FIRST DRAFT

On Being Watched and Being Watchful

Thoughts on the surveillance state, in no particular order: 

1. Every Republican, Glibertarian, and other opportunist screaming about this who was of voting age when the Patriot Act was passed and George W. Bush was re-elected can shut right up. I forget who said it when the FISA fight was first going on, but he or she said something about how "these are all powers you wouldn't want Hillary Clinton to have," which, as it turns out, was true from their perspective, and their outrage is just a little bit rich. 

2. Which makes it not okay one little tiny bit. Democrats are, and have always been, just as capable of rolling over and playing dead at mention of the word "threat" as anybody else, maybe more so, because of Chris Matthews in their ears constantly about how if they don't agree to attack everything all the time voters will think they're pussies. And the way I know that is that we went to war in Iraq, didn't succeed in that first FISA fight or in any subsequent one, and continue to do shit like this. 

3. OF COURSE we continue to do shit like this. No one ever gives up power. No one ever says, look, you know what? I don't actually want to be able to do whatever I want. That sucks. Here, take some of that back. Because what if you need it for something? That's the problem, what if you need it? That question never goes away. It's why you don't hand over power like this in the first place. You can't unfuck this dog. 

4. Which again, makes it okay not at all. 

5. Pressure on government in these matters works demonstrably not at all. Pressure on private companies, though? That may have a better chance of succeeding. Government don't have to give a shit, honey badgers. Businesses that lose customers do, though I don't know where we're all going to go, other than Google. 

5. Is it okay as long as they're not listening to the calls? 

It’s at that point, people, that law enforcement requires a full-throated argument of probable cause. It’s at that point that privacy rights must be seriously measured against the legitimate investigate needs of law enforcement. And it’s at that point that the potential for authoritarian overreach becomes significant.

6. Part of the problem here, though, is that we do not exactly have a track record right now, America, of using our power judiciously when it comes to vague threats of terrorism. The comparison above is David Simon on the drug war, and compared to the terrorism issue, we are models of human rights and above-board decency when it comes to the drug war. Simon goes on: 

The question is not should the resulting data exist. It does. And it forever will, to a greater and greater extent. And therefore, the present-day question can’t seriously be this: Should law enforcement in the legitimate pursuit of criminal activity pretend that such data does not exist. The question is more fundamental: Is government accessing the data for the legitimate public safety needs of the society, or are they accessing it in ways that abuse individual liberties and violate personal privacy — and in a manner that is unsupervised.

And to that, the Guardian and those who are wailing jeremiads about this pretend-discovery of U.S. big data collection are noticeably silent. We don’t know of any actual abuse. 

And we never will. My GRANDchildren will not know of any actual abuse. This will be classified until the end of time. That's the point and the problem.

Since his next graf is about the model of oversight that is the FISA court, I'll stop reading there. 

7. You don't wait for something to be abused before you decide it's okay, because see point 3 above. 

A. 

Sunday Morning Video: Edith's Accident

Here's one of my favorite episodes of All In The Family and that's saying a lot:

 

Weekend Question Thread

I'm spending the weekend at this.  BOOK NERDS UNITE.

What's your favorite local festival? 

A. 

How can I miss you when you won't go away, Willard?

The guy who tried to make history by becoming our first robot President is back in the news. And he's still saying stupid shit:

Among the things Romney thinks might have actually changed the election appears to be his own comments. He repeatedly referenced his own "mistakes" in the CNN interview. He said he "regrets" his comment about 47 percent of Americans refusing to take responsibility for their lives. He said of Clint Eastwood's empty-chair moment, "Clint didn't hurt my campaign, I hurt my campaign a couple times." He said dealing with the press is hard. "Jokes, for instance, will get you in trouble," Romney said. "Any time you're trying to be funny."

There's nothing more pitiful than someone with no sense of humor who is convinced that they're funny. Willard has a bad case of the inadvertent funnies, but when he tries cracking a joke it invariably falls flat. You know like the whole"I lost because of Hurricane Sandy thing." He lost because he was a bad candidate with a bad message in a year when the polls were static. Delusions die hard.

I must admit to missing Willard even if he won't go away. He's like a long distance Margaret Dumont to my Groucho; only without the cigar, the grease paint mustache, or the mute, harp plucking, horn honking brother.  Actually, it's nothing like that but Willard *is* a great straight man and like the guy in a certain Warren Zevon song, his hair is perfect.

 

Apathy as a default option

One of the best and most telling lines I think I ever read came from Terry Pluto’s book on the Cleveland Indians. After GM Frank Lane made about a dozen trades and stripped the team of anything worthy of a big-league roster, the club began the long march into 30 years of horrible baseball. Somewhere during that first scorched-earth season, a local fan told a local scribe: “I don’t know these guys well enough to be sore at them.” Pluto commented that this was the worst thing ever: apathy.

As a member of our state-run university system, I find myself in that same boat of sin. And, trust me, it doesn’t feel good.

The state has killed off much of the funding it promised for the UW System in the upcoming budget. Worse yet, it took away the freedom it promised for the system to govern itself a bit more. The freedom was promised a couple years back when THAT budget gutted the system of more than $300 million and enacted policies so scary that the Democratic senators fled the state.

So in other words, they gave us a pile of shit to eat, but promised we’d get a breath mint two years later. At that point, they decided to take away that mint because we probably couldn’t handle the responsibility of fresh breath, now that we’re used to smelling like shit.

The state took another swipe at my beloved profession by trying to bounce the Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism from it’s home in Vilas Hall.

I spent six years of my life in Vilas and can attest that the place smells like a cross between old newspapers and wet dog. It’s an ugly, cramped building and the rumor was that they designed it specifically to prevent radicals from taking it over. Thus, you had columns jutting out here and there instead of straight hallways, an insane number of entry points and a generally confusing layout. Not sure if that was true, but the ugly remained.

In any case, it’s not like the WCIJ was getting palatial digs. It was a good arrangement between a field in need of improved journalism and an organization committed to filling that need. Now, it’s in jeopardy for reasons past my understanding. The Republicans who felt this was so important as to include it in the state budget have bravely closed ranks and will not say in public whose brilliant idea this ban was. Classy and strong: Your Wisconsin GOP, everybody!

Each day, I read about the latest “Deliverance” moment from our statehouse and I’m finding myself more and more strangely detached and less and less outraged. I’m not even sad. I’m like Kurt in “Boogie Nights” when he’s mixing the Johnny Dough porno and Jack Horner asks how good the new movie is: “It is what it is.”

I have liberal friends who try to tell me that things will be better if we can get rid of Scott Walker, but that’s not true. First, we tried that and it ended up being like a Civil Rights vote gone wrong: People said the right things in public and then went into the booth and dropped the “n” word on the ballot. Second and more  importantly, this isn’t just Walker or the Republicans. Keep in mind it was Jim Doyle’s administration that rescinded a 2 percent pay increase for faculty and later furloughed all state employees to the tune of a 3 percent pay cut. It’s not one party or the other.

It’s both. It’s everyone.

At some unperceivable point in the past, people of this state started caring less about education and more about something else. It might be lower taxes, it might be private enterprise, who knows? In any case, the state as a whole started allowing tuition to carry a higher burden of the educational cost and that started hurting student a bit more each year. Like a frog placed in water that was heated a few degrees at a time, no one really noticed we were in trouble until it was too late and kids were boiling in loan debt.

(When I went to school, you could pay for college if you worked your ass off in the summer. Now, you can’t do it if you worked overtime all year.)

It happened when Republicans were in charge.

It happened when Democrats were in charge.

It just burned us all to the ground.

Cuts of the fat became cuts of the meat became cuts of the bone. Less money plus increasing responsibilities equaled more and more and more cuts. It never stopped.

The response from the general public has been appalling: everything from people saying “be grateful you still HAVE a job” to one person who encouraged students to punch professors in the face.

I remember reading a comment by a chancellor of a UW school who was asked about that morale on his campus. He said he mentally responded, “What morale?” He noted his faculty is discouraged and saddened about being the default option when it comes time for the state to hand out an ass-whipping. However, he also noted many of them are numb.

Numb is what happens when you are continually hit. Eventually, the body defends itself by not allowing you to feel the pain anymore. The body give up on sending out pain signals, the things that are supposed to alert you to get away from the injurious force. The body finally figures out that there is no way out, so it stops alerting you and it just protects you from feeling anything.

And that is where we are now as a higher-ed system.

Uncomfortably numb.

Friday Ferretblogging: Soft Chicken, Fuzzy Chicken, Little Ball of Fur

I swear I want to come back as a ferret. 

A. 

Friday Catblogging: Cover Up

This is one of Oscar's best poses:

Malaka Of The Week: Darrell Issa

Darrell Issa buffoon.

Darrell Issa scam artist.

Darell Issa witchhunter.

Darrell Issa liar.

Darrell Issa malaka.

This Issa swell version of an old song by Diana Krall:

 

Pulp Fiction Thursday: More Snappy Titles

This week's entry could be called silly titles but I decided to keep it snappy:

No, This Is Not A Joke

From Album4

Talking Points Memo profiles erstwhile (and soon to be once again) part time Jefferson Parish Deputy and (their words) "rather unusual spokesman for world peace" Steven Seagal, who's career trajectory -- Hollywood to Joe Arpaio to Jefferson Parish to Chechnya/Dana Rohrabacher -- looks to be on the  "Puppet Show and Spinal Tap" track...

Reality really is stranger than fiction sometimes. 

 

Judge Dingbat

The wonderful co-star of All In The Family, Jean Stapleton died the other day. Her portrayal of the dim but decent Edith Bunker was a delicious contrast to the bigotry and intolerance of her teevee husband, Archie. He used to call his fictional spouse a dingbat and tell her to stifle. There's another Edith in the news who should have stifled herself but failed to do so.

Judge Edith Jones was on President Beavis' short list for the Supreme Court. She was not selected, and instead stayed on the Fifth Circuit Court Of Appeals here in New Orleans. The Bushies thought she was too intemperate to be easily confirmable. They were right. Here's a summary of what the Other Edith said the other day at Penn:

 A federal judge who, until recently, led what is arguably the nation’s most conservative federal appeals court said blacks and Hispanics are more prone to commit crimes, according to a lawsuit filed this week. Although the remarks by U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit Judge Edith Jones were not recorded, five students and one attorney who attended a February event at the University of Pennsylvania law school signed affidavits attesting to what she said that day, the Associated Press reports. Among her comments were that “racial groups like African-Americans and Hispanics are predisposed to crime,” are “prone to commit acts of violence,” and more likely than people of other ethnicities to be involved in “heinous” acts. She also said the death penalty provides a public service by allowing an inmate to “make peace with God,” citing an article called “Hanging Concentrates the Mind,” according to the Austin Chronicle. She said claims that the death penalty is discriminatory, imposed arbitrarily, and violate international law are just “red herrings” used by those who oppose the death penalty; that claims of “mental retardation” disgust her; and that Mexicans would prefer to be on death row in the United States than serving prison terms in other countries.

The most depressing thing about Judge Dingbat's failure to stifle herself is that the Fifth Circuit was the home for courageous Judges like John Minor Wisdom (after whom the courthouse is now named) during the Civil Rights era. It is now the home base for Judge Dingbat and some equally incorrigible wingnutty judges.

Here's hoping that the misconduct complaint against Judge Dingbat has legs. She's been saying stupid shit like this for years. I think she should be sentenced to stick her gavel in her mouth, but she'd have to remove her foot first.

I'll let Archie Bunker have the last word. I have a hunch that Judge Dingbat would agree with him:

 

Joey The Shark On Frank Lautenberg

The Veep killed at the late liberal Senator's funeral with some classic Irish wake humor:

 

Update: Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism's Eviction Notice

The teawad anger bears running the Wisconsin State Legislature have picked a pretty nasty fight: 

The relevant text from Motion 999 (Download the full motion PDF here):

Center for Investigative Journalism. Prohibit the Board of Regents from permitting the Center for Investigative Journalism to occupy any facilities owned or leased by the Board of Regents. In addition, prohibit UW employees from doing any work related to the Center for Investigative Journalism as part of their duties as a UW employee.

There are a couple of things going on here. One, the nonprofit Center doesn't receive state funding, so it couldn't be de-funded in reaction to lawmakers' dismay at being investigated and occasionally called on their bullshit. This was pretty much the only way legislators could stomp on it, so they did.

Two, as to its presence on state property, the Center provides paid internships and other benefits to the university in order to earn its rent on a couple of little offices in a building that is quite possibly the least user-friendly on campus. This isn't just some taxpayer-funded luxury giveaway to a liberal or even journalistic cause. 

Three, what this does overall is interfere with the right of the university to form partnerships. It's not just "you can't keep your offices here." That would still be repulsive, but this is worse. It's "nobody's allowed to have any contact with you, do any work even near you, or speak your name aloud." If I'm employed by the UW, I can't even get coffee for people there.

You start down THAT road, pretty soon you hit a dead end. The university increasingly relies on outside money from private funders as state funding shrinks, and that trend isn't going to reverse itself anytime soon. You start outlawing private partnerships as well as legislating book-learnin' out of existence, there will be nothing left. Which is probably what these 'necks want. 

Four, the Center's work has been cited in the past by the same committee that's now trying to bludgeon it out of existence. STUPID. 

Five, nonprofit journalism is larval, as a model. With all the bleating that goes on about wither investigative journalism these days, and how nobody values it, and etc etc, you'd think we'd be a little less eager to whomp on something that's still finding its feet. 

Six, fuck these backwards-ass legislators and the dinosaurs they rode in on. Light 'em up: 

What you can do

• Contact legislative leaders. Let them know you support the Center’s nonpartisan, nonprofit journalism.
Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau: 608-266-5660, Sen.Fitzgerald@legis.wisconsin.gov
Assembly speaker Robin Vos, R-Rochester, 608-266-9171, Rep.Vos@legis.wisconsin.gov

• Support the Center. Send us your story tips, to tips@wisconsinwatch.org or any of our staff. Consider making a donation.

So say we all. 

A. 

Album Cover Art Wednesday: Little Creatures

Little Creatures is my favorite Talking Heads album. It's brilliantly sequenced and full of great songs. The cover art by the noted and wildly eccentric folk artist Howard Finster is pretty swell too.

The back cover is almost as cool:

I wasn't able to find an embeddable version of the whole LP, so here are two of the lesser known gems on the album:

 

 

Wisconsin Legislative Committee: Screw You, Journalists

Even for the "book learnin' is for liberals" caucus in my home state, this seems random and pointless and cruel: 

 The Wisconsin Center for Investigative Journalism would have to leave the UW-Madison campus, under a Republican motion before the Legislature's budget committe. 

GOP lawmakers were set to vote early Wednesday morning on the motion, which specifically named the center established by former Wisconsin State Journal investigative reporter Andy Hall. Currently the center has a small office in Vilas Hall on the floor occupied by the UW-Madison School of Journalism. 

Commenters are speculating that the teawads got all het up about the center because it received Soros foundation funding, which makes it the devil, obviously.

Andy's a great guy, his staff does important work, and if this is what it looks like, it's just a kick in the nuts for no good reason. I would hope, though I have no expectation of course, that the journalism school at Wisconsin would defend its partner in the strongest possible ways. 

A.  

Up in smoke, eh?

Toronto Mayor Rob Ford and Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

Photo via the Toronto Star.

The most entertaining political farce on the planet right now isn't taking place in the US & A or even at Westminster in woody old England. it's happening in, of all places, Canada. Other than Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Canadian politicians tend to be on the dull and bland side, and damn proud of it.The current Conservative Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, has helmet hair and is resolutely boring even while dragging his country kicking and screaming to the right. In fact, Canada is the only country I can think of who elected a man, Jean Chretien, with a minor speech impediment to be Prime Minister 3 times. And he was a good PM who kept his country out of the Iraq War.

That's all changed with the current Mayor of Toronto, Rob Ford. I'm sure everyone has heard the allegations that there's a video showing him smoking crack with a drug slinging gangbanger. Some reporters have claimed to have seen it and Gawker even made like Zach Braff and raised money on Kickstarter to buy it from the dealers. There's a problem: the video is "gone." I'm not sure if it's Gone With The Wind, gone, or just plain gone but apparently, it's a goner.

Josh Marshall is inclined to think that the video will resurface and I hope he's right. There is, however, a side benefit to all of this, Ford's colorful woes may be rubbing off on the colorless Stephen Harper:

But again, there is a video – though yet again, few have seen it. It was taken in Rob Ford's mum's backyard two summers ago, during a barbecue party in honour of federal Finance Minister Jim Flaherty, whose riding is in Toronto's eastern suburbs. The videographer was an unknown conservative stalwart, thrilled to record the surprise appearance of the prime minister himself.

Harper's brief remarks to the delighted backyard crowd contain two somewhat awkward revelations. The first was that he and Rob Ford had become fishing buddies – a condition of some intimacy in Canadian politics.

The second was his appreciation of the political situation:

"We've started cleaning up the left-wing mess federally in this area – Rob's doing it municipally – and now we've got to complete the hat trick, and do it provincially as well."

The "hat trick" line carries the two men's relationship beyond intimacy, into a unity of purpose, a joint political identity. This implication was not lost on the prime minister's office, which within 48 hours had the loyal videographer take it off YouTube – nor on the anti-Harper legions, who put it back up again, where it is beginning to attract renewed media attention.

So even if  the Rob Ford crack smoking video has gone up in smoke, the right-wing Prime Minister may suffer some collateral political damage or is that suffer from second hand smoke? I'm not sure what I really mean but who knew Canadian politics could be so wild, eh?

 I'll let John Hiatt, without the Goners, have the last doggone word and then I'm gone, baby, gone:

 

The last refuge of a scoundrel

Samuel Johnson said that it was patriotism and by, jingo, he's still right but I have another contender: the R WORD. Reform. If you have something unpalatable, you sell it as a "reform." Bobby Jindal, David Vitter and Scott Walker are just a few wingnuts who use the word "reform" to roll back the clock with their retrograde ideas. I think it tests well but it really should not.

The reason I'm trotting this out is the latest news out of school "reform" land. The entire "reform" movement seems to be imploding with even "reformers" like Paul Vallas backtracking. Diane Ravitch came over from the dark side quite some time ago. Michelle Rhee remains defiant but she should not be:

That gets to the news that exposes “reformers’” schemes — and all the illusions that surround them. According to a new U.S. Department of Education study, “about one in five public schools was considered high poverty in 2011 … up from about to one in eight in 2000.” This followed an earlier study from the department finding that “many high-poverty schools receive less than their fair share of state and local funding … leav(ing) students in high-poverty schools with fewer resources than schools attended by their wealthier peers.”

Those data sets powerfully raise the question that “reformers” are so desperate to avoid: Are we really expected to believe that it’s just a coincidence that the public education and poverty crises are happening at the same time? Put another way: Are we really expected to believe that everything other than poverty is what’s causing problems in failing public schools?

Because of who comprises it and how it is financed, the education “reform” movement has a clear self-interest in continuing to say yes, we should believe such fact-free pabulum. And you can bet that movement will keep saying “yes” — and that the corporate media will continue to cheer them as heroes for saying “yes” — as long as public education money keeps being diverted into corporate coffers.

The worm slowly but surely seems to be turning. The privatization of the public schools here in New Orleans looks worse and worse every day. Right after Katrina and the Federal Flood, it was plausible to say that anything would be better than the previous system. It may not be worse but it's not a helluva lot better either.

Education is not the only area full of sham reforms and fake reformers but I don't have all day. Suffice to say that every time I hear the R WORD, I make sure that my wallet is secure and not within reach.

Repeat after me; Reform is the last refuge of a scoundrel.

That is all.

 

Nothing Goes Wrong Most of the Time

There are a million things that can go wrong inside you. 

A couple of years ago when I first started going to a fertility clinic, Mr. A went on a business trip to, hell, I don't even remember. We spend a hell of a lot of time together so I get twitchy when he's not here for extended periods. My insomnia kicks in, and I do things like cut all my hair off or remodel the bathroom by myself with just a hammer. In this particular instance I stayed up all night reading stories about all the ways a pregnancy, even an advanced one, even one under the constant care of good doctors, can go wrong. 

All the ways in which your hopes, finally realized, can be destroyed. 

(Once you learn the names for every single part of you it starts to seem insane that anyone is healthy or can do anything at all.)

I read stories of women who lost twins at 18 weeks, who lost pregnancies at 22 weeks, who had baby showers. Who told everyone on the planet. Who bought maternity clothes. Who thought they were home free. Who were ready to have children, not hypothetically or by romanticizing a few cells in a petri dish but by feeling something kick and push inside them. 

I thought of those stories when I first heard about this bullshit, and it's taken me a few days to write about it because all I can think is that if it were possible to force every single one of these men to birth a stillborn or nearly-dead baby, I would do it, since personal experience is all that seems to get through to these thickheaded sociopaths [pdf link]: 

If this bill had been passed before my pregnancy, I would have had to carry to term and give birth to a baby whom the doctors concurred had no chance of a life and would have experienced near-constant pain. If he had survived the pregnancy—which was not certain—he might never have left the hospital. My daughter’s life, too, would have been irrevocably hurt by an almost always-absent parent.

The decision I made to have an abortion at almost 22 weeks was made out of love and to spare my son’s pain and suffering.

I am horrified to think that the doctors who compassionately but objectively explained to us the prognosis and our options for medical treatment, and the doctor who helped us terminate the pregnancy, would be prosecuted as criminals under this law for providing basic, safe medical care and expertise. This bill does not represent the best interests of anyone, especially families like mine. What happened to me during pregnancy can happen to any woman, regardless of her health, race, ethnicity, economic status, or where she lives. This proposed law is downright cruel, as it would inflict pain on the families, the women, and the babies it purports to protect. 

Just hearing about somebody else's experience wasn't enough for the fine gentlemen listening to this story: 

"Ms. Zink, having my great sympathy and empathy both, I still come back wondering, shouldn’t we wait, like that couple did, and see if the child can survive before we decide to rip him apart?" Gohmert said. "So these are ethical issues, they’re moral issues, they’re difficult issues, and the parents should certainly be consulted. But it just seems like, it’s a more educated decision if the child is in front of you to make those decisions."

Parents should be CONSULTED? Really? They should be consulted. I wonder who should actually fucking DECIDE, like a committee of maybe Rick Santorum, the Pope and a member of the Twilight cast? I mean fucking Christ on a catwalk, who else should be consulted if not the parents? And notice he didn't say mother, he said parents, because obviously a father has just as much a say in whether his partner should die of sepsis from carrying a dead body inside her as the woman does herself. 

While debating a similar 20-week ban last year, Georgia state Rep. Terry England (R) compared women to farm animals.

“Life gives us many experiences,” England said in response to concerns that a woman would have to carry a fetus to term that was not expected to live. “I’ve had the experience of delivering calves, dead and alive -- delivering pigs, dead and alive. … It breaks our hearts to see those animals not make it.”

That's his basis of comparison, because that's his only personal experience. He's not talking about his wife, daughter, mother, colleague, friend. He's not talking about anybody to whom this has happened, because doing that would require making the leap we call empathy and this semi-literate titlicker can't even spell it. 

I hear these rabid wingnuts when they're testifying about bills like this and I think, but this happens to so many women, so many that once you start looking for their stories, on a night when you can't sleep, you spend eight hours reading them all. This happens to so many women, how can they not know anyone this has happened to? 

And I guess it's that vicious circle of you are a pig-ignorant fish-fucking 'neck so nobody even BOTHERS to tell you about their experiences because what would be the point. Let's see, I've just had to have a D&C or Christ forbid a D&E of my desperately wanted child, and it's the most horrifying experience of my life, I'd better make sure the most backwards-ass Veggie Tale in my county knows about it so he won't do something so buttheadedly stupid as to suggest we ban all abortions after 20 weeks, even if they're medically necessary to save a woman's organs or her life.

Yeah, I'm rushing right out to tell America's Asshole Brother-in-Law about that too. 

A. 

Blind Fox News Squirrel Finds Nut

God, can we please stop treating Fox News’ Megyn Kelly like she’s some kind of goddamned hero or something?

So this is where we are? A female Fox News anchor calls her misogynist colleagues’ views about gender roles a bunch of sexist bullshit -- which they are -- and we’re supposed to cheer for her? Give me a fucking break.

Megyn Kelly is your typical Fox News hack. Like every other conservative out there, she only manages to find her spine (and voice) when something personally affects her. Jon Stewart called her out on this BS the last time she pulled her “I am woman, hear me roar” schtick; that was waaay back in 2011 when she lashed out at radio host Mike Gallagher for calling maternity leave a racket. Yes, good for her. But I also remember Megyn Kelly piling on during the whole Sandra Fluke flap. I guess Kelly doesn't need to worry about her brith control co-pay.

What initially pissed me off about the video of Kelly taking on Erick Erickson and Lou Dobbs was the way she prefaced her statements with, “I’m not a feminist but ...” God I hate that dodge. You're a woman in broadcast news and you're not a feminist? Well why the hell not? What the hell is wrong with being a feminist, anyway? Anyone who prefaces a statement with "I'm not a feminist but ..." is telling me they’ve bought into the whole right-wing framing of the word: “feminazi,” "man-hater," "ugly shoes," and the rest of the ugly baggage they've tried to saddle feminists with.

Also: if you’re calling bullshit on your male colleagues’ sexist remarks? Then yeah, you’re a feminist. So stop pretending you're not.

But you know what, I was wrong. Megyn Kelly is no feminist. She’s just another self-centered conservative narcissist who only speaks up when she feels personally insulted. She's no hero to women. She had no problem following Fox News' marching orders during Republicans' pre-election War On Women. And a part of me wonders if this whole Erick Erickson-Lou Dobbs-Megyn Kelly thing wasn't staged and scripted from the get-go in the first place.

So stop telling me Megyn Kelly is some kind of "feminist wonderwoman." She's not. She'll be back attacking women for the Republican Party as soon as her handlers give her the word.

Closed-Minded, Racist, Rigid, Old-Fashioned

This post title is taken from a report issued by the College National Republican Committee. It describes younger voters' attitudes about the GOP. It also describes this story out of Atmore, Alabama:

An Escambia Academy High School student said she was denied a diploma and fined $1,000 for wearing an eagle feather at her graduation.

For 17-year-old Chelsey Ramer, graduating on May 23 was supposed to be a joyous occasion.

"I was excited," said Ramer.

It has been more than a week, and she still does not have her diploma. She said it is all because of her feather.

"They told me that if I wore it that they would pull me off the field," said Ramer.

The eagle feather is part of her Native American Heritage. Ramer is of the Poarch Creek Band of Indians. She wanted to wear the feather as a show of pride for her heritage.

"Being honored with a feather for graduation is a wonderful experience. It's a lot more than showing off your culture. It has ties into our spirituality as well," Ramer's former teacher Alex Alvarez.

According to a school contract, Ramer must pay a $1,000 fine to get her diploma and transcripts.

"I don't think it's fair at all. I feel like its discrimination," Ramer stated.

The contract states, "Students and staff shall not wear extraneous items during graduation exercises unless approved by the administration."

Ramer stated she asked the Headmaster at the time for permission to wear the eagle feather.

"She told us we could not wear our feathers," said Ramer.

Shortly after inquiring, Ramer said she was told she must sign the dress code contract to walk on graduation.

Ramer stated, "I never signed it,"

Instead, she still walked across the stage proudly with her feathers and family's support.

"It was worth it. It means a lot to me," said Ramer.

I wonder if it would have been okay if she wanted to wear sheets? Imagine fining a high school girl $10000 for making a culturally based fashion statement. Disgusting.

Mad Men Thread: Joan Goes Rogue

Episode 10 is titled, A Tale Of Two Cities, but I would have added Chicago to New York and LA and made it a troika. See, I can be as pretentious as Matthew Weiner when I try. Actually, I think it was a very good episode but the Dickensian borrowing was a bit heavy handed for my taste.

LA used to be Don's happy place but this trip was different. Nothing much went right. Don got wasted on hash and did a Joe Gillis into a pool at a Hollywood shebang. Things weren't so great for Roger either. He ran into former Sterling, Cooper copywriter, Danny Segal, who is now a minor Hollywood luminary. Danny is almost short enough to play Tyrion Lannister, so Roger mocks him and gets punched in the bollocks for his trouble. Ouch. At least Roger fished our boy Don out of the pool.

Don was so stoned that he was hallucinating. First, the soldier he met in Hawaii in episode-1. He appeared missing an arm and informed Don that he was dead and that one's appendages don't reattach when you die. Bummer, man. Speaking of reluctant appendages, Megan appears to Don at the party looking like a hippie chick and tells him she quit her job and did an "I'm preggers" belly rub. The conspiracy buffs out there are going to revive the Megan is Sharon Tate meme after that scene. My money is against it, but Weiner is giving us a head feint in that direction. I'd love to see Harry Crane rubbing shoulders with Charlie Manson. How about a little helter skelter, douchebag?

Okay, let's line up a few balls and putt them in the hole or something like that. That's how I sound after being exposed to Roger Sterling:

Ginzo On The Knife Edge: Ginsburg is not a happy camper. He rages at the moon over the yippie/police riot in Chicago. Then, he gets into it with Cutler, calls the slippery accounts man a fascist and is generally mopey albeit in a frantic way. I guess he never had another date with that nice Jewish girl. Oy, such a pity.

What's interesting about the convention riot discussion is that both sides were right. The police went way too far but that's what Abbie Hoffman and his cohorts had in mind by throwing rocks and chanting "pig" and "the whole world's watching" over and over again. The cops broke the monotony and a few heads while they were at it...

Cutler's Sleight Of Hand: I'm really loving Harry Hamlin as the slick and souless Jim Cutler. His accent is prep-o-licious and every word is tinged with condescension, especially in his scenes with underlings Bob Benson and Ginsburg. Cutler seems to have a plan to take over the agency and the new name-Sterling, Cooper & Partners-is part of his maneuverings. It makes Cutler look modest when he's really out to knife everyone he can somewhere down the line. I think it might work: Don has checked out and only Pete Campbell suspects what's going on. And who's gonna listen to the Daffy Duck of Mad Men? Sputter, sputter, sputter.

Avon Calling: Cutler is not the only one making a move. Joan is ready to move on to bigger and better things. She cut Pete out of a meeting with a guy from Avon without telling her wingchick, Peggy. The Pegster was not amused, which led to an awesome recapitulation of their history. These two are the ultimate frenemies. They really cannot decide whether to be friend or foe.

Just when we thought the Pegster was turning against Joan, she fakes a call from the Avon man (not, Avon Barksdale, different show) that makes Joan look good to Ted. Pete is left sputtering ineffectually, so, in classic 1968 style, he grabs Stan's joint and takes a toke. That's joint as in reefer, not the other kind of joint, although Campbell does have a phallic name so...

Conclusion: I've got nothing profound to add. I'm not really sure where this season is headed, it may be going to hell in a bucket, but at least I'm enjoying the ride:

 

First They Came for the Bootstraps

You can't work your way through school anymore: 

Working one's way through a public university in four years with a minimum-wage summer job and part-time campus work study — with little to no family assistance or need-based financial aid — is an outdated ideal of previous generations.

It's virtually impossible today, if you do the math, and consider that tuition at four-year UW campuses has steadily risen above the rate of inflation since 1987, while state support has lagged below inflation since 1980. The diverging curves reflect a national trend of a dramatic shift in who covers the majority of cost for a college education: students and their families, instead of taxpayers.

Students today are paying a much higher share of the cost than students 40 years ago, when a family could have sent three kids to UW-Madison for what it costs to send one kid today, adjusted for inflation.

In 1978, a UW-Madison student paying his or her own way, without any help, had to earn $2,362. It could be done at minimum wage by working full-time through the summer and about 10 hours a week through the academic year, or a total 891 hours.

Today, a full-time UW-Madison student going it alone couldn't physically work enough hours at minimum wage to earn $18,402 for tuition, fees, room and board. It would take 2,538 hours, or about 50 hours per week for 50 weeks.

So work two jobs. I can hear them saying it, the bootstrap people. So work three. So save every single penny you ever earn. Don't eat lunch. Don't eat dinner Don't go to the movies. Don't buy yourself a prom dress or a new shirt. Don't put gas in your car. Don't put gas in your mom's car. Don't drive anywhere. Don't buy books. Don't have cable. Sit in your room or your apartment and think, think about how if you spend even one red cent in your teenage years on a cup of coffee, you will never be able to go to STATE SCHOOL. And then get up the next day and go to work agin. 

And at the end of that, when you worn thin as the sole of a marathoner's shoe, when you have absolutely nothing left at all to give and are probably addicted to speed of some kind, THEN we'll let you go to school, where you'll be expected to compete with people who, instead of having four jobs and basically a mortgage before they turned 18, had extra credit and private tutors and time to learn instruments and read poetry and play four sports. I mean, fucking hell. Even if you make the money, what are you supposed to do then? 

Work a miracle, I suppose. There's always an anecdote with these people. I knew a kid who ... Yeah, and the presence of an exception IMPLIES THE EXISTENCE OF A RULE. 

I'm not insensitive to the idea that laziness gets you nowhere, and that you have to work for what you say you want, but not only could I not afford to put msyelf through school at these prices even my parents couldn't have afforded it, with what they made when I went to college. And this is a public university, which as I was reminded once — when I applied for a job at an elite paper that rhymes with SCHMIBUNE  — is considered inferior in the minds of many. This is what you should be able to hope for in a basic situation. This is not the Ivy League. 

Nobody can have nice things anymore. 

A. 

Fine Stories

They're everywhere. 

A. 

Blame It On The Tweeter Tube

The Turks are acting like their Greek cousins and rioting. Yes, I said cousins, they may not be kissing cousins but the Greeks are more like Turks and vice versa than either will admit. Some of my ancestors may have just rolled over in their graves but what can I say? I'll send you some Turkish Greek Coffee and baklava...

Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan is having a bad week and he knows what's behind the street violence in Istanbul

"There is now a menace which is called Twitter," Erdogan said. "The best examples of lies can be found there. To me, social media is the worst menace to society."

Lies on Twitter? Sure, but snark and hyperbole are really what the Tweeter Tube is all about. That, and instantaneous communication. Turkey, of course, has a "free press" problem:

The dramatic events also exposed the complicity and almost complete government control of mainstream Turkish media, which has largely failed to report the protests.

"The Turkish media have embarrassed themselves," Caliskan said. "While the whole world was broadcasting from Taksim Square, Turkish television stations were showing cooking shows. It is now very clear that we do not have press freedom in Turkey."

Human rights groups have repeatedly expressed their concerns about the lack of freedom of expression in Turkey, and Erdogan routinely criticises media outlets and journalists who do not agree with his views and those of his ruling Justice and Development party (AKP).

State dominated media inevitably leads to a social media explosion and there's not a helluva lot that can be done about it even in a more authoritarian country than Turkey. The Turks have been flirting on and off for years with joining the EU, which takes a dim view of repression. Erdogan should suck it up and stop acting like a Sultan in the glory days of the Ottoman Empire. If he doesn't, Turkey may regain the title of the "sick man of Europe." The Greeks would like that: they're the current title holders...

Today on Tommy T's Obsession with the Freeperati - Odds and Clods edition

 

Well, folks, let's go back in time a little and mine some putrid nuggets from the recent past - because Freeper idiocy has no expiration date.

First up - stick to your gunships!

Navy Announces USS Gabrielle Giffords abc ^ | Feb 10, 2012 3:38pm | Luis Martinez

Posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:29:13 PM by Red Steel

The Navy’s newest ship will be the USS Gabrielle Giffords.

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus made the announcement at a Pentagon ceremony today, calling Giffords someone whose name is synonymous with courage.

Former Rep. Gabby Giffords looked on at the Pentagon as Mabus made the announcement in a public ceremony. Also in attendance at this afternoon’s brief ceremony in the Pentagon Courtyard was Roxana Green, the mother of 9-year-old Christina-Taylor Green.

Christina-Taylor was among those killed in last year’s deadly shooting rampage in Tucson that targeted Giffords as she met constituents outside a supermarket. Roxana Green will be the ship’s sponsor.

Giffords is still recovering from the gunshot wounds to her head that she suffered during last January’s shooting incident. She stepped down from Congress two weeks ago.

The ship named today for her, which has yet to be built, will be the Navy’s 10th Littoral Combat Ship (LCS), a new kind of ship designed to bring the Navy fighting power into shallow coastal areas. The first two ships in this class were called Freedom and Independence, but the conventional practice since then has been to name the other ships in the class after a city.

“It’s very appropriate that LCS 10 be named for someone who has become synonymous with courage, who has inspired the nation with remarkable resiliency and showed the possibilities of the human spirit,” said Mabus.

Mabus said the notion occurred to him that this would be a “fitting tribute” not only to Giffords but to Navy families because she was a Navy spouse. Her husband, Mark Kelly, was until recently an astronaut and Navy pilot.

1 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:29:13 PM by Red Steel

.

To: Red Steel

Is this appropriate?

2 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:29:46 PM by Red Steel

Define "appropriate".

Appropriate for Freeperville, or appropriate for human beings?

To: Red Steel

5 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:31:06 PM by Travis McGee (www.EnemiesForeignAndDomestic.com)

Um - does the word "irony" ring a bell?

This doesn't exactly make your point - if anything, just the opposite.

To: Red Steel

the USS Victim?

6 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:32:21 PM by digger48

.

To: Red Steel

Welcome to “Feel Good” Nation.

I see Mabus got his orders from the White House.

9 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:34:54 PM by headstamp 2 (What would Scooby do?)

Let me introduce you to three words:

"Commander In Chief"

What do you suppose those three words mean?

To: Red Steel

Courage?

It’s an awful thing to be shot and it takes a lot of strength to make it through the recovery, but exceptional courage?

We have literally thousands upon thousands of sailors who’ve undergone catastrophic injuries and illnesses that took years of therapy to recover that were worse than what Giffords had to deal with.

We used to name our ships in memory of great warriors... now we name them after whoever is popular in Washington.

22 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:39:28 PM by Bogey78O (We had a good run. Coulda been great still.)

.

Ah, yes - great warriors like Ronald Reagan. Why, who could forget when he bravely faced down made "Jap Zero"?

.

.

Whatta warrior!

.

And, of course, the coup de grace....

To: Red Steel

Is this appropriate?

If it has half a head...

10 posted on Monday, March 25, 2013 10:35:11 PM by null and void (If the government is so worried about civil disturbance, why are they working so hard to disturb us?)

Oh, Freeperati - you never ever disappoint me.

.

Die in a fire.

.

More stinking thinking after the jump...

Made to be Broken: Game of Thrones Thread

 

Spoilers within. And let's keep book spoilers out of the comments as much as possible, so that those who don't know what's going to happen beyond tonight can have the experience I did, of yelling "WHAT THE SHIT GEORGE RR MARTIN WHAT THE GAH HELP NO GAH NO SERIOUSLY GOD" and chucking the book across the room.

Nice Economic Recovery You Got Here

The places that were hard to begin with, just got harder: 

As hard as the foreclosure crisis hit Chicago, its force has been felt with an unevenness that can seem fiendishly unjust. The U.S. Postal Service, which tracks these numbers, reported that 62,000 properties in Chicago were vacant at the end of last year, with two-thirds of them clustered as if to form a sinkhole in just a few black neighborhoods on the South and West Sides. Currently about 40 percent of all homeowners in these communities owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth, and countywide 80,000 foreclosures are wending their way through circuit court. Last spring, a nine-month study conducted by the National Fair Housing Alliance revealed what everyone in these neighborhoods already knew: After forcing out families in foreclosure, banks failed to properly market, maintain and secure the vacated homes. Thieves subsequently entered many of the properties and stripped them of copper and anything else that could be trafficked. J. R. couldn’t reconcile the idea that homes were being allowed to turn into wrecks with the fact that the city had a shortage of 120,000 units of affordable housing and some 100,000 people sleeping in shelters or on the street each year. Chicago didn’t have just a housing crisis, he offered, it had a moral crisis.

This is why I get so crazy when people talk about how awesome the Clinton economy was or how the stock market is doing or how former Mayor Daley fixed up Chicago really nice. Because, um, an investment portfolio showing gains and a really pretty park downtown ain't this.

And until you fix THIS, no, "Chicago" isn't fixed up, and "the economy" isn't doing better. 

A. 

Sunday Morning Video: John Fogerty Live In LA In 2006

A smokin' set from the rock legend:

 

Weekend Question Thread: Doctor Arrogance

God, THIS: 

The funny thing about doctors is that you WANT them to be arrogant pricks. If someone is splitting my chest open, I want him to be the cockiest son of a bitch that has ever walked the face of the Earth. I don't want him to be PLEASANT. I don't want him to be self-effacing or emo. "We're gonna open up your left ventricle. And even though I went to medical school in Alabama, I'm pretty sure I know what I'm doing!" I want my doctor to be humorless, aggressive, and I want him to recite the Baldwin speech from Malice to people at least six times a day, with no irony.

I would like all my doctors to be the absolute tits, and I will take mean over tentative any day of the week so long as when they are done with me I am no longer sick or in need of their services. You're good at your job, you can get away with no bedside manner at all. 

The first time I ever saw a gynecologist, he was this jolly son of a bitch. He wore a Hawaiian shirt and had a furry pelt of chest hair and he wanted to chitter-chat. All I wanted was to be done with whatever and out of that goddamn room. I did not want to be put at ease or for him to get to know me, and besides, within ten seconds of being in a room with me almost everybody figures out that the worst way to put me at ease is to try to do it on purpose. 

We have a limited amount of time on the planet and it is my life's goal to spend as little of it as possible in a doctor's office. State your business, do the breast exam, see you next year. 

(Nurses, now? Nurses I like all warm and fuzzy. I am the worst patient, like even my pharmacy this week when I called them said, "Oh, um, you.")   

That gynecologist, I never saw again, and in fact his creepy joviality was so horrifying I didn't go see another one for years. When I finally did find one, having requested the most humorless bastard on the face of the planet from among my friends, I adored him. He's not rude, but he's businesslike, answers my questions, and I am no more skeeved out by him than I am by the guy who changes the oil in my car. They're much alike: courteous and competent, and not interested in wasting anybody's time. 

Do you want to be petted and cared for when you're sick, or would you rather they just shoot you up with antibiotics and be on your way?

A.  

Friday Ferretblogging: Caire Makes Her Own Fun

From the footstool, to the chair, to the stool, to the chair! 

It's an old chair of my grandmother's that I had re-upholstered, so I try not to let her chew on it too much, little nomming thing that she is. 

A. 

Shutterbugs shut out at Sun-Times

PHOTOGRAPHY! Anyone can do it!

 

The guy whose office is next to mine is the head of our visual sequence, a former news photographer and a pretty laid-back guy. During one particularly tumultuous term, however, he ended up in my office with the door closed, looking like he wanted to stab someone to death.

He had just come from a meeting with our chair, in which he attempted to convince the man that visuals needed a bigger place in our curriculum. The conversation turned from patronizing to dismissive, with the denouement being delivered when the chair whipped out his cell phone and said something to the effect of, “Look, I can take pictures with my phone. It’s not a big deal.”

We both thought it was a ridiculous statement. Apparently, the Chicago Sun-Times heard it and thought it was inspired.

The brain trust at the Sun-Times laid off its entire photography staff on Thursday. The paper issued a statement that was clearly written by someone who got his PR degree out of a Cracker Jack box. The Sun-Times blamed the audience that is “seeking more video content” and noted that “business is changing rapidly.” By the time I got to their need to “evolve with our digitally savvy customers,” I stopped reading because I had officially won my game of “buzzword bullshit bingo.”

The paper, of course, is not giving up on visuals, nor is it going back to the days of paying artists to do etchings. Instead, they’ll let reporters with phone cameras do most of the easy work and they’ll hire freelancers to pick up the slack. Where might these professional freelancers come from? Oh, wait… The Sun-Times just created 28 of them by FIRING THE WHOLE PHOTO STAFF.

The Sun-Times’ move is a brazen and obvious attempt to save money. By canning a bunch of people, the paper saves cash. That’s a no-brainer, which the paper clearly just proved because whoever did it has no brain.

However, this is just one instance in a string of dumb choices my industry is making because it follows the logic of, “I’m sure whatever they do can’t be that hard.”

Papers have fired writers because they see people on LiveJournal typing stuff for free and think, “Hey, that’ll save money! I’m sure writing can’t be that hard. I’m writing an email right now!”

In the case of photography, papers figure that 1 billion people using Instagram filters can’t be wrong, so let’s give them a try! Besides, it’s Chicago. There’s always SOMEONE who will work for almost nothing when they have exactly nothing now. If something really scary important comes along and the Sun-Times doesn’t want to be embarrassed (although given this move and the reaction to it, that’s a pretty high bar to clear), they can hire a freelancer who will work for cheap, be grateful for the cash/abuse and require no long-term commitment. Y’know, like a hooker…

The problem with all of this is the idea of quality. Not every writer or photographer is an artisan who has honed his or her craft over decades of work. Every journalist isn’t out there touching the lives of people covering political unrest in Afghanistan or insurgency in Syria. Plenty of them are doing crap like this.

However, the Sun-Times canned a ton of good pros Thursday, including Pulitzer-Prize winner John White. He’s not out there taking photos of a woman whose grilled-cheese sandwich has an image of the Son of God on it (Photo Head: Cheese-us Christ!). The ability to compose an image is an actual skill, one that not enough people value. Add that to concerns that these homeless guys they’ll hook up with an iPhone might not have the same ethics as the NPPA and you’re really asking for trouble.

I’d like to say that they eventually figure out that the quality of the writing isn’t as good or that the professionals bring something better to the table than the guy who writes in ALL CAPITALS ABOUT OBAMACARE AND CANT SPEL ANETHING RITE!

Or that they’ll get it after the third time they send a “freelancer” out into the field to get an in-depth expose on the conditions at a local animal shelter and have the guy come back with a dozen “cat selfies.”

However, that usually doesn’t happen because being reflective and evaluating your actions can only lead to “backward thinking” and “flip flopping” so it’s best to fuck up and just keep moving right along.

Friday Catblogging: Ode To Spot

I still have Star Trek on my mind. Dr. A and I were watching the TNG episode wherein Mr. Data held a poetry reading. The highlight was his ode to his ginger cat, Spot. Dr. suggested that it be this weeks catblogging. I agreed; what Dr. A wants, Dr. A gets:

 

Pulp Fiction Thursday: Snappy Titles

PFT goes back to its roots this week with a zany thematic, uh, theme. These two books don't have much in common except for their snappy titles and zesty tag lines:

Because What Has Posterity Ever Done For Us?

From Album4

Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson:

“What good is it to save the planet if humanity suffers?”

Tillerson's response wasn't to some forced government mandate, but a simple resolution to set goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Reductions that really wouldn't cost much of anything, except for maybe Exxon shareholders, who might see (slightly) reduced dividends. 

And what good is a dividend check when you're faced with the "choice" of choking or drowning? 

Tillerson is like the lunatic gun owners. They'll blow a gasket over the most minimal of background checks, but lack the slightest understanding that getting shot, or having a loved one shot, is also a violation of basic rights. 

Bachmann On The Dole

This is a tale of two Republicans who are in the news today. The first is the La Pasionaria of the teanut set, Michelle Bachmann. As we all know, the crazy eyed wackadoodle from the sensible state of Minnesota isn't running for re-election. She *claims* it has nothing to do with the ethics charges swirling about her goofball campaign for President, but that she's suddenly for term limits, which she used to be against. And now she's self limiting her term or some such nonsense.  Of course, no one should believe a word that comes out of the Bachmann bazoo. She's not running because it would be too hard. Sound familiar?

Establishment GOPers are heaving a sigh of relief over Bachmann's exit-for now-from center stage. That brings me to the second Republican in the news this week. It's an unlikely one: Bob Dole former Senate Republican leader, 1976 Veep nominee, 3 time GOP candidate for President ,and the party's 1996 nominee. In a sane world, Bob Dole would be regarded as a mainstream conservative. But in the fun house/loony bin that is the GOP in 2013, he's a squishy, moderate RINO as far as the teawads are concerned.Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Senator Aqua Buddha and the wacko bird caucus don't like Bob Dole and that's fine with Bob Dole.

That's right, sports fans, this is the same Bob Dole who served as a hatchet man for Tricky Dick and his hapless successor, Jerry Ford. The same Bob Dole who called World War II a "Democrat war," and always referred to himself in the third person. That Bob Dole. It shows what the GOP has come to when a politician who was moderate on a few issues in his time-food stamps, the Americans with Disabilities Act-now looks halfway decent because he wasn't barking mad.The good news is that the wingnuts will not listen to Bob Dole telling them what Bob Dole would do if Bob Dole were running the show. That's because Bob Dole is a squish, which makes St Ronnie one as well since he signed <shudder> a librul abortion law in California before discovering the sanctity of life,

While I'm not a Chris Christie fan,  I would love to see him run a scorched earth anti-wingnut campaign in 2016. The lunacy of the current Republican party is doing untold damage to our political system because today's GOPers have no interest in getting shit done. And while I'm a liberal Democrat, I also belong to the party of get-shit-doners, and I've had a bellyful of filibusters, ideological purity and the inmates running the political asylum.

Things are bad when I find myself nostalgic for Bob Dole. Really bad. I won't have to miss having Michelle Bachmann to kick around because I'm pretty sure she'll turn up spewing nonsense on Fox News and in the wingnut-o-sphere. Charlie Pierce calls her The Girl With Faraway Eyes after the Stones song from Some Girls, so I'll let Mick, Keith, Woody and the gang have the last word:

  

Album Cover Art Wednesday: Sketches of Spain

Miles Davis took a personal interest in cover art, which is why so many Davis LPs have swell images. This is one of the simplest but most satisfying covers of Miles' long and distinguished career.

Here's the LP courtesy of the YouTube:

 

Women Are Idiots, Part the Two Thousandth

Ladies, you may not know this, but you cannot have the babbies forever: 

"I do look back now and realise that leaving pregnancy late can be a risky bet as diminishing fertility can stack the odds against you. In some ways I wish I’d had my babies younger. Now I would love a third child but I’ve almost certainly left it too late. My fertility door is slamming shut," she said. "I want to alert women to start thinking about their fertility at a younger age than my generation did."

Girls are such selfish bitches, not "thinking about their fertility." AMIRITE? 

Yet even as First Response claims there is a lack of awareness about the female biological clock, they tout a survey by YouGov finding 70 percent of British women believe having a baby in her 40s would be too old. Women were also quite clear about their motives to wait: two-fifths said they would delay having a child until they have financial stability, while over a third said the cost of childcare is a deterrent. Another third said they would wait until they found the right partner.

How dare ladies not get knocked up while they're poor by some unsuitable asshole they don't like very much when they're not even sure they want kids! What, do they think they'll have infinite youth to ruin? Just because one chick regrets waiting until her 40s to have kids doesn't mean everyone else will have that same regret. My grandma liked her youngest child fine, and she was born when Grandma was 41. And this was in '57. 

I swear, people who want to increase the birth rate among younger women should spend more time making themselves into advertisements for young parenthood, because most of the people who are eager that everyone breed early make it look about as appealing as dental work. "Have a child before your womb grows cobwebs" is not a sexy sales pitch. 

Possibly making a world in which having children wasn't viewed as a screeching halt to everything you ever cared about would be a good thing, too. 

Absent THAT, everybody mind your own fucking business and stop assuming all girls without children were just too dumb to put it on their Google calendars. 

A. 

Unsolicited Advice

I am not now nor have I ever been either a communist or the target demographic for Lena Dunham's HBO show, Girls. I have, however, seen a few episodes, and find it well done and pretty well written. I also love Ms. Dunham's ability to irritate wingnuts. It's a gift, I tell ya.

Here's my unsolicited advice. There's a porn "parody" of Girls and Dunham has gone after it. There's *always* a porn film that riffs on the title of a successful film or teevee show. I use the term "parody" loosely when it comes to titles such as On Golden Pump. I, for one, would have never heard of the porn "parody" if Dunham had ignored it. There's no reason to, uh, pimp for something you detest. Bury it with inattention instead of taking to the Tweeter Tube.

That is all.

Slipping Into Darkness

I finally got around to seeing Star Trek: Into Darkness on Sunday. I avoided it the first week because I hate being put in the dread pre-show queue pen. I'm not crazy about long lines to begin with but being cooped up with Kliingons, Ferenghis, and Cardassians gives me the willies. The Bajorans, however, are all right...

The other reason for my reluctance is JJ Abrams' stated dislike of the franchise he now helms. He is, obviously, entitled to his opinion but kicking the fan base makes no sense whatsoever. It's kind of like the Beltway Borg Collective's love for pols who bash their own supporters. I hope that Abrams doesn't trash the Star Wars Borg Collective or he'll be wrasslin' with Wookies and locked in a closet with Jar Jar Bloody Binks who will annoy him to death...

On to the movie itself. I didn't like the first act because it was confusing and more like a standard action film than anything else. Also, Abrams tends to use Star Trek lore when it suits him and disregards it the rest of the time. For example, the prime directive wouldn't bar Kirk from saving a planet. That's as goofy as Simon Pegg's accent as Scotty.

More importantly, KLINGONS DO NOT WEAR HELMETS. I nearly resorted to an exclamation point but all caps will suffice. Your basic Klingon would feel like a pussy for strapping on a helmet. Plus, the only Klingon we saw wasn't butt ugly enough. Klingons should make Joe Torre look like George Clooney. Another big problem with the scene was the Enterprise warning the super villain before landing on the planet, all that did was alert the pussy helmet wearing Klingons who were then slaughtered. Repeat after me: KLINGONS DO NOT WEAR HELMETS.

Okay, now that I've rubbished the first half of the movie, the second half was a pretty darn exciting space action flick. It even struck some appropriately Trekkie moments but even then its disconnection from the Star Trek universe is jarring. Hardcore buffs/fans/geeks know that the reason the Vulcans are so cold and logical, logical, logical is that they are boiling cauldrons of emotion and if they let loose they make Klingons look like choir boys.

I guess I'm feeling adamant because I've been rewatching The Next Generation on DVD, and doing my Worf impression to enhance the experience. It scares the cats but I like it.

Anyway, I give the movie a B for a strong second half but at the risk of being repetitive: KLINGONS DO NOT WEAR HELMETS.  They do, however, listen to War:

 

Dear Readers, Screw You

Via Dan comes this masterpiece of corporate-speak and bullshit, this very special episode of Why We Suck: The News Industry Manifesto: 

As you may have heard, we recently announced changes in the way The Plain Dealer will publish and distribute the newspaper later this summer. These changes will enable us to meet the evolving needs of our print and digital audiences while continuing to provide Northeast Ohio with the most comprehensive and up-to-date news and information 24/7.

Um, if you're doing that already, why the need for changes? But hey, overall, sounds AWESOME. My needs are evolving. Tell me about the new stuff I'mma get! 

Effective Aug. 5, The Plain Dealer will begin home delivery of its premium print experience three times a week, with larger news sections and expanded local coverage: a Wednesday edition enriched with more food and dining coverage, a Friday edition with Northeast Ohio’s most comprehensive blueprint for entertainment, and a Sunday edition filled with even more arts, travel, opinion, sports and news. 

Is there a word in here that isn't focus group-tested? And what the tits is a "premium print experience?" This makes it sound like instead of the paper you've been getting, somebody is going to bring you something new. Is that the case? If so, say that. If not, say something else. 

Each premium edition will also include a free-standing Forum section, reflecting the thoughts and opinions on topics most important to the people in our community.

Syndicated columns, vaguely racist letters to the editor, and the occasional editorial about how local politics is all messed up. And what does "free-standing" mean? Is it a pop-up? A new magazine? If you're starting a new magazine, why not just do that without screwing up everything that already exists? 

I wonder if the paper's assessment of consumers' "evolving needs" showed that we were evolving a need for more boardroom-speak. That would explain this. 

As an enhancement to the weekend experience, a bonus Saturday edition, including an auto section, will provide the latest high school sports coverage and a complete Ohio State football preview.

How is a Saturday paper a "bonus?" Do you not get a Saturday paper now, Plain Dealer subscribers? If so, how is this new Saturday paper a bonus? And if you don't get a Saturday paper, and the paper is going to be cut back, why expand at the same time? 

With our updated digital edition, you can read The Plain Dealer anytime, anywhere. It is an exact digital replica of the morning’s paper in the page-by-page format you enjoy, delivered daily to your desktop or mobile device. The new digital edition is faster, includes enhanced search capabilities, and allows you to quickly scan headlines and section fronts and enlarge type to read articles at your comfort level. It also now offers you breaking news from our reporters as well as real-time information at your fingertips.

Also known as THE INTERNET. Now, with the Plain Dealer, you can read the exact same paper ON YOUR COMPUTERS. You can search, and change the type size, and LOOK AT STUFF ON A SCREEN. You can look at it QUICKLY. It's awesome! 

1998 called, it says hang in there, the music gets better.

As always, single copy editions of The Plain Dealer will be available at over 2,000 locations every day.

So you're still printing it, but not delivering it anymore. Ha ha, screw you, home subscribers!

We appreciate your loyalty and are dedicated to delivering the great coverage and service that you deserve. We look forward to presenting you with our new premium editions, access to our digital edition and news about other valuable subscriber benefits that will be coming soon.

Got questions? Too bad, suckers! 

And, if you’re currently a subscriber, we’ll be contacting you individually with a personal letter detailing your subscription, benefits and pricing in the coming weeks.

Translation: We have no earthly clue how this is going to work out, but we're so excited about our expanded premium replica expansion of more stuff but less stuff but different stuff but the same stuff that we had to tell you before we figured it all out, because that never makes anybody look bad. The EIC, answering a question from a 7-day subscriber about how he's getting hosed financially here: 

The 7-day subscriptions will be honored but converted to the new 4-day a week delivery schedule (which includes a Saturday newspaper), plus access to the new, replica electronic version of The Plain Dealer, 7 days a week. As I replied below, the exact pricing structure has not yet been finalized.

You have a newsroom full of professional bullshit detectors who, if they are good at their jobs, are mildly paranoid and always pissed off. Before you foist something like this on the public, HAVE YOUR NEWSROOM READ IT. They will poke holes in it so the customers don't have to. Christ. And it gets worse: 

cleveland.com is free and there are no plans to charge for the site's content. The big difference between cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer's electronic edition are lay out and presentation. The electronic edition is an exact replica of the newspaper, which some people prefer. It will also contain headlines and links to breaking news, weather and more. 

"The big difference between cleveland.com and The Plain Dealer's electronic edition are lay out and presentation." So you're paying for some code rearranging? Guys? I just ... 

I said this on Twitter when Dan put this thing in my sightline, but I fail to see what reducing the frequency of home delivery has to do with reaching audiences that like digital awesomeness. I fail to see why newspapers cannot be great newspapers and still have great web sites. Cleveland's is less bloated and heaving than most, but it's still ... a replica of the paper. As they proudly announce. As if that's an achievement.

I understand from a NEWSROOM perspective it's hard to do it all, but this is written by the circ department head. Do we have a multi-tasking problem here? And if so, how does reducing home delivery solve that? Is the money being saved on home delivery (which, I'd like a number here at some point) being funneled into servers, video equipment, I don't know, teaching people how to create for digital? And if not, I don't see what one has to do with the other. 

I have never in my life seen an industry so determined to insult its customers. Not only by peddling patent bullshit, but by telling customers it's their "evolving needs" that have caused the bullshit in the first place. 

A. 

Too bad he didn't go for the baklava

Walnuts and baklava go together like Senator Walnuts and war. Despite being tortured by the North Vietnamese, John McCain loves war and is always ready to intervene at any time, in any conflict, anywhere; especially when it makes no sense. He snuck into Syria to meet with the rebels he wants to arm even though they may use those weapons against us some day.

The Republican war veteran met rebel leaders inside Syria to discuss their calls for heavy weapons and a no-fly zone to help them topple President Bashar al-Assad and bring the bitter civil war to a conclusion.

McCain's office confirmed to the Guardian that he had slipped into the country in recent days but declined to comment on the outcome of his talks with the rebel groups or whether it had hardened his views on arming them.

McCain's advocacy of a no fly zone is reckless and idiotic even for him. The Syrians have advanced Russian anti-aircraft defense systems, which means that a no fly zone will result in casualties and perhaps even POWs. I guess Walnuts thinks it will be good for them. It helped get him elected to the Senate, after all.

Earth to Senator Walnuts, make baklava, not war.

Mad Men Thread: Let the wig do the work

The classic Mad Men pattern reasserted itself with this week's episode, The Better Half. After a clinker/experimental episode, this one moved quickly and was full of surprises, Don, Peggy, Betty, Pete, Roger and Joan. It was a good 'un, so without further ado, here we go:

Torn Between Two Mentors: It was tough to be the Pegster, both at the office and at home. Don and Ted continue to circle one another like tom cats but at least they skip the spraying and butt sniffing. They both did some hissing at the Pegster over the margarine account. She tried to stay neutral, which leaves both of her mentors unsatisfied, especially-surprise, surprise-Don Fucking Draper who gives her one of his most withering looks.

Meanwhile at home, Peggy and Abe are clearly not cut out to be urban pioneers. There's vandalism, violence, and more of Abe's inept handyman routine. He's no George Utley, y'all. He's also a classic lefty radical circa 1968. It's not fascist to give the cops a description of your assailant, dude. Peggy is horrified by the stabbing, becomes increasingly scared, and takes to wielding a spear as a self protection device. Abe was, quite literally, hoist on the Pegster's petard when she accidentally spears him like a swordfish from Brooklyn but Abe is no prize. She feels terrible, apologizes, and he dumps her for being THE MAN. She's well rid of Abe since he values his political purity more than their relationship. I will, however, miss seeing him melt down when Tricky Dick wins the election.

Meanwhile back at the unnamed agency, Peggy has two-count em two-private encounters with the artist formerly known as Teddy Turtleneck. Ted makes it clear that the smacker he placed on her was a mistake. Peggy is not happy, especially when she informs him of her breakup and he's disappointed, not opportunistic. Ted continues to be the anti-Draper. Don would have pounced on Peggy like a coyote on a pork chop in the same situation. I really hope that Peggy and Ted do not go bump in the night. It's far more interesting that way, but if they do, I hope margarine is not involved...

Duck and Recover: Pete Campbell remains whiny and petulant over his uncertain place at the unnamed agency. He meets with that dog abandoning motherfucker, Duck Phillips, who is now a head hunter but not one of Herbie Hancock's band of that name...

Pete is no longer hot shit so Duck mentions a job in Witchita. I expected Pete  to stroke out, but he survived. Pete is still sniffing around Joan but she continues to, quite wisely, keep him at arm's length. She does indirectly help him with his crazy mother problems by letting them slip to the man Roger calls Bob Bunsen. He does have a burning desire to fluff his bosses, so it's apt. Or is he just as nice and dull as Megan?

Speaking of Roger, he continues to screw up. His attempt to play Disneyland Grandad backfired when he took the kid to see Planet Of The Apes. His daughter was not amused, even by Roger's impish impression of the apish Dr. Zaius. She bars him from solo grandparenting, so he turns to Joan and Kevin. Joan tells him where to put his lincoln logs and reiterates that he cannot see his bio-kid. She figures if wee Kevin has to have an unreliable father, a "war hero" beats a raffish account man any day. Poor Roger,she even prefers the company of Bob Bloody Benson to his. Context is everything.

Megan Has The Twin Sister, Sapphic Pass Blues: Megan continues to have the mopes, and who can blame her? She's married to Don Draper who is distant and detached, and her new job isn't going so well. Her co-star/boss comes over, hits on her and tells her she's okay. Okay is the best that Megan's character is ever going to be. Nice people are undramatic and boring and she's trapped in a sweetheart loop with Don. The only way for her to win him back is to dump him as we shall see below...

Betty Is Back: She's got her figure back and she's enjoying the attention of some GOP fat cat, which in turn turned on Senator Wannabe Henry.Then, there was the rural grease monkey who leered while "giving her directions" to Bobby's camp. Enter Don, moth meet flame. Don always wants what he cannot have, so he winds up in the sack with Betty. Big mistake, dude. Don is usually the predator, but in this instance, he's the prey, and Betty will make him pay. That's what he gets for being a walking cliche by sleeping with his ex-wife. In contrast, Ted resists clichedom by not bonking his protege.

Damn, that last paragraph was sing songy, so it's time to end this post, but not before posting this musical tribute to Don and Roger who were clearly not made for 1968:

 

News!

This was a major story on the Today show on Friday. MAJOR: 

The rollout of former Rep. Anthony Weiner's (D-NY) New York City mayoral bid hit a snag Thursday when it was revealed that his campaign website featured a picture of the Pittsburgh skyline, The Hill reported.

Weiner's team ultimately changed the image to a familiar shot of the NYC skyline when bloggers and reporters pointed out that the original picture included a prominent Pittsburgh bridge and the BNY Mellon Center, one of the largest buildings in the Steel City.

I mean, okay, dumb as hell, but that was billed as the big news out of the mayor's race that day. Largest city in America, major morning show filmed in said city, and that was the story. Then we cut away for some discussion with the cast of the Jersey Shore, which I was not aware was even still on. 

Let's get on to that blogger ethics panel STAT. 

A. 

Memorial Day: Who I Remember

Memorial Day is all about celebrating and remembering veterans. Here's my annual commemorative post, which is going up for the fourth but not last time:

The veteran I'd like to remember on this solemn holiday is the late Sgt. Eddie Couvillion.

My family tree is far too tangled and gnarly to describe here but suffice it to say that Eddie was my second father. He served in Europe during World War II, not in combat but in the Army Quartermaster Corps. In short, he was a supply Sergeant, one of those guys who won the war by keeping the troops fed, clothed and shod. Eddie was what was called in those days a scrounger; not unlike Milo Minderbinder in Catch-22 or James Garner's character in The Great Escape. 

Eddie's favorite military exploit was running a army approved bordello in France after hostilities ended. He always called it a cat house and bragged that it was the best little whorehouse in Europe. One can serve one's country in manifold ways...

Eddie died 5 years ago and I still miss him. He was a remarkable man because he changed so much as he aged. When I met him, he was a hardcore Texas/Louisiana conservative with old South racial views and attitudes. At an age when many people close their minds, Eddie opened his and stopped thinking of black folks as a collective entity that he didn't care for and started thinking of them as individuals. Eddie was a genuine Southern gentleman so he'd never done or said an unkind thing to anyone but confided to me that the only one he'd ever hurt by being prejudiced was himself. I was briefly speechless because we'd had more than a few rows over that very subject. Then he laughed, shook his head and said: "Aren't you going to tell me how proud you are of me? You goddamn liberals are hard to satisfy."

Actually, I'm easily satisfied. In 2004, Eddie had some astonishing news for me: he'd not only turned against the Iraq War but planned to vote for John Kerry because "Bush Junior is a lying weasel and a draft dodger." That time he didn't need to ask me if I was proud of him, it was written all over my face. It was the first and only time he ever voted for a Democrat for President. 

I salute you, Sgt. Couvillion. I only wish that I could pour you a glass of bourbon on the rocks and we could raise our glasses in a Memorial Day toast. 

Today on Tommy T's Obsession with the Freeperati - You say tornaydo, and I say tornahdo Edition

Happy Memorial Day, one and all!

Well, the terrible F4 that hit Oklahoma caused a lot of pain and suffering, and not only in places it actually hit.

Get ready for Obama's BIG BOUNCE: Oklahoma Vanity

Posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:40:01 PM by Toespi

AF1 is getting fired up. Add another devastating, crushing event to the list that saves Obama. Hurricane Sandy, Sandy Hook, Jodi Arias verdict during Benghazi hearing, etc....now the Oklahoma devastation.

1 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:40:01 PM by Toespi

So you're all butthurt because an actual news event pushed your nothingburger off the front page?

Boo fucking hoo.

To: Toespi

Some of them Okies will tell him to get his ass back on that plane.

2 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:41:11 PM by Sybeck1 (What has the GOP done today to gain your support in 2014?)

And, no doubt, tell him they don't want any disaster relief unless it's offset in the budget.

To: Toespi

Is it possible, just for a moment, to feel for these people who have lost everything, maybe even their children, without playing the Obama card?

3 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:41:36 PM by greatvikingone

.

.

To: Toespi

The FEMA checks are on the way. Correct?

8 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:45:37 PM by Theoria

Apparently not.

To: don-o

I did not start this thread out of insensitivity. I am and have been stunned by the devastating events that have hit this nation, multiple times. Each time, Obama benefits. I think it is creepy and frankly evil.

11 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:49:29 PM by Toespi

.

To: Toespi

Yup, you are right.

If these tornado’s(sic) are as devastating as the media is describing, Obama is going to have a field day. All the scandals surrounding him will be forgotten by the media and Hussein will get to play Mr. “I feel your pain” President.

17 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:52:00 PM by Longbow1969

How DARE he??

To: Toespi

The thread is fine. Believe me...Obama and his minions are already plotting how they can benefit from this. The people of Oklahoma do not want Obama anywhere near our state. I will be furious if he tries to come here!

26 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:57:10 PM by yellowdoghunter (No man is without sin.)

That and a quarter will get you a Xerox of a cup of coffee.

To: Toespi

Each time, Obama benefits. I think it is creepy and frankly evil.
*******
Agree. It is indeed creepy the way disasters seem to benefit him.

27 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 4:59:10 PM by Starboard

No, dumbfuck, I'll tell you what is creepy.

Freeperati who are looking at a natural disaster, and all they can think about is their psychotic and pathological hatred of the man in the "Once-White House".

.

That's as creepy as it gets.

To: Starboard

It’s sick in the way they use these disasters to take advantage of people’s suffering to gain approval points in the polls.

52 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 7:28:29 PM by American Constitutionalist

.

To: Toespi

" Get ready for Obama's BIG BOUNCE: Oklahoma '

Obama's Tornadogate scandal, him trying to improve his poll numbers.

55 posted on Monday, May 20, 2013 7:39:47 PM by American Constitutionalist

.

.

"Tornadogate"?

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More shark-jumping action after the ski jump.

Sunday Night Game of Thrones Vid

No new ep this week, as it's a holiday, but have some of Ser Barristan the Hot: 

The best part of that whole scene? Joffrey's afraid. Protected by five kingsguard and his dog, not to mention the entire small council, Joffrey's still smart enough to realize that the biggest badass in the Seven Kingdoms is the man he just stripped of his cloak. 

Once, long ago, a prince had named him Barristan the Bold. A part of that boy was in him still.

- A Dance with Dragons

A. 

'Access to Paradise'

So the Pope said something this week: 

"The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the Blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics.Everyone! ‘Father, the atheists?’ Even the atheists. Everyone! And this Blood makes us children of God of the first class! We are created children in the likeness of God and the Blood of Christ has redeemed us all! And we all have a duty to do good. And this commandment for everyone to do good, I think, is a beautiful path towards peace. If we, each doing our own part, if we do good to others, if we meet there, doing good, and we go slowly, gently, little by little, we will make that culture of encounter: we need that so much. We must meet one another doing good. ‘But I don’t believe, Father, I am an atheist!’ But do good: we will meet one another there.”

That had a lot of the usuals freaking out, which was fun to watch: 

I wonder what Holy Scriptures this pope has been reading? Try as I might, I can find nothing in the Scriptures, that indicates non-believers can go to heaven. This must be another of the many changes in Scriptures that the popes have been guilty of over the history of the Catholic church.

He wasn't saying atheists are saved, says David Perry over at the Atlantic: 

He is clearly open to the idea that Christ may well redeem even those who are non-believers. More fully articulated, that would open up a new wager, in which whether or not one believed, one's actions in the world would determine one's access to paradise. 

Actually, he was saying something even better, which is fer fuck's sake, don't you have some poor people to get to feeding? 

Wednesday’s Gospel speaks to us about the disciples who prevented a person from outside their group from doing good. “They complain,” the Pope said in his homily, because they say, “If he is not one of us, he cannot do good. If he is not of our party, he cannot do good.” And Jesus corrects them: “Do not hinder him, he says, let him do good.” The disciples, Pope Francis explains, “were a little intolerant,” closed off by the idea of ​​possessing the truth, convinced that “those who do not have the truth, cannot do good.” “This was wrong . . . Jesus broadens the horizon.” Pope Francis said, “The root of this possibility of doing good – that we all have – is in creation.”

This isn't about "access to paradise" at all, much less who has it and who doesn't. It's about the following: 

1. The upstart church needed to tell people it had some kind of special hold on the very really really real truth, in order to attract followers and survive persecution. It needed to be able to give those mocking and threatening it the cosmic equivalent of Wait Till Your Father Gets Home, like, sure, now you beat us and chase us from town to town and call us heretics, but we alone are going to heaven. The political implications of nascent doctrine, seen through the lens of the times in which the apostles lived, in other words, became Holy Writ.

2. Keeping track of who gets saved and who doesn't like we're scoring a golf match is actively interfering in our working together as human beings to make the world suck less right the hell now. Why am I worried about whether you're an atheist, a Christian, a Muslim, and not worried about whether you're fed, clothed, housed, cared for? Why am I checking membership cards at the door? Get past your bullshit, is what I hear in what the pope said. We all need to not be such total ASSHOLES all the time, and if you get there, you get there, and the rest of it will sort itself out or it won't. Learn to prioritize. 

He obviously has, at the very least, considered the atheist's point of view: That we are not storing up riches in heaven, so let us go forth and not suck. And the latter is the most important part. 

Now, if he just eases up on women, gay people, contraception, and throws Bernard Law into the dungeon YOU JUST KNOW THE VATICAN HAS DOWN THERE SOMEWHERE, he and I might be able to hang out. 

A. 

Sunday Morning Video: The Doors Live At The Hollywood Bowl In 1968

Ray Manzarek, Doors keyboard player and keeper of the flame died earlier this week. The best piece I read about him this week was by my countryman, Alexis Petridis, in the Guardian. Anyhoo, here are the Doors in all their live glory:

 

Flaming Bag of Dogshit Tries to Put Out Fire With Vodka

It's not that it's a handout for welfare cheats and young bucks, it's that we don't NEED it because God doesn't hate our state as much as he hates New Jersey, or some such: 

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) fired back Thursday at those who have criticized him for demanding that any disaster aid package for Oklahoma tornado victims include offsets, or matching spending cuts elsewhere in the budget. The money is already available to help his constituents, Coburn argued, suggesting that lawmakers only want to pass an unpaid-for disaster aid package so they can tuck other unrelated items in it to benefit their home states.

"It's just typical Washington B.S.," Coburn said during an interview on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "There's $11.6 billion sitting in a bank account waiting to help people in Oklahoma ... It's a crass political game because I was being asked these questions before we even pulled the dead people out of the rubble."

Right. It's the dead people's fault you opened your cakehole and said something stupid. Doesn't Oklahoma have enough to deal with right now? Can't you take responsibility for your own words? 

Coburn then went on in the MSNBC interview to suggest that "most of the property damage" from the tornadoes was "insured." The senator claimed it would "be a 200, 250, maybe 300 million dollar cost to the federal government out of the FEMA fund" and accused Washington of "creating a crisis when none exists so they can advantage themselves."

The tornado that struck Moore, Okla., this week, killing at least 24, is estimated to have left more than $2 billion of damage in its path.

YEAH! We don't need HANDOUTS because we had insurance for everything, unlike you leeches who were just hoping you'd get your roofs ripped off so that the federal government would come along and replace them! 

A. 

Weekend Question Thread

Can you keep secrets?

Given that my entire job used to be telling everybody in the whole world stuff that somebody didn't want me to tell anyone, I really, really suck at it. I mean, I can keep a confidence but my own secrets, like a surprise party or a present? Yeah, all I do all December long is yammer at Mr. A that "betcha can't guess what I got you for Christmas!" 

A.