"Astoundingly Ignorant or Downright Orwellian"

That was the judgment of the Anchorage Daily News, the biggest paper in the state, about Caribou Barbie's disingenuous dismissal of the Troopergate report.

When you have your home state's largest media outlet against you, that has to tell you something.

Barbie has said that the report "vindicates" her, and that it proves "no unlawful or unethical activity on my part"...

I don't know what report she read -- if she did read one -- but Finding Numero Uno was this:

"I find that Governor Sarah Palin abused her power by violating Alaska Statute 39.52.110(a) of the Alaska Executive Branch Ethics Act."

As much as I do believe that Caribou Barbie is ignorant -- on a whole raft of issues and history and sociology and psychology and, well the list is endless -- I can't believe that her ignorance, deliberate though it may be, extends to the findings of this investigation.

Nope, I'm going for Option #2: Downright Orwellian.

After all, it's what the Rethugs do best, and she's doing her darn-betcha best to try to fit in. After all, she was chosen as "Miss Congeniality", so she doesn't want to do anything to upset that delicately crafted ship of state that the Rethugs have been foisting off on us lowly vermin for the last eight years.

But guess what, Barbie. It ain't gonna work. After watching the poll numbers for Obama climb and the numbers for Grampaw McSame plummet, I am starting to believe that, finally, "we won't be fooled again"...

Or maybe I'm being a starry-eyed optimist. Again.

More on "Did I Mention I was a POW?

Since Grampaw McSame is still bringing up his prisonerhood at every conceivable opportunity, I have a question for the American people (aka "my friends"):

If being a prisoner in Vietnam somehow automatically qualifies someone to be president, why don't we elect Gary Glitter?

I'm just asking.

How Racism Works

Here's a telling little list of "what ifs" that I lifted from my good friend BAC over at Yikes!.

It's an interesting exercise in perception:

• What if Michelle Obama walked 5 kids including a pregnant 17 year old on stage? Would racism change the perception?
• What if a video surfaced of Michelle Obama being cleansed of witch craft by a black preacher?
• What if John McCain were a former president of the Harvard Law Review?
• What if Barack Obama finished fifth from the bottom of his graduating class?
• What if McCain were still married to the first woman he said 'I do' to?
• What if Obama were the candidate who left his first wife at the age of 42 (for a 22 year old heiress) after she no longer measured up to his standards?
• What if Michelle Obama were a wife who not only became addicted to pain killers, but acquired them illegally through her charitable organization?
• What if Cindy McCain graduated from Harvard?
• What if Obama were a member of the 'Keating 5'?
• What if McCain was a charismatic, eloquent speaker?

If the answers to these questions reflected reality, do you really believe the poll numbers would be as close as they are?

This is what racism does: It covers up, rationalizes and minimizes positive qualities in one candidate and emphasizes negative qualities in another when there is a color difference.

I had naively hoped --believed -- in my youth, that we would be past all this crap by the time I got to this advanced age and started to enter my senescence.

Sadly, I was wrong.

Palinex -- The Running Mate Morning After Pill

This is absolutely brilliant political mockery. It's a purported ad for a prescription drug called Palinex, for that morning-after running mate regret:

This is undoubtedly going to turn viral, so a quick HT to It's My Right to Be :Left of Center, where I stole it.

Deconstructed -- a Must See Video

I just discovered Casey Porter, a member of Iraq Vets Against the War and a very talented filmmaker who has his own channel over at YouTube.

Here's Deconstructed, a sample of his work. This is a moving story from the Iraq War Illegal Occupation, and kudos to Casey for putting it together and sharing it with the world.

He has more on his channel. Be sure to check it out.

(And a big HT to constant reader jae for sending me this)

How to Cut the Unemployment Rate

Everybody just get back to work.

Yep, that's all it takes, apparently, to reduce the unemployment rate to Zero. At least that's what White House Spokeswhore Dana Perino says today.

The White House thinks there's no reason to extend unemployment benefits since the only thing holding back the American economy is those lazy bastards on "the dole" who kick back in their Barcaloungers, sipping double-caf creamy-half lattés and watching their big-screen televisions.

If we could just get them off their asses and back to work, everything will be hunky dory. Never mind the fact that the unemployment rate is now the highest it's been in five years, never mind the fact that we've lost something like 150,000 jobs in the last month, never mind the fact that there have never been enough jobs in this economy to put everyone to work.

Let me repeat that: There have NEVER been enough jobs in the American economy to put everyone to work.

There's a reason for that. Even in a so-called "full employment" economy, there is a certain amount of unemployment built in -- baked into the cake, so to speak. That way, no one can afford to be complacent about his or her job, and with the threat of being fired (or "laid off") hanging over your head, you are much more likely to be a "Good Toby" and not make waves. Like agitating to get paid a decent wage, have health benefits, join a union, for example.

Like I say, it's baked into the recipe. It's how capitalism really works. God forbid a worker would be able to negotiate from a position of strength with an employer. God forbid that an employer would actually be so desperate for workers that he'd be willing to pay them a living wage, give them health benefits, sick leave, paid vacations, etc etc.

Okay, I'm being a little simplistic. The actual system is a little more complex than this, but at its core, my theory holds up.

So it rings a little hollow for Ms. Perino to claim that all the unemployed need to do is "get back to work". While she admits that she's never been in that position, here's hoping that when she's out of work come January, she'll have to go on "the dole" and see how it feels.

Yeah, like that's every gonna happen...

FOX Attacks: They Distort. We Reply.

They're at it again over at Faux News. The more things change, etc...

more about "FOX Attacks: They Distort. We Reply.", posted with vodpod

Palin: The Enemy Within

This is "must see" video from Max Blumenthal that ties together Caribou Barbie's weird religious orientation in a neatly done 8-minute package:

Ties to Terrorism?

Okay, let's imagine for a moment that Barack Obama had close family ties to an organization that calls for separation of its territory from the United States and whose founding member is on record as saying "I'm ... not an American. I've got no use for America or her damned institutions."

By just squinting a little bit, you can almost see Reverend Wright up there on the pulpit, banging his fist, praising the black separatist movement and cursing America, can't you.

And if that was Wright we're talking about, the Capitalist Pig Media (aka the MSM, aka the SCLM) would be all over it. It would dominate the 24/7 news cycle for days, until everyone was simultaneously sick of hearing it and wondering if there wasn't some where-there's-smoke-there's-fire substance to it. It might even cause more than a few weak-kneed spineless Moron-American voters to change their votes to McSame & Barbie, don't you think?

So why the major silence from the media (you remember, that good old "liberal media") over Sarah Palin's lengthy and substantial ties to something called Alaska Independence Party?

While an official membership list is yet to be unearthed, it's pretty clear from the circumstantial evidence that Caribou Barbie was an active member of this astounding organization, and relinquished her membership only for political expediency, when she joined the Republicans. Her husband,
Todd Palin, has freely admitted that he was a party member in 1995 and in 2000, although he claims he left the party in 2002. Probably just in time for Sarah to become a Republican.

A party official said first that Barbie had been a member, but the next retracted the statement -- remember "the statement is inoperative" from the old Watergate days?

Here's Joe Vogler, founder of the party:

I'm an Alaskan, not an American. I've got no use for America or her damned institutions...The fires of Hell are frozen glaciers compared to my hatred for the American government, and I won’t be buried under their damn flag! I’ll be buried in Dawson, and when Alaska is an independent nation, they can bring my bones home.

In comparison, that kind of makes Reverend Wright sound like a Boy Scout, doesn't it?

So why the news blackout on something as important as this in the past -- the recent past -- of Caribou Barbie?

And more importantly, why is the Obama camp not trying to capitalize on this? You can bet, as I said above, were the shoe on the other foot, they'd be shouting it from the rooftops with bullhorns. Look at what they've already tried to patch together from the Ayers non-event.

And the more I learn about Caribou Barbie, the more nervous I become.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4177 4180

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2445
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1905
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1853
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 837
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 673

It is still 102 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

So Where are the POWs?

I was thinking about the 2004 campaign, and how John Kerry had his fellow Swift Boat crew members with him at nearly every appearance. Every member of Kerry's crew but one gave up many months of his own personal life to travel with him and campaign for him, and make himself readily available to the news media for "corrective interviews" whenever that nasty Swift Boat Liars for Bush bunch of assholes made noise about Kerry's service, his medals, etc.

So then I got to thinking about John McCain, and started wondering why I'm not seeing a single one of his fellow POWs with him at any of these campaign events. Not one.

Why the fuck is that? Do you think that maybe those guys who were with him at the Hanoi Hilton know something about him that he'd rather we didn't know?

I'm just asking, but it does seem more than a little odd, don't you think?

The McCain-Palin Mob

Jesus, just listen to some of these fucktards who are supporting Grampaw and Caribou Barbie. They don't know why, they don't know shit, but they know Obama is a "one man terrorist cell".

This is the kind of "thinking" in the wingnuttery that passes for civil discourse in today's political climate. It's fascinating, in a car-wreck-on-the-freeway kind of way. I especially like the woman who keeps getting in the camera's face -- that's her you see in the freeze-frame above. She's really a prize.

(HT to It's My Right to be Left of Center for the video)

Pounding the Table

There's an old saying around the legal profession that if you have the law on your side, pound the law. If you have the evidence on your side, pound the evidence. And if you have neither, pound the table.

And that seems exactly what Grampaw McSame and Caribou Barbie have been doing over the last few days. They can hardly afford to admit that Grampaw and his pack of fellow Rethug slimeball greedy-capitalist-pig deregulation-monkey cohorts are responsible for the economic mess we're in, and since they really have nothing else, they are pounding the table on Barack Obama: "Who is he? We don't know him. But we do know that he pals around with terrorists," etc etc etc.

Jeez, give me a fucking break already. Obama has been running for president for the last two years or so, he's been in a couple dozen debates, he's campaigned in almost every state, he's been in our living rooms on television nearly every day. And we don't "know" him? No, it's Grampaw that we don't "know", since he's taken great pains to try to hide the Real John McCain from the world. But thanks to people like Tim Dickinson, Mary Hershberger (see Investigating John McCain's Tragedy at Sea) and Sidney Schanberg, we're getting to know a new and different John McCain, different from that carefully-constructed persona of the Lone Maverick on the White Horse.

And what we see, Senator, we don't like very much. We very much miss the John McCain we thought we knew back in 2000, and we mourn his passing. The John McCain that we see today ... we don't like you very much. And we're going to like you even less if you keep up these nonsensical below-the-belt desperation attacks on your opponent.

Sarah Palin, "Prayer Warrior"

This is some seriously disturbing video, showing the kind of weirdo religious cult that Sarah Palin has been in, has been supporting, has been believing in for many years:

Oh, and be sure to read Mark Karlin's editor's blog over at Buzzflash: Sarah Palin is a Manchurian Candidate for One Extremist Splinter Group of the End-Times Crowd. It has a lot more information on the extreme and dangerous religious cult views of Sarah Palin and those who support her.

We simply cannot let this woman be a heartbeat away from the presidency. We just can't.

Please, give some money to the Obama-Biden ticket, and vow to do everything you can between now and election day to get out the vote in such overwhelming numbers that they will not be able to shave points and steal another election.

Make-Believe Maverick

This morning I happened across the Rolling Stone article on Grampaw McSame, and while it is fairly long, it's well worth the read.

Make-Believe Maverick by Tim Dickinson pretty much eviscerates the shaky claims that somehow McCain is some kind of maverick, willing to stand up to his own party, vote for the nation's interests over his own, blah blah blah.

The whole "maverick" thing was pretty much made up out of whole cloth by McCain himself, aided and abetted by his servile lackeys in the media, whose approval and friendship he coolly cultivated over the years.

This story gives us the complete McCain, from his pampered existence as the son and grandson of admirals to his ordinary and not heroic behavior as a POW. It also shows how carefully he has created and recreated his myth over the years. This was a reckless hotshot of a pilot who nearly caused an international incident in Spain when he flew so low he clipped some power lines, whose irresponsible behavior would have resulted in an immediate transfer from the air to the surface navy for anyone except this "golden boy".

In short, the McCain story parallels in so many ways the Fortunate Son saga of George W. Bush that it's kind of scary, in a "history repeats itself" kind of way.

Read it. It's a great insight into the man who would be king president. Plus it's enough to scare your socks off if you think there's a chance he could actually win steal the election.

McCain's Anger -- A National Security Issue?

So says Robert Greenwald of Brave New Films with this entry:

It's actually scary to think that this unstable and doddering old man could have his finger on the button. But even more scary is the thought that Sarah Palin would have it if -- when -- Grampaw shuffles off this mortal coil. She's made no secret of the fact that she belongs to a Fundo Xian Third Wave church whose main goal, aside from asserting Dominionism over the United States, is to help bring on the Apocalypse. And what better way to do it than with a few "newkewlar" missiles lobbed into various places in the Middle East?

"Crowd Control" = Martial Law

It's been kind of an open secret for the past couple of weeks that the US Military has redeployed part of the Third Infantry Division to the United States, ordered to stand by in case of the need for "crowd control". According to the Naomi Wolf story, members of congress were even threatened with martial law if they refused to pass the bailout bill.

I never thought that I would see the day the the Posse Comitatus Act would be swept away in this country, and swept away at the stroke of a pen by Der Monkey Fuehrer, not by the rule of law and the legislative deliberation process.

Now it's perfectly legal for infantry soldiers to patrol US streets, arrest "potential" lawbreakers, and shoot to kill in order to maintain "law and order"...

Get that? Shoot to kill. They have, according to Amy Goodwin, both lethal and non-lethal technology available to them, and, no doubt, orders to use both if necessary.

Let's see how it all adds up: We'll shoot to kill to maintain law and order ... We have to destroy the village in order to save it ... The death penalty is how we show our respect for human life ... Up is down, black is white, left is right and right is wrong. Jeez, we're through the looking-glass for sure now.

People, we are just steps -- no, inches -- no, millimeters -- away from the end of freedom in this country. Wanna bet that those troops (and probably many more that we're not aware of) won't be deployed in the dark of the night on November 4, available to put down what the government sees as inevitable riots in the streets when we all learn that Grampaw McSame and his Rethug handlers have managed to steal this election from Barack Obama?

"That One" or The One?

"That one." That was Grampaw McCain's patronizing reference to that uppity Barack Obama during last night's debate.

Could he get more dismissive? Could he get more condescending? Could he get more contemptuous?

Well, I guess the short answer is Yes, he can and he probably will. But on the bright side, he's not calling him The N-Word yet. At least not in public. But is a man who is willing to drop The C-Bomb on his own wife in public really going to be able to keep that impulse reigned in for another month?

The Rethugs think they have everyone bamboozled about their deep-seated racism -- and that seems to be the case some of the time -- but every so often a little reminder comes oozing out.

"That one"...

No, Grampaw, Barack Obama isn't "that one". He's The One. Get used to it.

Corsi Arrested, Deported

Noted slimebag and full-time liar Jerome Corsi, the author of the abomination Obama Nation and former purveyor of scurrilous attacks on John Kerry, has been arrested in and deported from Kenya.

Corsi's new book "falsely claims that Obama, who is revered in Kenya, was raised as a Muslim, and smears the prime minister, Raila Odinga, the country's most popular politician." Not an auspicious start to what was supposed to be Corsi's triumphant first visit to the African nation.

The Kenyan government, naturally, is taking the high road in all of this. Not to seem petty or mean, they are taking official line that his book of lies has absolutely nothing to do with his arrest and deportation; he had merely neglected to obtain a temporary work permit.

Uh-huh.

Buns of Leadership -- The Sarah Palin CDs

This is hilarious -- something I stumbled on over at YouTube:

Fighting Back on "Guilt by Acquaintance"

Unlike four years ago, today's Dems are fighting back. Where John Kerry went wind surfing, Barack Obama is sticking his finger in the eye of the Rovian Rethugs. Call us a pal of terrorists? We'll call you corrupt, and unlike you, we've got proof.

Keating Five.

That's all you need to say.

Grampaw McCain, despite his many cynical mea culpas over the years, remains at his core unrepentant over his role in the scandalous events of the mid-1980s.

In case you haven't seen it already, here's the latest video from the Obama camp that skewers Grampy over his participation in the Keating Five affair -- hoist on his own petard, as the Bard would have it.

It's a bit long for the average American attention span, but it cuts to the chase and points out the truth of the sage adage "a person who lives in a glass house shouldn't throw stones."

If Freedom is to be Abused, it Must be Taken Away

That's always been the idea behind the neo-con Rethug political philosophy, but up to now they've pretty much kept it hidden. No more. Now Sarah Palin (aka Caribou Barbie*) has come out on the propaganda arm of the Rethug party (Faux News) with the following statement:

As we send our young men and women overseas in a war zone to fight for democracy and freedoms, including freedom of the press, we've really got to have a mutually beneficial relationship here with those fighting the freedom of the press, and then the press, though not taking advantage and exploiting a situation, perhaps they would want to capture and abuse the privilege. We just want truth, we want fairness, we want balance.

Okay, that's typically Palin -- hazy, disjointed and weird, and you don't really come away having a clue as to what she said. But there's a gem in there. Boil all that crap down and you get this: "freedom of the press ... abuse the privilege".

Sarah, I don't quite know how to tell you this, but "freedom of the press" is guaranteed in the US Constitution, in the First Amendment -- arguably the most important of all the amendments:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances. (Emphasis added.)

Sarah, it's not a privilege that can be taken away. It's a guaranteed freedom under our constitution. Maybe you ought to read it sometime, since you apparently were in the process of school-hopping when they covered it. There are things in there that would surprise you.

BTW, it's especially galling to think that she finally got a degree in, of all things, journalism! I don't know about today's J-School education, but back in the Dark Ages, when I was an aspiring hack and took a bunch of journalism classes, the concept of Freedom of the Press was still alive and well. Now it seems to be on life support, and if these two manage to steal this election, they'll be more than happy to pull the plug.

* HT to Stephanie Miller for this terrific nickname.

Tina Fey Nails it -- Again!

In case you missed Saturday Night Live's right-on take on the Veep "debate", here's a second chance:

That's Queen Latifah as Gwen Ifill, in case you didn't recognize her. I laughed until my sides hurt at Tina Fey's Sarah Palin. Now I can't wait for next Saturday to see what she does then.

And the Rethugs dare to say that her performance was "disrespectful". Ha, that's a joke in itself. It's like I've always said, those people have absolutely no sense of humor, expecially when it comes to laughing at themselves -- and I don't trust anyone who does not have a sense of humor.

But I'm still fearful that come election day, the joke will be on us. Everyone, get out there and work as hard and as long as you can to get Barack Obama and Joe Biden -- along with the other Democrats who are down-ticket -- elected on November 4. We just can't afford another four years of Rethug rule.

The Sorrow of War - A Must Read

On the streets of Saigon (and Hanoi as well), you'll see street vendors walking around with a stack of paperback books to sell to tourists. They are usually cheap photocopy ripoffs of books you can get anywhere, and I rarely fell for it.

But on my last day in Saigon, I was approached by a middle-aged woman with one leg and a stack of books. She was of an age to have been a victim of the war, and I never passed those people by without giving some cash.

For some reason, she knew I was a Vietnam vet, and she handed me a copy of The Sorrow of War, by former North Vietnam soldier Bao Ninh:

I originally bought it as a charity contribution to her, but when I started reading it on the plane coming home, I literally couldn't sleep until I finished it. It's an astonishingly honest and brutal depiction of the tragedy of a North Vietnam soldier desensitized to his own humanity after ten years at war.

It's about time that the world woke up to the universal suffering of soldiers on all sides of a conflict, and this book ought to be required reading for anyone considering a "career" in the military.

I especially recommend it to my fellow Vietnam veterans; Bao Ninh truly is our "brother in arms", regardless of the fact that he was on the other side.

It is, in so many respects, the All Quiet on the Western Front of the Vietnam War. It is, as the Bao Ninh Wikipedia article says, among the most moving war stories of all time.

Highly recommended.

McCain & Palin: Unstable & Unable

That's the message on one of the signs at an anti-Palin rally. Not so much newsy, except for the fact that it was held in ... Anchorage!

According to the news stories, it was the biggest political rally ever in the state of Alaska. There are lots more cool photos over the Daily Kos story as well.

And where did she pick up that phony neo-Fargo accent, anyway? They don't talk that way in either Alaska or Idaho.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4177

Total coalition forces dead: 315
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2438
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1898
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1846
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 830
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 666(!)

It is still 109 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

West Virginia Miners Thump NRA

Here's a story from Crooks and Liars that you won't be seeing much of in the MSM/SCLM: Coal miners in West Virginia took an unscheduled day off (a walkout) after the mine owner allowed a film crew from, of all things, the National Rifle Association, to come on site and try to get the miners to say something negative about Barack Obama.

Kudos to those coal miners for standing up to management and to the NRA. West Virginians are an independent and sometimes cantakerous lot, and they obviously resented the hell out of the "gotcha" attitude of this so-called "documentary" film crew.

Fuckin' Disgustin'

I'm speaking about Sarah Palin, of course, and her performance in tonight's "debate".

Maybe it's just the frustrated English teacher in me, but I find it gratin' that she apparently can't bring herself to pronouncin' that trailin' "g": Lookin', watchin', seein', havin', doin', bein', etc etc ad nauseum.

She did better than expected, naturally, since anything above choking a kitten to death on stage and wetting her pants would have been "better than expected", but I find it extremely irritating to have to watch 90+ minutes of that phony-baloney "aw shucks" neo-Fargo affability of hers.

Unfortunately, I think that the average member of the Moron-American voting bloc just eats that shit up, and it would be to our detriment if we continue to dismiss her as a lightweight post turtle.

This is the most important election of our lives -- certainly of my lifetime -- and it's more than a little disheartening to think that this election could be decided by people deciding that they "like" her better than Joe Biden.

One other note: I haven't heard any of the talking head pundits mention it yet, but early in the debate I heard her make a comment about "artificial state borders". Can it be that, in addition to her calling for an expanded constitutional powers role for the vice presidency (apparently beyond that even usurped by Dick Cheney), she is signaling that, in a McCain administration, there will be an end to Federalism?

In short, despite her Reaganesque chuckleheaded affability, she still scares the shit out of me, even more so when I consider that McCain will be 72 -- and in ill health -- when he is inaugurated, so the chances of her eventually becoming president are extremely good.

And that's bad.

I'm Back -- for Good This Time...

...that is until my next foreign adventure. I got home Monday afternoon, in the 38th hour of September 29th (thanks to the International Dateline), and I'm just now ready to rejoin the land of the living. I still have some jet lag and I'm sleeping some very odd hours, but I think I have recovered enough to act -- if not actually be -- cogent.

My trip was terrific, the chance of a lifetime, really. I traveled for three weeks in Vietnam with my friend Minh, who is a native Vietnamese and who, naturally, speaks the language fluently. And there's nothing like seeing a country with someone who is a native of that country. I learned 100 times more about Vietnam's history and culture in three weeks than I learned in the whole 10 months and 23 days (but who's counting) that I spent there in 1968.

We flew into Hanoi for Minh's brother's wedding, we spent two days at Ha Long Bay and finally took a series of three passenger trains south -- first to Hue, then to Nha Trang, and finally to Saigon. While we were in Saigon, we took overnight trips to the beach resort of Vung Tau and to the Mekong Delta, as well as a day trip to Tay Ninh with a stopover at the Tunnels of Cu Chi exhibit -- which I ended up calling "Cong World" (as in Disney World).

I have a lot of pictures and travel stories, which I will be posting on my Vietnam website. It'll take me a while to sort through them and pick out the best ones, but I'll let everyone know when it's available.

While the trip was terrific, it's great to be back. So much has happened in my absence, and I never saw a single news show or read a newspaper while I was gone, so now I'm trying to catch up.

I'm Back -- Just in Time to Leave...

The good news is that I have the computer up and running. Not to full capacity, and not with all the programs and bells and whistles that I like. I don't have sound, for example, and can't find the reason for it.

BUT...I am able, finally, to post to my blog. At least until Sunday, since I am embarking on my return tour of Vietnam early Monday.

I've wanted to go back forever -- at least for 30 years anyway -- and when She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed finally told me she didn't have the slightest degree of interest in going to Vietnam and, since I really don't like going places alone, I was in a quandary.

So I was having lunch with a good friend of mine from work -- back before I retired -- who is from Vietnam (and, in fact, is from the same village where I was stationed 40 years ago) and he informs me that he is going to Vietnam in September for his brother's wedding and why don't I tag along?

Jeez, is a bear a catholic? Does the pope shit in the woods?

Naturally I glommed onto him and we immediately started making plans. With the result that he and I are leaving early Monday for Seoul, Korea, and Hanoi, Vietnam. I'll be gone for three weeks, and I am sure that it will be much more than I hoped for: I have my own translator and tour guide! Who else can say that?

So I'll catch you all in October.

--The F Man

Silence is Golden

So they say; I say bullshit.

I haven't posted a lot this week because I'm experiencing another computer meltdown. It looks like I'm going to have to -- once again -- tear it down and rebuild it from the bottom up.

This is compounded by the fact that I am also leaving for my "second vacation" to Vietnam next weekend. I don't really know if I'm going to have time to fix the computer before I leave, so my posts may be sporadic for the next week, and then they will disappear entirely until the first of October.

In the meantime, thanks for reading, and I'll see you all when I get back.

Sara Who?

That's the question on everyone's lips today as Grampaw McCain announces his dark-horse running mate.

Not since Dan Quayle has there been a more unlikely -- and unqualified -- VP candidate. Aside from the fact that the McCain camp wanted a nuclear bomb explosion to defuse that knock-it-out-of-the-park acceptance speech by Obama last night, I gotta ask ... What the fuck is he thinking?????

Two definite possibilies come to my mind. One is that McCain has the "Mondale Syndrome" -- he knows he's going to lose the election and he's making a statement about the Rethug "big tent". Or it's a pathetic attempt to pander to those Clintonistas who are reluctant still to get behind Obama.

Jeez, which could it be?

Okay, trick question: It's obviously the second option, but does he really think that the Female-American Voting Bloc is hung up solely on the gender issue? That they will come over en masse to vote Republican just because there's a woman on the ballot? Despite the fact that the woman in question is rabidly anti-choice?

To tell you the truth, I don't know. A couple of months ago I would have had an answer, but in the face of the cut-off-your-nose-to-spite-your-face PUMA movement in the Democratic Party, I'd have to say all bets are off.

Nevertheless, I kind of feel sorry for Sara Who, since she's kind of a sacrificial lamb in all this, and Grampaw McCain has just thrown away the only argument for electing him over Obama: The Experience Issue.

It's going to be fun watching the Rethugs dance around that whole experience thing... After all, Grampaw will be the oldest president ever inaugurated, and do you really want Sara Who answering that infamous "three a.m. phone call"?

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134 4143 4145 4150

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2543
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1990
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1947
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 928
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 771

It is still 144 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

BTW, Did I Mention that I Was a POW...?

Jesus, how many times is the SCLM/MSM going to let Grampaw McCain go to the same well before they figure out what he's doing?

· How many houses? Doesn't matter, because I spent 5 1/2 years in one house -- in North Vietnam!

· Cheating on his wife? Doesn't matter, because when I was a POW I wasn't "getting any" at all.

· Keating Five? It was only a little over $100,000 -- chump change, really -- and did I tell you that when I was a POW I had no money at all?

· Healthcare Plan? Did I mention that when I was a "guest" of the North Vietnamese I had no health care at all?

· Playing fast and loose with the so-called Saddleback Forum? Hey, I WAS a POW, you know? Did I forget to mention that?

Give me a fucking break. Yeah, he was a POW. Everybody knows that, but not everybody is willing to cut him as much slack as he's demanding for that 5 1/2 years -- which comes out to something like 13% of his entire life. He shouldn't expect to use his POW experience as a Get Out of Jail Free card for the rest of his life.

I'm getting a little sick and tired of it, and he's politicizing his military service -- prostituting it, really -- just to satisfy his sick and twisted ambition to become president. For him to continue doing this cheapens and demeans the military service of everyone else, and those of us who refuse to use our military service as shields against criticism of our bad behavior are not well served by this sad husk of a former military hero.

Remember what Farnsworth always says: A veteran voting for John McCain is like a chicken voting for Colonel Sanders.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134 4143 4145

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2536
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1983
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1940
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 921
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 764

It is still 151 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

Privatizing the VA -- Another McCain "Support the Troops" Idea

I learned today the Grampaw McCain has said he wants to privatize the VA Health Care system. That's a play right out of the neocon "drown it in the bathtub" ideology, and it's one that is opposed by virtually ALL of the veterans' groups in the nation.

So why, in the face of all of the facts militating against him (check the top three anti-McCain sites on my links list) when it comes to his non-existent "support" for America's veterans, is he still claiming that he's the veterans' friend?

How is he getting away with this crap? Well, I think it's because the media is still creaming its shorts over McCain, the way they always have been, and no one wants to step up and ask the hard questions, bring out the inconvenient facts, and show the nation that Grampaw is nothing more than a doddering old fool who should count himself lucky if he wasn't videotaped drooling his gruel down his grizzled chin.

But no, that good ole "leftwing media bias" is at work, and after all, if they were to show Grampaw for the aged and infirm, incipient-senility old timer that he really is, there really wouldn't be much of a contest in the election, and without that all-important horse race, they won't be able to sell advertising.

Follow the money. It was true back in the day, and it's still true now.

Active Military Contributing to ... Obama?

Yes, believe it or not, it is evident from a study by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics, a part of Open Secrets, that American troops deployed abroad are giving money to the Obama campaign -- in a ratio of 6:1 -- over the McCain campaign.

Hmmm, could it be that those "troops on the ground" know more about the Iraq War Illegal Occupation than Grampaw McCain?

Trick question: My cats know more about the Iraq Illegal Occupation than McCain. The canned tuna they ate for supper last night knows more. The rock at the end of my driveway... well, you get the idea.

Interestingly enough, the study also shows that Libertarian Ron Paul has gotten contributions in the ratio of 4:1 over McCain.

What this shows is that the popular perception of the political persuasions of our soldiers is wrong. As it pretty much always has been. I was in Vietnam for the 1968 election, and I would guess that the percentage was split pretty much in the same way as the general population in that election, roughly 50-50 Democrat/Republican

A major problem with that analysis, though, is that it doesn't take into account those who voted for Nixon solely because of his infamous "secret plan" to end the war, and these people represented a substantial number of military voters. Had Bobby Kennedy not been shot, had he gotten the 1968 Democratic nomination -- as all indications were that he would have -- then the military would have voted overwhelmingly for him.

After all, no one wanted the war to be over more than we did. And that's what's going on today in our overseas troops. Obviously. Otherwise why would they send so much money to Obama?

A Fellow POW Speaks Out on McCain

The fellow POW is Phillip Butler, former Navy pilot who spent eight years in a North Vietnam prison, and who knew John McCain.

He has an incisive, telling and profoundly moving piece on, of all places, Military.com. Here's an excerpt:

I'm disappointed to see John represent himself politically in ways that are not accurate. He is not a moderate Republican. On some issues he is a maverick. But his voting record is far to the right. I fear for his nominations to our Supreme Court, and the consequent continuing loss of individual freedoms, especially regarding moral and religious issues. John is not a religious person, but he has taken every opportunity to ally himself with some really obnoxious and crazy fundamentalist ministers lately. I was also disappointed to see him cozy up to Bush because I know he hates that man. He disingenuously and famously put his arm around the guy, even after Bush had intensely disrespected him with lies and slander.

Butler also gives lie to McCain's claim that he was tortured for five-and-a-half years. No, it was for only the first two years, since after the death of Ho Chi Minh in September of 1969 the NVA gave up on torture as an instrument of war and instead decided to use the POWs as bargaining chips. This is historical fact, but you wouldn't know it from listening to McCain.

It's one thing when someone like me, an ordinary draftee Vietnam vet, disses McCain. It's something else entirely when the criticism comes from a fellow POW.

Read the full story -- it's well worth it.

The Unthinkable

It has developed over in the UK that after Tony "The Poodle" Blair's surprise conversion to the Roman Catholic church, a survey was done of the Labour Party cabinet members: More than half of them are non-believers!

It shows a major difference between the UK and the US. Pete Stark aside, the vast majority of non-believers in this country are still in the closet and would likely sooner admit to stomping kittens than being even an agnostic, let alone an outright atheist.

But even more startling in the report out of the UK is the fact that Foreign Secretary David Millibrand is on track to become Prime Minister!

The odds of something similar happening here are about the same as an icicle's chances of survival in Furnace Creek.

And that's too bad, because as I've long held, an individual's religion or lack thereof is a deeply personal matter and shouldn't have any effect on his or her eligibility for office ("no religious test"). Yet another example as to why "Old Europe" is so far ahead of us in so many ways.

Welcome to Police State

I used to have a joke sweatshirt that resembled a college logo shirt, with "Police State" as the name of the college. It finally bit the dust and ended up in the rag bin, but I wish I had it now.

Especially when I read stories like this one, wherein an American citizen is detained and hassled by Homeland Security at JFK airport following a trip to Syria.

Every time I plan to go on a trip, I half expect to show up on some "no fly" list and be told I can't go. But until now I didn't give much thought to being hassled on my way back into the country. The closest I came was when we came back from Australia four years ago and I was singled out to step out of line and raise my shirt while I got the wand. After four weeks of eating meat pies and vegemite sandwiches, and guzzling Victoria Bitter... well, let's just say that I heard a tiny voice say, "Look, mommy, that man's smuggling lard!"

I'm going on a return trip to Vietnam next month, on a real vacation this time (unlike 40 years ago), so let's hope that when I come back home, the resident Nazis of Seattle's Homeland Security will give me a pass. I'm afraid that after 32+ straight hours of traveling, I won't be in much of a mood to put up with any bullshit from a low-level federal goon squad.

Which just might cause me to complete vanish. "Disappeared", as Joseph Heller had it in Catch-22.

Especially if I'm wearing my new "Police State" college sweatshirt -- in no time at all I'd be trading it in for a nifty bright orange "Gitmo Tech" jumpsuit.

Saddleback and Politics

I've tried to ignore the Saddleback Inquisition Interrogation, wherein the two presumptive presidential candidates were questioned -- separately -- about a variety of religious topics. Questioned by an evangelical minister, no less.

The whole thing was wrong, it was stupid, and it was unAmerican in a nation founded on religious liberty and the separation of church and state.

I believe that it was also of questionable constitutional legality, since the US Constitution clearly states that "no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States".

If that dog-and-pony show was anything BUT a religious test, I'll eat my shorts. Obama should have refused.

Yeah, right. He really couldn't refuse to go on the show and expect that the Rethugs wouldn't come out with guns blazing about that refusal -- What's he trying to hide? Is he REALLY a Muslim? etc etc etc.

And that's really too bad, since this kind of thing tends to turn into a self-perpetuating cycle, with each repeat becoming a little more religious and a little less secular, until ultimately the fundos will just out-and-out say that it's a religious test instead of fancy-footing their way around it, the way mega-pastor Rick Warren claimed that he supported the idea of separation of church and state.

I just hope that somewhere along the line someone will show some balls and tell the moron-American voting bloc that his or her religious beliefs -- or lack thereof -- are none of our business. But my guess is that the fundos have achieved the perception that they have a lot of electoral power, and no politician will be saying that anytime soon.

Too bad. And that's probably one (among many) reasons why I've resisted the call whenever anyone has suggested that I run for office. I don't suffer fools gladly.

The Meaning of "Separation of Church and State"

Every once in a while, I run across something that captures the essence of an idea which I hold dearly.

The concept of Separation of Church and State is one of those concepts or ideas, and it was with great pleasure that I read an editorial on the Michigan Messenger website by Ed Brayton.

Brayton lays out succinctly and logically the fallacies behind the neocon Religious Right's interpretation of the First Amendment, and goes into the thinking of the "Founders" and their concept of that Wall of Separation.

Go read the article, The Meaning of Separation of Church and State, for yourself, and then you might want to bookmark it for future reference, the next time some fundo religious crazy starts spouting that garbage about the Wall not being mentioned in the Constitution.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134 4143

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2529
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1976
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1933
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 914
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 757

It is still 158 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

The Newest Member of the Farnsworth Clan

Presenting my great-granddaughter, Alianna Catalina Avalos-Bazan, born August 1, 2008

Bush Twins in Uniform Watch -- Dead Horse Edition

Okay, I'm willing to man up on this whole issue and admit, despite all of my efforts, and the efforts of The Yellow Elephant, it appears that the Bush Twins will escape unscathed and not have to go and fight their father's war.

Too bad, since today marks the 1507-day countdown since the spoiled Bush brats graduated college and still have managed not to join up. Now it appears it isn't going to happen, so it is with some regret that I am forced to cancel the weekly watch.

But here's a link to my original post -- which just happened to be the very first post on this blog, all the way back in June of 2005. I'm actually going to miss being snarky about the twins, but all good things eventually come to an end.

Oh, and Jenna and Not-Jenna? It's still not too late. You can still join the military. Now they're taking convicted felons up to the age of 43 or so, so you two shouldn't have a problem getting in.

And, as I've said weekly, it's not like you'd really have to do anything. Just look at your dad for an example...

...and Speaking of Lies

I see that our old buddy, Jerome "The Liar" Corsi is at it again. Not content to rest on his laurels after successfully sliming John Kerry four years ago with that scurrilous piece of garbage entitled Unfit to Command, chock full of lies that it was, Corsi has just come out with a companion attack piece on (who else?) Barack Obama.

His new attack is called Obama Nation (i.e., "abomination" -- a little too cutesy-pie for the content, but what do I know?) and, if that's possible, it appears to be worse even than his skewering of Kerry.

Over at AlterNet there's a lengthy review of Corsi's new tome, and, unlike what you'll no doubt see in the MSM/SCLM, this review actually calls Corsi to task for his lies and misrepresentations.

Example:

Corsi writes of Obama campaign blogger Sam Graham-Felsen, "After leaving Harvard, Graham-Felsen published an article in an avowedly socialist magazine" [Page 148]. Corsi goes on to assert that "Writing in Socialist Viewpoint in the May/June 2006 issue, Graham-Felsen discussed a trip to Paris in which he participated in leftist street riots that involved a controversial employment law designed to facilitate the ability of French companies to fire workers under twenty-six years old."
In fact, the article Corsi presents as having been "published in an avowedly socialist magazine" was actually published in April 2006 in The Nation, and reprinted by the Socialist Viewpoint. This is clearly indicated on the Socialist Viewpoint website for which Corsi provides the link. The same Graham-Felsen article was also reprinted at CBSNews.com. The May/June 2006 issue of Socialist Viewpoint also reprinted articles from the February 27, 2006, edition of Detroit Free Press, and from the March 29, 2006, edition of London's The Guardian.

There are a lot more examples showing that all of the lies are easily refutable by the slightest amount of research.

Do yourself a favor and read it. And you might also want to commit some of the major ones to memory, for the next time that idiot rightwing brother-in-law of yours starts to get a little too cocky about Obama.

Fighting Fire with Fire

I've always said that the Dems tend to show up at a gunfight with a butter knife, and that's why we've lost so many elections.

Over at Monkey Muck, I stumbled on the following letter, with the intent being email guerilla warfare, to fuck up the right the way they always do us. I'm not, of course, advocating that anyone actually do this (nudge-nudge, wink-wink), but Monkey von Monkerstein's advice is to spam the world with scurrilous lies about Grampaw Mac the way the wingnuttery spams the Internets with all of those false claims about Obama.

Here's the suggested text of the letter:

Wow.
This is amazing!
Did you know that when John McCain was a POW in Vietnam he spilled his guts under pressure? He claims that when asked to give the names of the men in his squadron he gave the Commies the names of the Green Bay Packers. But recently he said it was the Pittsburgh Steelers. Which is it? The Packers or the Steelers?
Or is this bigger than they will admit?
Sources in the military intelligence community say this could be a case of brainwashing. They claim that McCain could have been brainwashed into being a spy for the Vietnamese and their pals the Commies in Red China and that he'll deliver then all our state secrets as soon as he's sworn in. Think about it. It all makes sense. His backers in business and industry are already doing big business in China and they are now dependant on the Chinese government to keep their cost of doing business low and to supply them with a steady stream of workers. Big business then turns around and gives money to McCain. When, or should I say if, he takes the oath of office he'll be doing it on a Bible that's been made in China and then the floodgates will open and the Chinese will have free reign over not just our businesses but also our military, the CIA, the FBI, and everything else.
Spread the word that if we all want to keep America free we need to vote for Barack Obama and not for the tool of the Communists, John McCain.

As The Monkey says, cut and paste it, and then "send this out to anybody and everybody and if you get it in your inbox then forward it along again. Let's see how far this will go and if the corporate media picks it up."

Hmmmmm..... In the words of all those classic movies, "It's crazy, but ... it just might work!"

GUILTY GUILTY GUILTY!!!!!

Or so screamed all of the headlines this week when the verdict came down on Salim Hamdan, the driver/chauffeur for Osama Bin Laden. (Remember him? Tall skinny Arab dude, hooked up to a dialysis machine? Used to make videotapes? Masterminded the 9-11 attacks? Yeah, that guy.)

You would think that Hamdan was found guilty of any variety and number of crimes against humanity, what with all that breathless reporting on the guilty verdict, not only from the usual suspects (Faux News) but from the MSM/SCLM as well.

But what was poor Salim actually found guilty of? Apparently it's a crime to be Salim Hamdan, a chauffeur for the forgotten leader of The Terra (how could we have a War on Terra^tm without him?), since that's about all they could finally gin up out of all of those charges to convict him on.

So, bottom line, Hamdan is hardly the criminal terrorist mastermind/murderer/etc. that the Bush-Cheney Assholes of Evil coalition tried to make him out to be, is he now?

In fact, Salim was sentenced to about five-and-a-half years in prison for being...well, for being Salim Hamdan, with -- and this is the good part -- credit for time served!

Which means that Salim will be getting could have gotten out of Gitmo in just a few months. But, silly boy, don't count your yogurt before it's fermented. The BFEE says that it will keep Hamdan under lock and key regardless, long past his release date, essentially forever, since it would send "the wrong message" to the "terrorists" to release him when his sentence has been served...

And what message would that be? Well, it's like I said a long time ago. Baby Doc said "'they' hate us for our freedoms", and then he began immediately to dismantle those freedoms, apparently under the theory that if we no longer have our freedoms, "they" won't hate us and the War on Terra^tm will be over.

Hmmmm..... Now that sounds an awful lot like "appeasement" to me.

Oh, and that verdict and sentencing came from the military tribunal which was deliberately constituted to sidestep and bypass all of those pesky constitutional issues surrounding our precious Gitmo "detainees". But the officers on that panel, when they first joined the military, took an oath to "preserve and defend the constitution from all enemies, foreign AND DOMESTIC".

It's encouraging that those guys are still taking that oath seriously; it's alarming that the military seems to be the only federal institution that still believes in the Constitution.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118 4134

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2522
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1969
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1926
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 907
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 750

It is still 165 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

We'll Always Have Paris

For those who have been living under a rock the past few days (like me) and haven't seen the Paris Hilton campaign ad:

And you know the funniest thing about it (maybe aside from the references to "that wrinkly white-haired dude")?

That Paris Hilton has a better energy program than Grampaw McCain.

A Dubious Milestone

Today is the seventh anniversary of that fateful day when Der Monkey Fuehrer was personally handed that now-infamous "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US" memo.

It's just too fucking bad that there weren't any adults in charge seven years ago. If there had been, maybe we would have avoided those 4134 needless deaths in Iraq.

I'm of the opinion that had the true 43rd President been in charge in August 2001, he would have done something about that memo.

But then I'm also of the opinion that if the true 43rd President had been in office, there never would have been a 9-11 to begin with.

But that's just me.

Obama Attack Watch

As expected, the rightwing smear machine is in full court press. The latest attack is a viral email that accuses Obama of removing the American flag from the tail of his campaign plane and replacing it with -- shock -- his own logo!

Here's the full text of the email:

Subject: A Disgrace
I just looked this up on Snopes; it is true.
Obama Removes American Flag From His Plane
Barack Obama recently finished a $500,000 total overhaul of his 757. And as part of the new design, he decided to remove the American flag from the tail...
What American running for President of the United States would remove the symbol of his country? And worse, he replaced the flag with it with a symbol of himself...
Please forward this on if you're not ashamed of your country or it's [sic] flag & think this is a disgrace!

If my correspondent had only taken the time to actually READ the Snopes article, he would have seen that the American flag on the tail of the leased plane is a registered trademark of North American Air, that there is an American flag on the plane, next to its registration number, and that refurbishing/repainting a campaign plane is normal in politics these days.

But, as usual, facts mean nothing to these people.

Why I continue to get these is another story, but I'm willing to let my correspondents think that I welcome them. In point of fact, I do welcome them. If it weren't for my political troglodyte friends, I wouldn't know about them.

We're Back!

And none the worse for wear, I might add. We saw plenty of bears, HUGE ravens, and especially a lot of bald eagles, but didn't fall victim to any of them.

It was our first trip to Alaska, and I was not surprised by the clean air and the clear water.

I was surprised by the large number of float planes that had a habit of taking off right outside our window, starting at 6:00 AM and continuing just long enough to prevent us from getting any more sleep.

Alaskans are a special breed of people, I've learned. When we arrived, my son's boss took the day off and the three of us drove up in the mountains where we drank beer and shot pistols. I had the opportunity to shoot a fifty caliber handgun, and it was not only huge and heavy (I had to steady it with both hands), but it also kicked like a Missouri mule.

Hmmm, guns and alcohol, I can hear you say. There's no way this is going to end well.

Well, you would be wrong. Like I said, Alaskans are a special breed, and I guess they know what they're doing, since we all came back down the mountain with our skins unmarred and our body parts attached.

So I am still tired from the trip, but glad to be back. More tomorrow after I've had some rest.

North to Alaska

I haven't posted for the last week or so because we've suddenly become really busy with a garage sale and the unanticipated -- and stunning -- announcement from my granddaughter that She-Who-Must-Be-Obeyed and I are about to become ... wait for it ... great-grandparents!!!!

It took us by complete surprise. Okay, I knew it was bound to happen eventually -- the Farnsworth clan is nothing if not fecund -- but I didn't think it would happen this soon.

So now we're off to Alaska where we will meet our son's girlfriend -- who is also carrying another grandchild for us (I told you we were a fecund lot).

I'll be back in a couple of weeks, once the shock wears off, and assuming that I don't get eaten by a bear. The boy is taking me on a zipline tour above bear country, so there is some doubt whether I'll survive ("Remember when I wanted to hang out with my friends and I couldn't because you grounded me? Take this, old man!" Snip, drop, eeeeyaaaaa!!!)

In the meantime, you can ponder the large number of names that appear on this list, and wonder why the Democrats can't seem to get into those high numbers...

"THE Cover"

Okay, everyone has seen by now the infamous New Yorker cover, so we don't need to go into a lengthy rehash of it.

I was an English major in college lo these many years ago, and one of my "specialities" was satire. And I can tell you, without a hint of reservation, that this cartoon was NOT satire. It was at best a lampooning juvenile parody, more suitable to the pages of, I don't know, the National Lampoon (although I'm sure that even they wouldn't have published it) or Mad Magazine (same caveat applies).

If it were, however, as the mouthpieces for the New Yorker have been all over the MSM declaiming, in actuality, a satire of the wingnuttery's impressions of the Obamas, there was absolutely no context to indicate that.

If, for example, they had shown Rush Limbaugh stretched out on an opium couch with the cartoon as his drug-induced hallucination, then it would have been satire. As it was, it was nothing more than a semi-skillful illustration of the Moron-American voting bloc attitude that reinforces their already-elevated prejudices against the Obamas.

It's disgusting -- and appalling -- and the editor and publisher of the New Yorker ought to be ashamed. It's especially disingenuous for them to try to explain it away ("our readers are too sophisticated", etc.) when they don't run a corresponding cover on McCain, showing him as, say, a zombie "Manchurian Candidate" by way of Night of the Living Dead, and his trophy wife as a charity-thieving trollope-dressing c-word dope addict.

Anybody wanna bet on when that's gonna happen? Yeah, I didn't think so.

It makes me wish I'd been a subscriber, just so I could inflammatorily cancel my subscription.

Impeachment Now -- It's Not Too Late!

You gotta hand it to Dennis Kucinich. Like a Timex watch, he takes a licking and keeps on ticking. He's condensed his impeachment articles down to just one, and you can put your voice to it on his website.

Go there and sign the petition, copies of which will be hand-delivered by Dennis to your congressman/woman.

Let them know that we STILL want impeachment hearings.

Remember, Baby Doc will be able to issue blanket presidential pardons to everyone -- including Karl Rove and Dick Cheney -- before he leaves office, unless he is under impeachment!

Obama and the FISA Vote

I will admit that I was more than a little disappointed in Barack Obama's seeming shift to the right over this issue, but I'm not about to take him to task for it. Beating John McCain is the most important thing in the political world to me; I'd still actively support Obama even if there were a video of him stomping puppies (and come to think of it, there might as well be, since he's being taken to task -- and cast as some kind of Anti-Faux-News Un-American -- because the Obama family has no pets... but that's another rant for another day).

But after I got to thinking about it, I can understand why he did it. His vote didn't matter one way or the other, the bill would still have passed if he'd voted the other way. But, by casting his vote in favor of the bill, it immediately and automatically removes an item of ammunition from the Other Side -- you know, the whole "Democrats are soft on defense, love the terrorists, etc etc" thing.

And, since Grampaw McCain had "other priorities" and wasn't present to vote on it, he's giving the Dems a precious gift: "John McCain cares so little about the defense of this nation that he didn't even bother to show up to vote", etc.

If they'll only use it.

Friday by the Numbers

Total American dead in the Iraq Illegal Occupation: 2500 2513 2532 2540 2546 2558 2571 2585 2597 2605 2619 2641 2710 2737 2758 2788 2809 2826 2865 2888 2906 2959 3006 3018 3025 3067 3087 3118 3132 3151 3166 3189 3210 3233 3245 3266 3299 3316 3337 3358 3387 3409 3444 3504 3519 3546 3577 3592 3611 3631 3683 3705 3725 3738 3760 3780 3795 3823 3830 3838 3845 3866 3875 3881 3886 3891 3896 3908 3921 3932 3943 3952 3960 3974 3987 3992 4004 4032 4036 4102 4113 4118

Total coalition forces dead: 314
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2431
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1891
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1839
Number of days between Pearl Harbor and the end of WWII: Only 1347

Number of days that the the Vice President has NOT shot a man in the face: 824
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 659

It is still 253 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

Baby Doc Quote of the Week

"We don't believe in planners and deciders making the decisions on behalf of Americans."

--Scranton PA, Sept 6, 2000

[I guess he eventually changed his mind about that whole "decider" thing...]

Flip Flop Flip Flop

It's hard to believe that just four short years ago the Rethugs were crowing about John "I Was for It Before I Was Against It" Kerry being a flip flopper.

Grampaw Johnny McCain said over the weekend that "this election is about trust and trusting people's word and, unfortunately, apparently on several items, Senator Obama's word cannot be trusted."

Pot, meet Kettle.
Pot: "Hi, Kettle. You're black!"

Grampaw McCain, the flag bearer for the Rethug party, doesn't really have a patent on "the truth", and, as my favorite Talking Head, Keith Olbermann, sees it, McCain has been a stellar performer in no fewer than thirty major flip-flops since 2000.

At this rate he ought to try out for the Barnum and Bailey Circus -- Floppy the Clown has nothing on McCain, and Grampaw Shakey is gonna need a new gig after election day. The only reason the Wicked Witch of the West (aka Cindy McCain) is sticking with the doddering loser is so she can be Firstest Lady, and when he loses (and loses Big Time), she's going to drop him faster than an addiction to pain pills.

Which Cindy is an expert on, so it'll be interesting to see the "compare and constrast" essay that should be required when she finally pulls the plug on Grampaw...

Weekly Bush Twins in Uniform Watch

It has now been 1472 days since Jenna and Not-Jenna Bush, the slacker offspring of Preznit Numnutz, graduated from college and they are still not in the uniform of the US armed services.

Why? Because they have other priorities. They are too busy partying down in Georgetown, Argentina and god-knows-where-else to show their support for the war by enlisting their chickenhawk-child selves into the military service, that's why.

And it's not just The Twins: ONLY ONE member of the extended Bush family has seen fit to volunteer for military service. Check out the Buzzflash analysis of the chickenshit Bush/Cheney extended family and see for yourself. There's even a photo taken in 2000 of the extended Bush family, complete with a whole lot of young fresh faces who seem to be of an age now to be eligible to enlist.

Little Georgie Bush, the son of Jebbie, has enlisted in the Naval Reserve. He's going into the Officer Training Program, preparing to be ... an intelligence officer. Okay, the obvious jokes aside, what are the chances he's ever going to see Iraq? Especially since he apparently hasn't actually even put on the uniform yet, even though he "enlisted" way last year.

Little Jenna has now married her boyfriend, one Henry Hager. Wanna bet that he won't be wearing a uniform anytime soon? Like ever? Unlike the husbands of Lynda and Lucie, the daughters of Lyndon Johnson, both of whom joined the service and went to Vietnam.

Bush and Cheney were cowards during Vietnam who sent other men off to die in their place. Now the next chickenhawk generation is doing its part, sending their own peers off to die instead of them.

Why can't the Twins be more like their royal counterparts in the UK? The British Royal Family, unlike the Bush Crime Family, has a centuries-long tradition of honorable military service. Prince Andrew was a combat helicopter pilot in La Guerra de las Malvinas (aka the Falklands War) and Prince Harry, until the decision was made not to send him, was on his way to Iraq as a cavalry lieutenant. Not to be denied, Harry turned around and went to Afghanistan on a "stealth" assignment for three months, until Matt "The Traitor" Drudge outed him for no good reason except his own self-aggrandizement.

So will the Bush Twins follow Harry's example?

No, they will not. They are fucking cowards like their father and their Uncle Dick(less) Cheney.

Be sure to check out The Yellow Elephant blog, which asks the question "It's their war; why aren't they fighting it?"

BTW, the twins are also still not pregnant with their own Snowflake Babies. If they can't -- or won't -- join the service, the least they could do would be to get themselves impregnated with a couple of blastocytes that would otherwise go down the sewer pipe.

Remember what Farnsworth always says: Baste 'em, don't waste 'em.

Baby Doc Quote of the Week

"The trial lawyers are very politically powerful ... But here in Texas we took them on and got some good medical--medical malpractice."

--Waco, TX Aug 13, 2002

[That's a relief -- nothing worse than bad medical malpractice... --The F Man]

More on the Supreme Court

Regular readers know how fucking freaked out I am over how a McCain victory would enable the neocon nutjob wing to pack the court even more tightly with Scalia clones than Baby Doc did already.

So E. J Dionne's July 1 column is a must read for anyone who feels the same way:

If the long conservative era that began with Ronald Reagan's election is over, will the judges appointed during the right's ascendancy be able to block, frustrate and undermine the efforts of a new progressive majority?
Consider this analysis from two influential journalists describing Supreme Court justices as "the last hope of the conservative interests in the United States."
Imagine, they write, that a new liberal approach to the country's problems "had been overwhelmingly approved both in Congress and at the polling booths," so "conservative interests resorted to the courts, starting literally thousands of actions to stay the government's hand." Of the ensuing fight, they say: "The liberal justices themselves called their conservative colleagues arbitrary and madly unwise. But while the liberals warned, the conservatives laughed."
Yes, we may go back to the future. Those words are from a still-compelling 1938 book called "The 168 Days" by legendary Washington journalists Joseph Alsop and Turner Catledge.

Read the whole thing. It's well worth it.

The New GI Bill: Through the Lookinglass

The new Jim Webb-sponsored GI Bill of Rights was finally signed by Baby Doc. Somewhat to my surprise, since I figured that even though it was an election year, he'd veto it. After all, he's not up for reelection.

But he did thank John McCain for his work on it, and then McCain turned right around and starting using the term "we" when he was talking about it getting passed.

Who the fuck do they think they're fooling here? McCain did everything he could to water it down and when that didn't work, to get it to fail. And when the final vote for passage came in the Senate, he was AWOL. As he has been on pretty much every vote this year.

And Baby Doc? He was against it before he was for it. He was dead set resistant since the beginning of time, which is why it was so surprising that he finally signed it, with such great flourish that anyone watching would think it was all his idea.

So now he and Grampaw Mac are taking credit for it? It's appalling. It's disgusting.

Oh, and to answer my own question above: They are fooling everyone in the Moron-American voting bloc, who remember maybe the last two news snippets they heard, the last two News McNuggets they consumed, and when it comes time to vote in November, they won't remember this but they will have a "feeling" that the Rethugs "support veterans".

And as we all know, nothing could be farther from the truth.

New McCain Tax Plan: Just Say "No"

Over at The Spoof, there's a delightful outline of the new John McCain tax plan.

For those who haven't heard the news, Cindy and Johnny failed to pay property taxes for more than four years on property owned in San Diego. Only when it became clear that they'd have to pony up the cash or suffer the angst of being a presidential candidate who could be described as a tax cheat did they finally pay up.

As The Spoof has it, "I'm selling a book describing my method, which I call 'Tax FReedom Against Untimely Demands', said McCain, "Remember: Tax FR.A.U.D. works!"

So What Did Wesley Clark Say That Was So Bad?

Wingnut media -- along with their enablers, aiders, abettors and morons in the MSM/SCLM have been climbing all over Wes Clark's ass the last couple of days, and for what?

For saying that McCain's service was honorable, he was heroic, etc., but that it didn't qualify him, any more than anyone else's, to be president.

And he was right, it doesn't. But you'd think that Clark had slapped the Pope, stomped a puppy and called McCain an alcoholic serial rapist wife beater.

If anything, Clark was too nice to doddering old fucker. Note that Clark did not attempt to dismiss McCain's service, or point out some inconvenient facts about it, such as that he lived a protected -- a charmed -- life as the son and grandson of admirals for most of his Navy service (and even for part of his time in captivity), that he most likely would have been kicked out of Annapolis if it were not for that, that he lost a couple of planes under mysterious circumstances, or his questionable role in the deadly USS Forrestal fire in 1967.

No, Wesley Clark took the high ground on these issues, and I think that both he and Obama are wise to do so. But that's not going to stop them from surfacing out here in Left Blogistan.