Unashamed
(my brother, Scott)
Crazy Aunt Purl
(my friend Laurie)
There's Pie In the Lunchroom
(my friend Chuck)
Too Fat For Ponies
(my friend Sam)
Post Secret
(a place to share secrets)
Recent posts:
2006
June 26-July 5, 2006
June 13-20, 2006
May 30-June 8, 2006
May 22-26, 2006
May 9-16, 2006
May 2-5, 2006
April 17-28, 2006
April 10-14, 2006
March 27-April 7, 2006
March 6-10, 2006
Feb. 27 - March 3, 2006
Feb. 20-24, 2006
Feb. 13-17, 2006
Feb. 6-9, 2006
Jan 30-Feb 2, 2006
Jan 23-27, 2006
Jan 16-20, 2006
Jan 3-11, 2006
2005
Dec 27-30, 2005
Dec 19-22, 2005
Dec 8-16, 2005
Dec 1-7, 2005
July 31, 2006
Been on vacation. Trying to catch up at work. More later. Sorry.
July 20, 2006
In the car going home yesterday, Max heard a news story about the GOP in Congress working on a bill to ban judges from ruling on the Constitutionality of including the phrase "under God" in the Pledge of Allegiance.
"Why don't they want us to say 'under God'?" he asked.
"That's not what the story said," I replied. "The bill will stop judges from deciding whether saying 'under God' goes against Constitutional principles. See, in the First Ammendment to the Constitution it says that the government won't pick any one religion over any others. And while most Americans believe in the Christian God, many don't and to make them pledge allegiance under the Christian God they don't believe in is making them lie.
"Think about your friend, Hanine," I said. "She worships Allah, the Muslim god. Is it fair to her to make her pledge allegiance under the Christian God?"
"No."
"There you go," I said. "But all of that is beside the point because no one is trying to change the Pledge. See, we're coming up on an election and the Republicans want to get their voters fired up. So they propose bills to get the attention of the people who vote for them. But since there is no real threat, what they're really doing is wasting a lot of time on nonsense when there are real problems in the country that they should be dealing with."
"Oh."
You have to start showing them the way when they're young.
Alberto Gonzales testified to the Senate Judiciary Committee that the reason the Justice Department's Office of Professional Responsibility could not complete an investigation of the NSA's domestic wiretapping program was because Justice Department lawyers couldn't get clearance to access Justice Department files on the issue. He then said the reason they couldn't get clearance is because President Bush wouldn't give it to them.
Bush personally interferred in the investigation to block the OPR from investigating the legality of the NSA program. Bush remains convinced that his program is legal and Constitutional, but doesn't want either the courts or the Justice Department to offer an opinion on the matter.
Back during the Clinton Administration, Janet Reno was constantly hammered by Republicans for not being independant from the Clinton Administration. They argued that she couldn't investigate the various trumped up charges against the president because she was too close to the administration. It was this bullying that caused Reno to appoint Ken Starr to investigate White Water. Now we have an attorney general that was Bush's personal lawyer. The opinions coming out of the Justice Department is that the president is always right.
November cannot get here soon enough. I only hope the Dems take back at least one chamber of Congress so we can get to the bottom of what is undoubtably the most corrupt administration in my lifetime.
Billions in damage, hundreds killed, thousands being evacuated, fighting, bombing and threats on both sides. But the White House doesn't characterize it as a war.
July 19, 2006
Rep. Lincoln Davis (D-Tennessee) took to the floor of the House today for the debate over same-sex marriage. I know what you're thinking. "But, Mike, didn't the Senate already defeat that measure?" Yes. "Then why is the House wasting time debating it?"
Check the calendar. November is coming up and the House members didn't get the chance to shake their righteous fists in front of the C-SPAN cameras when the Senate did it. So, they're wasting some more precious legislative time on this crap.
But Davis may have the right idea. He said he would not support this ammendment because it didn't go far enough. He said that if the purpose of the ammendement was to protect the institution of marriage, then there are more serious threats than homosexuals. He proposed outlawing divorce, making adultery a felony and preventing those who have divorced or committed adultery from obtaining elected office.
I don't think the cameras picked it up, but I'm betting a few sphincters tightened at that prospect. Currently, 29 members of congress have divorced at least once. There is no official count of those who have committed adultery.
Heh.
There is a Republican congressman from Minnesotta named Gil Gutkneckt. A month ago when the House was debating a useless, non-binding resolution on the Iraq war, Gutkneckt accused the Dems of "going all wobbly" over the war. According to Gutkneckt, things in Iraq were just dandy. That was then.
Gutkneckt just returned from a trip to Bagdhad where he saw first hand just how great things are. This is what he told his local paper, The Mankato Free Press.
Congressman Gil Gutknecht found the situation in Iraq more bleak than he anticipated during a weekend visit to the war zone, and said a partial withdrawal of some American troops might be wise.
Gutknecht, a strong supporter of the war since it began in March of 2003, told reporters in a telephone conference call Tuesday that American forces appear to have no operational control of much of Baghdad.
“The condition there is worse than I expected,” he said. “... I have to be perfectly candid: Baghdad is a serious problem.”
[...]
Gutknecht was critical of some of the “spin” from Bush administration officials in the Pentagon and the State Department. He specifically pointed to past statements that a few hundred insurgents were causing the violence in the Iraq. Military officials say they’ve captured 10,000 even as the insurgency continues unabated.
“That’s a far cry from what we were told originally,” he said. “... All of the information we receive sometimes from the Pentagon and the State Department isn’t always true.”
Read the whole thing. One wonders where he's been for the last few years.
Tesla Motors is going to unveil their new battery operated sports car tomorrow. They claim it will reach top speeds of 135 mph and hit 0-60 in four seconds. The price tag is a bit steep at about $100,000 and there's no place to put the child seats. So this one will have to wait until I hit the Powerball.
But I like the fact that battery technology is reaching the point where we can have a purely electric car that reaches highway speeds. You can charge the battery on this thing (and drive 250 miles) for less than $3.
So Bush vetoed the bill to expand stem cell research to allow federally funded labs to use the embryos that fertility clinics were throwing away. This is his first veto of his presidency. Yesterday, I mentioned that if your cause was just and righteous, you shouldn't have to lie about it.
Karl Rove, in defending Bush's veto, told a Denver crowd:
"We were all an embryo at one point, and we ought to as a society be very careful about being callous about the wanton destruction of embryos, of life," Rove said.
Recent studies, he said, show that researchers "have far more promise from adult stem cells than from embryonic stem cells."
Let's leave aside for a moment the notion that the embryos covered by the legislation will be destroyed whether the bill passes or not. What about these "recent studies" he cites? What is he talking about?
The Chicago Tribune could not find a single scientist in the field who either agreed with Rove's assertion or knew of any study that did. The fact is the field is still too young to make comparative statements about the promise of adults vs. embryonic stem cells. But we do know that adult stem cells are less flexible when it comes to generating new tissue. So where did these "recent studies" come from?
White House spokesman Ken Lisaius on Tuesday could not provide the name of a stem cell researcher who shares Rove's views on the superior promise of adult stem cells.
Meanwhile, Tony Snow says that the reason Bush vetoed the bill was because he felt it was murder. Bush's own statements continue to cloud the issue:
Announcing the veto, Bush was surrounded in the East Room by so-called "snowflake" families, those with children born through embryo donation.
"They remind us of what is lost when embryos are destroyed in the name of research. The remind us that we all begin our lives as a small collection of cells. And they remind us that in our zeal for new treatments and cures, America must never abandon our fundamental morals," Bush said.
If this is the way Bush really feels, then he should encourage congress to close fertility clinics and outlaw invetrofertilization. Because despite the efforts of "snowflake" families and organizations determined to find a home for adoptable embryos, dozens of embryos are destroyed for every one that is successfully brought to term. Congress is proposing nothing more than taking the byproduct of an accepted medical practice that will be destroyed anyway and using it for a live-giving purpose. How can that be ethically wrong?
But Bush will not be moved because there's an election coming and the GOP base needs some red meat. The only problem is that the Republicans are split on the issue. Even some of the most conservative recognize that this bill will not cause any additional embryos to be destroyed and may in fact lead to cures for more than 71 diseases that plague mankind.
They call themselves pro-life, but you can't tell it from where I sit.
"I am pro-life, but I disagree with the president's decision to veto the Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act," said Frist. "Given the potential of this research and the limitations of the existing lines eligible for federally funded research, I think additional lines should be made available."
July 18, 2006
The Senate is getting ready to pass a bill that expands federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. The House has already passed the measure so, if the Senate follows suit (and the current count is 62 for, 38 against) then Bush has threatened to veto the bill.
For those of you against embryonic stem cell research, please do me this favor: take a pencil and make a dot on a piece of paper. The zygote you are equating with human life is smaller than the mark you just made. That zygote is a clump of cells. It is not a human life. It's a genderless, featureless and souless clump of cellular tissue which may hold the key to curing 100 million Americans who suffer from various diseases, including the Alzheimers that claimed my grandmother.
Sen. Brownback (R-Nutjob) brought in a prop in the form of a crippled man and his family to cloud the issue. The man said he didn't think it would be right to kill his own daughter just so that he might be able to walk again. Stem cell research would not kill anyone.
Look. If you're against embryonic stem cell research on the basis that it would destroy human life, then you have to want to outlaw invetrofertilization clinics. If zygotes are the moral equivilent to human beings, then these fertility clinics are the death camps of our time. When a couple goes to one of these places, dozens of embryos are fertilized and implanted. Then the doctor takes deliberate steps to get rid of all but one. The others are either thrown out with the trash or frozen for a while, then thrown out with the trash. It is inconceivable to me that people would not want to use this byproduct (and face it, that's what it is) for the betterment of mankind and the advancement of medical science.
The current lines of stem cells available for research began before Bush's ban. The labs had no idea that they were working with the last available lines and so the current stem cells are not viable for saving human life. Many have been mixed with mouse stem cells. Many have been degraded. None are ever going to be used on humans. Bush's ban is too limiting and isn't based on either logic or reality.
Frist agrees with me, as does Specter and Hatch. The Senators are coming around. It's that pigheaded man in the White House who is going to doom millions of Americans to suffering and death for the sake of a clump of cells that will sit in the trash and melt away.
CNN's big story yesterday was that Bush said "shit" at a luncheon for the leaders of the G8. I could care less. He didn't know there was a live microphone, so we got a rare look at some inside baseball-type stuff. What's more embarrassing than Bush's salty language is his table manners and the fact that he can't come up with any meaningful conversation when faced with his peers.
Here is an excerpt from the transcript. Bush is talking to Chinese President Hu Jintao
Bush: "Gotta go home. Got something to do tonight. Go to the airport, get on the airplane and go home. How about you? Where are you going? Home?"
Bush: "This is your neighborhood. It doesn't take you long to get home. How long does it take you to get home"
[Reply is inaudible]
Bush: "Eight hours? Me too. Russia's a big country and you're a big country."
[At this point, the president seems to bring someone else into the conversation. Possibly British Prime Minister Tony Blair]
Bush: "It takes him eight hours to fly home."
[to a server]
Bush : "No, Diet Coke, Diet Coke."
[Back to Blair]
Bush: "It takes him eight hours to fly home. Eight hours. Russia's big and so is China."
Now imagine him saying it while chewing on a buttered roll and you've got a clear picture of our president. November 2008 cannot get here soon enough. Elsewhere in the transcript, Bush calls the British Prime Minister by saying "Yo, Blair." He tells an aid that he doesn't want any prepared remarks for the closing speeches because he's not going to speak long. Some of his peers, he believes, talk "too damn long."
And it's not just the fact that Bush has nothing meaningful to say to his peers. It's that he doesn't seem to know how to act around them. Germany has a new chancellor, Angela Merkel. At the end of one meeting, Bush comes up behind her and rubs her neck before leaving the meeting. Watch the video. She's not happy about it. In fact, it looks like she's recoiling.
This is not the behavior of the supposed leader of the free world. It is the sort of behavior that leads world leaders to lose respect for America. This was reflected at press conference in which Russian President Vladimir Putin had no problem badmouthing Bush's Iraq war while sharing a stage with him.
BUSH: I talked about my desire to promote institutional change in parts of the world, like Iraq, where there’s a free press and free religion. And I told him that a lot of people in our country would hope that Russia will do the same thing. I fully understand, however, that there will be a Russian-style democracy.
PUTIN: We certainly would not want to have same kind of democracy as they have in Iraq, quite honestly.
BUSH: Just wait.
[sigh]
The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee posted an internet ad that featured flag-draped coffins of dead soldiers being brought home from Iraq. The Republicans went ballistic, raising a big stink about politicizing dead Americans. Here's the thing. Back in 2004, the Bush/Cheney campaign ran an ad that featured a flag-draped body being pulled from the wreckage from 9/11.
That, according to House Majority Leader John Boehner is completely different. Here's what he told the Cincinatti Enquirer:
Questioned by reporters on what the difference was, Boehner seemed tongue-tied. "These were American citizens killed by terrorists. That is a very different policy issue than American soldiers dying on the battlefield protecting the rights and freedoms of American people."
"How so?" a reporter asked.
"How so? You want me to describe the difference between men and women of the military out there defending the American people, and victims - victims - of terrorist activities?" Boehner asked
"They were both killed by opponents, right? Terrorists or Islamic insurgents?" a reporter pressed.
An exasperated Boehner said: "The World Trade Center victims were victims of a terrorist act here on our shore and I think all Americans were appalled that this did in fact happen. But I think the differences, in terms of the images, are as clear as night and day."
Tim Grieve at Salon said it well:
Yes, they are. One is an image of a flag-covered body used in an ad by the Republican president of the United States. The other is an image of flag-covered bodies used by the Democrats who challenge him. One represents a victim of a terrorist attack that the president and his party use to justify most everything they do. The other represents victims of an unnecessary war whose consequences the president and his party would like very much to ignore.
Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif) had several members of his staff phone federally funded pregnancy resource centers posing as pregnant 17-year-olds to find out what sort of information these centers were offering. He discovered that much of what was being disseminated was false, misleading and wrong.
Staffers contacted 23 centers and 20 of them gave false or misleading information:
* One center said that “all abortion causes an increased risk of breast cancer in later years," while another told the caller that an abortion would “affect the milk developing in her breasts” and that the risk of breast cancer increased by as much as 80% following an abortion.
* Seven centers told the caller that having an abortion could hurt her chances of having children in the future. One center said that damage from abortion could lead to “many miscarriages” or to “permanent damage” so “you wouldn’t be able to carry,” telling the caller that this is “common” and happens “a lot.”
* One center said that the suicide rate in the year after an abortion “goes up by seven times.” Another center said that post-abortion stress suffered by women having abortions is “much like” that seen in soldiers returning from Vietnam and “is something that anyone who’s had an abortion is sure to suffer from.”
I see it this way. If your cause, in this case ending abortion, is good and righteous, then you shouldn't have to lie about it to scare kids.
We were grocery shopping this weekend at the local Kroger. Now you have to understand that Murfreesboro is a college town and as such, we get our share of co-eds wandering around in public places.
I have aged to the point where I am invisible to said co-eds and since I travel with a wife and two chattering howler monkeys everywhere I go, there is little fear that I will actually engage anyone socially. This is a good thing as I've never been much of a ladies man. I am, however, quite fond of "getting my gawk on" as the kids say.
So we're in Kroger and I'm pushing a cart. Rozzy is in the seat jabbering on about something or other. Max is touching every product on the shelf as we walk by (knocking over about every seventh bottle of maple syrup) and Dollie is leading the way. Coming up the aisle is a young woman possessed of the superficial qualities that many shallow men find alluring. She was wearing a wife-beater t-shirt over either a very dark bra or, more likely a bikini top. I stopped fussing at my kids long enough to pick up my jaw.
As we walked passed and I was completely ignored by her (invisible, remember?). Dollie, who knew what was up, whispered in my ear.
"You're old enough to be her father," she said.
"She can call me daddy," I replied as we turned the corner.
It's a funny phenomenon to me because, while co-eds are often pretty to look at and can stir up some primal urges within the old man psyche, teenage and even college age boys offer little for Dolls because they look so damn stupid all the time with their pants pulled down below their butts and their caps pointing in any direction but forward. Oh, she may get the occasional thrill of seeing the rugby team jogging shirtless down the sidewalks near campus, but for the most part, young men just look ignorant, jobless and not very bright.
The other day, Dolls told me of seeing a teenager who was standing in his front yard with his pants down to just above his knees. They were belted and he kept them from completely falling off by holding onto his belt buckle. In what world is that cool? Do these people make fun of those of us who pull our pants up?
There is a rumor that the droopy pants fad started in prison as a means of letting homosexuals know you are "available." But Snopes says that, while the fad did start in prison, the homosexual advertisment thing is a myth.
The Wall Street Journal ran an article about how droopy pants are making it easier for police to catch criminals because they can't run or jump in them. Virginia tried to outlaw droopy pants, but the bill was killed in the Senate. Since the origin of the fad can be traced to the early '90s, I can only assume it's lasted this long out of spite. Fashions usually change more rapidly, but this one so confounds adults who, like me, just don't "get it" that the practice is . . . uh . . . hanging around for longer than fashion would normally dictate.
So wear your droopy pants, young man. Become incapacitated by your own clothing. Make one hand completely useless for anything other than holding up your pants. I'm sure there are people out there who think you look cool. But only if you put on a $40 trucker cap and point the bill over your ear.
I've been there. I lived through the era of parachute pants, bad '80s haircuts, t-shirts with the collars rippd off, rat tails, Member's Only jackets, liesure suits and rainbow suspenders. I've suffered for fashion. I wore my shirts buttoned to the top without a tie. I've rolled up the sleeves of many a sport coat. I've worn fingerless gloves and bolo ties. I get it. You're young, you've got the right to look like an idiot. I mean if not you, then who?
Oh man. I just discovered a blog written by a woman named Emily. She found out a few days ago that her husband is cheating on her with her best friends. Today begins her 14 days of revenge and day one is a doozy.
Late update: Oh wait. It's a fake. Viral marketing -- gotta love it.
July 17, 2006
It was a busy, busy weekend. Dollie's show is going well. The kids are breaking in the new kitten and I had a big clix tourney.
We went to see Grandaddy at the rehab center yesterday. His physical therapy is going well. He said they're sending him back to Vanderbilt on Tuesday to have a doctor check out his leg and see if he could put some weight on it. He says he's ready to go home, but he's been saying that for weeks.
Grandaddy is hard of hearding. He had hearing aids, but I can hardly ever get him to understand what I'm saying. I don't know if it is the pitch of my voice or what, but he can't hear me. So, he nods a lot and plays with the kids. Rozzy was putting on a show when my brother Dan and his wife, Tiffany showed up. Grandaddy immediately lit up. He can hear Dan and Dan knows how to get him talking and actively engaged.
While Tiffany was getting the update from Grandaddy, Dan and I discussed politics. It seems he's picked his candidate for president in 2012 -- Bob Corker.
"Bob Corker is the man," he said. "You can blog about this tomorrow. Bob Corker for president."
Corker is currently running for the GOP nomination for Frist's seat. He's got two major candidates for the nomination: Ed Bryant and Van Hilleary. Dan's support for Corker seems to be based on a single TV commercial in which Corker walks part of the Mexican border and talks tough on immigration.
"But Bush wants limited amnesty and a guest worker program," I pointed out.
"He just said that because we needed the votes," he replied.
"He said it last week," I said.
"Corker for president."
I have to admit that his TV spots are powerful, not the immigration one that Dan likes so much, frankly, it plays too much to our fears and bigotry. But he's got another one in which people in Chattanooga talk about how he was the greatest mayor in the city's history. I like Chattanooga. The progress they've made on many fronts it to be commended. So of the GOP candidates, Bob Corker is probably the least offensive.
Ed Bryant, who bills himself as "the real conservative" was the prosecutor for the Clinton impeachment hearings and the congressman chosen to interview Monica Lewinsky. His knee-jerk Republican conservative street cred is without question. But the GOP is embarrased about the impeachment now, so I don't know how it will play out. Most likely, though the nomination is Bryant's to lose.
Van Hilleary is a bit of a joke. He doesn't come of well on TV (or in any venue in which you hear him speak). In his TV spot he brags about his intention to "fight Hillary Clinton every step of the way." He doesn't photograph well and his last attempt at winning statewide office failed spectacularly. This is most likely his last chance because losing twice makes it harder to raise money for a third campaign.
On the side of goodness and light, Harold Ford, Jr. is bringing in the Big Dog to campaign for him. Bill Clinton will speak at three Ford fundraisers and hopefully bring in enough cash to keep him going for a while. When I mention Ford, Dan said "Isn't he that crazy guy from Memphis?"
"That's his uncle," I said.
"No difference." Using that logic, there's no difference between Dan and Uncle Curtis, Uncle Junior, Uncle Harold, Uncle Glenn or Uncle Richard.
Dan also informed me that during a free Showtime preview weekend, he watched "Fahrenheit 911" to see what all the fuss was about.
"If all that was true," he said. "I'd hate Bush, too." However, Dan is convinced that it was a bunch of lies.
"What specifically was untrue?" I asked.
"He made it all up from scratch," he joked.
"You're experiencing what we call 'congnitive dissonance'," I said. "You only hear what you want to believe and the rest of it goes right by"
"Yeah," he laughed.
I'm proud of him for watching it, though. So often when people are so convinced that they're right, they won't even attempt to see the other side or hear their arguments.
Last week, as I walked home from Badger's house, I kicked something made of plastic in the street. I picked it up. It was a game cartridge for Gameboy Advanced. The label had been peeled off, so I didn't know which title it was, but I was struck at how odd it was to find such a thing on the road.
I bought my first Gameboy in 1989. It took 17 years for the technology to advance to the point where you might find a cartridge laying in the street.
What other technology can we measure that way? The ball-point pen? The disposable lighter? The digital watch? I got my first digital watch in 1978. Now you can get them free in cereal boxes.
Colorado Confidential has a post detailing a campaign event inwhich Ann Coulter appeared on behalf of a Republican candidate for governor named Bob Beauprez. No donors showed up, not a single one, to hear Ann Coulter speak. Heh. Total money raised for the evening: $0.
The National Journal published a list of White House staffers and their salaries. Think Progress identified the four most overpaid White House staffers:
Deborah Nirmala Misir
Ethics Advisor
Salary: $114,688
Erica M. Dornburg
Ethics Advisor
Salary: $100,547
Stuart Baker
Director for Lessons Learned
Salary: $106,641
Melissa M. Carson
Director of Fact Checking
Salary: $46,500
July 14, 2006
Evidently, we have a new kitten. Max picked one from the litter at my mom's house and will be bringing it home today. It's a grey, short-haired male tabby named "Speedy." Speaking of males, there is a male pug running around the neighborhood. It has a colar, so I assume it's just getting away from home for a walk-about.
Anyhoo, it wandered up to the house and Max saw it. He thought it was a great dog until it turned to walk away and Max caught a glimpse of it's boy parts. Evidently, the pug hasn't been fixed. Max was completely creeped out by the sight of pug scrotum and decided right then that he no longer wanted a dog. Heh.
Four winners of the National Design Awards have turned down an invitation to breakfast at the White House. Here is the letter they wrote:
Dear Mrs. Bush:
As American designers, we strongly believe our government should support the design profession and applaud the White House sponsorship of the Cooper Hewitt National Design Museum. And as finalists and recipients of the National Design Award in Communication Design we are deeply honored to be selected for this recognition. However, we find ourselves compelled to respectfully decline your invitation to visit the White House on July 10th.
Graphic designers are intimately engaged in the construction of language, both visual and verbal. And while our work often dissects, rearranges, rethinks, questions and plays with language, it is our fundamental belief, and a central tenet of "good" design, that words and images must be used responsibly, especially when the matters articulated are of vital importance to the life of our nation.
We understand that politics often involves high rhetoric and the shading of language for political ends. However it is our belief that the current administration of George W. Bush has used the mass communication of words and images in ways that have seriously harmed the political discourse in America. We therefore feel it would be inconsistent with those values previously stated to accept an award celebrating language and communication, from a representative of an administration that has engaged in a prolonged assault on meaning.
While we have diverse political beliefs, we are united in our rejection of these policies. Through the wide-scale distortion of words (from "Healthy Forests" to "Mission Accomplished") and both the manipulation of media (the photo op) and its suppression (the hidden war casualties), the Bush administration has demonstrated disdain for the responsible use of mass media, language and the intelligence of the American people.
While it may be an insignificant gesture, we stand against these distortions and for the restoration of a civil political dialogue.
Last night I attended the opening of "Sordid Lives" at the Murfreesboro Center for the Arts. Dollie has been working very hard on the show and she did a great job. It's funny and a little sad. The cast did a great job. I particularly liked the actress who played "Sissy." She's just started getting involved with community theatre. Her portrayal was sympathetic and nuanced, which, frankly, the show could use more of.
It is about a young gay man who lives in New York, but must go back to Texas for the funeral of his grandmother. He doesn't want to go because he hasn't come out to his family yet. His grandmother died in a motel room when she tripped over her (married) boyfriend's two wooden legs and hit her head on the sink. This causes a town scandal which sweeps up the family. The "B" story is about the grandmother's son, Brother Boy who is a gay transvestite. His mother locked him away in a mental institution when he was 18, some 23 years ago. He performs drag shows as Tammy Wynett for the other patients.
Dollie plays a psychiatrist trying to "dehomosexualize" Brother Boy so she can become famous and go on Oprah.
My friend Richard directed the show and I'm reluctant to criticize it. But the scene with Brother Boy and Dr. Bollinger needed something. The actor playing Brother Boy, didn't bring enough depth of emotion to the scene. The way it's written, it's too easy to just go over the top and laugh and the funny fag in drag as he flounces around the room. But there is a sadness, anger and frustration to Brother Boy that can easily get overrun by a thick southern drawl and a big blonde wig.
Regardless, it is a great show and I'm glad I got to see it. I also encourage anyone in the area to see it. In fact, support community theatre in whatever town you call home.
"The failure to do effective, aggressive oversight disserves the country and disserves the president."
Those are the words of Newt Gingrich, appearing along with Tom Foley at a panel discussion on how bad this congress has become.
Coverage of Valerie Wilson's lawsuit against Cheney, Rove, Libby and many other Republican operatives.
Katherine Harris' senate campaign in Florida is imploding. It has been on a slow erosion for weeks. A couple of days ago her entire senior campaign staff walked. Now I read where, last year, she called up big Republican donors and warned them away from supporting a possible Senate run by Joe Scarborough because he may have been involved in the death of an intern.
Scarborough, who hosts his own show on MSNBC, was approached by GOPers to run against Harris for the senate seat. Before he could announce that he wouldn't do it, Harris started calling up GOP donors and badmouthing him. For the record, the medical examiner found no evidence of foul play in the death of Lori Klausutis. She hit her head after passing out due to a heart arrhythmia.
Coming as it did on the heels of the Chandra Levy case and the resignation of Rep. Gary Condit, the left-wing knives were out for Scarborough, but the story was dropped when the official report was filed. Only Harris seems to be talking about it now.
Looking at that kook Harris' actions, is it that far of a stretch to think she may have helped Bush steal the 2000 election?
Uh oh. ABC News is reporting that Palestinian gunmen blew a hole in a wall on the Egyptian border leading to a flood of people entering Gaza. Considering the fighting going on there, it is not to hard to speculate that those people are looking to fight the Israeli incursion.
Meanwhile, it looks like Israel is prepping to expand the fight to Syria. I don't like this at all.
The Bush administration announced recently that prisoners at Gitmo will now be subject to the Geneva Convention. This was not a situation they volunteered for out of the goodness of their collective heart. The Supreme Court made that decision for them and, amazingly enough, the Bushies have announced they will comply.
If you want to gain some insight into the conditions at Gitmo, take a gander at the report by the Center for Constitutional Rights. It includes statements from prisoners and their lawyers. See if any of it sounds like the America we were all taught about in school.
…Prisoners being interrogated at Guantánamo have been:
• held in solitary confinement for periods exceeding a year;
• deprived of sleep for days and weeks and, in at least one case, months;
• exposed to prolonged temperature extremes;
• beaten;
• threatened with transfer to a foreign country, for torture;
• tortured in foreign countries or at U.S. military bases abroad before transfer to Guantánamo;
• sexually harassed and raped or threatened with rape;
• deprived of medical treatment for serious conditions, or allowed treatment only on the condition that they “cooperate” with interrogators; and
• routinely “short-shackled” (wrists and ankles bound together and to the floor) for hours and even days during interrogations.
Have a good weekend.
July 13, 2006
It's been a while. I know. I suck.
Work has been crazy. I just finished up on a huge project and I've got another couple coming down the pike. This one was interesting, though. We have a client who has a lot of speculative capital that invests exclusively in a certain industry. They wanted to produce a mailing that will attract clients to their company.
What we came up with was a video pitch, which included a host as well as testimonials from other clients. We cast it, hired voice over artists to read the testimonials, bought stock footage to play under it and produced a very professional video.
Then, we put it on 60 video iPods, created custom boxes to hold the iPods with instructions on how to play the video, giftwrapped the boxes, attached hand -calligraphed gift tags and shipped them FedEx priority overnight to people around the country. It was a huge, expensive undertaking, but we made our deadlines and the client is happy.
In general, all the clients are happy. That's a nice feeling. I just wish it didn't come at the cost of my sanity.
The kids are at my mother's for most of the week. Dollie is attending the Tennessee Academy of the Arts, so no one is home to care for the little scamps. Let them spend a few days on the farm milking the chickens. I called to check up on them and mom told me Max was bored.
"It's too hot to go outside and he can't find anything to watch on TV."
I remember those days well. Though it seems when I was little, it didn't matter how hot it was, I got pitched out the front door.
We've picked up the Sleuth Channel. I don't watch it much, except that they play "Karen Sisco." I'm still mad they cancelled that show. It was great. There are only about six episodes, so I guess I'll watch those again and move on. They're also showing "John Doe" which I watched when Fox first showed the series. It ended in a huge cliffhanger and got canceled. I hate that.
They're showing "LA Dragnet" which I also liked. If they start showing "Boomtown" I'll have my canceled cop show trifecta working.
Speaking of cop shows, I'm looking forward to the premier of a British series called "Life on Mars." It looks like it might be really interesting. It's about a cop who's chasing down a serial killer. For some reason I've yet to glean, he's transported to 1973. He discovers that this is the beginning of the killer's spree, so he tries to solve the mystery on the front end without modern technology like DNA profiling and computers. It might be interesting.
Ann Coulter's syndicate, UPI, has cleared her of plagarism charges. I don't have all the details, but I'd like to know how that's possible, considering the evidence I've read. Regardless, the purge has begun. In Cedar Rapids, the Gazette has dropped her column after conservatives complained that their views were being misrepresented by the Queen of the Harpies.
The Shreveport Times is letting the readers vote on whether to drop her column. Here's a fun tidbit:
The National Society of Newspaper Columnists, meeting in Boston this past weekend, awarded Coulter its annual Sitting Duck Award for easiest column target. The NSNC noted that it gave the prize to the columnist/author "for cheapening political discourse in America." The statement added: "We award the Lame Duck reluctantly, because we know Ms. Coulter is desperate for any kind of attention."
Man, it didn't take Tony Snow long to bust out the "It's all Clinton's fault" card, did it? North Korea is testing missiles because the Clinton policy failed? Excuse me? When Clinton left office, the UN had inspectors in North Korea verifying that they had no plutonium. We were very close to a peace treaty that would have gone a long way toward stabalizing that region.
If you'll recall, during the first few weeks of Bush's first term, Colin Powell was enthusiastic about continuing the process of negotiation with North Korea. But the Bushies were insistent on the meme that anything Clinton was wrong and so he'd do the opposite.
So Bush embarrassed Powell and the president of South Korea (our ally) and broke off all talks with North Korea. Then he called them "evil" and made lots of threats. So, North Korea kicked out the UN inspectors and began refining plutonium.
Now, six years after the Clinton policies were abolished and Bush's swagger doctrine was enacted, North Korea has enough plutonium for as many as six nuclear weapons and they are testing ICBMs. And Bush is blaming Clinton while asking China to take care of North Korea. Pathetic.
But pathetic bloviation is what the Bushies do best. Take, for example, the recent proclamation that the deficit is going to be smaller than the White House predicted, thanks to Bush's tax cuts. There are a couple of things wrong with this:
1. The reason we have a record deficit is because of the Bush tax cuts which essentially erased the record surplus he inherited.
2. The White House's "projections" last January were overinflated and didn't jibe with the Congressional Budget Office's projections -- a pattern they have repeated often -- predict really high deficits so that when they come in 30 percent lower, you can take credit for reducing the deficit.
Think about that for a second. In January, the White House predicted budget deficits of $423 billion. In July, the deficit is measured at $296 billion. The White House says it was the tax cuts. So, these magic tax cuts reduced the deficit by $127 billion between January and July? Again, pathetic.
A near $300 billion deficit is not sound fiscal policy. Neither is a never-ending war, tax cuts in the face of a never-ending war and no-bid cost-plus contracts to the vice president's former company. Bush and his buddies must think we're all idiots with memories that don't stretch back to 2000.
A reporter for Fox News was reporting live from the Gaza strip. He gave the Israeli solders' position away and they shot at him on live TV.
Oh yeah! Game. ON!
WASHINGTON--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 13, 2006--Valerie Plame Wilson, Ambassador Joseph Wilson and their counsel, Christopher Wolf of Proskauer Rose LLP, will hold a news conference at 10 AM EDT on Friday, July 14 at 10:00 AM at the National Press Club, 529 14th St. NW, 13th Floor, Washington, DC 20045, to announce the filing of a civil lawsuit against I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice-President Richard Cheney and Karl Rove.
