I'm Still Alive

I'm just taking a short break. I quit smoking last week and it wasn't the easy tripping of the light fantastic that I expected it to be.

I'll be back next week, once my head clears, my lungs are used to pure air, and the snarling moods are behind me.

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 28652888 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 4052 4073 4077 4080

Total coalition forces dead: 312
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2432
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: 823
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.

Call to Action

Tomorrow the GI Bill for the 21st Century is coming up for a vote. Sign the petition and check out the details at GI Bill 2008.

And please, contact your senators and representatives and tell all of them that you want this bill passed. There is no earthly reason for them not to pass it!

It is unconscionable that the Rethugs, led by faux veteran John McCain, are trying to stonewall this bill and prevent its passage.

Don't let them get away with it. Get this bill passed!

Beating Ted Danson

I can now crow that I beat Ted Danson in the ratings.

Here's how it happened: On Saturday I gave a speech in support of Barack Obama at my congressional district caucus. The setup was that one person would give a speech attempting to persuade the Clinton delegates to switch to Obama, and another person would do the same for the Obama delegates.

It wasn't until I actually showed up at the caucus that I learned that I would be up against Ted Danson for Clinton. Talk about bringing in a Big Gun!

In the event, however, it turned out that good old Ted never showed up. He was apparently scheduled to appear at several district caucuses that day, and I guess the mostly rural and yet solidly Obama Third District wasn't important enough for a big-time celebrity to appear at. So I gave my speech and a Clinton supporter threw together his own ineffective presentation. Fortunately, it wasn't enough to sway any Obama delegates -- but on the other hand, neither was my own dynamic oratory.

Except for this: Dwight Pelz, the top Democrat in this state, was there on Saturday, and on Sunday he came out in support of ... Barack Obama.

I feel pretty good about that.

Even though I'm pretty sure that he'd left the caucus by the time I spoke... but hey, let me have my dreams, okay?

But I still beat Ted Danson in the ratings. It's not my fault that he didn't bother to show up...

Weekly Bush Twins in Uniform Watch

It has now been 1444 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 the daughters of Lyndon Johnson, both of whom went into the service and were sent to Vietnam.

Bush and Cheney were cowards during Vietnam who sent other men off to die in their place. Now the next 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.

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 28652888 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 4052 4073 4077

Total coalition forces dead: 312
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2425
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1884
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1832
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: 816
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 652

A Great Day in California

Just a quick overview: The California Supreme Court today ruled that California's antiquated marriage laws that did not allow for so-called "same sex marriages" was unconstitutional.

Hurray for California! Once the most populous state in the nation goes the way of humanity and decency and civil rights, can the rest of the nation be far behind?

And to all of my GLBT readers: Good on you! Congratulations on the California victory. But let's not relax just yet. It's still going to be a long haul from where we are now to truly equal rights for all Americans.

But, that aside, let's all join in rejoicing for the victory of Human Rights in California!

Have You No Shame, Sir? At Long Last, Have You No Shame?

Those were the words directed to pompous rightwing crypto-fascist bully Senator "Tailgunner Joe" McCarthy by attorney Joseph Welch during the course of the Army-McCarthy Hearings way back in 1954.

They are as appropriate today as they were back then, albeit in somewhat different circumstances.

Today Der Monkey Feuhrer made an absolutely appalling statement during a speech in Israel:

"Some seem to believe that we should negotiate with terrorists and radicals, as if some ingenious argument will persuade them they have been wrong all along. We have heard this foolish delusion before," Bush said.
"As Nazi tanks crossed into Poland in 1939, an American senator declared: 'Lord, if only I could have talked to Hitler, all of this might have been avoided.' We have an obligation to call this what it is -- the false comfort of appeasement, which has been repeatedly discredited by history," he added.

Columnist Will Bunch called it an act of political treason, and points out the irony that just the day before, Baby Doc's own SecDef, Robert Gates, said about Iran, "...we need to sit down and talk with them..."

So I guess that makes Gates an appeaser and Nazi enabler, too. But, as the unofficial mantra of the Rethug party has it, "It's not fascism when we do it."

Naturally the White House scrambled to deny that the comments were aimed specifically at Barack Obama. Yeah, right. That's really believable. If you also believe in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny...

This brings the legacy of the BFEE to a new low. I really didn't think it was possible, but stick around. Chances are it will get even worse, even uglier, before the little fucker is finally out of office in 2009.

And while we're on it, in case you missed Keith Olbermann's rant about the Smirking Chimp last night, here's a link to the MSNBC video. Watch it. KO tears him a new one. So much so that now I fear that KO will be "disappeared"...

* * * * *

Addendum: That Nazi-enabling senator from 1939 that Baby Doc was criticizing? He was none other that Idaho's Willam Borah who, it turns out, was ... [wait for it] ... a Republican!!!

Harbinger of Doom for the Rethugs?

Lost in all the media coverage of Hillary Clinton's huge win in West Virginia was this story: In one of the most conservative districts in Mississippi, Travis Childers, the Democrat, won an open House seat by about 8 points over his Rethug competition.

Note that this was in a district that voted overwhelmingly for Baby Doc Bush (62%) just four short years ago.

Note that this took place even after his Rethug opponent spammed the airwaves with a television ad that attempted to Willie Hortonize Childers with a blatantly racist guilt-by-association screed on Childers' endorsement by the "liberal Barack Obama", and topped off the sundae with a Reverend Wright cherry.

It didn't do him any good. Childers still won, and this victory represents the disgust that rank-and-file Republicans must be feeling toward their own party and what it has done to attempt to destroy our democracy over the last seven years.

It's shaping up to be a Democratic sweep, even way down ticket, in November. Unless the lying cheating stealing Rethugs can figure out how to steal the election again. Which they will do unless we turn out in such massive numbers that there's no way they will be able to switch a few votes and snatch victory from the jaws of defeat.

A Little Constitution is a Dangerous Thing

In an incredible story out of East Texas, a bible college student was accused of committing an act of terrorism and espionage after he gave a talk to a group of boy scouts about ... The United States Constitution!!!

It's both Orwellian and Kafkaesque what happened to "Jeff" (who for his own protection wishes to remain anonymous) after he spoke about patriotism and liberty to a visiting troop of scouts "It's going to be you who is going to take this country and either make or break it - you need to get back to your constitution, you need to get to know your bill of rights and you need to stand up for them."

And that apparently was enough to bring Homeland Security down on his neck like a pride of shrieking banshees.

Read the whole story. It's shocking and appalling what is being done to us in the name of "freedom".

So I guess Jeff will now have his potential future job opportunities pretty limited. Of course he can always fall back on the one phrase that us Liberal Arts graduates have always needed when it comes to making it in the workforce: "You want freedom fries with that?"

An Administrative Change

A number of readers of this blog have contacted me off-blog to complain about my pet idiot, one "pepsiholic" by name. Up to this point I have refrained from blocking him because, basically, I felt sorry for him.

But when people start telling me that they are reluctant to post any comments to this blog because of the sophistry of pepsiholic's juvenile comments, the way he is so skilled at elevating some minor point to the level of consideration, and the fact that he refuses to engage in an adult-level debate, I have to take them seriously.

And that is why, after much soul-searching, I have instituted a "moderated" feature to this blog's comments. From now on, your posts will have to be approved by me before they will see the light of day.

I didn't want to do this, but given the number of complaints I've received, I feel I have no choice. So go ahead and post your comments; I will try to get to them as soon as possible and approve them for publication.

I regret any inconvenience this may cause you, but it was necessary to facilitate a reasoned discussion among adults.

-- The F Man

A Solution Without a Problem

A move is under way to have potential voters prove their US citizenship before they would be allowed to vote. Indiana was at the front of the pack with their own law -- which was upheld by the Supreme Court a couple of weeks back (surprise surprise) -- that demanded that voters show some form of government ID. As a result, a group of retired nuns in their 80s was prevented from voting in the most recent election.

Missouri, Florida, Kansas, South Carolina at least 16 other states are considered passing similar laws.

And what's all this about? Alleged voter fraud. Even though real voter fraud is almost nonexistent, the push is on to prevent it.

It's a solution without a problem, and its main purpose is actually vote suppression. After all, the smaller the electoral turnout, the more likely Rethugs are to win elections. No less a leading light of the Rethug Right than Paul Weyrich said, way back in 1980 when speaking to a group of Christianist evangelical preachers, "I don't want everybody to vote. Elections are not won by a majority of the people. They never have been from the beginning of our country and they are not now. As a matter of fact, our leverage in the elections quite candidly goes up as the voting populace goes down."

The more roadblocks these people can put across the tracks of democracy, the better they like it. They know that they can't win elections fair and square because the numbers are against them, so they have to get really creative in coming up with ways to keep the total votes low.

Questions that Won't Go Away

I'm not one to go all tinfoil hat at the drop of a stick, but even I have had some trouble swallowing the official line on the events of 9-11. Conspiracy theories abound, some of them seemingly reasonable, and many of them out-and-out wacko.

That aside, the 9-11 Commission Report is not the be-all and end-all that they wanted to us believe it was.

Not when Baby Doc refused to testify, and would speak to the commission only if he were sitting on Uncle Dickless Cheney's lap, the perfect meat puppet. Neither was sworn in, and the "interview" took place in the Oval Office. Not a turn of events that was going to provide confidence in whatever bullshit story that they came up with.

So while was Der Monkey Fuehrer was sitting in that classroom with that classic "deer caught in the headlights" look on his smirking chimp mug, and later zipping around the country in Air Force One trying "to keep out of harm's way", Cheney was in charge, more or less, and it now appears, ordered the Air Force to shoot down Flight 93 when it became obvious that it had been taken over by terrorists.

Later, after it augured in to that field in Pennsylvania, following the heroic "let's roll" actions of the passengers, Flight 93 entered the national lexicon as an example of Americans fighting back and not giving in to terrorists.

That became the legend, and that created the myth. But the Buzzflash editor's blog, has an analysis that is compelling. The Bush White House covered up much about 9-11, not the least of which was its own incompetence, and Cheney's orders to shoot down Flight 93 was most likely carried out, and then covered up.

After all, it wouldn't fit into that heroic narrative if the country learned that the passengers of the plane died due to "friendly fire", would it?

Weekly Bush Twins in Uniform Watch

It has now been 1437 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 the daughters of Lyndon Johnson, both of whom went into the service and were sent to Vietnam.

Bush and Cheney were cowards during Vietnam who sent other men off to die in their place. Now the next 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.

Justice Through the Looking Glass

It's the world where black is white, up is down, left is right, and truth is fiction. So when Grampaw McCain issued his proclamation on the Judiciary the other day, it wasn't really surprising that he displayed an appalling lack of knowledge about the American system of Justice.

Grampaw complained, among other things, that the Supremes routinely issue opinions that "abuse" the system, by deciding questions that rightly belong in the democratic process.

Well, isn't that just special.

What McCain seemingly, apparently, fails to grasp is that the whole point of having lifetime-appointed Supreme Court justices to interpret the laws was to insulate them from the whims of the political winds, and therefore prevent a tyranny of the majority. Imagine if, say, landmark cases such as Brown v. Board of Education, Gideon v. Wainright, Miranda v. Arizona, et al., were put to a popular vote. Nothing would have changed, schools would still be segregated, the poor would not have attorneys, and the presumably guilty would have to cough up a confession, even under unrestrained police brutality.

Those are the cases that are usually trotted out as "poster children" for the "activist" Supreme Court, and that's mostly because those are "liberal" decisions that are guaranteed money-makers when it comes to plucking campaign cash out of the pockets of the Moron-American voting bloc. But the Supreme Court over the last couple of decades has been much more "activist" than the Warren Court ever thought of being in their rush to overturn established case law. These guys apparently have never heard of the concept of stare decisis. It's oddly ironic that the large majority of the "activist" judges have been the very ones who were appointed by Rethugs.

But that's okay, since the current mindset of the court has been shaped and nurtured by the heavy hand of closet Dominionist Antonin "Tony Quack-Quack" Scalia. The mantra of the Rethugs has always been "it's not fascism when we do it".

Maybe Grampaw needs to go back and take a Civics 101 class. I've ranted before on this topic, and I'm certain that this won't be the last time.

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 28652888 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 4052 4073

Total coalition forces dead: 309
Total Iraqi Dead: 700,000+

Number of days since Baby Doc said he'd get Osama Bin Laden "dead or alive": 2418
Number of days since the illegal occupation of Iraq began: 1877
Number of days since "Mission Accomplished": 1825
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: 809
Number of days that the Bush Twins are still not pregnant with baste-'em-or-waste-'em Snowflake babies: 645

It is still 267 days until the end of the BFEE Maladministration.

Baby Doc Quote of the Week

"Anyway, after we go out and work our hearts out, after you go out and help us turn out the vote, after we've convinced the good Americans to vote, and while they're at it, pull that old George W. lever, if I'm the one, when I put my hand on the Bible, when I put my hand on the Bible, that day when they swear us in, when I put my hand on the Bible, I will swear to not -- to uphold the law of the land."

Toledo, OH; Oct 27, 2000

McCain Theocracy Watch

Grampaw McCain is going around saying that he would appoint Supreme Court justices with "a proven record of excellence in the law, and a proven commitment to judicial restraint."

That's code, in case you didn't know, that lets reluctant wingnut voters know that he's on board with the fascist right turn that the court has taken, thanks to a inordinate number of Rethug presidential appointments.

That means he just loves some of the more rabid rightwing members of the court. So let's take a look at a speech given by Antonin "Quack-Quack" Scalia, the de facto leader of the fascist wing of the court, back in 2002 at the University of Chicago divinity school, on the subject of the death penalty:

This is not the Old Testament, I emphasize, but St Paul…[T]he core of his message is that government – however you want to limit that concept – derives its moral authority from God … Indeed, it seems to me that the more Christian a country is the less likely it is to regard the death penalty as immoral … I attribute that to the fact that, for the believing Christian, death is no big deal. Intentionally killing an innocent person is a big deal: it is a grave sin, which causes one to lose his soul. But losing this life, in exchange for the next? … for the nonbeliever, on the other hand, to deprive a man of his life is to end his existence. What a horrible act! …

The reaction of people of faith to this tendency of democracy to obscure the divine authority behind government should not be resignation to it, but the resolution to combat it as effectively as possible. We have done that in this country (and continental Europe has not) by preserving in our public life many visible reminders that – in the words of a Supreme Court opinion from the 1940s – "we are a religious people, whose institutions presuppose a Supreme Being" … All this, as I say, is most un-European, and helps explain why our people are more inclined to understand, as St Paul did, that government carries the sword as "the minister of God," to "execute wrath" upon the evildoer.

[quoted from The End of Faith by Sam Harris, pp. 156-157]

Read that over again and then tell me that we are not centimeters away from theocracy in this country. If McCain is elected, he will have the opportunity to appoint at least two, and more likely three, justices to the Supreme Court. There is no reason to suspect that he will appoint men (women need not apply) who disagree in any substantial way with Scalia's theocratic musings.

And that, once again, is why, if Clinton somehow manages to weasel her way into the nomination, we all need to suck it up and campaign for her, despite any or all of our reservations.

But fortunately, after last night's total Obama victory in North Carolina, and his oh-so-close showing in Indiana, it appears that we won't have to make that decision.

Now let's keep our eye on the prize and win the White House in November.

The Bush-McCain Challenge

Those clever folks over at MoveOn.org have put together a little test to see if you can tell the difference between Der Monkey Fuehrer and Grampaw McCain.

Go ahead and take the quiz and see how you do. It may actually surprise you a little bit.

Weekly Bush Twins in Uniform Watch

It has now been 1430 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 set a date to marry her boyfriend, one Henry Hager. Wanna bet that he won't be wearing a uniform anytime soon? Like ever? Unlike the husbands of the daughters of Lyndon Johnson, both of whom went into the service and were sent to Vietnam.

Bush and Cheney were cowards during Vietnam who sent other men off to die in their place. Now the next 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.

A Loyalty Oath???

In a story that seemed to come out of the left field of Mars, a Cal State instructor was fired for refusing to sign a loyalty oath!

In my innocence and naïveté I thought that loyalty oaths had gone out the window with the rest of the trappings of the McCarthy era. So I was more than a little surprised by this story.

Years ago, before I started work for the government, I said that I would never under any circumstances sign a loyalty oath. I was fully prepared to stir the pot and take them to court when I was first hired by a state agency.

Imagine my surprise when I found that loyalty oaths were no longer required to get a government job. After that I guess I just assumed that they were some kind of ancient ritual and we'd somehow gotten beyond such meaningless exercises (after all, if you really were an enemy agent/aspiring saboteur, would you balk at signing a fucking piece of paper indicating otherwise? No, you wouldn't, and neither would I).

But no, not the Cal State system. Even today they demand that individuals sign their fucking oath, to the professional and personal detriment of persons of conscience who, for whatever reason, feel ethically required to refuse to sign.

Welcome to the return of McCarthyism. Actually, it never really left us, but it's been underground for 50 years, just waiting for the opportunity to raise its ugly head.

Saturday Song Parody

Who'll Stop McCain
(Who'll Stop the Rain -- Creedence
Clearwater Revival
© 2008)

Long as I remember McCain has been around.
He was a hotshot pilot, 'fore they brought him down.
Now he fumes and rages, no longer a top gun,
And I wonder, still I wonder, who'll stop McCain?

Jim Webb from Virginia, helpin' vets beyond the norm,
McCain at the table, I watched him just say "no".
Wants us under his heel, wrapped up in his chains.
And I wonder, still I wonder, who'll stop McCain?

Hillary and Barack, media jeered for more,
They thrust them both together, it's a money farm.
Still McCain kept comin', despite all our fears,
And I wonder, still I wonder, who'll stop McCain?