This place was created near the end of the twentieth century just for the heck of it..
Tuesday February 29, 2000
Obviously this day doesn't exist so neither will I.
Monday February 28, 2000
Naturally, I am still outraged by the Daillo killers exoneration, but I will wait for possible prosecution by the Federal Department of Justice, or at least a civil case down the road which (like in the Simpson debacle several years ago finally put the blame on Simpson where everyone who can think knew it belonged) could nail the Giuliani hit men with the responsibility for the wrongful killing.
Meanwhile, I have to get back to the haplessness of George W and his advisers. So they finally figure out that the pandering to the wackos might backfire and decide that they need the Catholic vote so they put out this baloney-fat letter. Well George, where is the letter of explanation to all the others. The Blacks, the Latinos, the Asians, the Muslims, the regular Protestants, the Jews, even the agnostics and atheists. George W. the equal opportunity offender should at least be an equal opportunity apologist.
So, it's only a few days to the first game of the Spring Exhibition Season. Are you ready? Pedro is.
Saturday February 26, 2000
Today I am forced suffer the words of some who want me to believe that the four policeman who gunned down Amadou Diallo were not guilty of anything; and that a slight, young black man in broad daylight looking a little afraid as four large brutish looking white guys approach him and force him a to simply try to get away by entering his own house then the four cop thugs decide that he must be reaching for a gun when he reached for his wallet, probably to show some ID that the cops were no doubt screaming for, this small frightened black man scared this gang of Giuliani enforcers enough to shoot him down in a hail of 41 bullets. Not guilty! Not Guilty! Not guilty of anything?
Then this Giulani character goes on television and tells me that I should feel sorry for the four cops and what they and their families were forced to go through. This is an exact quote from Giuliani, "We also express sympathy, in the strongest terms, for the four police officers who were involved in this case and to their families, who have gone through also a nightmare."
Friday Februrary 25, 2000
Recently, one of Americas growth industries has been the selling of souls, so whats with eBay.
Now a short list of other stuff that bugs me lately.
John McCain(s) all of them.
Thursday February 24, 2000
Go George W
Keep them coming. Being born again, following Jesus is pretty cool. You get to kill in his name just like the Crusaders, the Inquisitors, the Conquistadores....I could go on and on, but what's the point.
Wednesday February 23, 2000
Look, I don't know what happened to yesterday. I just forgot. Tuesdays are very easy to forget. But Wednesdays are not. So here we go with the stuff for today and the ages.
Life here in America is great lately, circuses everywhere. Take the "How to Marry a Millionaire" circus. What could be better?
Maybe this. And this. Now, make no mistake about it, The guy they want to win will win. George W. will make further pacts with the wackos and especially Pat Robertson, who I am sure will eventually reveal that in one of his latest talks with god was told that not only is McCain the spawn of the devil, but that Bush has to be the nominee, because...well, because god says so. What insights cause Bush to court the really far out types like Robertson? Is there word for reverse Faustian pacts? I know George W is not exactly smart, but Pat Robertson. All I can do is enjoy it because like this fellow traveler says, Bush may be committing political suicide. Who could have guessed.
Lets see other circuses. Here is a baseball one. And a religion one that is related to "sports". There are other and funnier ones everywhere, but I am lazy and bored.
Monday February 21, 2000
Well, faced with this anxious news, why should we worry about this guy any more?
Happy Presidents Day. For the fun of it try to imagine President George W. Bush!!! For something to do waiting for the end.
Sunday February 20, 2000
Allright, so McCain can't see the future. It's funny, I spent a short time this morning listening to a panel of pundits try their best to overanalyze the NC primary results and at the same time try to say something that would have their listeners believe that even though they have now blown two so-called big elections that they can safely call the next big one accurately. So, the consensus. Well. MCain better win Michigan or he is "finished", "toast", "dead", "gone", "history", "a dim memory", "out of it" and on and on and on it goes. What insight.
Bush, the pandering puppet of the extreme right wing wackos, will be their nominee as I have said here over and over and over and over and over again. Period and end of story.
Now, here from the "funny parts" as we used to call them back when I was a kid and always got to look at the funny parts right after I picked up the paper on the way home from church where my mother and father used to make me go every Sunday morning although I have no memory of them ever going inside a church on their own volition, anyway after puzzling over the depiction of Puck at the top of the page holding a banner that read "What fools these mortals be" I would go on to read them, the funny parts, or as we now say, the comics and find truth and wisdom and some occasional baloney-fat. This is a little of all three. But, alas I can't show it to you since the strip, Non-Sequitur has joined a comic syndicate on the stinking internet and it is not posted and I don't know what to do except to forget about it............ Oh, baloney fat, find an actual newspaper and read it there.
Saturday February 19, 2000
And this just in, twenty four hours before the vote, McCain gives all another reason to vote for him. He can see the future. In one fell swoop, McCain becomes, oh what's her name --oh yeah, Dianne Warwick. Now I only wish I were down in that enlightened place that gives the nation Strom Thurmond and congressman Lindsay Graham ( he is the one who frothed at the mouth a lot during the impeachment trail as one of the house's 13 prosecuters) and Susan Smith---remember her the nutcase who drowned her kids and tried to ignite the country by blaming a "black man" while she got tons of national press.
Republicans are fun aren't they?
What else is going on.
Thursday February 17, 2000
Nearly 23,000,000 Americans are interested in this and you I are worried over the person who will be the President and will appoint Supreme Court Justices who will affect the way all of us will live our lives for the next half century or so?
Wednesday February 16, 2000
I did not watch the so-called debate last night. I haven't ( I have to confess) been paying much attention to the presidential campaign period in the past few days. It's all pure baloney-fat in the very visible GOP scramble, and it pretty much seems to be over in the invisible Democratic "race". So what's a person to do?
I am doing a couple of things. I am taking courses and studying history. Note the last line of this essay.
Monday February 14, 2000
First, foremost, and most of all appropriately, Happy St. Valentine Day!!! I would have preferred to give you chocolates, but the article will have to do.
This morning C-SPAN gave me a really nice time with Mona Charen for Valentines Day. That, as I have noted here before is one very scary woman. Today she repeated one of her favorite fantasy wishes to make America a better place. Only people who pay taxes should be allowed to vote. This is her version of the right wing wacko rap that most Democrats and Liberals are freeloading late sleeping non tax-paying lazy stupid types, and most likely ethnic and non god-fearing and tv watching to boot. The scary part with Mrs. Charen is that she means it. She doesn't remember America back in the days of Poll taxes and other prequalifiers to vote.Or maybe she does.
Back in the days, I had an friend who argued with me that I wasn't and shouldn't be allowed to vote in the la-di-da town I lived in because I was just renting a house there, and she also said that she was and should be allowed to vote in three towns because she and her husband owned a house in the la-di-da town plus rental buildings in two others. The lady actually believed that and probably still does. So, my Valentine day present from C-Span, Mona, is a liberal by comparison.
Enough of that nostalgic wax. Back to today and the clear danger that George W ( despite the recent wave of McCain hysteria and hype) might be the next President of the good old USA. Here is some more reading to scare you, as it scared me.
Saturday February 12, 2000
A long time ago I figured out that certain things were worth taking seriously. And I will not get into that very long subject here. Just as long a time ago, I figured out that certain certain things were not worth taking seriously, and thankfully I won't tackle that here and now either.
Having said that, as the pundits so often like to say, here is an example of what I could talk about that illustrates both sides of the aforementioned subject. Jesse, The Bad Joke, Ventura. Notice that it is the venerable Time Magazine doing this "analysis" as though it mattered a tinker's damn. GIHSMFAT. for those of you who have not been paying attention, that is "god in heaven, save me from all this". said as metaphor of course.
Friday February 11, 2000
So I had my bowl of macaroni last night and my spitits are elevated. And out in the surreal world of national politics and opinion journalism, things keep getting silly, even more silly and silly to the point of this. And I thought I was the only one in an idea drought.
Thursday February 10, 2000
I am defeated. The squirrels have won. Today, just a little while ago, I was forced to take the bird feeder down by a most serious and relentless attack from as many as ten of the vile little beasts at a time. There has to be five pounds of bird seed and various other unspeakable squirrel messes all over the ice and snow covering my little ten foot by ten foot deck. That plus the fact that they have occupied the area as if it was theirs. They are running and flying all around and I have given in.
I am depressed. I am vanquished. I am tired. I need a bowl of macaroni.
Wednesday February 9, 2000
While "thereyouhaveit" was not, I repeat not attatcked by those awful people, I did have my own version of techno-baloney yesterday. While trying to get my new links working---incidently, I have only earned $0.51 so far, you guys are going to have to do much better if I am to become well to do as I assumed would happen just after posting the links--- anyway, while trying to get them working I had to learn some more technical stuff. I actually utilized "tables" and read and edited HTML blocks if you will pardon my quasi-geektalk. C'est la vie, I suppose.
And, just in case you think I have lost all my interest in politics, here is a pretty even handed and fairly civilized continuing over view of our coming national election. It is a BBC site and worth a look. Today the lead story is about that other publishing tycoon.
And here is something I lifted from Slate.com today:
this is a quote by George W. Bush while campaigning in Nashua, NH as quoted in Slate where they, under the headline of Bushism of the Day, are quoting Gail Collins in the New York Times, Feb 1 ( if I may borrow from the new journalistic technique of quoting other journalists quoting what they think other journalists said that someone may have said)
"I think we need not only to eliminate the tollbooth to the middle class, I think we should knock down the tollbooth."
----George W. Bush
Tuesday February 8, 2000
It's another day of not much going on. I did get a newsletter today and this article by W.E.B.Du Bois was reprinted. The article is his take on the election of 1956.
This was the first election for which I was eligible to vote and vote I did:; Dwight David Eisenhower was running for re-election and back then I was caught up in all the Peace Progress and Prosperity sloganeering as well as having a father who was a red-hating, union fearing, near fascist died in the wool Republican. Miss Poolers infuence on me ( after all, she was my fifth grade teacher) was gone for the time, so I voted for Ike. I liked Ike, I guess.
Reading the Du Bois article today I am struck by how much of it could be taken word for word and applied to the election of 2000. Unlike him I will vote. Not so much for or against the candidates but against the political party that threatens the most.
Monday February 7, 2000
Over the weekend, well part of the weekend, I spent some time thinking about this whole John McCain stuff. While I still know in my bones that Bush will be the GOP candidate, McCain is still there and he worries me a little more than George W does as a potential President of the USA. The guy is with the exception of his so-called "reform" position on campaign financing is really a hard nose right winger. Baybe not as out front about it as the "I wear my Christain credentials on my sleeve" crowd but right wing enough to scare the heck out of any one but a right winger. The wackos are pretending that he is not because they really want a dupe as candidate.They picked their guy, Babs' boy, a while back. McCain will not be their dupe, but how can he be anything except their ally?
The worst thing about him is that he is being seen by the public as some kind of fresh breeze. As a truth teller. He is neither. He is an old school politician who has capitalized on his hero POW status, his powerful family military background, his very rich second wife and his good old "hey did I tell you the one about..." status with the press boys and girls.
Changing the subject. Maybe congress should ban TITANIC. Not only the worst movie ever made for a kazzillion bucks, but the worst movie ever made period, because it encourages jerks like this guy.
And back to the subject, Camille Paglia saying some of the same stuff about the candidates that I have been saying. Talk about unlikely bed-fellows. I hate this woman. Well, most of the time I do.
Sunday February 6, 2000
Take the day off. Do something outside.
Saturday February 5, 2000
C-SPAN had it's usual line-up of second stringers on this morning. It's as though they guess that all the old geezers and junkies( political) who watch every day are like the working folks and take Saturdays off to sleep late then drive around to the malls and supermarkets and dry cleansers and barbers and hair dressers and liquor stores. Well, we are not. Mostly, on Saturdays, we stay home and avoid the crowded Saturday world of the working folks, so it is the day when C-SPAN should try even harder. Doesn't matter much today though. At least for me. The increasingly silly and shrill Presedential primary "races" are boring. The outcome is not in any genuine doubt. And listening to candidates and their spinners run around calling one another liar liar, pants on fire is the ultimate political oxymoron anyway.
So I turned to some of the alternative sources today and lo and behold this bizarre and semi-sick news item from the world of science gets my eye and attention. So I conclude, hmmmmm. Giant worms. What about that!
P.S. buy a book, search for other great worm stories or something. Buy a computer, even.
Friday February 4,2000
Changes are on the way. The first of them can be seen on this page. It is a banner for Amazon.com searches and purchases. Try it if you will so I can see if it is working the way it is supposed to work Click on the banner and your personal Amazon.com purchasing page should come up. Buy a book and I get a commission. The search should find what your looking for and if you buy I get money.
Try the AltaVista search engine too. In fact try it a bunch of times. Better yet, use it for all your searches.
Back to business as uusual next time. Wisdom, politics, baloney fat, other good stuff, it will all be back.
Meanwhile, what could be funnier or funner, as the new hip would say, than watchng the GOP insider types begin to panic about whether George W can win or not. And the reality that they may have picked a horse that can't finsh. Read this.
Thursday February 3, 2000
OK! OK. I give up. Maybe we all should. This warning does it for me. It's over.
Or is it. Who really knows?
Wednesday February 2, 2000
It is Groundhog Day, and here in my local area Chucky saw his shadow. Now here I wanted to link to a weather column featured daily in my local paper, but they do not carry it on their web site. Instead I will quote from it. The column is Weatherwords by Dr. Mel Goldstein and todays headline for the column is "Is Weather Waning?Phil Knows" Dr. Mel goes on to point out that long before Punxsutawney Phil, famous groundhog of TV fame, that Feb. 2 was known as Candlemas Day and for centuries there were weather related legends associated with it. Oh, the heck with it. Look here for more on this. I am too lazy to quote the column anymore, besides he got all his stuff from this site anyway.
Oh yes, yesterday was the day of the big NH primary.
McCain won, Big Bad Barbara Bush's Bratty Baby Boy didn't. Gore won again, Bradley didn't again. What does it all mean? Not much except for the entertainment / news media.
Tuesday February 1, 2000
When was it, back in September or October last year (last century) when I first ranted some about Vieques Island in Puerto Rico? It was a while back. Well, a compromise of sorts has been worked out. My newspaper, which lapses into it's own version of tabloid headlines and yellowish journalism, headlines the story this way in a front page above the fold main headline.
I prefer the compromise angle to the yellowish angle of my local paper. And despite my suggestions here to end all use of the beaches on Vieques as targets right now, as a pragmatist the actual compromise is a good one. The politicians and military guys here get to say they didn't cave and the island of Vieques gets a ton of money for clean-up and development.
Lesson: scream and holler like an extremist for your position,
but unlike wackos, compromise when a reasonable one comes along.
Then start again. What is it they say. Peel the onion one layer
at a time? Chip away? Journey of a thousand miles? All that stuff.
True facts.
Monday January 31, 2000
OK, I admit that I did watch the Super Bowl last night, and I did tell a couple of friends who came over to watch the game here--way back when I cared about football, we often had a bunch here for the game, but that was back when the roman numerals were still easy to figure out like III or even X---what was I saying? oh I remember I was telling them that as lousy as the games have been lately as games, the event was one of the handful of truly unifying events in American culture.
Then to my surprise, the
actual game was better than the overpriced commercials by a
long way, well, with the exception of the E-TRADE.com commercials
which were pretty good. So this morning while I was having my
coffee, doing battle with the newly educated squirrels that
attack my bird feeder, and reading my paper I read this
column by George Will. Now I will not usually agree with
George on much, nor will I pass his stuff along very often, but
this is an exception to both rules. So, read it. It's pretty good.