Enemy Combatant
Sunday, October 31, 2004
Accelerate The Entropy! Cannon Fodder Is Too Precious And Sacrosanct For Stem Cell Research!
Wednesday, October 27, 2004
Same Back At Ya, Chimpy
I regret that I have but one ballot to cast to rid America of this vile and shallow poltroon. But I'm looking forward to this country, collectively, giving him back our "one-fingered victory salute" this coming Tuesday.
The Massachusetts Miracle: Talk About Your Trifecta
Boy . . . the Patriots in February. The Sox in October. (Who'da thunk?)
I think Kerry needs to start bringing a broom with him everywhere for the next six days . . .
Good Dog! Here's A Milkbone
thanks to DC and bartcop
Tuesday, October 26, 2004
Fear And Loathing, Campaign 2004
Hunter S. Thompson -- making the empirical argument that the only rational way to deal with the Bush administration is to ingest phenomenal amounts of booze and pharmaceuticals -- returns to a familiar subject, and finds himself pining for The Unshaven One:
Richard Nixon looks like a flaming liberal today, compared to a golem like George Bush. Indeed. Where is Richard Nixon now that we finally need him?
If Nixon were running for president today, he would be seen as a "liberal" candidate, and he would probably win. He was a crook and a bungler, but what the hell? Nixon was a barrel of laughs compared to this gang of thugs from the Halliburton petroleum organization who are running the White House today -- and who will be running it this time next year, if we (the once-proud, once-loved and widely respected "American people") don't rise up like wounded warriors and whack those lying petroleum pimps out of the White House on November 2nd.
Nixon hated running for president during football season, but he did it anyway. Nixon was a professional politician, and I despised everything he stood for -- but if he were running for president this year against the evil Bush-Cheney gang, I would happily vote for him.
Absolutely worth reading. Features the recent presidential debates, RMN, LBJ, a little of both JFKs, Muhammad Ali, a truly ha-ha-strange sex limerick allegedly told by Shrub at Yale, the Reichtag fire, and a few other surprises.
That Hunter -- he might mince his brains, but he doesn't mince his words.
Monday, October 25, 2004
Happy Days Are Here Again (And I Have Proof)
Newt Gingrich, August 1993: "The tax increase [in Clinton's first budget] will kill jobs and lead to a recession, and the recession will force people off of work and onto unemployment and will actually increase the deficit."
Newt Gingrich, October, 2004: "Neither side is going to get a 1964-style landslide."
Let's hope Newt's powers of prognostication prove just as accurate today as they were 11 years ago.
Friday, October 22, 2004
GOP Plan To Scare Voters By Crying Wolf Is A Howler
The impact of the GOP's big, anticipated "Wolf" ad, premiering today (and viewable at the Bush-Cheney site), apparently is turning out to be less of a bang than a whimper. First, the audience at CNN's Crossfire, when it was shown to them, reportedly laughed at it. Second, it lends itself to too many unfortunate metaphors ("Boy King again cries wolf," anyone?). Third -- and I hope Kerry mentions this about every 30 seconds or so, in the next eleven days -- no human being has ever been killed by a wolf in the continental United States -- ever.
And lastly -- aren't those wolf puppies just too cuuuute?
Wednesday, October 20, 2004
Remember: You Heard It Here First
Congress will hold approval of Bush's "9/11 reforms" hostage, until he releases the CIA report re: said date. Afghanistan and Iraq will continue to implode, the victims of a brain-damaged wingnut policy that will leave them each with a central government weak enough to drown in a bathtub. Further Abu Ghraib leaks will come out, these involving rapes of young boys (caught on tape). Gasoline, the price of which has rocketed through the stratosphere the last few months, may stay plateau'd for the next two weeks. (That last tidbit is the good news for Bush.)
Not only should Kerry be measuring for new drapes, but I've already got his campaign victory song. And, in keeping with the Clinton tradition, it's by Fleetwood Mac.
No, not that one (thank God!). That one.
(And I propose they get the Dixie Chicks to perform it at the inaugural ball. Right after they perform Warren Zevon's "Lawyers, Guns and Money," and dedicate it to Dubya.)
Oh, and in the Series? Bosox in six.
Tuesday, October 19, 2004
The Perfect (Shit)Storm
Robert Scheer has a story in the LA Times about how, as of June, the CIA prepared a scathing report on 9/11, that allegedly kicks ass and "blames names." Seems that the Bush administration wants to sit on the report (which Congress requested) until after the election. Something makes me think all those "blame the CIA" excuses Bush has made for believing his own special Ripleys-Believe-It-Or-Not funny pages version of Iraq intel might just come back to haunt him.
Listen -- do you hear a drip, drip sound? Is that a leak somewhere?
Thursday, October 14, 2004
Don't Laugh: It's Probably A Lucrative Magazine Idea
Wednesday, October 13, 2004
Lord, Somebody Put A Fork In Dubya
'cause he's done . . .
It'll be a slow count by the refs (20 more days, in fact), but he ain't getting up off the canvas between now and then . . .
Tuesday, October 12, 2004
Electronic Or Alien, Take Your Pick
OK, salon.com is running the above two pictures, side by side. To me, it means one of two things -- either:
1. Dubya's "wired for sound" pretty much all the time (at least while a camera is on him); or
2. He's got one of those slimy alien leeches on his back, a la Puppet Masters:
Sunday, October 10, 2004
Topic One: It's The Incompetence, Stupid
Right out of the box, Kerry in the last debate has to look for an opening, and then say this: "I'll tell you what -- in a Kerry administration, if we get the heads-up that half the flu vaccines might be contaminated, we won't sit around on that information with our thumbs up our asses for a month, without scrambling (like the British and French did) to buy up replacement vaccines available around the world.
"Of course, they 'hide' that kind of information from our Widowmaker-in-Chief, by printing it in the newspapers. What happened there, W -- couldn't tear yourself away from the sequel to My Pet Goat?"
Saturday, October 09, 2004
No More Mr. Nice Guy
Come Wednesday, I hope somebody's worked John Kerry into the proper state of mind for his last debate with Bush -- which is to say, politically homicidal. It's time to bare those teeth, Big John. It's time to show the American public the proper, patriotic way to frag a superior officer.
No more of this halfway, mealy-mouthed bullshit -- I want him to call Bush a liar, and use that very word, repeatedly. I want him to talk about the cooked intelligence that led us to Iraq (and to call THAT war a mistake). I want him to talk about Abu Ghraib, and Gitmo, and how those are a national disgrace that will haunt us well into this new century (if not longer). I want him to say if Bush had any real sense of "restoring honor and decency" to the White House, he'd have resigned a long time ago.
I want the issue of the day for the Media Attack Poodles to gnaw on endlessly the next day to be framed as follows: Has the Bush administration been worse than the Herbert Hoover administration, or about the same? You decide.
If he needs to watch Congressman Ryan's comments on the "draft dodgers" in the GOP House this week, or read about what Nancy Pelosi managed to sneak past the Republican Politburo, to pump him up, I'd say go for it. Ask the American public for exactly what you want: A Democratic Congress, to replace the Do-Nothing GOP Congress that's currently wasting space at Foggy Bottom. Hell, you gots to go all Harry Truman on his ass; get all up in his grill, yo.
For this last debate, please, Big John -- it's time to get your Howard Dean face on.
A Gertrude Stein Riddle: Why Is Bush Like Oakland?
Scott Rosenberg, who blogs at salon.com, had an interesting insight after last night's debate, about how Kerry invariably benefits (and Bush invariably loses ground) just from the media exposure alone:
Kerry's prize, just for showing up!
I imagine the Bush people are happy tonight -- this debate wasn't the obvious rout the last one was. But I still think the essential dynamic here helps Kerry. The problem for Bush is simple: The more time he spends in front of the American people in a forum that is not handpicked and tightly controlled by his own handlers, the more it's clear that there's nothing more to Bush.
If you already support him, well, you already support him, you're probably not going to change. If you're a Kerry supporter, like me, you're just going to keep shaking your head in disbelief. So all that matters is the slim wedge of people outside of the two camps. And with each debate, those people are seeing that, with Bush, that's all there is, folks. His lines are writ in stone, and we've heard them already. Here they were again: "He changed positions." (As if that in itself were a crime.) "I know how these people think." (The line reeked of dismissive condescension in the first debate, yet here it was again: does it play to the know-nothing xenophobic heartland?) "We've already got 75% of al-Qaida."(Oh, so why are we so worried about a terror attack? Ah, that's right, we got 75% of the leadership as of 9/11/2001 -- then we gave them some real effective recruiting help by invading Iraq.) Love him or hate him, you couldn't come away from this debate feeling that you'd heard or learned a single new thing from Bush.
Meanwhile, with each debate Kerry gets to display more of himself, gets to prove -- simply by virtue of showing up, being fast on his feet and articulate and smart and able to stand up for himself -- that he is nothing like the insane caricature of himself that the Bush ads have portrayed.
The time Bush spends in the spotlight diminishes him; the time Kerry spends in the spotlight enhances him. Since a political campaign can't hide the candidate, this leaves Bush in a bind. No wonder Kerry's strategists were willing to compromise on so many details of the debate formats to get Bush to commit to a third engagement. On to the next debate!
Thursday, October 07, 2004
New Florida E-Voting Machine
Give it a try!
Glad to see they've got that problem nailed down. So to speak.
Wednesday, October 06, 2004
Why Kerry's Alleged "Global Test" For Use Of American Power Sounds Familiar
The GOP talking pointy-heads have steered clear of pointing this out, but Kerry's announcement in Debate One that America's warmaking should have to meet a "global test" sounds eerily familiar -- like our having to explain, on a world stage, our taking up arms to defend ourselves, out of "a decent respect for the opinions of mankind."
Now we see who's filling Kerry's mind with this internationalist garbage -- that goddamned wine-swilling, world-travelling, French-speaking, church-and-state-separating, Unitarian-believing hippie commie liberal, Thomas Jefferson!
Monday, October 04, 2004
Powell Quits: "Apres Moi, Le Deluge"
We've got us a significant leak, folks:
from salon.com:
A veteran Foreign Service officer warns that when Colin Powell departs in a second Bush term, America will lose its last bulwark against the radical ideologues who are planning more Iraqs.
Editor's note: "Anonymous" is a veteran Foreign Service officer currently serving as a State Department official. The views expressed are personal and not related to his official position.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
By Anonymous
Oct. 4, 2004 | Secretary of State Colin Powell is not staying for a second Bush term. When he goes, the last bulwark against complete neoconservative control of U.S. foreign policy goes with him. The implications are enormous, yet the American electorate appears to be blinded by the Bush campaign's deliberate manipulations of 9/11.
. . .
Powell is leaving. We need to repeat that. When this reality sinks in, we will finally understand what we are getting ourselves into in a second Bush term. A handful of conservative columnists, Republican senators and a few other GOP luminaries are trying to reclaim a traditional conservative Republican foreign policy approach. But it is clearly too late.
Further evidence the Bush kakocracy is beyond redemption.
Sunday, October 03, 2004
Here's a question I'd like to see someone pose to Bush
at the next, "town hall" forum debate:
If your performance in the Oval Office over the past four years is the result of all your "hard work" (as you reminded us seven times at the last debate) -- if you're giving us what I assume are your "best efforts" now -- why should we expect that you're even capable of the increased effort that will obviously be necessary just to start to improve things?
Friday, October 01, 2004
Some Headlines I'd Like To See
WHITE HOUSE TIMEPIECES RUNNING MORE SMOOTHLY, ACCURATELY TODAY
Early Polling Shows Nation Grateful For Bush "Clock Cleaning" By Kerry
