Gerald Ford: RIP

I'm sorry for Betty Ford's loss.
Gerald Ford was one of the few Republicans who didn't seem to be on the take, and that made him a very unique member of his party.
Sure, he pardoned known-criminal Richard Nixon, but I'm sure he agreed to do that in order to get the job. Let's face it, we'd all perhaps do something sort of slimy if we got to be president as a result.
Besides, he lost his shot to be an elected president because of the pardon, so what went around came around. End of story.
But Ford's best asset was his wife.
Betty Ford is the ONLY GOP wife in history who admitted she was a pill popping drunk. You don't see Crazy Eyes going in for treatment, and you sure as hell don't see Barbara Bush admitting she's a tippler.
The Betty Ford Treatment Center is one of America's preeminent dry-out centers, and the nation has her to thank for that, and the recovery trend in general.
So, Betty, I send my sympathies to you and your family.
He seemed to be a decent old guy. May he rest in peace.

Dead Saddam

Okay, I personally don't care if the guy's dead or not.
Sure, he was a tyrant who sent hundreds of thousands of Iraqis to their deaths, but he certainly was no threat to America, and he wasn't the only tyrant in the Middle East who probably needed killing.
Besides, he seemed to personify the Iraqi character: violent, dogmatic and without regard for human life. When he was their dictator, we heard nothing about civil war or other incessant Iraqi turmoil. He kept that Hellhole contained, for what it's worth.
Please note that George W. Bush, who set this whole thing into motion, has been curiously absent from the "Saddam is Dead" fray. He simply issued a terse, written statement about the execution, obviously trying to distance himself from the final outcome.
Yep, Bush once said of Saddam, "He tried to kill my Dad."
And now he's dead. Mission accomplished.
So...if the world is getting hot on executing leaders whose decisions and orders result in the death of his or her countrymen, what about a leader who attacks other nations unprovoked and causes the death of thousands of military troops and tens of thousands of innocent civilians?
Should Bush be tried for war crimes and executed?
Nah. That would be Barbaric.
Should Bush and his war cabinet be tried, and if convicted of war crimes, be put into prison for life?
That would suit me fine.
Criminals are criminals, and regardless of their national origin or political clout, if we tolerate their intolerance and support their dictatorial policies, we are no different from the bloody mongrels in the Middle East who simply do not value human life.
Bush is not quite as Barbaric as Saddam, but he sanctions torture and the wholesale slaughter of human beings as casually as he did when he was caught driving drunk those times.
Saddam, Bush, Cheney, bin Laden, the Saudi Princes--what a bunch of pricks.

America Wakes to Dying Dreams, Dead Soldiers
by Cokie Roberts and Steven V. Roberts

Cheektowaga, N.Y.; Thibodaux, La.; Pflugerville, Texas; Presque Isle, Maine; Westerville, Ohio; Marysville, Wash.; Redding, Calif.; Stokesdale, N.C.; Bapchule, Ariz.; Oxford, Ala.

These are the hometowns of 10 American troops killed recently in Iraq, 10 of almost 3,000 fatalities. And there will be many more. The good folks of Pflugerville and Westerville and Marysville no longer believe their sons and daughters are dying for a good reason, but President Bush seems in no mood to hear them.

Yes, he fired Donald Rumsfeld. And yes, he will announce next year "a new way forward." But listen carefully. It's clear the president is not really interested in a "new way" at all. He still firmly believes that his old way is right, that the war was justified, that "victory" is the only way to keep Stokesdale safe.

His own words reflect no doubt or regret: "Iraq is a central component of defeating the extremists who want to establish a safe haven in the Middle East, extremists who would use their safe haven from which to attack the United States. This is really the calling of our time, that is, to defeat the extremists and radicals."

But the president has not only lost the "battle for hearts and minds" across the Arab world, he's lost it across the United States. The people of Bapchule and Oxford no longer believe his words or trust his judgment. Virtually everything he ever said to them about the war — from "Mission Accomplished" to "absolutely, we're winning" — has been wrong.

Once, Americans might have shared his vision of a free, self-governing Iraq, but not any more. He has squandered their trust and betrayed their patriotism. The parents of Thibodaux and Cheektowaga no longer want to sacrifice their children to a lost cause.

The elections certainly showed that, and since his party's defeat, the president's standing has continued to deteriorate. In the latest CBS News poll, only 15 percent agree with him that America is winning the war. Even his closest supporters are jumping ship. Fewer than half of all Republicans, and only one-third of all conservatives, approve of the president's war strategy.

In a USA Today poll, three out of four Americans say Iraq is engaged in a "civil war." How does the president convince parents in Redding and Presque Isle that it is worth American lives to keep Muslim sects thousands of miles away from slaughtering each other? The answer: He can't.

Republicans are turning against Bush. Sen. Gordon Smith of Oregon, who faces a tough campaign in 2008, broke ranks with an extraordinary speech: "I, for one, am at the end of my rope when it comes to supporting a policy that has our soldiers patrolling the same streets is the same way being blown up by the same bombs day after day. That is absurd. It may even be criminal."

Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska says Bush "misunderstood, misread, misplanned and mismanaged our honorable intentions in Iraq with an arrogant self-delusion reminiscent of Vietnam."

But how can these critics exert any leverage over a president who is not running again and seems detached from reality? GOP hardliners — like Rush Limbaugh and Dick Cheney, who don't have to stand for office, or send their own children to war — are still telling Bush to ignore the "surrender monkeys," as one headline put it.

As for the Democrats, they're in a bind. As the Baker-Hamilton panel demonstrated, the Bush administration has made such a mess that there is no such thing as a good option in Iraq. The panel's two main suggestions — negotiating with Iran and Syria and turning over security to Iraqi forces — have been widely derided as unrealistic. Neither holds much promise of working. Nothing else does, either.

That's why the Democrats are lying low and insisting that "the ball is in the president's court." That might not be a courageous position but it's certainly an understandable one. This is Bush's war. He broke Iraq and now he owns it.

The nation is facing an enormous tragedy. Bush can't or won't leave Iraq, but staying means Pflugerville will keep burying its children. Only a new president will be able to stop the dying.

Cokie Roberts is a journalist; Steven V. Roberts wrote "My Fathers' Houses: Memoir of a Family."

Copyright 2001-2006 Cox Texas Newspapers, L.P.

Merry Christmas

Yeah, I know the radical right hasn't got much to pin on the rest of us, so they allege that we don't like the term "Merry Christmas" because it's not inclusive.
But a lot of us celebrate Christmas, and I see no reason to have to say "happy holidays" just so some Islamic or Jewish person doesn't feel excluded.
All the Jews I know have in some way noted Christmas for me, so it's not like they have their panties in a wad about it.
I don't know very many Islamics or Buddhists, but in America I sense they too would understand that Christmas is a big deal for many of us and they'd get over a phrase like Merry Christmas.
Besides, if someone wished me a happy Chanukah or joyous Ramadan, I'd say thanks because I'd know they were just trying to include me in their holiday joy.
Anyway, I hope your day is a nice one, regardless of what day it is for you.
I'll be on the road shortly, planning to spend part of the day in Austin with my family. We've agreed to keep it low key and without stress.

The X in Xmas Shopping

I never shop at Walmart but I absolutely had to go there yesterday because it's close to my house, my electric blanket broke and I hated the idea of spending 'Bed, Bath and Beyond' money on something that just needs to lay there and be warm about 12 days of the year.
However, Walmart didn't have electric blankets but they did have screaming, unsupervised kids who think nothing on slobbering on merchandise their parents have not purchased, people who can't operate a simple cart, lots of curiously large people on electric scooters, and a staff that must have descended from the Jabba the Hutt clan.
I felt sticky and unclean after I left that dump, like someone had rubbed me down with damp gumdrops they'd found in the parking lot.
Meanwhile, my neighbor Pete used to live next door until he shacked up with Margie across the street, then they married and he rented his house to a drunken young asshole and the things he holds dearest (in descending order:) his loud motorcycle, yelping dog, wife and kids.
Needless to say, a few battles have started between me and the neighbor punk, and between me and his landlord Pete, whose face resembles a pockmarked scrotum with a mustache.
Pete seems not to care that he's turning the neighborhood into a rathole by renting it to a drunken little punk and his low-life brood.
Suffice it to say, the punk family is learning all about opera these days. I turn it on when they start making noise too close to my house...which is all the damn time.

Anyway, last night I had to laugh.

After Pete told me to go fuck myself last Thursday night when I called him after 11p.m. to tell him the stupid ass next door woke me up by nailing boards on the fence they have illegally attached to my house, Pete spent the weekend putting up Christmas decorations on the house he shares with Margie.
That must make him feel so Christian.
I just hope Jesus is watching him.

Christmas Happiness

... is not having to watch the Clay Aiken Christmas Show with special guest Rod Stewart.

You?

Christmas Happiness

... is not having to watch the Clay Aiken Christmas Show with special guest Rod Stewart.

Another Democratic Landslide

Repugnican Congressman Henry Bonilla was ceremoniously thrown out of office in a run-off election in San Antonio yesterday.
Former Congressman Ciro Rodriguez won in a landslide.
Bonilla had been elected after Tom DeLay and his cronies masterminded the scheme to redistrict Texas, causing the noted coconut to collect the all-important honky vote in Texas.
Once the Supreme Court, lopsided as they are, had to admit that the redistricting was illegal, Ciro was finally returned to his rightful place in Congress.

I loathed Henry Bonilla when he ran 14 years ago because he was then the news director for CBS affiliate KENS-TV in San Antonio.
When he first ran, he used the station's computers to create and print his campaign materials. Chris Marrou, the anchorman, held a fundraiser for his boss in his home. Bonilla was married at the time to co-anchor Deborah Knapp, who also ignored journalistic ethics and stumped for him.
I figured a dishonest, unscrupulous journalist would make a dishonest, unscrupulous Congressman- and I was right.
Bonilla had his nose so far up Tom DeLay's ass, it's a wonder DeLay could sit down.

So, let's give Bonilla a big adios, MoFo.

Busy

This new job has me busier than a one legged man in an ass kicking contest.
I like it, though. I like it a lot.
Between the job and a new little friend in Austin I try to see two or three times a week, blogging has slipped to the bottom of the list, right after following politics.
Yep, once we got back the House and the Senate, I felt vindicated. Rummy and that cocksucker Ken Mehlman getting fired were gravy.
All is well...we just have to watch that imbecile Bush bumble through the next 700 or so days, which I think will be fun.
...If I had time to watch the news, which I don't.

Happy Thanksgiving!
Mine was great--hope yours was, too. What'd you do?

Links Missing-Please Help Me Get New Ones
I lost all my e-greeting card links and I need some funny new ones. Got any?
Thanks!

Your Tax Dollars at Work

One of Bush's twin daughters, Barbara Bush, was robbed in Buenos Aires.

The first daughter had her purse and cell phone stolen while dining in the city's picturesque San Telmo neighborhood – even though Secret Service agents were guarding her, said ABC News.

According to the reports, the Secret Service failed to notice the incident. The alleged robbery happened during Barbara's first night in town.

The Secret Service, which you know must have spent at least $50,000 in taxpayer money sending its bumbling agents to guard the drunken twin, had no comment.

Heh. Must have been the same agents who were guarding her in Austin when she and the other drunken Bush bimbo were busted for trying to buy booze using fake IDs.

If I Did It, This Is How I Did It

If anyone has any lingering doubts about the scumminess of Aussie Wetback Rupert Murdoch, look no further than his company's ("News Corps") efforts to make a buck off OJ Simpson's recently scuttled book and TV specials called, "If I Did It."
Just when I think I've mellowed and evolved, a news item like this comes along and reminds me that, yes I could shoot Simpson OR Murdoch in the head without a moment's guilt.
If Murdoch wants to really make some news, he should hire someone to kill Simpson, then himself.

From Michael Moore (I loved this)

A Liberal's Pledge to Disheartened Conservatives

November 14th, 2006

To My Conservative Brothers and Sisters,

I know you are dismayed and disheartened at the results of last week's election. You're worried that the country is heading toward a very bad place you don't want it to go. Your 12-year Republican Revolution has ended with so much yet to do, so many promises left unfulfilled. You are in a funk, and I understand.

Well, cheer up, my friends! Do not despair. I have good news for you. I, and the millions of others who are now in charge with our Democratic Congress, have a pledge we would like to make to you, a list of promises that we offer you because we value you as our fellow Americans. You deserve to know what we plan to do with our newfound power -- and, to be specific, what we will do to you and for you.

Thus, here is our Liberal's Pledge to Disheartened Conservatives:

Dear Conservatives and Republicans,

I, and my fellow signatories, hereby make these promises to you:

1. We will always respect you for your conservative beliefs. We will never, ever, call you "unpatriotic" simply because you disagree with us. In fact, we encourage you to dissent and disagree with us.

2. We will let you marry whomever you want, even when some of us consider your behavior to be "different" or "immoral." Who you marry is none of our business. Love and be in love -- it's a wonderful gift.

3. We will not spend your grandchildren's money on our personal whims or to enrich our friends. It's your checkbook, too, and we will balance it for you.

4. When we soon bring our sons and daughters home from Iraq, we will bring your sons and daughters home, too. They deserve to live. We promise never to send your kids off to war based on either a mistake or a lie.

5. When we make America the last Western democracy to have universal health coverage, and all Americans are able to get help when they fall ill, we promise that you, too, will be able to see a doctor, regardless of your ability to pay. And when stem cell research delivers treatments and cures for diseases that affect you and your loved ones, we'll make sure those advances are available to you and your family, too.

6. Even though you have opposed environmental regulation, when we clean up our air and water, we, the Democratic majority, will let you, too, breathe the cleaner air and drink the purer water.

7. Should a mass murderer ever kill 3,000 people on our soil, we will devote every single resource to tracking him down and bringing him to justice. Immediately. We will protect you.

8. We will never stick our nose in your bedroom or your womb. What you do there as consenting adults is your business. We will continue to count your age from the moment you were born, not the moment you were conceived.

9. We will not take away your hunting guns. If you need an automatic weapon or a handgun to kill a bird or a deer, then you really aren't much of a hunter and you should, perhaps, pick up another sport. We will make our streets and schools as free as we can from these weapons and we will protect your children just as we would protect ours.

10. When we raise the minimum wage, we will pay you -- and your employees -- that new wage, too. When women are finally paid what men make, we will pay conservative women that wage, too.

11. We will respect your religious beliefs, even when you don't put those beliefs into practice. In fact, we will actively seek to promote your most radical religious beliefs ("Blessed are the poor," "Blessed are the peacemakers," "Love your enemies," "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God," and "Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me."). We will let people in other countries know that God doesn't just bless America, he blesses everyone. We will discourage religious intolerance and fanaticism -- starting with the fanaticism here at home, thus setting a good example for the rest of the world.

12. We will not tolerate politicians who are corrupt and who are bought and paid for by the rich. We will go after any elected leader who puts him or herself ahead of the people. And we promise you we will go after the corrupt politicians on our side FIRST. If we fail to do this, we need you to call us on it. Simply because we are in power does not give us the right to turn our heads the other way when our party goes astray. Please perform this important duty as the loyal opposition.

I promise all of the above to you because this is your country, too. You are every bit as American as we are. We are all in this together. We sink or swim as one. Thank you for your years of service to this country and for giving us the opportunity to see if we can make things a bit better for our 300 million fellow Americans -- and for the rest of the world.

Signed,

Michael Moore

Please, God

With Nancy Pelosi as Speaker of the House and possibly Jack Murtha as Senate Majority Leader, all my federal legislative dreams will come true.
Perhaps even more fun than impeaching and banishing Bush and his cohorts from office will be watching Georgie Boy either have to grow up or go under when he sees he can't get his way anymore.
It's a pity we Americans have to bear witness to Bush's maturation process at this late stage of his life, but my guess is it'll be great entertainment.

Ken Cocksucker Mehlman: You're Next

Looks like the GOP's head faggot Ken Mehlman will be next to get the ax.
So long, queenie.
See you at the next Log Cabin Republican meeting, you self loathing clown.

More on Speaker of the House Pelosi


Rumsfeld is out.
We took the Senate.
Now, friends, hear me now and believe me later:

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi was likely the one who forced Bush to fire Rumsfeld today.
Here's how I think the conversation went on Tuesday night:

"Bush? It's Nancy."
"Hey, Fancy Nanc-"
"Shut the fuck up George, and listen for a change."
"Wha- little lady, you better watch your to-"
"I said shut the fuck up. Now here's the deal, you coke head, dry-drunk, useless fuck-up---
tomorrow you're gonna fire Rummy, and that's just for starters."
"Now wait. Who the Hel-"
"I said shut up. See, Georgie, here's the way it is.
"I am Speaker of the House now. I decide whether we investigate treason, war crimes and the rest of the shit you've pulled. You know you and Dick are guilty, and now you know Americans hate you both.
"So hear this, pinhead: The chain of succession is: president, vice president, then speaker of the house. If I want you and Dick out, I can do that, capische?"
"Cap-what?"
"I said shut up."
"Yes, ma'am."
"And tomorrow you're gonna go on TV and say your fired Rumsfeld, right?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"And you aren't the fucking decider anymore, you got that?"
"Yes, ma'am."
"Uhhh, Nancy?"
"What?"
"You remind me of my Mommie."
"Fuck you, George."

Speaker of the House: Nancy Pelosi

Open the investigations, girl!
Get rid of Bush and Dick and guess what?
YOU ARE NEXT IN LINE.

Elections!!!

I could write a detailed summation of how the American people got fed up, swarmed to the polls and threw so many of those crooked Republican sons of bitches out, but there are hundreds of thousands of lefty Bloggers doing that right now.
So instead, let me hone right in on this vindicating bliss I am feeling at this moment and please allow me to say...

Hey, Barcode/Recycled Sip/Clyde--
SUCK IT!

It took Americans a lot longer than I thought it would to realize what a bunch of wrong minded assholes the GOP has been, but they finally caught up and they threw most of the bums out.

Did I mention that Barcode should suck it?
Oh, right, I did.

:D

Why I Love Texas

Rocketbuster Boots

Rev. Ted Haggard

He didn't have gay sex, he just hired the same gay male hooker to give him body massages in hotels during a three year span.
And he didn't use the methamphetamine he bought from the gay male hooker on numerous occasions, he just bought it out of curiosity, a curiosity that was strong enough to keep buying it, but never strong enough to try it.

Fill in the blank:

Ted Haggard is _____________________.

Coulter Refuses to Cooperate in Voting Probe
Case Involving Columnist Likely to Go to Prosecutors

"WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (Nov. 1) - Conservative columnist Ann Coulter has refused to cooperate in an investigation into whether she voted in the wrong precinct, so the case will probably be turned over to prosecutors, Palm Beach County's elections chief said Wednesday..."

After hearing that smarmy, dishonest tramp slime everyone in her path, is it any wonder she likely cheats at the polls, too?
I hope they throw the book at her.
She's one person I'd gladly spend a night in jail for, if I had the honor of punching her as hard as I could, right in the mouth.
Hate's too strong a word, but dislike's not strong enough.

Don't Apologize! They Don't.

I was going to write about how disappointed I was in John Kerry for apologizing about implying that Bush was stupid.
Bush is stupid, but so is Kerry for continuing to be overly cordial to those lying criminals in the Bush administration, and the rest of the GOP in general.
Then (hats off to Brett for sending it to me) Keith Olbermann said it all:


And finally tonight, a Special Comment.

On the 22nd of May, 1856, as the deteriorating American political system veered towards the edge of the cliff, Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina, shuffled into the Senate of this nation, his leg stiff from an old dueling injury, supported by a cane. And he looked for the familiar figure of the prominent Senator from Massachusetts, Charles Sumner.

Brooks found Sumner at his desk, mailing out copies of a speech he had delivered three days earlier — a speech against slavery.

The Congressman matter-of-factly raised his walking stick in mid-air, and smashed its metal point, across the Senator's head.

Congressman Brooks hit his victim repeatedly. Senator Sumner somehow got to his feet and tried to flee. Brooks chased him, and delivered untold blows to Sumner's head. Even though Sumner lay unconscious and bleeding, on the Senate floor, Brooks finally stopped beating him, only because his cane finally broke.

Others will cite John Brown's attack on the arsenal at Harper's Ferry as the exact point after which the Civil War became inevitable.

In point of fact, it might have been the moment — not when Brooks broke his cane over the prostrate body of Senator Sumner - but when voters in Brooks's district started sending him new canes.

Tonight, we almost wonder to whom President Bush will send the next new cane.

There is tonight no political division in this country that he and his party will not exploit, nor have not exploited; no anxiety that he and his party will not inflame.

There is no line this President has not crossed — nor will not cross — to keep one political party, in power.

He has spread any and every fear among us, in a desperate effort to avoid that which he most fears — some check, some balance against what has become not an imperial, but a unilateral presidency.

And now it is evident that it no longer matters to him, whether that effort to avoid the judgment of the people, is subtle and nuanced — or laughably transparent.

Senator John Kerry called him out Monday.

He did it two years too late.

He had been too cordial — just as Vice President Gore had been too cordial in 2000 — just as millions of us, have been too cordial ever since.

Senator Kerry, as you well know, spoke at a college in Southern California. With bitter humor, he told the students that he had been in Texas the day before, that President Bush used to live in that state, but that now he lives in the state of denial.

He said the trip had reminded him about the value of education — that quote "if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework, and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don't, you can get stuck in Iraq."

The Senator, in essence, called Mr. Bush stupid.

The context was unmistakable: Texas;the state of denial;stuck in Iraq. No interpretation required.

And Mr. Bush and his minions responded, by appearing to be too stupid to realize that they had been called stupid.

They demanded Kerry apologize — to the troops in Iraq.

And so he now has.

That phrase "appearing to be too stupid" is used deliberately, Mr. Bush.

Because there are only three possibilities here:

One, sir, is that you are far more stupid than the worst of your critics have suggested; that you could not follow the construction of a simple sentence; that you could not recognize your own life story when it was deftly summarized; that you could not perceive it was the sad ledger of your presidency that was being recounted.

This, of course, compliments you, Mr. Bush, because even those who do not "make the most of it," who do not "study hard," who do not "do their homework," and who do not "make an effort to be smart" might still just be stupid — but honest.

No; the first option, sir, is, at best, improbable. You are not honest.

The second option is that you and those who work for you deliberately twisted what Senator Kerry said to fit your political template. That you decided to take advantage of it, to once again pretend that the attacks, solely about your own incompetence, were in fact attacks on the troops — or even on the nation itself.

The third possibility is, obviously, the nightmare scenario; that the first two options are in some way conflated.

That it is both politically convenient for you, and personally satisfying to you, to confuse yourself with the country for which, sir, you work.

A brief reminder, Mr. Bush: You are not the United States of America.

You are merely a politician whose entire legacy will have been a willingness to make anything political — to have, in this case, refused to acknowledge that the insult wasn't about the troops, and that the insult was not even truly about you either — that the insult, in fact, is you.

So now John Kerry has apologized to the troops; apologized for the Republicans' deliberate distortions.

Thus the President will now begin the apologies he owes our troops, right?

This President must apologize to the troops — for having suggested, six weeks ago, that the chaos in Iraq, the death and the carnage, the slaughtered Iraqi civilians and the dead American service personnel, will, to history, quote "look like just a comma."

This President must apologize to the troops — because the intelligence he claims led us into Iraq proved to be undeniably and irredeemably wrong.

This President must apologize to the troops — for having laughed about the failure of that intelligence, at a banquet, while our troops were in harm's way.

This President must apologize to the troops — because the streets of Iraq were not strewn with flowers and its residents did not greet them as liberators.

This President must apologize to the troops — because his administration ran out of "plan" after barely two months.

This President must apologize to the troops — for getting 2,815 of them killed.

This President must apologize to the troops — for getting this country into a war without a clue.

And Mr. Bush owes us an apology… for this destructive and omnivorous presidency.

—

We will not receive them, of course.

This President never apologizes.

Not to the troops.

Not to the people.

Nor will those henchmen who have echoed him.

In calling him a "stuffed suit," Senator Kerry was wrong about the Press Secretary.

Mr. Snow's words and conduct — falsely earnest and earnestly false — suggest he is not "stuffed" - he is inflated.

And in leaving him out of the equation, Senator Kerry gave an unwarranted pass to his old friend Senator McCain, who should be ashamed of himself tonight.

He rolled over and pretended Kerry had said what he obviously had not.

Only, the symbolic stick he broke over Kerry's head came in a context, even more disturbing: Mr. McCain demanded the apology, while electioneering for a Republican congressional candidate in Illinois.

He was speaking of how often he had been to Walter Reed Hospital to see the wounded Iraq veterans, of how, quote "many of the have lost limbs." He said all this while demanding that the voters of Illinois reject a candidate who is not only a wounded Iraq veteran, but who lost two limbs there: Tammy Duckworth.

Support some of the wounded veterans. But bad-mouth the Democratic one.

And exploit all the veterans, and all the still-serving personnel, in a cheap and tawdry political trick, to try to bury the truth: that John Kerry said the President had been stupid.

And to continue this slander as late as this morning — as biased, or gullible, or lazy newscasters, nodded in sleep-walking assent.

Senator McCain became a front man in a collective lie to break sticks over the heads of Democrats — one of them his friend; another his fellow veteran, leg-less, for whom he should weep and applaud, or at minimum about whom, he should stay quiet.

That was beneath the Senator from Arizona.

And it was all because of an imaginary insult to the troops that his party cynically manufactured — out of a desperation, and a futility, as deep as that of Congressman Brooks, when he went hunting for Senator Sumner.

This, is our beloved country now, as you have re-defined it, Mr. Bush.

Get a tortured Vietnam veteran to attack a decorated Vietnam veteran, in defense of military personnel, whom that decorated veteran did not insult.

Or, get your henchmen to take advantage of the evil lingering dregs of the fear of miscegenation in Tennessee, in your party's advertisements against Harold Ford.

Or, get the satellites who orbit around you, like Rush Limbaugh, to exploit the illness — and the bi-partisanship — of Michael J. Fox — yes, get someone to make fun of the cripple.

Oh, and sir, don't forget to drag your own wife into it.

"It's always easy," she said of Mr. Fox's commercials — and she used this phrase twice — "to manipulate people's feelings."

Where on earth might the First Lady have gotten that idea, Mr. President?

From your endless manipulation of people's feelings about terrorism?

"How ever they put it," you said Monday of the Democrats, on the subject of Iraq , "their approach comes down to this: the terrorists win and America loses."

No manipulation of feelings there.

No manipulation of the charlatans of your administration into the only truth-tellers.

No shocked outrage at the Kerry insult that wasn't; no subtle smile as the First Lady silently sticks the knife in Michael J. Fox's back; no attempt on the campaign trail to bury the reality that you have already assured that the terrorists are winning.

Winning in Iraq, sir.

Winning in America, sir.

There, we have chaos: joint U.S./Iraqi checkpoints at Sadr City, the base of the radical Shiite militias — and the Americans have been ordered out by the Prime Minister of Iraq… and our Secretary of Defense doesn't even know about it!

And here — we have deliberate, systematic, institutionalized lying and smearing and terrorizing — a code of deceit, that somehow permits a President to say, quote, "If you listen carefully for a Democrat plan for success, they don't have one."

Permits him to say this while his plan in Iraq has amounted to a twisted version of the advice once offered to Lyndon Johnson about his Iraq, called Vietnam.

Instead of "declare victory — and get out"… we now have "declare victory — and stay, indefinitely."

And also here, we have institutionalized the terrorizing of the opposition. True domestic terror:

– Critics of your administration in the media receive letters filled with fake anthrax.

– Braying newspapers applaud, or laugh, or reveal details the FBI wished kept quiet, and thus impede or ruin the investigation.

– A series of reactionary columnists encourages treason charges against a newspaper that published "national security information" — that was openly available on the internet.

– One radio critic receives a letter, threatening the revelation of as much personal information about her as can be obtained — and expressing the hope that someone will then shoot her with an AK-47 machine gun.

– And finally, a critic of an incumbent Republican Senator, a critic armed with nothing but words, is attacked by the Senator's supporters, and thrown to the floor, in full view of television cameras, as if someone really did want to re-enact the intent and the rage of the day Preston Brooks found Senator Charles Sumner.

Of course, Mr. President, you did none of these things.

You instructed no one to mail the fake anthrax. Nor undermine the FBI's case. Nor call for the execution of the editors of the New York Times. Nor threaten to assassinate Stephanie Miller. Nor beat up a man yelling at Senator Allen. Nor have the first lady knife Michael J. Fox. Nor tell John McCain to lie about John Kerry.

No, you did not.

And the genius of the thing, is the same, as in King Henry's rhetorical question about Archbishop Thomas Becket: "Who will rid me of this meddlesome priest?"

All you have to do, sir… is hand out enough new canes.

Relax and Let Mother Do the Work

Friends, don't waste your valuable time researching talking points so you can debunk the never-ending crap you hear from the neo-cons and Bush lovers in your life.
Now you can use this handy timeline from Mother Jones that points out when the Bush administration lied and what they lied about.

Lies and the Fucking Liars Who Told Them

Just Wait

If you think BushCo has fucked us over pretty well as of now, just wait till after the election when he loses his strangle hold on the Senate and Congress.
The little dictator isn't going to like hearing the word no- so you better gird your loins and tank up your car before the election results.
We're all about to see what happens when a delusional dry drunk isn't give his way.
...KABOOM!

Bush's Message Gets a Facelift

Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Stay The Course
Ooops!
Never mind.
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible
We Are Flexible...

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

Vote.

The Democrats will most likely be taking over again, if not the Senate then certainly Congress. But let's not get too giddy or complacent yet.
If there's early voting in your area- grab it.
If not, be sure to make time to vote on election day.
After years of just saying fuck you to the GOP, this is finally the time to actually start fucking them back.
Go get 'em, readers.

Are These People Living in a Parallel Universe?

Rush Limbaugh interviewed Dick Cheney on his show yesterday. At one point, admitted narcotic abuser Limbaugh asked Dick to respond to reports of growing frustration over the war in Iraq.

Dick acknowledged there is a “natural level of concern out there” because fighting didn’t end “instantaneously.”

Dick then cited various news snippets to paint a positive picture of conditions in Iraq and concluded, “If you look at the general overall situation, they’re doing remarkably well.”

By next month, the war will have lasted longer than U.S. fighting in World War II.

Remarkably well?
I don't know how these wackos can speak without bursting into laughter.

Bloggy Round-up

1. I've decided to vote for Democrat Chris Bell for Governor of Texas. I listened to Kinky Friedman and sort of liked him until I found out he voted for G.W. Bush, not once but twice. Anyone that goddamned stupid doesn't deserve my vote.

2. I have a new criteria for dating.
She must be Google-able and the Google results must be positive.

3. I love my new job. It's a dream come true. My boss likes me and I think I may be getting a promotion and raise soon. They give me money every two weeks and I don't have to ask them for it, unlike some of my former freelance clients.

Yes, the Christian Right are Just as Stupid and Gullible
As They Seem

Stupid Chumps

Katie Couric's Meteoric Crash

I read in the news today that Katie Couric's ratings are rapidly slipping down the drain.
In week one, she wasted the only first impression she'll ever get to make by lobbing Bush softball questions.
Anyone in the media who's still willing to lick Bush's balls on national TV -after all he's done to ruin the country- deserves to be pushed into obscurity.
She may end up on one of those late night infomercials, selling patriotic knickknacks or commemorative shit with eagles and red, white and blue all over it, but she's not a newsperson, never has been a newsperson, and never will be a newsperson.
I gave her a chance, like millions of others did, but she chose to blow it on trying to make Bush look good.
Adios, Mofo.

It's the Platform

I know, I know, the Democrats have behaved like a bunch of spineless, wimpy victims, letting the fat pedophile bullies over at the GOP kick sand in their faces and club them with Christ.
But I'm still a Democrat.
Why? Because more Democrats than Republicans support my views on:
Pro-choice
Gay rights
Education
Stem Cell Research
Separation of Church & State
Diplomacy Before War
The Constitution
etc.

Yes, we need some Democrats with balls.
But when we hear or read of a Democrat taking a ballsy position on an issue, who among us is first to call or write and encourage them?
We get what we demand, folks.

Chickenshit Bush Brother Hides in Closet to Escape Protesters

This is hilarious:

PITTSBURGH (Oct. 7) - Florida Gov. Jeb Bush got a rude welcome to the city when he came across several anti-Republican protesters on his way to a fundraising event for U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum.

Authorities said the president's brother was briefly ushered into a supply closet at a subway station Friday, retreating with a security guard and a female aide to get away from the protesters. The picketers were marching to the exclusive Duquesne Club downtown where Santorum, R-Pa., was holding a fundraiser.

Bush was walking near the subway stop when several dozen pickets "tailed him and stayed with him and went into the Wood Street station," said Bob Grove, spokesman for the Port Authority of Allegheny County.

"(Bush) was quickly getting out of the way and not wanting to engage us," protester Jon Vandenburgh, a researcher for the United Steelworkers, told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

About six or seven officers responded to control the crowd, Grove said, while approximately 75 protesters remained on the street.

Two officers used their stun guns on a pair of protesters who "were asked to leave but did not go," Grove said. "It was a very tense situation. They were very close to the governor and shouting on top of him," Grove said.
The whole incident lasted about five minutes. No one was arrested or cited, Grove said. Bush was not injured.

A spokeswoman for the governor's office said Bush was taking a walk in Pittsburgh when his security detail from the Florida Department of Law Enforcement saw the protesters.

"The agents took an alternate route to get around them. The governor was safe at all times and had full confidence in the FDLE agents who were with him," Bush spokeswoman Alia Faraj said Saturday..."


HA HA HA HA- things are starting to get real for the Bush clan. I guess hiding in a closet is becoming a GOP habit.

Big Sis's Turn

Today I'll let an excerpt from an e-mail I got from my big sister summing up recent events be my blog entry:

Hillary summed it up perfectly when asked for her opinion on the whole mess:
"The Republicans are in charge, they created this mess, and its their job to clean it up."
Pontius Pilate couldn't have said it any better.

Ya Think??

"If they get to me it looks like they could affect our election as well."
- J. DENNIS HASTERT, who is trying to keep his post as speaker of the House..."

Puleeze.
The guy's job is to keep Congress Reps in line.
He knew about Mark Foley trying to diddle teen boys way before the story exploded in the news, yet he did nothing.
If a firefighter stands by watching as a house burns down, wouldn't he be fired?
If a teacher sits at her desk and stares at the students rather than teaching them, wouldn't she be fired?

The idiot pundits on the Right keep saying they wish this wouldn't become such a political issue. Can anyone imagine what the GOP would have done had the pervert pedophile instead been a Democrat?

We know that politics makes strange bedfellows, but when the politician is trying to get in bed with a teenager, all bets are off.
This is political because the Republicans made being gay a political wedge issue.
But this isn't about being gay, it's about a pedophile who happens to be gay.

The GOP has so many dirty little secrets, some can help but ooze out like pus from a festering boil.
Their little camouflage Band-Aids aren't working anymore.
It's time to lance those sons of bitches out of power, including their faggot leader, Ken Mehlman.

Oh, Boo Hoo

I heard on NPR today that Mark Foley's lawyer/mouthpiece said Foley had been sexually molested between the ages of 14 and 16 by a male member of the clergy.
I guess that's supposed to excuse him being a pedophile who prefers boys in that age range.
Yeah, well, I was molested between the ages of 4 and 5, but I don't get aroused by or molest kindergarten girls... whether I'm drunk or not!
Foley's flack needs to shut the hell up and stop making excuses.
The fact is, Foley likes young chicken because he's an old chicken hawk.
Frankly I don't care how he got that way.
Do you?

Three Jokers and a Queen

Duke Cunningham
Bob Ney
Tom DeLay
Mark Foley

Four GOP politician whose heinous acts caused them to have to leave their jobs in disgrace.
Too bad the MSM isn't connecting the dots and mentioning this group of clowns in the same sentence.
And Foley's newly admitted alcoholism is no excuse- even the worst drunk won't try to fuck a kid unless he's into it to begin with.

Yes, Foley is the fourth House Republican forced out by ethics problems.
Randy "Duke" Cunningham of California resigned in November after pleading guilty to accepting $2.4 million in bribes.
Former majority leader Tom DeLay of Texas was indicted on state campaign finance violations and resigned in June.
Rep. Bob Ney of Ohio has agreed to plead guilty to charges of corruption and is not seeking re-election.

Anyone who still has faith in the GOP is, simply put, an idiot.

Foley and the Boy

For those of you who haven't been treated to one of the semi literate IM conversations between Mark Foley and a teenage male Congressional Page, here, be my guest:
Pervy IM
Hard to believe Dennis Hastert heard about this but didn't feel the need to investigate.
I guess preserving a seat for a Republican in Congress was more important to Hastert than investigating an aggressive pedophile.

I've Got An Idea

Maybe "confirmed bachelor" Ken Mehlman, the swishy head of the Republican National Committee, should investigate chicken hawk pedophile GOP Rep. Mark Foley and his blatantly sexual e-mail and Instant Messaging with teenaged male pages.
Or maybe Karl Rove, the son of a gay man, has the kind of credentials to launch a sensitive but penetrating probe into the scandal.
Too bad Scottie McClellan got sacked as the White House Press Secretary. With his experience cruising gay bars in Austin and San Antonio, I'm sure he could get to the bottom of Foley's adventures.
I'm just sorry firebrand attorney and right-hand man of Joseph McCarthy Roy Cohn died of AIDS in 1986. He'd be the perfect lawyer for Foley and the GOP legislators who helped him cover up his dirty little hobby.

Rep.Mark Foley (R FL)
Another Gay GOP Chickenhawk BUSTED

"...ABC News reported Friday that Foley also engaged in a series of sexually explicit instant messages with current and former male pages. In one message, ABC said, Foley wrote to one page: "Do I make you a little horny?"

In another message, Foley wrote, "You in your boxers, too? ... Well, strip down and get relaxed."

Foley, as chairman of the Missing and Exploited Children's Caucus, had introduced legislation in July to protect children from exploitation by adults over the Internet. He also sponsored other legislation designed to protect minors from abuse and neglect.

"We track library books better than we do sexual predators," Foley has said.

And he once accused the Supreme Court of "siding with pedophiles over children."

Foley was a member of the Republican leadership, serving as a deputy whip. He also was a member of the House Ways and Means Committee..."

Yay!
There goes one GOP seat in the Congress.
Enjoy your NAMBLA membership.
Adios, MoFo.

Molly Ivins Says It All:

Habeas Corpus, R.I.P. (1215 - 2006)

With a smug stroke of his pen, President Bush is set to wipe out a safeguard against illegal imprisonment that has endured as a cornerstone of legal justice since the Magna Carta.

by Molly Ivins

AUSTIN, Texas - Oh dear. I’m sure he didn’t mean it. In Illinois’ Sixth Congressional District, long represented by Henry Hyde, Republican candidate Peter Roskam accused his Democratic opponent, Tammy Duckworth, of planning to “cut and run” on Iraq.

Duckworth is a former Army major and chopper pilot who lost both legs in Iraq after her helicopter got hit by an RPG. “I just could not believe he would say that to me,” said Duckworth, who walks on artificial legs and uses a cane. Every election cycle produces some wincers, but how do you apologize for that one?

The legislative equivalent of that remark is the detainee bill now being passed by Congress. Beloveds, this is so much worse than even that pathetic deal reached last Thursday between the White House and Republican Sens. John Warner, John McCain and Lindsey Graham. The White House has since reinserted a number of “technical fixes” that were the point of the putative “compromise.” It leaves the president with the power to decide who is an enemy combatant.

This bill is not a national security issue—this is about torturing helpless human beings without any proof they are our enemies. Perhaps this could be considered if we knew the administration would use the power with enormous care and thoughtfulness. But of the over 700 prisoners sent to Gitmo, only 10 have ever been formally charged with anything. Among other things, this bill is a CYA for torture of the innocent that has already taken place.

Death by torture by Americans was first reported in 2003 in a New York Times article by Carlotta Gall. The military had announced the prisoner died of a heart attack, but when Gall saw the death certificate, written in English and issued by the military, it said the cause of death was homicide. The “heart attack” came after he had been beaten so often on this legs that they had “basically been pulpified,” according to the coroner.

The story of why and how it took the Times so long to print this information is in the current edition of the Columbia Journalism Review. The press in general has been late and slow in reporting torture, so very few Americans have any idea how far it has spread. As is often true in hierarchical, top-down institutions, the orders get passed on in what I call the downward communications exaggeration spiral.

For example, on a newspaper, a top editor may remark casually, “Let’s give the new mayor a chance to see what he can do before we start attacking him.”

This gets passed on as “Don’t touch the mayor unless he really screws up.”

And it ultimately arrives at the reporter level as “We can’t say anything negative about the mayor.”

The version of the detainee bill now in the Senate not only undoes much of the McCain-Warner-Graham work, but it is actually much worse than the administration’s first proposal. In one change, the original compromise language said a suspect had the right to “examine and respond to” all evidence used against him. The three senators said the clause was necessary to avoid secret trials. The bill has now dropped the word “examine” and left only “respond to.”

In another change, a clause said that evidence obtained outside the United States could be admitted in court even if it had been gathered without a search warrant. But the bill now drops the words “outside the United States,” which means prosecutors can ignore American legal standards on warrants.

The bill also expands the definition of an unlawful enemy combatant to cover anyone who has “has purposefully and materially supported hostilities against the United States.” Quick, define “purposefully and materially.” One person has already been charged with aiding terrorists because he sold a satellite TV package that includes the Hezbollah network.

The bill simply removes a suspect’s right to challenge his detention in court. This is a rule of law that goes back to the Magna Carta in 1215. That pretty much leaves the barn door open.

As Vladimir Bukovsky, the Soviet dissident, wrote, an intelligence service free to torture soon “degenerates into a playground for sadists.” But not unbridled sadism—you will be relieved that the compromise took out the words permitting interrogation involving “severe pain” and substituted “serious pain,” which is defined as “bodily injury that involves extreme physical pain.”

In July 2003, George Bush said in a speech: “The United States is committed to worldwide elimination of torture, and we are leading this fight by example. Freedom from torture is an inalienable human right. Yet torture continues to be practiced around the world by rogue regimes, whose cruel methods match their determination to crush the human spirit.”

Fellow citizens, this bill throws out legal and moral restraints as the president deems it necessary—these are fundamental principles of basic decency, as well as law.

I’d like those supporting this evil bill to spare me one affliction: Do not, please, pretend to be shocked by the consequences of this legislation. And do not pretend to be shocked when the world begins comparing us to the Nazis.

Opera Canceled Over a Depiction of Muhammad

(NY Times snippet)
"A German opera house canceled performances of Mozart's
"Idomeneo" after a scene that depicts the severed head of
the Prophet Muhammad prompted an anonymous threat..."

Let me get this straight.
An opera house in Germany can't offer a Mozart performance without some Islamic extremist wing-nuts threatening them?
These extremists are really giving Islam a bad name.
Islam-a-bad...Oh, I get how they named that place.

I wish I knew more about the Koran because I'm pretty sure the prophet Muhammad wouldn't have wanted his followers to kill people just for depicting his face or physical embodiment.
Nor do I believe any true representative of God would want his followers to roam around perpetually pissed-off and looking for a fight.

If the radical Muslims (and the radical Christians, for that matter) want people to stop resenting them, they ought to learn to live and let live and mind their own goddamn business.

How Much Is Too Much?

We know about 50 percent America has been stricken with a collective consciousness that is anything but conscious, but how much more can the NASCAR set take from the Bushitters before they join the rest of us?

When Bill Clinton recently lashed out against Fox News "journalist" Chris Wallace for asking him leading questions that seemed to try to pin the Bin Laden donkey tail on him, the Fox hyenas reported on his "meltdown" rather than on the simple truth he was telling.
So what if he was forceful in his delivery? I would have defended myself the same way against the smug Wallace.
As usual, the Fox crowd made a big stink about the way Clinton expressed himself, not about the veracity of what he said.
Like the allegedly forged Bush military records that ruined Dan Rather's career- the content of the documents were never disputed- the typewriter font was the "big issue."

A couple more high ranking retired military officers on Monday bluntly accused Donald Rumsfeld of bungling the war in Iraq, saying U.S. troops were sent to fight without the best equipment and that critical facts were hidden from the public.
Of course the Bush administration dismissed their statements as a Democratic ploy to get votes.
Bush ass-kisser in chief, Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) dismissed the Democratic-sponsored event as "an election-year smoke screen aimed at obscuring the Democrats' dismal record on national security."
What dismal record on national security?
Didn't 9/11 happen on Bush's watch, and wasn't it perpetrated primarily by citizens of his beloved Saudi Arabia?

And more on a favorite topic of mine- Bush being a dry drunk.
Check this out:
Bush & Dry Drunk Syndrome
Thanks to Marla for hooking me up with the link.

I Quit, etc.

After 30+ years of being an avid smoker (except for a few years of abstention that ended in Ogunquit, Maine after a particularly crazy night with a certain ex of mine) I finally quit 10 days ago.
I sat next to a cardiac nurse at a gay conference two weeks ago and she scared the hell out of me about smoking and diabetes, so I quit.
I think God should be giving me a reward of some sort- something along the lines of a beautiful, single, intelligent, child-free, frisky lesbian whose estranged ex-lovers all live at least 1,000 miles away, and whose family lives even further.
Is that too much to ask?

And what about the racially divided "Survivor" this season?
I'm loving it.
I put my money on the Latinos. They work harder than anyone, they are used to harvesting food and they can easily deal with hot weather.
But why oh why did they send that cute Korean dude to Exile Island?
Dude found the immunity idol in about 15 seconds. Duh!

Back to the Salt Mines

Starting October 2, I'm going back to work full-time.
I was offered a dream job in the journalism field that I couldn't turn down.
After 12 years of freelancing, it'll be good to get back to civilization and being around people again.
Please don't tell my cats.
I'm hoping they don't notice, since they sleep all day as it is.

Ann Richards: Oh, What A Ride
Part 4

On Monday morning in a light rain, Ann Richards was buried at the Texas State Cemetery in a small ceremony that included only her family and 500 of her closest friends. My sister and I didn't make the cut, but our friend Bettie Naylor did.
At 11 that morning, the giant Frank Erwin Center in Austin filled to near capacity for a public memorial for the Governor.
Invited guests included a couple of U.S. senators, five U.S. representatives, former Texas governors Mark White and Dolph Briscoe, National Democratic Party Chairman Howard Dean, Lance Armstrong, Sandra Bullock, singers Jerry Jeff Walker and Ray Benson; and Tom DeLay Prosecutor Ronnie Earle, D.A. of Austin.
Who did the Bush Administration send to represent his administration at the memorial for the Governor he succeeded in Texas?
Don Evans. As in, who the hell is Don Evans?
Fuck you, Bush.
Anyway, my sister and I caged some good seats, right behind past and present members of The University of Texas Lady Longhorns, the basketball team of which Ann Richards was a rabid fan.
On the stage was a lectern, speakers' seats and about 50 seats behind them for the amazing Wesley United Methodist Church choir. If you have to die, I say it's best to have a huge, African American Gospel choir send you off in style.
A small orchestra was in the pit beside the stage.
On each side of the stage were giant screens, one showing a photo of Ann making a speech, the other of Ann in profile with her firstborn toddler granddaughter, Lily (now 19).
Hundreds of white tulips were centered in front of the lectern and two other gigantic, white floral tributes flanked the stage.
Former Dallas Mayor and Ann's Secretary of State Ron Kirk was the Master of Ceremonies.
He spoke fond memories of Ann, then he introduced the choir, who sang a moving gospel hymn.
New York Post Columnist Liz Smith, a great friend of Ann's, was introduced next.
Her best story was about a lunch she'd had not long ago in New York with Ann and actor George Clooney.
Ann brought Clooney a piñata shaped like that bastard Tom DeLay.
After Smith finished, opera legend Jessye Norman got up and sang, "Ave Maria."
If you have to die, I'd say Jessye Norman would be the right pick to sing "Ave Maria" for you.
Former Mayor of San Antonio and Clinton Commerce Sec. Henry Cisneros followed. His speech was the usual, "what a great Texan she was..." thing. Ho hum.
Then the Kleenex came out in droves...
The video tribute began to the sound of Willie Nelson singing, "Don't Fence Me In."
Between the photos and brief video clips, my big sister and I were sobbing so hard we had to gasp between wails. My glasses were specked with flying tears. My abs got sore from crying.
After the video tribute, Hillary Rodham Clinton spoke in sort of a quasi Texas accent, dropping all the "g's:" from "ing" words. I wish she wouldn't have done that. You either have a real Texas drawl, a mild Texas drawl, or you don't.
Clinton gave a nice, standing ovation speech, but she's no Ann Richards and never will be.
Nice of her to drop in, though.
After Hillary came another flawless gospel song from the choir, with a fabulous woman soloist that made more tears come to our eyes.
Then Ann's firstborn granddaughter, Lily Adams, 19, got up and talked about the woman she and her cousins called "Mammy."
We remembered her when she used to run all over the room during legislative sessions when she was about 3. Ann used to let that kid get away with ANYTHING.
After Lily finished, Jessye Norman sang another song, then Ron Kirk closed the ceremony.
As we left the building, the rain had cleared and we faced a beautifully sunny day with a cool breeze blowing. We think Ann sent us the needed rain, then the beautiful day that followed.
Ann's final resting place is on Republic Hill, where 12 other Texas governors including John Connally and Jim and Miriam "Ma" Ferguson are buried.
She picked out the spot several years ago, officials said, near plots that have been reserved by former Governors George W. Bush, Mark White and soon-to-be former Governor Rick Perry.
Let's hope she can teach some of them a thing or two in the afterlife.

Godspeed, Ann.
We love you.

Ann Richards: Oh, What A Ride
Part 3

As the reporter for the documentary and I stood around looking for good people for her to interview, I looked out the window and nearly fainted.
Walking toward the front door of the joint were Lily Tomlin, her partner Jane Wagner, and two other women who looked like they must be local handlers.
I nudged the reporter and said, "Holy fuck, look out the window! Here comes Lily Tomlin and her girlfriend!"
We scampered outside with her video crew and cornered them.
Lily agreed to be interviewed for the documentary, "after she'd been inside a while," so I stepped forward and reminded her of the time we'd met in Venice Beach in the mid 70's when she was marching up the Boardwalk with a bunch of women for the Equal Rights Amendment.
I admitted how intimidated I was to meet her back then, and how I'd created some bullshit name-dropping connection so she'd think I was cool.
She patted me, said, "Bless your heart," then was shuffled away by one of her handlers, a large, scowling butch of a Mulatto woman.
Later on, while Lily was inside the bar surrounded by ass kissers, I spied Jane Wagner standing at the bar talking to one of Ann's former staff members.
I horned in, said hello to both of them, then Jane--the creative genius behind Lily Tomlin's creative genius-- asked if she could buy me a drink.
The staffer drifted away from us, leaving me alone to chat with one of my true idols.
After we chatted briefly, Jane said she had been drinking a bit that day and that she needed to eat something.
Just then, my big sister and her partner walked by and said, "Let's get something to eat."
I said, "Jane, this is my big sister R and her partner S. Would you like to eat with us?"
By then, Lily was outside being interviewed for the documentary, so Jane shrugged and said, "Sure."
We found a nice table for four, then quickly were joined by a couple of women who moved another table against ours to make more room. Jane sat at the head of our table, flanked on either side by my big sister and me.
Jane and I talked about the things she had written and produced, and I tried my best to crack her up. I actually succeeded a few times.
Then we started talking about how we were both television addicts...especially when it came to "Project Runway."
Meanwhile, the cranky Mulatto butch was seated next to my sister and eavesdropped on our conversation like a motherfucker.
She butted in and said, "Jane, if you lived in New York, do you think you'd still watch a lot of television?"
I asked her if she lived in New York and she sniffed, "Yes,"
Then I asked her name and she said, "Anna Something-Smith." I asked what she did and she glowered at me and answered, "I'm an actress."
I said, "What might I have seen you in?"
She said, "The West Wing?"
Turns out her name was Anna Deavere Smith and I'd never seen or heard of the bitch before.
I quickly turned my attention back to Jane, and in a moment of impulse I said, "Jane, I'll give you ten dollars cash for your e-mail address."
Jane laughed and said, "Come on, my e-mail address is worth more than that."
I said, "Okay, twelve dollars..."
Suddenly Anna Nicole Smith or whatever her fucking name was actually stood up and yelled, "Jane, don't give her your e-mail address!"
I looked up at her looming over the table and said, "But I'm not a nut, I come from a good Texas political pedigree!"
Just then, Lily and the documentarian walked back in, joined us briefly, then Lily and Jane left for their hotel, with Anna Who-the-Fuck Smith lumbering after them like the musk ox she was.
I so wanted to say to her, "Anna, nice to meet you and I'm so sorry about your son's recent death," but my Al-Anon program prohibits me from being an obvious bitch in person.
To be continued...

Ann Richards: Oh, What A Ride
Part 2

My big sister, her partner and I arrived at Scholz Garden around 6.
The place was not only packed, it was packed with people from all over the place that I thought I knew, but couldn't remember their names or from where I knew them.
A real tall, Texas-looking guy was the first person I knew but didn't know.
He turned out to be Turk Pipkin, an actor and author who recently created an amazing documentary where he asks Nobel Prize winners what we can do to fix the world.
In the throng of people behind him was the gorgeous Cecile Richards, Ann's oldest daughter and the president of Planned Parenthood, Inc.
As we worked our way through the crowd, I spied the familiar face of an African American woman whom I stopped and said, "I know you, but I can't recall from where."
"I'm Sheila Jackson-Lee.
My jaw dropped and I said, "Oh my God, Congresswoman! I loved you in "Fahrenheit 9/11."
She smiled and we hugged.
Then I said, "Girl, we got some screwed up messes up there in Washington. We need you to continue to rabble rouse those crooks." She smiled and said, "Oh, I will."
Behind her stood Ron Kirk, Ann's Secretary of State who went on to become the first African American mayor of Dallas, from 1995 to 2001.
When we finally worked our way to the back of the room to get a bird's eye view of the crowd, we spotted clumps of local state representatives, state senators and other big shots mingling.
Seated at a table was a woman with spiky silver hair and big eyes who kept meeting my gaze.
I thought I knew her from some San Antonio gay gaggle, so I finally walked up to her and asked from where I might know her.
She said, I'm Mary Beth Cahill. I ran John Kerry's campaign."
By then, I was chagrinned not to recall her name or where I'd seen her, so I rushed over to grab my friend
Bettie Naylor, the co-founder of the Human Rights Campaign, to introduce them.
I believe Cahill was the only person on Earth Bettie had never met, so I felt all puffed up being the go-between.
In the meantime, I'd been invited to recall memories of Ann Richards from my MSM reporter days for a small team of documentarians I'd met at the Capitol earlier. The reporter for the documentary and I clicked, then re-clicked when they showed up at Scholz Garden.
I told her I'd bird-dog some good people to interview for her documentary, so we hung out and watched the crowd together.
Please note, I am not a political star-fucker like that egomaniac blogger John Aravosis. My big sister has all the juice in Austin. I am merely lucky to be in her political shadow and have the proximity to the noteworthy based mainly on her, her partner and their Austin connections.

To be continued

Ann Richards: Oh, What A Ride
Part 1

Last Sunday morning, I sat on my living room couch reading in the newspaper about the ceremonies surrounding the passing of Ann Richards.
Once I read that her coffin would be lying in state in the Capitol until 8 p.m. that night, I quickly threw some clothes in a bag, dressed in black and hit the road for Austin.
My big sister and her partner asked me to join them after I was done at the Capitol.
We planned to go to Scholz Garden, a political beer joint close to the Capitol, for an informal wake for the Governor.
As I arrived at the Capitol, the line to get in snaked almost to the street.
On either side of the steps, bunches of flowers- mostly yellow roses- were thrown casually on the lawn.
Just as I was about to enter the building, two ladies asked the woman behind me if they could cut in line. I looked behind me, ready to glare, only to look into the eyes of New York Post Columnist Liz Smith and ABC Correspondent Cynthia McFadden.
On impulse I grabbed McFadden, hugged her, welcomed her to Texas and said, "Please don't think most of us Texans aren't aware that George W. Bush is an idiot."
She laughed and said, "That's for sure."
Just past the entry was a kiosk of photos of Ann in her early days.
Then, between two ramrod straight Texas DPS guards stood her rosewood coffin, draped with a Texas flag.
I stood at the coffin and said a prayer, then moved to the right to view another photo display- this one covering Ann in her active years as a politician.
I stood there and sobbed into my hands. I couldn't help it.
As I continued along the rotunda, I saw her portrait hanging among the other past Texas Governors. Hers bore a black drape at the top, and on the floor below were flowers and mementos visitors had left, including a "One Day at a Time" sign, no doubt left by one of her AA friends.
By then the tears spilled through my hands to the floor...until I looked to the right and saw former Governor George W. Bush's portrait.
His smug grin and dopey face snapped me out of my grief and led me quickly out the door.

The Saddest Day in Texas

I just returned from Austin, where for the last two days I was there attending various farewell ceremonies for the late, great Governor Ann Richards.
I have much to report but a sad and empty heart for now, so please check this site for a photo preview of today's funeral and memorial services.
http://www.statesman.com/news/content/news/photos/09/091806_richards/index.html
It was as beautiful a send-off as anyone ever earned.
More later, I promise.

Project Runway

I can't write a funny review today, so here's one from Runway alum Nick Verreos:

I have spent most of my summer waiting for this moment – this season's corresponding episode to when I was kicked off. Who would replace me? In my recap last week, I speculated that it was going to be Kayne. If any of you followed Season 1 or 2, you can see how Kayne would be the obvious choice to go next. With the above in mind, I was ready to watch intently as I polished the crown of fifth runner-up that I was giving away.

Wearing a bias-cut Uli-esque dress, Heidi told the designers that she was having a party where she would announce what their next challenge would be. They gathered at the Pink Elephant club, where the designers popped open some champagne and pretended to have some fun.

Their faux festive mood came to a sudden halt the minute they saw Vincent and Angela enter the room. THEY'RE BAA-AACK! No one could even feign a real smile as they sauntered in. Kayne quickly chugged his drink, Jeffrey looked as if something smelled bad, and Laura, well, I was afraid her water would break over the thought of having to see those two again. Call the doctor: Mr. Smiley Pants and Miss Fleurechon got a second chance for having won previous challenges. They joined the remaining five designers in this week's competition to create a cocktail dress out of black-and-white fabric (and utilizing every scrap of material). And to throw a wrench in the challenge, three designers would be voted off this week.


In the workroom, Michael tried to come to Kayne's aid as he struggled with his monochromatic canvas of a dress. Laura's hormones and stress began affecting her, forcing her to almost have a breakdown in front of an uncomfortable Tim Gunn. I could almost see Tim looking for the mini-bar he hoped the producers had set up for him to take refuge in situations like these.

Eventually, Laura recovered to create what I undeniably felt was the best cocktail dress in the group. She designed a young, sexy yet elegant lace-over-satin dress, winning praise from all the judges – including guest judge, designer Zac Posen. Laura rightfully won.

Uli's dress was a surprising mess. It was too short and the sleeves were too long, a casualty of bad proportions. What was not a surprise was the paisley print fabric she chose. We have seen this from her week after week. Someone better pull her finger from the autopilot button soon. Michael's dress was a simple asymmetrical tube dress with a midriff corset. It was contemporary and perfect for drinks at Buddha Bar. Jeffrey's, on the other hand, was more appropriate for a hooker in Old San Juan, featuring goodies such as off-the-shoulder polka-dotted ruffles and thigh-baring leggings.

Returning designers Vincent and Angela were predictably dismissed for their respective comeback-kid creations. Even L'Oréal makeup artist Collier Strong could not help these two. Delusional Vincent exited saying that he has been "making beautiful music all his life…it's a gift." Excuse me, but since when is Vincent the Andrew Lloyd Webber of fashion? I somehow knew they would be eliminated AGAIN. Why were we forced to go through this a second time?

As I predicted, Kayne was auf'ed for his dress, mainly for lacking the requisite white color and a touch of class. Bye bye, Kayne, you'll wear my crown well.

Governor Ann Richards 1923-2006

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

-W. H. Auden

Briefly Commenting

The ABC Mockudrama "The Path to 9/11" has been discussed to death.

If anyone doubts the accuracy of this Clinton-bashing, neocon rah-rah piece of fiction, look no further than the way they spelled Madelyn Albright's first name: "Madeleine."

The real issue for me is, who paid for the 5.5 hours of prime time programming for a Mockumentary like this to be aired commercial-free?
Some company (or companies) with deep pockets and a hidden agenda paid for it.
When a commercial enterprise finances governmental propaganda, which this movie clearly was, it's called fascism.

The Saudi terrorists hit on Bush's watch on September 11, 2001 because they have owned Bush since they gave him seed money for his failed Arbusto Oil company.
They owned his daddy when they paid him off to offer up American troops in 1992 as rent-a-cops when Saddam Hussein hassled Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.
They rewarded Bush Senior after he was ousted from the White House by giving him a big money gig with The Carlysle Group, an international conglomerate in which the Bin Laden family once held a large chunk.

The Saudi terrorists, headed by Saudi Osama Bin Laden, a member of one of Saudi Arabia's wealthiest families, could and will strike America whenever they damn well please, as long as a Bush is in office.

With Bush being entirely owned and operated by the Saudis, he is the 20th terrorist of 9/11.

Osama Bin Laden will never be captured on Bush's watch because the Saudi's own Bush and they will not allow it. It's as simple as that.

9/11

I'm too pissed off to think straight enough to blog about how the GOP and the neo-cons are feasting off the corpses of 9/11 today.
Plus, I want to finish part 2 of that ridiculous mock-u-drama ABC is running tonight before I feel I'll have enough information to write about it accurately.

Karl Rove's stepfather was gay, book asserts

SUMMARY: The top Bush aide was close to his father figure, Louis Rove, who died in Palm Springs as Rove worked on Bush's gay-baiting 2004 campaign.

A new book from the authors of a previous tome about the life and work of Bush political adviser Karl Rove claims that Rove's stepfather was gay, the American-Statesman newspaper of Austin, Texas, reported.

In "The Architect: Karl Rove and the Master Plan for Absolute Power," James Moore and Wayne Slater dedicate two chapters to the touchier side of the Republican Party's exploitation of antigay sentiment.

In Chapter 9, "A Few Simple Questions: What's in Karl's Closet?" the authors draw on interviews with gay acquaintances of Rove's stepfather, Louis Rove, as well as an interview with a circumspect Karl Rove, to reveal that Louis came out as gay after divorcing Rove's mother, according to the American-Statesman.

The chapter jabs hard at Rove, pointing out that Louis Rove, who was clearly Rove's primary father figure, died in Palm Springs, Calif., just as "his son was in the midst of launching the anti-gay issues campaign that was to lead to the re-election of George W. Bush."

The authors quote Rove and friends of Rove's stepfather to illustrate that Rove was close to him throughout his life and seemed not to judge his sexuality. This, and Rove's self-professed agnosticism, are major exhibits in Moore and Slater's claim of hypocrisy.

Moore, an Austin-based journalist, and Slater, senior political writer for the Dallas Morning News, paint a sharp portrait of an intelligent, ruthless and deeply cynical Karl Rove.

Though this is their second book on Rove (after 2003's "Bush's Brain"), there's little overlap. Bush's Brain focused on Rove's rise and the development of his association with George W. Bush; "The Architect" focuses on how he pursued the creation of an enduring Republican hegemony. (The Advocate)


--PlanetOut News

The following editorial was written by Jerry Politex, the creator of the fabulous
e-news source, "Bush Watch."

Editorial: "The Path to 9/11": Follow the Money, Jerry Politex

Many observers have little doubt that the main purpose of "The Path to 9/11" is to support the distorted version of world events favored by the Bush administration with an eye towards minimizing Republican congressional defeat in November so Bush can continue to screw our country big time in his last, two-year gasp as Decider-in-Chief.
It won't take much, since CNN informed us the other day that 43% of the American people still think Saddam had a hand in 9/11. CNN senior political analyst and American Enterprise Institute resident fellow Bill Schneider reported that the 43% in question tend to be uneducated, while those who believe Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11 tend to be the opposite: educated readers who get their news from numerous sources, rather than "24."
Cyrus Nowrasteh, the author of "The Path to 9/11," is involved in the making of "24." Figures.
As for that 43%, it's not likely that the ABC film will change their view of the correctness of Bush's invasion of Iraq, since they're not apt to see any difference between documented fact and made up dramatization.
The Rovean thinking goes that if the American public sees the Clinton administration as being responsible for taking its eye off the ball prior to 9/11, then the horrendous mistakes and misdeeds of the Bush administration sorrounding that event will not be seen in such a harsh light, leading to the voters cutting Republican candidates some slack for backing Bush since 9/11.
The facts, of course, are quite different. As I wrote in "9/11, Bush Lies, and the Puppet Presidency" (BIG BUSH LIES, 2004), the Clinton admistration developed a plan to get rid of Bin Laden, but the Bush administration shelved the plan once in power. While DOJ's Janet Reno gave anti-terrorism her first priority and called for an even larger budget for it, Bush's John Ashcroft slashed anti-terrorism budgets and programs once he took over.

In "Path to 9/11" we're seeing one of the most blatant attempts in history to shape the facts to reflect a predetermined point of view, not just for the U.S., but for international consumption as well.
As is so often the case in politics, we have to follow the money. Since there are no sponsors of the show (there are no commercials) one wonders how ABC is picking up the financial slack for presenting 5 hours of non-commercial TV on its commercial network.
Not with distribution rights or unit sales, since ABC is freely providing both over the internet.
Nothing has been said about the funding source in any of the many news and opinion reports published to date. Until we learn more about where the money for such an expensive undertaking is coming from, our experience of the workings of the Bush administration suggest that this Bush propaganda project is being carried out with corporation and government working hand-in-hand to change history for political ends.
In other words, what we're seeing is a classic case of fascism in action.

Attention: All Suckers

If you're planning to watch ABC's "Path to 9/11" you're falling once again for more fetid Bush propaganda.
In essence, the sensationalist liars who put together this fictitious piece of crap would like you to believe that the Clinton administration was ultimately at fault for 9/11.
It doesn't matter that it occurred on Bush's watch; those conniving sons of bitches haven't taken responsibility for anything from environmental disasters, to FEMA's mismanagement, to rising gas prices, to any damn thing.
Clinton's administration endured a few terrorist activities, to be sure. A military ship was damaged. A parking area was bombed.
Bush's stupidity and lack of successful leadership experience made his reign a perfect time for terrorists to get the drop on us and do some serious damage. Think of it as Sheriff Andy Taylor being away from Mayberry and leaving Deputy Barney Fife in charge.
People are sick of the 9/11 sky is falling rhetoric.
We thinking people are more scared of having an idiot in charge than another terrorist attack.
This stupid, made for TV movie is one last ditch effort at swaying the sheep and lemmings into thinking Bush the bullying imbecile and his GOP criminal cohorts should still be trusted.
Fuck them and fuck this phony docudrama.
And fuck ABC for pandering to the terminally ignorant.
I'd boycott ABC, but I don't watch any of their crappy programming as it is.

So Much News!

Before I start in with my weekly Project Runway review, I'd like to comment on some juicy news bits I've come across the last day or two.
Bush admitted yesterday that he and his sadistic posse did have a shitload of secret prisons scattered all over, but now he's had the baddest of the bad guys shipped to Gitmo for eventual war tribunals (if he gets permission to hold the tribunals).
In the meantime, he claims, they will not be tortured because as we all know, Bush is The Decider, not The Torturer.
In livelier news, it seems Paris Hilton was busted for DUI in Hollywood last night. Her blood alcohol level was said to be ever so slightly over the legal limit, so I'm thinking the skinny bitch starved herself all day, then ate a martini olive and got buzzed off it.
Kevin Federline whined to Ellen DeGeneris yesterday that being married to his meal ticket Britney Spears was "hard, hard work." Hey, who among us would have a problem snuggling up to her rich butt after a day of being a lazy, talentless baby making machine?

Last night on Project Runway, I was nearly convinced the show was too rigged to continue watching.
Then they voted off Vincent and I sighed with relief. There is justice in the fashion world.
Last week, the challenge was to design jet-set wear for themselves.
Once they donned their outfits, they were all whisked away to Paris where no-chin tattoo neck Jeffrey won the prize with his aging rock star costume.
By the way, his psycho tattoo says, "Hamilton Detroit" with some Italian proclamation of love for his son Hamilton Detroit underneath. Who would name a kid that, much less have it carved into his neck in 88 point script?
Anyway, Angela, who resembles my sister's first girlfriend, was righteously booted off for her hideous brown, silk linen pedal pushers with two of her jumbo, trademark fleurchons planted smack dab in the middle of each ass cheek.
Even I couldn't forgive that ensemble- although Vincent's black and charcoal pajama suit and Kayne's white trash Elviswear were close seconds in the hideous category.
So...
Last night the contestants were tasked with designing an haute couture gown from the workrooms of Parsons Paris.
Haute couture is so fancy, Parisienne designers must intern for about a decade to eventually be licensed by the government to call themselves couturiers.
Couture design is known for flawless finishing, hand-sewn hems and other details, and usually requires a team of tiny handed French seamstresses several weeks to finish one gown.
Not these guys.
They got two days and 300 Euros ($375USD) to put together their entries.
In order of viewer ratings, here's the best to the worst:
Uli the German woman made a gorgeous, flowing gown of pearl gray charmeuse. She clearly should have won, especially since she raised the bar by selecting a solid color instead of one of her trademark prints.
Kayne made a complicated bronze-colored gown with a great corseted top and a skirt that fluttered just right as his model walked. The judges hated it but I thought it was hot.
Michael made a sloppy sort of slate blue gown with goofed up ruching up top. Not his usual quality. The look was improved by his tucking in the big titty cupcakes he'd designed into the gown, but not by much.
Jeff no-neck made a gaudy monstrosity in two patterns of bright yellow cotton plaid and madras, with bells and whistles and tentacles and ribbons... all in different lengths. It looked like a huge pile of fabric on and off the model.
Laura, whose belly is now brimming with a three-month-old fetus, designed an unfortunate slim black gown with a lacy, starchy stand-up white cuffs and a collar that extended into a deep V. Anyone who recalls Yves St. Laurent in his 1970's heyday would see the similarities.
Then there was Vincent- whose gold colored gown was done in a brocade sofa upholstery fabric down below and a silk top, which he unfortunately sewed on backward with the model's breasts exposed just to the modest side of each areola.
The sleeves were especially hideous, shaped a little like the ace of spades.
His model Gia was the one who got hit by a bus- apparently two buses, the first being Vincent's tacky glue-gun couture.
So who won?
That fucking Jeffrey, with his yellow cotton plaid circus tent of a mess.
See for yourself:
http://www.bravotv.com/Project_Runway/rate/season/3/episode/9/results

G.O.P. Sets Aside Work on Immigration
By CARL HULSE and RACHEL L. SWARNS
Going into a critical pre-election stretch, Congressional
Republican leaders will concentrate on national security
issues instead of immigration..."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/09/05/us/05cong.html?th&emc=th


Yeah, right.
They didn't want to expose the huge chasms within their party about immigration, so suddenly this "issue of vital importance" will disappear because the GOP fears it won't play well at the polls.
Truth be told, the fascist GOP captains of agro-industry rely on cheap foreign labor to do their bidding for pennies on the dollar so they can pocket the profits their exploitation provides.
Rest assured, some deep pocketed Big Dogs in the industry told that imbecile Bush and his lackeys in the Congress to eat immigration reforms, and they did.
So, now they are opting to play the national security card again?
What national security?
FEMA failed New Orleans and the Gulf. It's still a fetid, stinking cesspool down there and everyone knows it.
Airports are STILL NOT retrofitted to security measures even close to Tel Aviv's airport.
Taking the war to them, i.e. Iraq, was and is a fucking joke.
Does anyone think Iraq is not the biggest, most expensive boondoggle in American history?

The GOP stands for nothing but fattening the wallets of corporate white American men.
Unless you're a rich, powerful, white, Christian man- send those bastards a message in November.
They've been fucking us for years.

It's time for THEM to bend over.

The Kickapoo Lucky Eagle Casino

I came, I saw, I was almost conquered.
I spent the day with some friends down In Eagle Pass, a dreary Texas border town whose only claim to fame is one of Texas's two Indian casinos, in this case being the Kickapoo Lucky Eagle.
The good news is, in four and a half hours I only lost about $38.
The place is clean and spacious, but the machines are mostly those goofy, off-brand cartoon kinds where you have to have at least an associate's degree in gaming design to even begin to understand what you need to do to win a buck or two.
The staff was sure as hell not helpful in explaining the games- I doubt they knew more than I did about them, which was next to nothing. Plus, they hardly spoke any English.
After pissing away a 20 trying to find a quarter or dollar machine that felt right, I settled into a bank of penny machines, where for 24 cents a pull you can win up to $1.50 or more on a winning line. I spent maybe 20 bucks on those machines and made about 16 bucks beyond my initial investment.
I never thought I'd play penny slots at any casino, but the rest of the machines were all so space age and confusing, the pennies were the only machines I didn't think would wipe me out in the first hour.
In the last hour, I played a quarter machine that paid $21 on a $20 investment, so that was about as exciting as it got.
There were no free drinks.
I think they worry too much about the Kickapoos drinking free cocktails and going off their collective nuts. That shit you hear about drunk Indians is true- the politicaly correct just need to deal with it.
A well drink cost $4.75 and a lukewarm bottle of Diet Coke was 2 bucks. And besides the unappetizing $7 buffet, all they had were small bags of pork rinds- which are pretty delicious when one's stomach is snarling.
We were pretty exhausted on the two hour drive home, made extra tedious by the soundtrack CD playing on the stereo from the movie, "Brother, Where Art Thou" with it's abysmally depressing 1930's era country music. My head would have exploded, but I was too tired to spend the energy getting worked up over it. Mostly I just went into a daze until it was over.
I had fun, but I have Vegas withdrawal symptoms big time now.
But for less than $40, the Lucky Eagle was a great little diversionary day trip.
I'd go again, just not anytime soon.

Happy Labor Day, kemosabes.

Creativa, Restorativa, Positiva, Negativa and Imbeciliva

I was in line at Brooke Army Medical Center today getting a prescription filled.
I stood behind an older lady, chatting aimlessly with her when a young GI rolled by in a shiny new wheelchair, with both of his legs amputated and freshly bandaged.
The lady and I looked at each other sadly, and I said, "I hate this war."
She nodded in agreement.
I added, "And I hate the idea of those draft dodgers in the Bush administration waging this war. And I'm a liberal saying that."
She said, somewhat defensively, "I'm a Christian," as if being a Christian was the polar opposite of being a liberal.
I said, "Well, Jesus was a total liberal, so you're in good company."
By then, she was called to the window and walked away.
That was before I could explain to the old fool how Iraq had nothing whatsoever to do with 9/11, and how Bush was a fucking idiot who embodied the Anti-Christ.

Attention Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and Hindus:
Your God does not advocate killing in his (or her) name.
Your God is not on anyone's side during wartime.
There is nothing holy about war.

If you love your God, you should hate ALL war.
It's as simple as that.