake of our safety? And then permitted others to fire or discredit or destroy anybody who disagreed with you, whether they were your own generals, or Max Cleland, or Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame, or Daniel Levin?

Daniel Levin should have a statue in his honor in Washington right now.
Instead, he was forced out as acting assistant attorney general nearly three years ago because he had the guts to do what George Bush couldn't do in a million years: actually put himself at risk for the sake of his country, for the sake of what is right.

And they waterboarded him. And he wrote that even though he knew those doing it meant him no harm, and he knew they would rescue him at the instant of the slightest distress, and he knew he would not die — still, with all that reassurance, he could not stop the terror screaming from inside of him, could not quell the horror, could not convince that which is at the core of each of us, the entity who exists behind all the embellishments we strap to ourselves, like purpose and name and family and love, he could not convince his being that he wasn't drowning.

Waterboarding, he said, is torture. Legally, it is torture! Practically, it is torture! Ethically, it is torture! And he wrote it down.
Wrote it down somewhere, where it could be contrasted with the words of this country's 43rd president: "The United States of America ... does not torture."
Made you into a liar, Mr. Bush.
Made you into, if anybody had the guts to pursue it, a criminal, Mr. Bush.


Waterboarding had already been used on Khalid Sheik Mohammed and a couple of other men none of us really care about except for the one detail you'd forgotten — that there are rules. And even if we just make up these rules, this country observes them anyway, because we're Americans and we're better than that.

We're better than you.

And the man your Justice Department selected to decide whether or not waterboarding was torture had decided, and not in some phony academic fashion, nor while wearing the Walter Mitty poseur attire of flight suit and helmet.
He had put his money, Mr. Bush, where your mouth was.

So, your sleazy sycophantic henchman Mr. Gonzales had him append an asterisk suggesting his black-and-white answer wasn't black-and-white, that there might have been a quasi-legal way of torturing people, maybe with an absolute time limit and a physician entitled to stop it, maybe, if your administration had ever bothered to set any rules or any guidelines.
And then when your people realized that even that was too dangerous, Daniel Levin was branded "too independent" and "someone who could (not) be counted on."

In other words, Mr. Bush, somebody you couldn't count on to lie for you.

So, Levin was fired.
Because if it ever got out what he'd concluded, and the lengths to which he went to validate that conclusion, anybody who had sanctioned waterboarding and who-knows-what-else on anybody, you yourself, you would have been screwed.
And screwed you are.
It can't be coincidence that the story of Daniel Levin should emerge from the black hole of this secret society of a presidency just at the conclusion of the unhappy saga of the newest attorney general nominee.
Another patriot somewhere listened as Judge Mukasey mumbled like he'd never heard of waterboarding and refused to answer in words … that which Daniel Levin answered on a waterboard somewhere in Maryland or Virginia three years ago.
And this someone also heard George Bush say, "The United States of America does not torture," and realized either he was lying or this wasn't the United States of America anymore, and either way, he needed to do something about it.
Not in the way Levin needed to do something about it, but in a brave way nonetheless.

We have U.S. senators who need to do something about it, too.
Chairman Leahy of the Judiciary Committee has seen this for what it is and said "enough."

Sen. Schumer has seen it, reportedly, as some kind of puzzle piece in the New York political patronage system, and he has failed.
What Sen. Feinstein has seen, to justify joining Schumer in rubber-stamping Mukasey, I cannot guess.

It is obvious that both those senators should look to the meaning of the story of Daniel Levin and recant their support for Mukasey's confirmation.

And they should look into their own committee's history and recall that in 1973, their predecessors were able to wring even from Richard Nixon a guarantee of a special prosecutor (ultimately a special prosecutor of Richard Nixon!), in exchange for their approval of his new attorney general, Elliott Richardson.
If they could get that out of Nixon, before you confirm the president's latest human echo on Tuesday, you had better be able to get a "yes" or a "no" out of Michael Mukasey.

Ideally you should lock this government down financially until a special prosecutor is appointed, or 50 of them, but I'm not holding my breath. The "yes" or the "no" on waterboarding will have to suffice.

Because, remember, if you can't get it, or you won't with the time between tonight and the next presidential election likely to be the longest year of our lives, you are leaving this country, and all of us, to the waterboards, symbolic and otherwise, of George W. Bush.

Ultimately, Mr. Bush, the real question isn't who approved the waterboarding of this fiend Khalid Sheik Mohammed and two others.
It is: Why were they waterboarded?

Study after study for generation after generation has confirmed that torture gets people to talk, torture gets people to plead, torture gets people to break, but torture does not get them to tell the truth.
Of course, Mr. Bush, this isn't a problem if you don't care if the terrorist plots they tell you about are the truth or just something to stop the tormentors from drowning them.

If, say, a president simply needed a constant supply of terrorist threats to keep a country scared.

If, say, he needed phony plots to play hero during, and to boast about interrupting, and to use to distract people from the threat he didn't interrupt.
If, say, he realized that even terrorized people still need good ghost stories before they will let a president pillage the Constitution,
Well, Mr. Bush, who better to dream them up for you than an actual terrorist?
He'll tell you everything he ever fantasized doing in his most horrific of daydreams, his equivalent of the day you "flew" onto the deck of the Lincoln to explain you'd won in Iraq.
Now if that's what this is all about, you tortured not because you're so stupid you think torture produces confession but you tortured because you're smart enough to know it produces really authentic-sounding fiction — well, then, you're going to need all the lawyers you can find … because that crime wouldn't just mean impeachment, would it?
That crime would mean George W. Bush is going to prison.

Thus the master tumblers turn, and the lock yields, and the hidden explanations can all be perceived, in their exact proportions, in their exact progressions.

Daniel Levin's eminently practical, eminently logical, eminently patriotic way of testing the legality of waterboarding has to vanish, and him with it.
Thus Alberto Gonzales has to use that brain that sounds like an old car trying to start on a freezing morning to undo eight centuries of the forward march of law and government.

Thus Dick Cheney has to ridiculously assert that confirming we do or do not use any particular interrogation technique would somehow help the terrorists.
Thus Michael Mukasey, on the eve of the vote that will make him the high priest of the law of this land, cannot and must not answer a question, nor even hint that he has thought about a question, which merely concerns the theoretical definition of waterboarding as torture.

Because, Mr. Bush, in the seven years of your nightmare presidency, this whole string of events has been transformed.

From its beginning as the most neglectful protection ever of the lives and safety of the American people ... into the most efficient and cynical exploitation of tragedy for political gain in this country's history ... and, then, to the giddying prospect that you could do what the military fanatics did in Japan in the 1930s and remake a nation into a fascist state so efficient and so self-sustaining that the fascism would be nearly invisible.

But at last this frightful plan is ending with an unexpected crash, the shocking reality that no matter how thoroughly you might try to extinguish them, Mr. Bush, how thoroughly you tried to brand disagreement as disloyalty, Mr. Bush, there are still people like Daniel Levin who believe in the United States of America as true freedom, where we are better, not because of schemes and wars, but because of dreams and morals.

And ultimately these men, these patriots, will defeat you and they will return this country to its righteous standards, and to its rightful owners, the people.

© 2007 MSNBC Interactive

Remember When Dennis Miller Was Still Funny?

Before he became a hateful, rabid right-wing tool and could only find work on Fox News shows and talk radio....

Always Trust Your Government

The Old Sneezeguard

Don'tcha just hate when someone tries to lay out orthodoxy?

Do you hate it when people ascribe motives when they couldn't possibly know your motivation?


"I AGREE. PEOPLE WHO COME HERE TO CREATE CONFLICT OR TO LOOK FOR A CHANCE TO "ONE UP" SOMEONE MUST BE SUCH TOTAL FAILURES IN LIFE THAT HAVE NOTHING BETTER TO DO.

IF IT IS NOT ABOUT THE LIFESTYLE I AM UNLIKELY TO READ IT. THAT INCLUDES THE MAJORITY OF BLOG POSTS, ESPECIALLY IF IT IS ABOUT POLITICS. SOME OF THE MOST SUCCESSFUL BLOGS HAVE LITTLE TO DO WITH THE LIFESTYLE. IT SEEMS MANY COME HERE PRIMARILY TO GET A FREE BLOG THAT ALLOWS X RATED TOPICS OR TO GET LAID. VANILLA PEOPLE PREDOMINATE, NOT THOSE WHO ACTUALLY LIVE AN ALTERNATIVE LIFESTYLE.

AFTER CHECKING FOR MAIL, MY GROUPS AND MY WATCHED BLOGS, I SKIM DOWN THE LIST OF RECENT POST AND SOMETIMES I FIND ONE OR TWO THAT LOOK INTERESTING, BUT MORE OFTEN I FIND NOTHING."

How amazingly boring.

Gone Baby Gone

Went to see it last night. It was very, very well done. I had a few issues with it...but they were due to my being a fan of the series of novels from which the characters were drawn, not the film itself.

The author of the book, Dennis Lehane, grew up in my neighborhood and sets most of his books here...in a neighborhood pretty much ignored by other movies filmed here. (The Departed had two scenes filmed here though) I love the books...there's the neighborhood connection...I watched them film of of this movie. A few scenes were filmed, quite literally, around the corner from my house.

So I had high expectations. Ben Affleck being a first time director taking on this material...had me a little wary. But he really pulled it all together. Very impressive work by the actors and by Affleck the Director.

A few of the performances are outstanding...most notably Ed Harris as a BPD detective on the missing child case. He's fucking intense.

BRRRRRIIIINNNNGGGGGGGG!

Yip yip yip yip
IS it any wonder Generation X grew up to be ill in the head?

Video No Go

Anyone else having a problem getting videos to load? I've never done it before...but I think I'm doing it correctly...but the fuckers just will not load onto this site for me.

Ennui

I'm finding that blogging at the other place is becoming less and less...interesting...or something.

I was looking at my Watched Blogs list just now. About a year ago it numbered 76 members. It's down to 21 now.

I took a tally of the front page bloggers. Excluding my own...there are 15 members there. I read just 5 of them....and not all of them regularly.

(related tangent: further looks determined that only 3 of those 15 people come to my blog...so apparently they find me as boring as I find most of them. I wonder if there's an unspoken, unacknowledged kind of competition amongst a lot of the Front Pagers? A quiet enmity that keeps them away from those who would surpass them in rankings? I know a few have open hostility in this regard. The apply Sun Tzu's teaching to blogging. Me? I just don't see the interest in a lot of them. How many times can the same blogger ask the same questions? And I already receive plenty of e-mail forwards from friends...I don't need to read them in blogs as well.)

======================

I'm not sure what it is that's causing this...fatigue?...lack of interest? Maybe familiarity breeds contempt. Maybe it's the fact that so many of the people I read and enjoyed have left after becoming fed up with alt's service, the proliferation of scumbags and whackos...or both. I do know that the really great writers who've moved on from there...are rarely replaced by writers of the same caliber.

Maybe it's the repetition. Just the other day the topic of submission being a gift was being tossed back and forth. And my only thought on the subject was "Sweet Jebus, not THIS again!" No one has anything new to say on it...it's the same tired, old retread viewpoints. You can only watch so many reruns of Gilligan's Island.

Oh well.....it's a "whatever" kind of issue. I do miss a lot of people there though.

Legal or Not, Abortion Rates Compare
By ELISABETH ROSENTHAL

ROME, Oct. 11 — A comprehensive global study of abortion has concluded that abortion rates are similar in countries where it is legal and those where it is not, suggesting that outlawing the procedure does little to deter women seeking it.

Moreover, the researchers found that abortion was safe in countries where it was legal, but dangerous in countries where it was outlawed and performed clandestinely. Globally, abortion accounts for 13 percent of women’s deaths during pregnancy and childbirth, and there are 31 abortions for every 100 live births, the study said.

The results of the study, a collaboration between scientists from the World Health Organization in Geneva and the Guttmacher Institute in New York, a reproductive rights group, are being published Friday in the journal Lancet.

“We now have a global picture of induced abortion in the world, covering both countries where it is legal and countries where laws are very restrictive,” Dr. Paul Van Look, director of the W.H.O. Department of Reproductive Health and Research, said in a telephone interview. “What we see is that the law does not influence a woman’s decision to have an abortion. If there’s an unplanned pregnancy, it does not matter if the law is restrictive or liberal.”

But the legal status of abortion did greatly affect the dangers involved, the researchers said. “Generally, where abortion is legal it will be provided in a safe manner,” Dr. Van Look said. “And the opposite is also true: where it is illegal, it is likely to be unsafe, performed under unsafe conditions by poorly trained providers.”

The data also suggested that the best way to reduce abortion rates was not to make abortion illegal but to make contraception more widely available, said Sharon Camp, chief executive of the Guttmacher Institute.

In Eastern Europe, where contraceptive choices have broadened since the fall of Communism, the study found that abortion rates have decreased by 50 percent, although they are still relatively high compared with those in Western Europe. “In the past we didn’t have this kind of data to draw on,” Ms. Camp said. “Contraception is often the missing element” where abortion rates are high, she said.

Anti-abortion groups criticized the research, saying that the scientists had jumped to conclusions from imperfect tallies, often estimates of abortion rates in countries where the procedure was illegal. “These numbers are not definitive and very susceptible to interpretation according to the agenda of the people who are organizing the data,” said Randall K. O’Bannon, director of education and research at the National Right to Life Educational Trust Fund in Washington.

He said that the major reason women die in the developing world is that hospitals and health systems lack good doctors and medicines. “They have equated the word ‘safe’ with ‘legal’ and ‘unsafe’ with ‘illegal,’ which gives you the illusion that to deal with serious medical system problems you just make abortion legal,” he said.

The study indicated that about 20 million abortions that would be considered unsafe are performed each year and that 67,000 women die as a result of complications from those abortions, most in countries where abortion is illegal.

The researchers used national data for 2003 from countries where abortion was legal and therefore tallied. W.H.O. scientists estimated abortion rates from countries where it was outlawed, using data on hospital admissions for abortion complications, interviews with local family planning experts and surveys of women in those countries.

The wealth of information that comes out of the study provides some striking lessons, the researchers said. In Uganda, where abortion is illegal and sex education programs focus only on abstinence, the estimated abortion rate was 54 per 1,000 women in 2003, more than twice the rate in the United States, 21 per 1,000 in that year. The lowest rate, 12 per 1,000, was in Western Europe, with legal abortion and widely available contraception.

The Bush administration’s multibillion-dollar campaign against H.I.V./AIDS in Africa has directed money to programs that promote abstinence before marriage, and to condoms only as a last resort. It has prohibited the use of American money to support overseas family planning groups that provide abortions or promote abortion as a method of family planning.

Worldwide, the annual number of abortions appeared to have declined between 1995, the last year such a broad study was conducted, and 2003, from an estimated 46 million to 42 million, the study concluded. The 1995 study, by the Guttmacher Institute, had far less data on countries where abortion was illegal.

Some countries, like South Africa, have undergone substantial transitions in abortion laws in that time. The procedure was made legal in South Africa in 1996, leading to a 90 percent decrease in mortality among women who had abortions, some studies have found.
Abortion is illegal in most of Africa, though. It is the second-leading cause of death among women admitted to hospitals in Ethiopia, its Health Ministry has said. It is the cause of 13 percent of maternal deaths at hospitals in Nigeria, recent studies have found.

===================================

NEWS FLASH

5:01 am today I'm drinking coffee and watching the Nobel Peace Prize announcement.

Al Gore wins it.

Congrats, Mr. Gore.

5:03 am: nutty right-wingers everywhere start gnashing their teeth and foaming at the mouth.

It's True

http//www.blackpeopleloveus.com/index.html

ONE STOP SHOPPING

Swallow Your Head

I really hate when people boast that they don't watch television or, worse, do not own one.

If you do this...please...stop. Nobody cares.

LEMUR MADNESS
needs no explanation

The Savage Beasts of Maine

From York Wild Kingdom....a lounging (and large scrotumed) kangaroo...a baby alligator....a platoon of pot-bellied pigs...and a very friendly llama. I think his name was Ralph (the Wonder Llama).

This is Not a Love Song


I recently caught the tail end of a brief news story on a local cable news station. One of the 14 soldiers killed in the helicopter that crashed a few days ago in Iraq was a local kid and was receiving the obligatory brief mention.


The story went on in an even briefer mention of some of the other kids on board. Something mentioned caught my eye...so I went web searching some news sites and the official site of the 25th Inf Div to get more information.


Here's the gist of it:
21 year old Specialist Nathan Hubbard was killed in the crash...and he's the second son to be killed in action in Iraq. His brother Jared died there in 2004. Nathan and his other sibling, Jason, enlisted together after Jared's death and served in the same division and deployed together in Iraq. Jason was on the same mission the night of the crash and watched his brother Nathan's chopper go down and crash and burn. Nathan and Jason had joined to continue what their brother started and to look out for each other.



This is the type of story about family, sacrifice, loyalty, duty, sadness, tragedy that perfectly brings home to the American public the realities of the war in Iraq. It puts the effects of the war right in the reader's face. But....



...this story was almost completely passed over by the media. Yet again the fourth estate has fallen down on the job.

Instead...much of the coverage that eclipsed this story was all about another American family.

"Jenna Bush Engaged" is what they breathlessly reported for the entire week. The TV networks rolled out footage of presidential daughters going back to LBJ's Basset Hound-esque offspring. Now Jenna Bush is betrothed to the son of some Republican Party bigwig (if she truly were a rebellious daughter and not just a drunken party girl she'd have chosen some hairy neo-hippie). Looking at the two squeaky clean, slack-eyed kids together...one can't help but get the creepy feeling of an arranged marriage. I half expected to see Angela Lansbury flitting about making the arrangements The Manchurian Candidate style.

Cue much breathy commentary from media types about how Party Girl Number One has cleaned up her image, is growing up. You know the types of stories....

In looking at the coverage of the two stories...I can't help but shake my head at the prioritizing of the media in what they consider news. On the one hand...a story containing all the human drama and tragedy imaginable goes mostly unreported. On the other...a fluff piece about Generalissimo Busho's fermented piece of crotch fruit putting her tequila bottle down long enough to find a man gets coverage on every network...for days.

This isn't really the surprise to me it sounds like. I'm much too cynical. But sometimes the media still manages to shock me.

Which Would You Rather Do?

Have a staring contest with Nancy Pelosi or take a Wide Stance with Larry Craig?

Which Would You Rather Do?

Go hunting with Dick Cheney or driving with Ted Kennedy?