wasp jerky

Huh?

2008-10-15T10:44:00.002-05:00

OK, let me see if I have this straight. Barack Obama, as of today, is leading John McCain 357 to 181 electoral votes. Obama is leading in all the states John Kerry won in 2004, plus Iowa, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada, Florida, Ohio, Virginia, Missouri, West Virginia and North Dakota. So Sarah Palin is spending the day giving speeches in New Hampshire? Seriously?

The last eight years aside, this is the sort of stupidity that ought to disqualify one from holding public office.

The Empire Strikes Back

2008-03-22T10:13:00.001-05:00

Casey Knowles, the little girl from Hillary Clinton's infamous 3 a.m. phone call add, strikes back.

Another One Bites The Dust

2008-03-19T20:55:00.002-05:00

From an article in my wife's hometown newspaper:

According to Wikipedia, an online encyclopedia, cacti are members of the succulent plant family Cactaceae, which is native to the Americas. Often used as ornamental plants, cacti are accustomed to loving in arid and hot environments. Ferguson said the plant started dying in 2007, but did not grow back like the first time.

Sigh. I'm sorry, but Wikipedia is not a source. It just isn't. Journalism in this country is officially dead.

Crystal Ball

2008-03-13T19:24:00.005-05:00

OK, some Lost predictions:

1) Michael is the spy on the boat.
2) A major character is rumoured to die tonight. My money is on Claire.
3) Sun and Jin are the last two Oceanic Sixers.
4) Ben was the guy in the coffin last season.
5) I've said it before and I'll say it again: the two skeletons from the very beginning of the show? Jack and Kate.
6) Sun's dad works for Charles Widmore.

What say ye?

And Now As Promised...

2008-03-12T21:27:00.002-05:00

Earlier this evening Keith Olbermann delivered a special comment aimed at the Clinton campaign and its lackluster response to the Ferraro debacle. Good for him. Hillary Clinton is lapsing into self-parody more with each passing day. It's also interesting that after eight years of a President who can barely bring himself to apologise for anything, that half of Democrats are backing someone who, well, can barely bring herself to apologise for anything.

Winners Never Quit

2008-03-05T18:51:00.002-06:00

Though the media has in some respects been avoiding the issue, there's been a bit of talk today about how unlikely it is that Hillary Clinton can win.

As The Washington Post explains,

Clinton wiped away the debate last night with a robust victory in Ohio and a narrow win in Texas. But as she vowed to keep campaigning, the tight vote in Texas signaled she may yet face a tough decision in coming weeks. The slim margin in the Texas popular vote and an additional caucus process in which she trailed made clear that she would not win enough delegates to put a major dent in Sen. Barack Obama's lead. And regardless of the results, she emerged from the crucible of Ohio and Texas with a campaign mired in debt and riven by dissension...

[I]t would be enormously difficult for Clinton to overtake Obama in the pledged delegates chosen by voters in primaries and caucuses. By some calculations, Clinton would need to win more than 60 percent of the vote in the dozen contests remaining between now and June 7 to catch Obama in pledged delegates -- a steep challenge given that, so far, she has won that much in only one state, her onetime adopted home of Arkansas. Even in New York, where she is a sitting senator, she won 57 percent of the vote. She won 55 percent in Michigan, where Obama was not even on the ballot.

"Her durability is impressive if not astonishing, but she is still looking at some pretty cold, hard numbers in the race," said Jim Jordan, a Democratic strategist who initially ran the 2004 primary campaign of Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.). "She's running out of time, she's running out of space." He described a Clinton nomination even with wins in Texas and Ohio as "impossible, really."

So after eight years of a President who can't string two sentences together, do we really now want one who apparently can't add?

McCain In The Membrane

2008-02-05T16:56:00.000-06:00

James "I beat my dog with a belt" Dobson released a statement today detailing why he cannot in good conscience vote for John McCain for President. Dobson insisted his statement was personal and doesn't reflect the views of his organisation, despite the statement being prominently displayed on the front page of his organisation's web site.

So things are getting interesting. Either A LOT of RepubliChristians will be staying home in November, or the Republican Party will finally split. Or white conservative evangelical Christians will learn that they don't have to do whatever Dobson tells them.

That said, I still think McCain can take Hillary Clinton in a head to head election. Hopefully the Democratic Party will make the right decision this summer at the convention. But given their fetish for spinelessness and losing presidential elections, I'm not holding my breath.

Anyways, the official press release:

Dr. James Dobson released a statement to The Laura Ingraham Show today, stating his personal opinions of this critical election.

As voters in 24 states head to the polls today to choose a presidential nominee, Dr. James Dobson released a statement to The Laura Ingraham Show today. He stated his personal opinions of this critical election:

"I am deeply disappointed the Republican Party seems poised to select a nominee who did not support a Constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage, voted for embryonic stem-cell research to kill nascent human beings, opposed tax cuts that ended the marriage penalty, has little regard for freedom of speech, organized the Gang of 14 to preserve filibusters in judicial hearings, and has a legendary temper and often uses foul and obscene language.

"I am convinced Sen. McCain is not a conservative, and in fact, has gone out of his way to stick his thumb in the eyes of those who are. He has sounded at times more like a member of the other party. McCain actually considered leaving the GOP caucus in 2001, and approached John Kerry about being Kerry’s running mate in 2004. McCain also said publicly that Hillary Clinton would make a good president. Given these and many other concerns, a spoonful of sugar does NOT make the medicine go down. I cannot, and will not, vote for Sen. John McCain, as a matter of conscience.

"But what a sad and melancholy decision this is for me and many other conservatives. Should Sen. McCain capture the nomination as many assume, I believe this general election will offer the worst choices for president in my lifetime. I certainly can't vote for Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama based on their virulently anti-family policy positions. If these are the nominees in November, I simply will not cast a ballot for president for the first time in my life. These decisions are my personal views and do not represent the organization with which I am affiliated. They do reflect my deeply held convictions about the institution of the family, about moral and spiritual beliefs, and about the welfare of our country."

Around noon today, Dr. Dobson talked to national talk-show host Dennis Prager. He made it clear he was not endorsing anyone.

"Dr. Dobson's statement speaks for itself," said Gary Schneeberger, vice president of media relations for Focus on the Family Action. "He made it as a private citizen, and it reflects his personal opinion of Sen. McCain's candidacy and record. People can read into it what they like; all I see is his own personal 'straight talk' regarding why he can't vote for one candidate."

What's Mine Is Yours

2008-02-04T17:59:00.001-06:00

Two posts from me in the span of a week. What's the world coming to?

I haven't weighed in on politics and/or religion in a while. As I think I mentioned before, I've sort of grown tired of this blogging thing. But tomorrow is Super Tuesday, and today an email arrived from David Rees, creator of the always wonderful Get Your War On. Pretty telling stuff, and just another reason I consider Hillary Clinton to be Bush/Cheney Lite, and why tomorrow I'll be voting for Barack Obama.

On a side note, can someone please explain to me why Senator Clinton's eight years of being First Lady makes her "more experienced" than Obama? Would I be a more efficient psychologist because my wife was one first?

At any rate, Rees writes:

Cluster bombs and landmines are particularly terrifying weapons that wreak havoc on communities trying to recover from war. They are fatal impediments to reconstruction and rehabilitation of agricultural land; they destroy valuable livestock; they disable otherwise productive members of society; they maim or kill children trying to salvage them for scrap metal.

Over 150 nations have signed the 1997 Mine Ban Treaty. It pains me that our great nation has not. But in the autumn of 2006, there was a chance to take a step in the right direction: Senate Amendment No. 4882, an amendment to a Pentagon appropriations bill that would have banned the use of cluster bombs in civilian areas.

Senator Obama of Illinois voted IN FAVOR of the ban.

Senator Clinton of New York voted AGAINST the ban.

Analysts say Clinton did want to risk appearing "soft on terror," as it would have harmed her electibility.

I'm not a single-issue voter. But as Obama and Clinton share many policy positions, this vote was revelatory for me. After all, Amendment No. 4882 was an easy one to vote against: Who'd want to risk accusation of "tying the hands of the Pentagon" during a never-ending, global War on Terror? As is so often the case, there was no political cost to doing the wrong thing. And there was no political reward for doing the right thing.

But Senator Obama did the right thing.

Is Senator Obama perfect? Of course not. Nobody who voted for 2005's wack-ass energy bill is perfect. Nobody who voted to reauthorize the Patriot Act is perfect.

But of the two remaining Democratic candidates, one decided her vote on Amendment No. 4882 according to a political calculation. The other used a moral calculation.

I'm 35 years old, and over the years, I've had two experiences in the voting booth: I've voted for politicians I really respected, who I knew could never win. And I've voted for politicians I didn't really respect, because I knew they could win.

Tomorrow, I'm going to vote for a politician I really respect, who I know can win.

(DEEP BREATH)

I urge you to vote Senator Barack Obama for the Democratic Party's nominee for President of the United States.

Thanks,
David Rees

I can't argue with that.

Lost And Found

2008-01-31T16:14:00.000-06:00

Hey look. I'm posting every six weeks now. What fun!

Anyways, tonight I kneel before Lost, my sweet sweet master. It's been far too long. I don't care what anyone says. Best. Show. Ever. Anything that draws this much influence from Alan Moore's Watchmen can't be less than brilliant.

Is This Thing On?

2007-12-09T17:49:00.000-06:00

Haven't been here in a while. It appears that I may be over the blogging thing. Time will tell, I suppose. I haven't missed it at all actually, for whatever it's worth.

At any rate, there were a couple of shootings in Colorado today, one at a Youth With a Mission center, the second at New Life Church, which is Ted Haggard's former church:

A gunman in a black trench coat and a high-powered rifle entered the church's main foyer about 1 p.m. and began shooting, according to the source at the church, who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity because the police department had asked that it release all information.

The church's 11 a.m. service had recently ended, and hundreds of people were milling about when the gunman opened fire. Nearby were parents picking up their children from the nursery.

The gunman was killed by a member of the church's armed security staff, the source said. Four people were shot, and the source did not know whether the shooter was one of the four. A SWAT team was searching the building for an explosive device, but the source could not confirm any details.

This sucks for everyone involved. But I'm more than alarmed that New Life Church has gunmen under its employ. What the fuck is wrong with the American Christian church, that it has armed security guards? I don't know who these people think they're following, but it isn't Jesus.

This Is The Way The World Ends

2007-09-20T15:18:00.000-05:00

These are the sordid tales of how it all came crashing down.

Harmless Sparks

2007-09-06T18:46:00.000-05:00

Yah!!! David Bazan aka Pedro the Lion aka Headphones aka Paperback aka David Bazan's Black Cloud is in town tomorrow night. The Internets are atwitter that he's been playing several new songs at live shows lately, including the not quite finished piece below. Good stuff.

they might have burned
but the priests were all taking turns
showing nuns what they had discerned
about their bodies in the dark
they carried on
from the evening until the dawn
like they should've been all along
making harmless sparks
instead of breaking little boys' hearts

God knows
if you notice the millions of small holes
and ponder the weight of an apple
compared to the trouble we're in
then some grown men might
be tempted to question their birthright
in front of their kids and devout wives
causing the doubt to begin
to spread like original sin

These Are Jokes

2007-08-27T20:11:00.000-05:00

You may know comedian Demetri Martin from his Trendspotting spots on The Daily Show. He also happens to be one of the funniest people alive.

Toy Story

2007-08-02T10:29:00.000-05:00

Later this month, my arch-enemy Wal-mart will begin selling what the BBC refers to as faith-based toys. These scripture quoting ~~action figures~~ dolls hardly mark the first time Christians have dabbled in the action figure business, but this is the first I’ve been aware of such toys breaking into the mainstream. Or did Mel Gibson put out a line of Passion of the Christ action figures?

David Socha, founder of One2believe, the company which makes the dolls, is confident the demand is there for "God-honouring" toys which reflect Christian teachings and morality.

"We get a lot of people, even people who are not of faith, don't go to church, saying 'I've got a four and a six-year-old and I don't know what to get them any more'," he said.

"If you go in a toy aisle in any major retailer, you will see toys and dolls that promote and glorify evil, destruction, lying, cheating.

"In the girls' aisle where the dolls would be, you see dolls that are promoting promiscuity to very young girls. Dolls will have very revealing clothes on, G-string underwear."

What his company offers instead is "something faith-based that is not only fun to play with but also is solidifying a person's spiritual wherewithal and their spiritual journey", he said.

This is excellent news, of course. Now children corrupted by Spider-man and Bratz will have access to wholesome action figures like Noah (alcoholic), Moses (murderer), Sampson (terrorist and, as Slacktivist recently called him, inventor of the suicide bomb) and David (whose poems about throwing babies against rocks and washing his feet in the blood of slaughtered enemies may make him the world’s first gangster rapper). The action figures are a steal at $19.99 and $24.99, perfect for any Christian family on a budget. For my money, though, the collection seems sadly incomplete without nudist prophet Isaiah.

If you’re a girl, you might prefer one of the Proverbs 31 dolls. They’re $39.99 and will help “encourage young girls to pursue biblical womanhood.” As an added bonus, one of these Jewish dolls from the Middle East even has brown skin.

Sadly, there’s not a tent spike-wielding Yael or a sword-carrying Judith. I’m not sure how girls are going to properly learn biblical womanhood if they can’t dramatize killing men.

On another note, if you prefer a different sort of toys altogether (the segue possibilities here are so deliciously wonderful that you should feel free to invent your own), there’s a Christian couple in the UK that has set up their own online sex shoppe. The store, Wholly Love, is designed for married Christian couples who believe that sexy time is a gift from God. This is surely the only place on earth where you can purchase both Philip Yancey’s Disappointed with God and an amertrine glass dildo.

Left Behind

2007-08-01T19:30:00.000-05:00

I say this from time to time, but every now and again it bears repeating. If you haven't read through Slacktivist's ongoing literary and theological deconstruction of the Left Behind series, you owe it to yourself to do so. Great stuff.

One delightfully strange thing about (premillenial dispensationalists) is the way they earnestly insist that all they're doing is providing a straightforward, linear reading of a straightforward, linear account. All the while they insist this they're jumping to and fro -- from Revelation to Daniel, to Thessalonians, back to an (earlier) chapter of Revelation, then to Ezekiel. Even as they tie themselves into knots flipping around, back and forth, to and fro, unable to work their way through John's apocalypse from beginning to end without recursive loops back to earlier chapters, even as they themselves get lost in the convoluted mess of it all and they are forced back to the drawing board to try again to force this narrative into a tidy timeline -- through all of that they seem utterly sincere in insisting that this impossible-to-follow-the-same-way-twice approach is really nothing more than a straightforward, linear and "literal" reading. It would be laughable if it weren't so heartfelt.

No, scratch that. It's still laughable.

----------------------------------

Left Behind is a fictional world, and as such its creators are free to invent a fictional president, a fictional Manhattan that's 50 miles long and a fictional U.N. with fictional powers. They are even free to invent a fictional Bible full of fictional prophecies. This is exactly what (LaHaye & Jenkins) have done. Their problem -- and it's a big problem -- is that neither they nor most of their millions of devoted readers realize that this is what they have done. They recognize that "Fitz" is a piece of fantasy and imagination, but they think the equally unreal Bible in their story is the same one we have here in reality. They present an inhuman planet inhabited by alien creatures who hardly seem to care that all of their children have vanished and yet they imagine that this imaginary world is a realistic portrayal of realistic people. The main differences between the world of Left Behind and the real world are not the products of the authors' invention, but the products of the authors' mistakes.

The Devil Is Beating His Wife

2007-07-31T14:40:00.001-05:00

Why Are You Wearing That Stupid Man Suit?

2007-07-24T17:21:00.000-05:00

Finally, finally, finally, writer/director Richard Kelly's film Southland Tales has a release date. This is unbelievably cool. Kelly's Donnie Darko is easily one of my favourite films ever, certainly in my top three (alongside Magnolia and Requiem for a Dream). Southland Tales looks like it will be just as weird and wonderful as Donnie Darko. The trailer won't be out until mid-August, though, so I've embedded the Donnie Darko trailer below for the time being. Sigh. It's like Christmas morning.

Kelly's "Southland Tales" Coming to U.S. Theaters in November

Samuel Goldwyn Films has announced the U.S. release of Richard Kelly's "Southland Tales." The company is planning a theatrical debut on November 9 in partnership with Destination Films and Sony Pictures Worldwide Acquisitions Group. The film, which debuted at last year's Cannes Film Festival and has since been completed, stars Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Sarah Michelle Gellar, Seann William Scott, Justin Timberlake, Mandy Moore, Cheri Oteri, Kevin Smith and Amy Poehler among others, with original music by Moby, a music sequence by Timberlake and a soundtrack that includes The Killers, The Pixies, Muse, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club, Radiohead, and Jane's Addiction. Set in the near future in Los Angeles, July 2008, the film is described as, "an epic story that takes place over the course of three days, culminating in a massive 4th of July celebration." It features, "Boxer Santaros (The Rock), an action star stricken with amnesia, Krysta Now (Gellar), an adult film star developing her own reality television project, and Roland Taverner (Scott), a Hermosa Beach police officer who holds the key to a vast conspiracy." "The time and additional visual effects that were added have allowed me to achieve my original vision for 'Southland Tales," Kelly said in a statement. "The fans' response has been overwhelming and I anticipate that moviegoers will respond enthusiastically." The filmmaker will be at Comic-Con in San Diego this Friday from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 to sign autographs and greet fans.

Snapes On A Plane Redux

2007-07-20T13:26:00.000-05:00

So tonight is the big night. Any last minute predictions? Who lives? Who dies? Who finds redemption? What's so special about Harry's eyes? Is Snape really evil? Can I finish re-reading the last two books by midnight tonight? If not, can I successfully avoid spoilers until I've read Deathly Hallows? Stay tuned.

Dear Abby

2007-07-16T12:09:00.001-05:00

Don't get me wrong. I like babies. I like mothers. I like pregnant mothers. I understand that small children can be a handful. I also understand that it can be difficult to find a babysitter. But is there some special circumstance of which I am unaware in which it is acceptable to bring an infant to a movie theatre?

It's a well known fact that babies tend to cry on occasion. And though I can understand the insatiable need to see the newest Harry Potter film on opening weekend, for the love of Jesus when your baby starts crying take it outside.

That is all.

Assholes For Christ

2007-07-12T16:43:00.000-05:00

Earlier today three Chistians were thrown out of the Senate chamber for loudly protesting a Hindu cleric who was giving the morning invocation. For loudly protesting the Hindu cleric while he was giving the morning invocation.

Notes TCMCafe:

The three protesters, who all belong to the Christian Right anti-abortion group Operation Save America, and who apparently traveled to Washington all the way from North Carolina, interrupted by loudly asking for God's forgiveness for allowing the false prayer of a Hindu in the Senate chamber.

"Lord Jesus, forgive us father for allowing a prayer of the wicked, which is an abomination in your sight," the first protester began.

"This is an abomination," he continued. "We shall have no other gods before You."

Senator Bob Casey (D-PA), serving as the presiding officer for the morning, immediately ordered them taken away — though they continued to yell at the Hindu cleric as they were headed out the door, shouting out phrases such as, "No Lord but Jesus Christ!" and "There's only one true God!"

No doubt these protesters probably think their removal was persecution. Ah, sweet sweet irony.

The group released a laughable press release commenting on the incident:

Theology Moved to the Senate and was Arrested

Theology has moved from the church house onto the floor of the United States Senate, and has been arrested.

Ante Pavkovic, Kathy Pavkovic, and Kristen Sugar were all arrested in the chambers of the United States Senate as that chamber was violated by a false Hindu god. The Senate was opened with a Hindu prayer placing the false god of Hinduism on a level playing field with the One True God, Jesus Christ. This would never have been allowed by our Founding Fathers.

"Not one Senator had the backbone to stand as our Founding Fathers stood. They stood on the Gospel of Jesus Christ! There were three in the audience with the courage to stand and proclaim, 'Thou shalt have no other gods before me.' They were immediately removed from the chambers, arrested, and are in jail now. God bless those who stand for Jesus as we know that He stands for them." Rev. Flip Benham, Director, Operation Save America/Operation Rescue

It's hard to know how to even comment, since this group seems to be completely illiterate about, well, pretty much everything. Ignorance of Christian theology, constitutional law, Hinduism and American history aside, though, I love how they capitalise founding fathers. It's almost like they consider them gods. And insinuating that the world's third largest religion had raped a branch of American government was sheer tactical brilliance. And that bit about backbone and standing on the gospel of Christ? Nice play on words. Poetry really.

Still, this reminds me yet again that Christians in the US aren't concerned so much with loving their neighbour as they are with being right. Which is fine, I suppose. Pride is a fruit of the spirit, after all. Remember kids, nothing converts the heathen quite like three people behaving like complete dicks.

I'm also reminded that, short of strapping bombs to themselves, Christian fundamentalists aren't all that different from their Muslim counterparts.

Milestones

2007-07-12T12:04:00.000-05:00

Second best, oh second best. I can learn to live with this. Plus I really need the rest. After all, what's wrong with second best? What's wrong with second best? -- Pedro the Lion

Never let it be said that President Bush isn't good at something. This week President Bush did something many would have thought unthinkable: he tied Richard Nixon's disapproval rating, the second worst ever for a US President. I'm not sure why the liberal media isn't reporting it. They must be busy melting glaciers in the arctic or something, so it appears that global warming is real.

If the President can apply himself just a bit, he'll take home the gold. We know he's an underachiever and all, but surely he can make us proud. Just two more measly disapproval points and he'll be the least popular ever. That's our President, we'll say with a look of triumph. We knew he could do it.

Salon has more:

Amid our nostalgia for the day in 1974 when (Hank) Aaron hit number 715 to pass Babe Ruth, it's easy to forget another race for the record books that went on that same season. While Aaron was hitting for the fences, Richard Nixon was trying to hit bottom – chasing Harry Truman's single-season record as the most unpopular president in the history of presidential polling.

At the time, Truman's record of 67% disapproval – set when Americans were weary of the Korean War and angry over the firing of Douglas MacArthur – had stood untouched for 22 years. Most pollsters assumed that Truman's mark, like Ruth's, could never be broken. Just as the physical wear-and-tear of baseball made 714 homers look insurmountable, the physics of politics seemed to put 67% disapproval out of reach. You could look it up in the Founders' rule book: a two-thirds majority is the threshold for impeachment by the Senate.

But Richard Nixon had spent his entire career being underestimated. By Opening Day of the 1974 season – less than two years after one of the greatest electoral landslides in history – Nixon stunned the political world by reaching 65% disapproval. Like Aaron, then at 713, Nixon began the 1974 season just two away from claiming the mark for all time.

Aaron's persistence paid off with a swing off Al Downing that launched him past Ruth on April 8, 1974. The same day, White House aides told the New York Times correspondent that far from stepping down, Nixon was abandoning his eighth counterattack (dubbed "Operation Candor") and launching his ninth. With such determination, he must have felt certain the record was within his grasp.

Yet when the last Gallup Poll of his presidency came out in August 1974, Nixon would taste the bitterness of defeat once again. His final disapproval rating was 66% -- one shy of Truman's record. By any other standard, Nixon left office the most hated president in American history. But in the record book, he had not even an asterisk to show for it.

In a remarkable historical coincidence, those same two records that were under assault in 1974 are on the ropes again in 2007. The sports world is already dreading the day Barry Bonds will pass Aaron. But the political world has scarcely noticed another milestone in the making: With 66% disapproval in this week's Gallup Poll, George W. Bush just tied Richard Nixon as the second-most unpopular president ever.

Bush has flirted with immortality before. In May 2006 and again in February 2007, he secured third place with personal bests of 65% disapproval. But each time, some random piece of less horrible news and the statistical vagaries of polling intervened to interrupt Bush's quest for the record.

For most of this year, Bush has been mired in the low 60s, unable to sustain any negative momentum. His team tried everything – mounting a hopeless surge in Iraq, botching the immigration bill, standing behind an Attorney General any other administration would have left for dead. But each week, the American people kept handing him the same verdict they gave Richard Nixon – in the words of King Lear, "The worst is not, so long as we can say, 'This is the worst.'"

Can Bush reach the goal that eluded Nixon? Or is Truman's record enduring proof that Dick Cheney is wrong: You can offend some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't offend all of the people all of the time.

(h/t: Streak)

Live From The People's Republic Of Wasp Jerky

2007-07-05T17:14:00.001-05:00

I've added a new feature to my blog. Over in the right column, below the archives, I've added a streaming mp3 player from Streampad. I haven't figured out all the kinks yet, like why a handful of songs that should be there aren't. Still it's pretty cool. Let me know what you think. I'll try to switch out the music periodically.

George W. Bush Will You Please Go Now

2007-07-04T06:32:00.000-05:00

Last night Keith Olbermann delivered what may be his most passionate special comment yet, asking the President to resign. In a more perfect world, television stations would have interrupted regularly scheduled programming to broadcast this instead. Hell hath no fury like a former SportsCenter anchor scorned.

I accuse you, Mr. Bush, of lying this country into war.

I accuse you of fabricating in the minds of your own people, a false implied link between Saddam Hussein and 9/11.

I accuse you of firing the generals who told you that the plans for Iraq were disastrously insufficient.

I accuse you of causing in Iraq the needless deaths of 3,586 of our brothers and sons, and sisters and daughters, and friends and neighbors.

I accuse you of subverting the Constitution, not in some misguided but sincerely-motivated struggle to combat terrorists, but instead to stifle dissent.

I accuse you of fomenting fear among your own people, of creating the very terror you claim to have fought.

I accuse you of exploiting that unreasoning fear, the natural fear of your own people who just want to live their lives in peace, as a political tool to slander your critics and libel your opponents.

I accuse you of handing part of this republic over to a Vice President who is without conscience, and letting him run roughshod over it.

And I accuse you now, Mr. Bush, of giving, through that Vice President, carte blanche to Mr. Libby, to help defame Ambassador Joseph Wilson by any means necessary, to lie to Grand Juries and Special Counsel and before a court, in order to protect the mechanisms and particulars of that defamation, with your guarantee that Libby would never see prison, and, in so doing, as Ambassador Wilson himself phrased it here last night, of you becoming an accessory to the obstruction of justice.

Escape From Chicagoland

2007-06-13T09:52:00.000-05:00

Getting out of ~~Jesusland~~ the US for a while. Back in July. Don't let President Bush start another war while I'm gone.

TV Killed Our Democracy

2007-05-29T17:40:00.000-05:00

We've got to try to realise the effect that television has had on our ability to retain information and to have our attention be held on a particular topic. It's shortened our memories by quite a lot. And the way that we interact with politics has been, really, it's just been demolished completely. -- David Bazan

I have a love-hate relationship with television. On the one hand, programming has come a long way, even in my lifetime. A lot of the stuff that's on these days is, really, just brilliant. On the other hand, well, spend two minutes watching one of the 24-hour cable news networks.

The above clip from Family Guy is the sharpest critique of what television has done to politics that I've seen in quite a while, perhaps even on par with some stuff Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert have done. The Solomon Grundy joke is a bit flat and out of place, but the rest of this is just top notch. This is what happens when you reduce leadership to soundbites and I'd-have-a-beer-with-himism. Ironic that I saw it on TV.

It also makes me wonder if this presidency, which I imagine to be the most PR-focused in history, could even exist without television.

Requiem

2007-05-28T21:03:00.001-05:00

The truth is that the nightmare of the Bush years won’t really be over until politicians are convinced that voters will punish, not reward, Bush-style fear-mongering. And that hasn’t happened yet.

Here’s the way it ought to be: When Rudy Giuliani says that Iran, which had nothing to do with 9/11, is part of a “movement” that “has already displayed more aggressive tendencies by coming here and killing us,” he should be treated as a lunatic.

When Mitt Romney says that a coalition of “Shia and Sunni and Hezbollah and Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood and Al Qaeda” wants to “bring down the West,” he should be ridiculed for his ignorance.

And when John McCain says that Osama, who isn’t in Iraq, will “follow us home” if we leave, he should be laughed at.

But they aren’t, at least not yet. And until belligerent, uninformed posturing starts being treated with the contempt it deserves, men who know nothing of the cost of war will keep sending other people’s children to graves at Arlington. -- Paul Krugman

Things I Learned Last Month While Not Blogging

2007-05-03T18:56:00.000-05:00

1) When a Palestinian Muslim straps a bomb to his waist and blows up 32 Israelis, he’s a terrorist. When a Korean living in the United States shoots 32 people for “being rich,” he’s a troubled college student.

2) A white man leaves a nail bomb at an abortion clinic in Texas? Just another example of something that white folks do that isn’t terrorism. And, boy, the liberal media and the Republican Party won’t shut up about it, either.

3) Laura Bush says that Iraq, a country approximately the size of California, with a population approximately that of Texas, is pretty much stable now, except for that pesky one bombing a day. School shooting in Virginia kills a measly 32 people? United States whines for weeks. Pussies.

4) Chinese? Korean? Japanese? They all look alike.

5) A South Korean kills dozens of people on American soil? Time to invade China. Better to fight the Asians over there, so we won’t have to fight them here.

6) The world has changed dramatically since 11 September. Thus, US citizens should be willing to give up certain basic rights and freedoms to ensure everyone’s safety. Except, of course, for tighter restriction on firearm purchases.

7) The Virginia Tech shooting could have been prevented if people were allowed to carry concealed handguns. Life is, after all, just like an episode of 24.

8) No one could have predicted that a bullied kid who wrote disturbing stories in English classes, who was encouraged to seek counselling, who was investigated for stalking and harassing female students, and who was declared mentally ill and ordered to seek outpatient treatment, could have been a threat to himself or others. Just like no one could have predicted 11 September, despite detailed warnings to the Bush administration from governments and intelligence agencies in Indonesia, France, Britain, Italy, India, Argentina, Russia, Morocco, Israel, Germany, Jordan, Egypt, and even Afghanistan. Hindsight truly is 20-20.

Almost Friday Funnies

2007-03-08T17:49:00.000-06:00

1) This deleted scene from Borat made me laugh so hard that I'm pretty sure I broke at least one rib (might be offensive to some):

2) In celebration of International Women's Day, I stole this from Transforming Seminarian:

Top Ten Reasons Why Men Should Not Be Ordained

10. A man's place is in the army.

9. For men who have children, their duties might distract them from the responsibilities of being a parent.

8. Their physical build indicates that men are more suited to tasks such as chopping down trees and wrestling mountain lions. It would be "unnatural" for them to do other forms of work.

7. Man was created before woman. It is therefore obvious that man was a prototype. Thus, they represent an experiment, rather than the crowning achievement of creation.

6. Men are too emotional to be priests or pastors. This is easily demonstrated by their conduct at football games and watching basketball tournaments.

5. Some men are handsome; they will distract women worshipers.

4. To be ordained pastor is to nurture the congregation. But this is not a traditional male role. Rather, throughout history, women have been considered to be not only more skilled than men at nurturing, but also more frequently attracted to it. This makes them the obvious choice for ordination.

3. Men are overly prone to violence. No really manly man wants to settle disputes by any means other than by fighting about it. Thus, they would be poor role models, as well as being dangerously unstable in positions of leadership.

2. Men can still be involved in church activities, even without being ordained. They can sweep paths, repair the church roof, and maybe even lead the singing on Father's Day. By confining themselves to such traditional male roles, they can still be vitally important in the life of the Church.

1. In the New Testament account, the person who betrayed Jesus was a man. Thus, his lack of faith and ensuing punishment stands as a symbol of the subordinated position that all men should take.

Before The Music Stops

2007-03-03T14:50:00.000-06:00

I can't seem to stop posting clips from YouTube. I came across the trailer for Before the Music Dies earlier. Looks interesting.

Hallelujah

2007-03-01T08:48:00.000-06:00

All my favourite artists seem to be covering Leonard Cohen lately. That's Over the Rhine above, covering "Hallelujah." And then David Bazan has been covering the same song, as well as Bob Dylan's "The Man in Me."

Click over here for a recent Bazan show from Virginia. You'll get both those songs, as well as some stuff he doesn't sing live as often anymore. Plus snappy banter about Jesus, fabric softener, freemasons and speaking Chinese. What the hell else do you need from a Thursday? Even better, Bazan is touring the next couple of months, first with Will Johnson of Centro-matic, then with Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie and The Postal Service.

Mr Deity

2007-02-25T22:22:00.000-06:00

And all the while the good Lord smiles and looks the other way. -- Pedro the Lion

Got this site from Greg. Pretty amusing.

Interesting, The Best Thing Since Wrestling

2007-02-21T20:34:00.000-06:00

I've written before about Christian fundamentalists and their selective reading of the Bible, particularly as it relates to the charging of interest.* It's good to know I'm not the only one who wonders how homosexuals can be kicked out of churches while bankers can be deacons. As usual, Slacktivist says it better than anyone:

Let's consider a case of actual conflict. Based on my e-mail, my fellow evangelical Christians are greatly interested in the matter of homosexuality. Many of my correspondents disagree with my advocacy of equal rights for homosexuals because they perceive such equality as incompatible with the teaching of scripture. I'm not talking here about the Phelpsian homophobes or those who seem primarily motivated by bigotry. I'm talking about people who seem like they wish they could agree with me, but feel they are not allowed to do so because they have no choice but to side with the map.

I don't think this perceived conflict is as substantial or as actual as they imagine. Their premise of unambiguous biblical teaching may be much closer to Hall's "biblical" geocentrism than they realize. (I don't want to get sidetracked here into a detailed exegetical analysis of the handful of New Testament passages dealing with the subject, so let me just generally point out that if your interpretation of scripture leads you to believe that "homosexuality is a choice," yet you cannot find a single homosexual who thinks this is so, then perhaps you ought to consider rethinking your interpretation.)

But let's assume, for the sake of argument, that this is an actual instance of actual conflict and that I am, in this instance, siding with reason/experience against the text. In that case ...

Wait. You know what? This example is too easy. I'm a straight guy, and my evangelical critics on this matter seem also to be heterosexual, so this seems a bit too conveniently abstract. (It's also unseemly, too much like we're telling homosexuals, "You wait out in the hall while we discuss your fate. We'll call you in later and let you know what we decide.")

So let's pick an example that hits closer to home.

The Bible prohibits the charging of interest. No getting around it. This is explicit and unambiguous and more frequently discussed in scripture than is homosexuality. Jesus himself didn't just repeat this prohibition, he amplified it by forbidding the expectation of repayment. So no wiggle room there.

The charging of interest is, of course, the basis of our market economy. It is as unavoidable now as the air we breathe. I have several interest-bearing accounts (as well as, unfortunately, several interest-charging accounts). So does my local church. So does my denomination. So do even the least "worldly" of our coreligionists, the Amish. And so do, I'm guessing, my evangelical detractors who feel my advocacy of homosexual rights is "unbiblical."

How on earth do we justify this? More to the point, why is it that we don't even feel the need to bother to justify this?

I would argue that free markets can be a Good Thing. The charging of interest, when properly harnessed, can be a powerful engine for growth and prosperity, creating incentives for investment that makes possible many good things which would otherwise be impossible. The recognition of this fact, over the centuries, led to an evolution of our interpretation of the prohibition against usury. It ceased to mean the charging of any interest (even "the hundredth part" or 1 percent) and came to mean, instead, the charging of "excessive" interest. We began to reinterpret the evident meaning of the text in an effort to reconcile it with what we were learning about the world and how it works. The prohibition against usury remains in recognition of the principle contained in the text, a principle we continue to honor despite the sometimes laughably elastic application of that weasel-word excessive.

This argument can be challenged as mere "rationalization," in the psychological sense, an after-the-fact attempt at self-justification by a religious tradition whose adherents had become wealthy and worldly. But I would counter that in the non-psychological sense, rationalization is, well, rational. The application of reason is reasonable and necessary, and I find the reinterpretation of the prohibition against interest to be a reasonable step.

This reasonable step is regarded as noncontroversial when the matter involved is our own money. When the matter involved is someone else's sexuality, however, such a reasonable step is regarded as extremely controversial. Why do you suppose that is?

*An aside for all the people who surf through here looking for where to find the phrase "neither a borrower nor a lender be" in the Bible (and there seem to be a lot of you): It's from the apocryphal book of Hamlet, Act I, Scene 3.

Political Science

2007-02-20T22:51:00.000-06:00

Things I Will Probably Never Understand:

1) Iraq invades Kuwait in 1990? United States invades Iraq. Israel illegally acquires Palestinian land in 1967 and never returns it? United States gives Israel $3 billion+ annually.

2) Syrian occupation of Lebanon? Bad. Israeli occupation of Syria? Not so much.

3) Former head of Pakistan’s ISI (the Pakistani equivalent of the CIA), Lt General Mahmoud Ahmad, orders $100,000 wired to 9/11 hijacker Mohammad Atta? United States invades Iraq.

4) Hamas behind suicide bombings against Israelis? Terrorism. Israel kills Palestinians and bulldozes their homes? Not terrorism.

5) Israeli possession of nuclear weapons? Acceptable. Iranian possession of nuclear weapons? Unacceptable.

6) How Osama bin Laden and Saddam Hussein could have had an “operational relationship” in the early 1990s, as former Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith claimed, given that bin Laden wanted to attack Hussein with mujahideen warriors at that time.

7) Despite having more than 700 military bases in 130 countries around the world, the United States should not be considered an empire.

8) Bill Clinton fails to take down Al-Qaeda following bombing of U.S. embassy in East Africa? Republicans go apeshit. Ronald Reagan fails to even retaliate after Hezbollah bombs U.S. embassy in Beirut? Republicans eerily silent.

Something Old, Something News

2007-02-20T16:42:00.000-06:00

CNN plays the fiddle while America burns. -- Sole

In case you missed the media orgy, Anna Nicole Smith died 12 days ago. And Britney Spears has checked into rehab after shaving her head and getting a couple of tattoos. Meanwhile, in Iraq, American trained Iraqi security forces are raping women. Apparently only the first two items warrant coverage from American media outlets.

I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. Thousands of voters were illegally removed from voter rolls in Florida in 2000, and I'm still waiting for the American media to provide coverage. But, hell, I'm sure Tom Cruise will jump on a couch sometime soon, and that's what really matters, eh?

Anyways, Riverbend has the scoop on yet another story all those liberal American reporters aren't reporting:

As I write this, Oprah is on Channel 4 (one of the MBC channels we get on Nilesat), showing Americans how to get out of debt. Her guest speaker is telling a studio full of American women who seem to have over-shopped that they could probably do with fewer designer products. As they talk about increasing incomes and fortunes, Sabrine Al-Janabi, a young Iraqi woman, is on Al Jazeera telling how Iraqi security forces abducted her from her home and raped her. You can only see her eyes, her voice is hoarse and it keeps breaking as she speaks. In the end she tells the reporter that she can’t talk about it anymore and she covers her eyes with shame.

She might just be the bravest Iraqi woman ever. Everyone knows American forces and Iraqi security forces are raping women (and men), but this is possibly the first woman who publicly comes out and tells about it using her actual name. Hearing her tell her story physically makes my heart ache. Some people will call her a liar. Others (including pro-war Iraqis) will call her a prostitute- shame on you in advance.

I wonder what excuse they used when they took her. It’s most likely she’s one of the thousands of people they round up under the general headline of ‘terrorist suspect’. She might have been one of those subtitles you read on CNN or BBC or Arabiya, “13 insurgents captured by Iraqi security forces.” The men who raped her are those same security forces Bush and Condi are so proud of- you know- the ones the Americans trained. It’s a chapter right out of the book that documents American occupation in Iraq: the chapter that will tell the story of 14-year-old Abeer who was raped, killed and burned with her little sister and parents.

They abducted her from her house in an area in southern Baghdad called Hai Al Amil. No- it wasn’t a gang. It was Iraqi peace keeping or security forces- the ones trained by Americans? You know them. She was brutally gang-raped and is now telling the story. Half her face is covered for security reasons or reasons of privacy.

______________________________________

I look at this woman and I can’t feel anything but rage. What did we gain? I know that looking at her, foreigners will never be able to relate. They’ll feel pity and maybe some anger, but she’s one of us. She’s not a girl in jeans and a t-shirt so there will only be a vague sort of sympathy. Poor third-world countries- that is what their womenfolk tolerate. Just know that we never had to tolerate this before. There was a time when Iraqis were safe in the streets. That time is long gone. We consoled ourselves after the war with the fact that we at least had a modicum of safety in our homes. Homes are sacred, aren’t they? That is gone too.

She’s just one of tens, possibly hundreds, of Iraqi women who are violated in their own homes and in Iraqi prisons. She looks like cousins I have. She looks like friends. She looks like a neighbor I sometimes used to pause to gossip with in the street. Every Iraqi who looks at her will see a cousin, a friend, a sister, a mother, an aunt…

Humanitarian organizations are warning that three Iraqi women are to be executed next month. The women are Wassan Talib, Zainab Fadhil and Liqa Omar Muhammad. They are being accused of 'terrorism', i.e. having ties to the Iraqi resistance. It could mean they are relatives of people suspected of being in the resistance. Or it could mean they were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time. One of them gave birth in the prison. I wonder what kind of torture they've endured. Let no one say Iraqi women didn't get at least SOME equality under the American occupation- we are now equally as likely to get executed.

And yet, as the situation continues to deteriorate both for Iraqis inside and outside of Iraq, and for Americans inside Iraq, Americans in America are still debating on the state of the war and occupation- are they winning or losing? Is it better or worse.

Let me clear it up for any moron with lingering doubts: It’s worse. It’s over. You lost. You lost the day your tanks rolled into Baghdad to the cheers of your imported, American-trained monkeys. You lost every single family whose home your soldiers violated. You lost every sane, red-blooded Iraqi when the Abu Ghraib pictures came out and verified your atrocities behind prison walls as well as the ones we see in our streets. You lost when you brought murderers, looters, gangsters and militia heads to power and hailed them as Iraq’s first democratic government. You lost when a gruesome execution was dubbed your biggest accomplishment. You lost the respect and reputation you once had. You lost more than 3000 troops. That is what you lost America. I hope the oil, at least, made it worthwhile.

Update: Good to see the media reporting on this. Finally. A day after the fact. You'd think they'd be ashamed to have been scooped by bloggers. Again.

Dedicated To The People Who Never Thought It Could Be This Way

2007-02-18T19:11:00.000-06:00

Dear Sol.illaquists of Sound,

Please come back to Chicago soon.

Sincerely,

The People's Republic of Wasp Jerky

Brokeback Rapture

2007-02-18T19:07:00.001-06:00

Tuesday Comics Blogging

2007-02-13T21:12:00.000-06:00

As Quick As A Tick In A New York Minute

2007-02-02T19:47:00.000-06:00

There are a lot of great benefits to having a psychologist for a wife. Having a psychowifey means leafing through the DSM-IV-TR at bedtime to snarkily diagnose family members. It also means a weird sense of humour: no one else in the world would be caught wearing a pair of Freudian slippers. And, of course, there’s tagging along to conferences.

Last spring I got to see Tony Campolo give a plenary lecture at a conference where Focus on the Family and Liberty University were in attendance. There’s nothing quite like hearing a Baptist preacher disdain free trade, capital punishment and Premillennial Dispensationalism in that context.

This year there’s no Tony Campolo. Instead we're taking day trips to Philadelphia and New York. I’ve never been to either of those cities, so I’m feeling adventurous. We’ve got a general idea of what to do in New York. Right now we’re thinking Central Park, Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, World Trade site and the Museum of Natural History. Philadelphia is a little more up in the air.

Anyways, has anyone been to either place? How’s the night life? Any cool spots we should hit while we’re there? What the hell is there to do in Philly?

So This Is The New Year

2007-01-16T08:32:00.000-06:00

Perspective is a funny thing. Perspective can make a glass either half full or half empty. But, as Demetri Martin quipped on his Comedy Central special over the weekend, it also depends on what's in the glass. What if it's baby blood?

Most reasonable people seem to view the current situation in Iraq as a complete disaster. Others continue to see the glass as half full of baby blood. As my wife and I were told at Thanksgiving, it's really all the fault of the liberal media. Things really aren't that bad in Iraq.

I stand corrected. Iraq is, apparently, a bit like Disneyland these days. Only at this theme park 34,000 park visitors died last year, there's only four hours of electricity a day, women can't travel through the park alone or with uncovered heads, and you have to stand in line for eight hours for gasoline to ride attractions like Splash of Blood Mountain. And if you're a florist, sales are at an all time high, because Iraqis still love to greet the troops with flowers and candy.

Of course, it's easy for Americans to see the situation in Iraq as not that bad. We aren't the ones who have to choose between standing in line for gasoline or standing in line for less time to buy it off the black market. We aren't the ones without electricity for 20 hours a day. We aren't the ones who have to fill up multiple containers of water every time the stuff comes out of the tap, because we don't know when the tap will stop working again. We aren't the ones having our homes raided by overzealous security forces. And we probably aren't the ones who have been to the morgue several times to see if a body is or isn't a relative. No, we're the ones gearing up for a new season of American Idol. Iraqis should clearly be more grateful for their four years of misery.

But what do I know? I've been brainwashed by the liberal media. I'm sure the Iraqis are just glad that Saddam is dead. Oh, wait, sorry, no they aren't:

You know your country is in trouble when:

1. The UN has to open a special branch just to keep track of the chaos and bloodshed, UNAMI.

2. Abovementioned branch cannot be run from your country.

3. The politicians who worked to put your country in this sorry state can no longer be found inside of, or anywhere near, its borders.

4. The only thing the US and Iran can agree about is the deteriorating state of your nation.

5. An 8-year war and 13-year blockade are looking like the country's 'Golden Years'.

6. Your country is purportedly 'selling' 2 million barrels of oil a day, but you are standing in line for 4 hours for black market gasoline for the generator.

7. For every 5 hours of no electricity, you get one hour of public electricity and then the government announces it's going to cut back on providing that hour.

8. Politicians who supported the war spend tv time debating whether it is 'sectarian bloodshed' or 'civil war'.

9. People consider themselves lucky if they can actually identify the corpse of the relative that's been missing for two weeks.

A day in the life of the average Iraqi has been reduced to identifying corpses, avoiding car bombs and attempting to keep track of which family members have been detained, which ones have been exiled and which ones have been abducted.

2006 has been, decidedly, the worst year yet. No- really. The magnitude of this war and occupation is only now hitting the country full force. It's like having a big piece of hard, dry earth you are determined to break apart. You drive in the first stake in the form of an infrastructure damaged with missiles and the newest in arms technology, the first cracks begin to form. Several smaller stakes come in the form of politicians like Chalabi, Al Hakim, Talbani, Pachachi, Allawi and Maliki. The cracks slowly begin to multiply and stretch across the once solid piece of earth, reaching out towards its edges like so many skeletal hands. And you apply pressure. You surround it from all sides and push and pull. Slowly, but surely, it begins coming apart- a chip here, a chunk there.

That is Iraq right now. The Americans have done a fine job of working to break it apart. This last year has nearly everyone convinced that that was the plan right from the start. There were too many blunders for them to actually have been, simply, blunders. The 'mistakes' were too catastrophic. The people the Bush administration chose to support and promote were openly and publicly terrible- from the conman and embezzler Chalabi, to the terrorist Jaffari, to the militia man Maliki. The decisions, like disbanding the Iraqi army, abolishing the original constitution, and allowing militias to take over Iraqi security were too damaging to be anything but intentional.

The question now is, but why? I really have been asking myself that these last few days. What does America possibly gain by damaging Iraq to this extent? I'm certain only raving idiots still believe this war and occupation were about WMD or an actual fear of Saddam.

Al Qaeda? That's laughable. Bush has effectively created more terrorists in Iraq these last 4 years than Osama could have created in 10 different terrorist camps in the distant hills of Afghanistan. Our children now play games of 'sniper' and 'jihadi', pretending that one hit an American soldier between the eyes and this one overturned a Humvee.

This last year especially has been a turning point. Nearly every Iraqi has lost so much. So much. There's no way to describe the loss we've experienced with this war and occupation. There are no words to relay the feelings that come with the knowledge that daily almost 40 corpses are found in different states of decay and mutilation. There is no compensation for the dense, black cloud of fear that hangs over the head of every Iraqi. Fear of things so out of ones hands, it borders on the ridiculous- like whether your name is 'too Sunni' or 'too Shia'. Fear of the larger things- like the Americans in the tank, the police patrolling your area in black bandanas and green banners, and the Iraqi soldiers wearing black masks at the checkpoint.

Again, I can't help but ask myself why this was all done? What was the point of breaking Iraq so that it was beyond repair? Iran seems to be the only gainer. Their presence in Iraq is so well-established, publicly criticizing a cleric or ayatollah verges on suicide. Has the situation gone so beyond America that it is now irretrievable? Or was this a part of the plan all along? My head aches just posing the questions.

---------------------------------

My only conclusion is that the Americans want to withdraw from Iraq, but would like to leave behind a full-fledged civil war because it wouldn't look good if they withdraw and things actually begin to improve, would it?

Here we come to the end of 2006 and I am sad. Not simply sad for the state of the country, but for the state of our humanity, as Iraqis. We've all lost some of the compassion and civility that I felt made us special four years ago. I take myself as an example. Nearly four years ago, I cringed every time I heard about the death of an American soldier. They were occupiers, but they were humans also and the knowledge that they were being killed in my country gave me sleepless nights. Never mind they crossed oceans to attack the country, I actually felt for them.

Had I not chronicled those feelings of agitation in this very blog, I wouldn't believe them now. Today, they simply represent numbers. 3000 Americans dead over nearly four years? Really? That's the number of dead Iraqis in less than a month. The Americans had families? Too bad. So do we. So do the corpses in the streets and the ones waiting for identification in the morgue.

Is the American soldier that died today in Anbar more important than a cousin I have who was shot last month on the night of his engagement to a woman he's wanted to marry for the last six years? I don't think so.

Just because Americans die in smaller numbers, it doesn't make them more significant, does it?

Monday Random Ten

2007-01-15T23:26:00.000-06:00

Bedhead - Smoke
Sufjan Stevens - All the Trees of the Field Will Clap Their Hands
The Beatles - Long, Long, Long
Bonepony - Twenty More People
The White Stripes - Slicker Drips
Gorillaz - Every Planet We Reach Is Dead
Sage Francis - Come Come Now
Northern State - Dying In Stereo
Superdrag - Gimme Animosity
Girl Talk - Give and Go

Something Corporate

2007-01-14T15:49:00.000-06:00

All the experts say you ought to start them young. That way they'll naturally love the taste of corporate cum. -- Pedro the Lion

One of the guiding principles Christians in the United States live by is to be "in the world but not of it." Christians, as Paul writes in his letter to the Romans, are to "be not conformed to this world but...transformed by the renewing of (the) mind."

It's interesting to see how this plays out in real life. Such ideas are often used to suggest that Christians shouldn't engage in particular behaviours, like smoking, drinking alcohol, watching movies with a rating above PG-13, or saying words like fuck. Such activities, I have been told, can hurt one's "Christian witness." I don't run in such circles any longer, so I honestly don't know how many Christians still believe those things. I suspect it's still a lot.

Funnily enough, other behaviours are still acceptable for the Christian who isn't conformed to the world. Whether it be shopping at businesses that use sweat shop labour, eating fast food, or attending a church that models itself after a corporation (instead of after the early church), for some reason many Christians don't consider these things to be "worldly." Thus, you often see Christians boycotting businesses for things like treating homosexuals as human beings. But you don't as often see Christians boycotting businesses for paying substandard wages or for failing to provide adequate health benefits for their employees.

Tonight a couple from my church who lives in Chicago's Pilsen neighbourhood is on ABC's Extreme Home Makeover. I'm really happy for them. At the same time, it's hard not to be simultaneously unnerved. Should I be happy that Sears is donating thousands of dollars worth of free stuff to a family in need? Or should I be upset that that free stuff was built on the backs of tens of thousands of sweat shop labourers?

I don't know. But I do know that I'm not going to stop saying fuck until RepubliChristiamericans stop shopping at Wal-Mart.

A Brief Recap

2007-01-10T21:18:00.000-06:00

Not dead. Only unmotivated. In the meantime, Keith Olbermann recaps the war, and the President's credibility.

A Look Back

2006-12-27T21:24:00.000-06:00

More Than Meets The Eye

2006-12-20T21:40:00.000-06:00

The Transformers trailer is up. It actually looks a little creepy.

In Which I Kneel Before My Sweet, Sweet Master

2006-12-20T20:38:00.000-06:00

After a more than three year hiatus, we've got cable again. It's the cheap, basic kind, but, just like the last time we got basic cable, they didn't filter out the higher channels. No more watching Countdown, The Daily Show and The Colbert Report via YouTube. In completely unrelated news, posting could be scarce in the near future.

So what else should I be watching?

A Moment Of Silence

2006-12-17T18:44:00.000-06:00

It's a good thing nothing important was going on...

The War On Christmas Returns

2006-12-14T21:38:00.000-06:00

Via Film Chat I came across Operation Merry Christmas. I was going to make fun of them, but it really seems like they do a better job of making themselves look ridiculous on their own. It's kind of like comedian Lewis Black says in his HBO special, Red, White, and Screwed. Comedians today don't need to write jokes anymore. They just need to sit onstage and read the newspaper to the audience.

Meme Pool

2006-12-14T19:51:00.000-06:00

A while back everyone's favourite Aussie, Liz, tagged me for this meme. This is the part of the movie where I finally get around to doing it. So off we go then:

Six Things Nobody Particularly Wants to Know About the Person Who May or May Not Be Responsible for This Blog

1) Unbeknownst to many, my left nipple proudly wields a piercing. Yes, it hurt. No, you can't touch it. Weirdo.

2) No department store will ever employ me in their gift wrapping department. My gifts come bundled in saggy, bloated, poorly-taped, easily torn paper receptacles. My poor wife's Christmas presents appear to be placed in gift bags, but that's only an illusion.

3) People who have loud, annoying mobile phone ring tones that go off in public, people who answer their mobile phones while standing in checkout lines, and people who loudly, endlessly twitter on their mobile phones in public places, ought to all be rounded up and shot in the face. Twice.

4) I have never been in a car accident.

5) A piece of advice: you should download or purchase as much Longmont Potion Castle as you can possibly find.

6) Future goals: adopt two children of race or ethnicity other than own; have cars converted to electric; have solar tiles installed on roofing; own various livestock, including hens, cow and goat; slow, deliberate destruction of Western civilisation.

I have been instructed to tag six people to play along. If you're reading, consider yourself tagged.

Wow

2006-12-05T20:36:00.001-06:00

This may be the most disturbing video I've ever seen. At least now I know why German hip-hop act Tic Tac Toe always sounds so pissed off.

(hat tip: God Is Not A Hamburger)

Another Dispatch From The War Of Terror

2006-12-05T08:40:00.000-06:00

A week ago, a 40-year old man was sentenced to 30 years in prison by a U.S. District Judge. His crime? Attempting to obtain what he thought were the ingredients needed to make Sarin nerve gas and a block of C-4 explosive, and possession of stolen explosives. His plan? To explode a briefcase bomb while Congress was in session. The man, who was convicted in April on a total of five charges, will now instead go to prison.

Of course, you haven't heard about any of this. The "liberal media" didn't report it. Michelle Malkin and Bill O' Reilly didn't go apeshit. The President didn't use the sentencing for a photo op. Hell, it didn't even make the front page of the local paper in the city in which it happened. But I suppose that's what happens when a terrorist is a white man from Tennessee, instead of a Muslim.

(hat tip: Crooks and Liars)

Things I Learned From Family At Thanksgiving

2006-11-29T20:47:00.000-06:00

1) Anyone born in the United States can become whatever they want to be if they work hard enough. Race, skin colour, class, lack of a familial support system, excess body fat and the absence of a penis cannot hold back someone who is truly determined.

2) Caucasians should be allowed to say the word “nigger” because African Americans do.

3) Arizona is to be admired because they do not observe Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday as a holiday.

4) When African Americans get together, they plot against the whites.

5) God blesses nations that bless Israel and curses nations that curse Israel. That is why the United States is so blessed. That Europe, Canada, Australia, Japan, China, India, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, South Korea, Taiwan, Turkey, Iran and Mexico are also very wealthy only proves that God has a strange sense of humour.

6) One of the pillars of Islam is death to Israel and America. All Muslims believe this. This remains true despite the tremendous amount of diversity found within Christianity, whose adherents have been known to dissolve fellowship with one another over issues as seemingly insignificant as whether musical instruments can be played during worship. That the world’s one billion Muslims have not already destroyed Israel and all Christians only means that they’re up to something very sneaky.

7) Jesus, who never killed anyone, and routinely taught such things as turn the other cheek and love thy neighbor as thyself, was not a pacifist.

8) Because it is the church’s job alone to care for the poor, the United States government should have no programmes that support the impoverished or the common good. That God required the nation of Israel to give 10 percent of its income every three years for caring for the poor is irrelevant.

9) All Christians at all times in all countries have always believed the view of biblical eschatology currently held by Christians in the United States. This despite the fact that said view is only approximately 150 years old.

Haggardback Mountain

2006-11-21T21:26:00.000-06:00

This line is metaphysical
And on the one side, on the one side
The bad half live in wickedness
And on the other side, on the other side
The good half live in arrogance
And there's a steep slope with a short rope
This line is metaphysical
And there's a steady flow moving to and fro
--Pedro the Lion

I'm late, it seems, in commenting on the Ted Haggard scandal. I'm not sure I have much to say that hasn't already been said. It has, however, been interesting to see how Christians have reacted to the situation. Some, like the Trinity (Falwell, Dobson and Robertson) have distanced themselves from the events. Falwell and Robertson have pretended that Haggard is an insignificant man, despite his connections to the White House and the sheer immensity of his former congregation. Dobson backed out of helping counsel Haggard through the aftermath, citing his busy schedule. Perhaps he's too overwhelmed counseling his son Ryan through the aftermath of his divorce and remarriage. Others have tried to make the case that Haggard really isn't a hypocrite. That may fly in Christian circles, but, as Greg pointed out, try convincing non-Christians that a man who says one thing and does another isn't a hypocrite.

Most Christians (or most of the blogs I read written by Christians), though, seem to have reacted with a surprising degree of grace. I think that's appropriate. Haggard is clearly a fuckup. But he's no more of a fuckup than you or I. The only real difference is he's in the public eye, and he got caught.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of losers in all of this. Haggard's family is a given. Then there are those outside the church. Most people don't need another reason to discount Christianity. But we've given them another anyway. And, sadly, we've managed to once again demonise gay and lesbian people, many of whom just want to be accepted for who they are. It's a tragedy that in 2,000 years of Christianity we haven't figured out how to do that.

Interestingly, all this parallels the release of a documentary about Lonnie Frisbee, a prominent hippie evangelist of the Jesus Movement. Frisbee pointed thousands towards the Christian faith in the 60s and 70s, and was an important figure in the history of the Calvary Chapel and Vineyard movements. But he has been largely ignored by Christians because he was a non-self-identifying gay man who died of AIDS. At least Haggard has something to look forward to (that being written out of history, not AIDS).

Decisions

2006-11-20T15:56:00.000-06:00

Both Derek Webb and Over the Rhine are in my neck of the woods on 2 December. Sadly I haven't perfected the art of being in two places at once. No one should have to make these kinds of choices.

Friday Random Ten (Christmas Mix 1.0)

2006-11-16T21:34:00.000-06:00

Half-Handed Cloud - The Star That Moved Around the Night
Jars of Clay - Christmas for Cowboys
Pedro the Lion - Silent Night (live)
Jack Johnson - Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer
Fleming & John - Carol of the Bells
Sense Field - Happy X-mas (War Is Over)
Barenaked Ladies & Sarah McLachlan - God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
Belle & Sebastian - O Come O Come Emmanuel
Starflyer 59 - Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas
Badly Drawn Boy - Donna & Blitzen

Friday Comics Blogging

2006-11-16T21:27:00.000-06:00

Does Whatever A Spider Can

2006-11-10T13:12:00.000-06:00

So the new Spider-man 3 trailer is up. Looks really good. And talk about your post-11 September subtext. Forgiving your enemies indeed.

Christmas In November

2006-11-08T18:05:00.000-06:00

It feels a little like Christmas today. I’m not a Democrat by any means. But I am a GeorgeBushAndWhatPassesForTheRepublicanPartyTheseDaysNeeds
UncheckedPowerLikeBritneySpearsNeedsAnotherHusbandocrat. For the past five years these men have done whatever the hell they wanted, Constitution be damned, under the guise of fighting a silly War on Terror™.

Not anymore. Democrats have the House by a big margin, almost certainly the Senate, and a tremendous number of governorships and other state offices. So much for that mandate George Bush claimed to have. And so much for Democrats being out of touch with mainstream America. As Kos put it, when you can’t get an abortion ban passed in South Dakota, or a gay marriage ban passed in Arizona, the last thing that the U.S. is is conservative.

Hopefully all this will mean my country will be injected with some semblance of what passes for sanity now. But, if nothing else, the next couple of years will certainly be entertaining.

A few scattered thoughts:

1) In the past couple of days gas prices in my area have gone up 15-20 cents per gallon. I’d like to believe that’s just a coincidence.

2) The Virginia Senate seat will more than likely belong to the Democrats. While it certainly isn’t over until Karl Rove sings, Allen is down 7,000 votes. He’s not going to make that up in a recount. Democrats are also going to control the machinery of a recount, which means Republicans are only delaying the inevitable. Beyond that, a recount would also give ample time for an investigation into Virginia vote suppression. That may happen anyway, given that the FBI is already looking into the matter. But I’m betting Republicans don’t want to call any more attention to their attempts at cheating than they have to.

3) The mainstream media shows once again that it is completely incompetent. Electronic voting glitches in multiple states? People showing up to polls and mysteriously not being registered to vote? Real reporters might actually investigate things like that.

4) I went to sleep in the United States. I must have awakened in Europe. There are now more women in Congress. There’s also now a female Speaker of the House, a Muslim Representative, the second black governor ever and a Socialist Senator. Good times.

5) Kung Fu Monkey still misses real Republicans

6) I’m curious about what all this means for Christians. There’s the potential for a Republican split here, between old school, fiscal conservatives and Christians who have hooked up with the Republican Party in the belief that it will eventually do something about abortion and homosexuals (keep holding your breath). People also seem to be realizing that not all people who call themselves Christians are conservatives or Republicans. It’s about time.

7) Bush twin porn. Will it happen? I don’t know.

An Election Day Mix

2006-11-07T11:22:00.000-06:00

Today is Intervention ~~Election~~ Day. In celebration, here's an election-themed mix:

Derek Webb - A King and a Kingdom
Derek Webb - A New Law
Derek Webb - My Enemies Are Men Like Me
Dar Williams - Empire
Bad Religion - American Jesus
Eric Idle - The FCC Song
Daniel Roop - This Poem Is Not the Revolution
The Legendary K.O. - George Bush Doesn't Care About Black People
Pedro the Lion - Backwoods Nation
Sage Francis - Makeshift Patriot
Sage Francis - Slow Down Gandhi (Reanimator remix)
James McMurtry - God Bless America
Bright Eyes - When the President Talks to God

You can find plenty more similarly-themed songs here, here and here.

Thoughts On Iraq Part 2

2006-11-07T09:49:00.000-06:00

I grew up in East Tennessee. East Tennessee is big on many things. One of those things is football.

There's nothing necessarily wrong with that, of course. But if there's one thing you'll notice about sports fans, it's that many of them are experts. The funny thing is that many such experts, at best, only played second string lineman in high school. These particular fans have lots of advice for coaches and players. But that advice isn't exactly backed up by experience. Such avid sports fans are also notorious for throwing around words like "we," as if they are somehow actually on the sports team in question.

Such sports fans remind me of that group of war supporters referred to as the 101st Fighting Keyboarders. Similar to those armchair quarterbacks, the 101st Fighting Keyboarders are a group of people who are very enthusiastic about fighting in Iraq, provided that it's someone else who is fighting in Iraq.

I suppose it's easy to "support the troops" when that means shelling out $5 for a magnetic ribbon. But here's the deal. If you think the U.S. should be in Iraq, and yet you aren't actually in Iraq, you really have two options. Either go fight in Iraq or shut the fuck up.

As Steve Gilliard notes:

We have a volunteer army with fewer and fewer volunteers, and people reenlisting only to save their friends. There is a time limit to their ability to be in combat. They cannot serve forever. They will have to be replaced. And fewer and fewer are willing to replace them,

What I want people to do is be honest.

If you will not serve in Iraq, and no one you know will serve, stop expecting someone else to do what you will not.

Therefore, it is time to stop calling for more troops, or the US to make Iraq safe. We cannot do this and even Americans are refusing to join the fight. It is time to look at your actions and realize, that despite your ideals, you oppose continuing this war. In practical terms, you have decided that this war is not worth your life or anyone you know. And million of Americans have joined you in this decision.

So, with this fact evident, it is time to call for US troops to withdraw from Iraq. Not save it, not add more boots on the ground. You have already voted by your actions. It is time that you match it with your words.

It couldn't be more simple.

(h/t: On The Homefront)

Thoughts On Iraq

2006-11-07T08:48:00.000-06:00

Shelly points to a really interesting op-ed in Rolling Stone. The piece, written by Matt Taibbi, talks about the growing shift in the U.S. from supporting the ~~war~~ occupation in Iraq to the backlash we're seeing now:

We saw this same kind of cultural shift in 1968, after the Tet offensive (an analogy so obvious that even Tom Friedman saw it recently), when the American political establishment soured on the Vietnam War. Despite the conservative propaganda that for decades has insisted that it was the media that lost the war for us in Vietnam, in fact the media didn't turn on the Vietnam war effort until the war was already lost. And the reason the media soured on that war had nothing to do with it being wrong; it had to do with the post-Tet realization that the war was expensive, unwinnable and politically costly. America is reaching the same conclusion now about Iraq, and so, like Dave Letterman, a whole host of people who just a few years ago thought we "had to do something" are now backing off and repositioning themselves in an antiwar stance.

What's dangerous about what's going on right now is that an electoral defeat of the Republicans next week, and perhaps a similar defeat in a presidential race two years from now, might fool some people into thinking that the responsibility for the Iraq war can be sunk forever with George Bush and the Republican politicians who went down with his ship. But in fact the real responsibility for the Iraq war lay not with Bush but with the Lettermans, the Wolf Blitzers, the CNNs, The New York Timeses of the world -- the malleable middle of the American political establishment who three years ago made a conscious moral choice to support a military action that even a three-year-old could have seen made no fucking sense at all.

It doesn't take much courage to book the Dixie Chicks when George Bush is sitting at thirty-nine percent in the polls and carrying 3,000 American bodies on his back every time he goes outside. It doesn't take much courage for MSNBC's Countdown to do a segment ripping the "Swift-Boating of Al Gore" in May 2006, or much gumption from Newsweek's Eleanor Clift to say that many people in the media "regret" the way Gore was attacked and ridiculed in 2000. We needed those people to act in the moment, not years later, when it's politically expedient. We needed TV news to reject "swift-boating" during the actual Swift Boat controversy, not two years later; we needed ABC and NBC to stand up to Clear Channel when that whole idiotic Dixie Chicks thing was happening, not years later; we needed the networks and the major dailies to actually cover the half-million-strong protests in Washington and New York before the war, instead of burying them in inside pages or describing the numbers as "thousands" or "at least 30,000," as many news outlets did at the time; and we needed David Letterman to have his war epiphany back when taking on Bill O'Reilly might actually have cost him real market share.

--------------------------------

Letterman's subsequent reasoning -- that seeing one death turn into dozens and then hundreds and thousands made him reconsider the whole thing -- all that tells you is that this is a person who makes life-and-death decisions without considering the consequences. If the Iraq war was not ever going to be worth 3,000 American lives (and countless more Iraqi lives), then why the hell did we go in in the first place? If you make a decision to fight, you had better not be scared of blood. And if you're suddenly changing your mind about things after you lose a few teenage lives, you're a hundred times more guilty than the guys like Bush who are actually sticking to their guns about this war.

Because Bush and the rest of that crew sent young men to die for something they believed in, fucked-up as their reasoning might be and have been. But these shitheads in the political middle who are flip-flopping right now sentenced teenagers to death for the cause of expediency and careerism. There are young men coming home now without arms and legs because the Wolf Blitzers of the world were too afraid to lose their jobs or piss off advertisers bucking the war hysteria of the times. Remember, CNN and the rest of the networks did great business in the run-up to the war. They had artists cooking up fancy new "America's New War" graphics and they were selling lawn fertilizer and soda and male-enhancement drugs by the metric ton right up to the time when the Saddam statue came down. But the war isn't selling anymore; the war is a bummer. And so these guys are changing their minds.

Are you throwing up yet? Surely that behavior is more shameful than anything coming out of the White House.

This assault on the Republicans that's taking place in the national media right now is partially a reflection of national attitudes, but mostly a matter of internal housecleaning. The members of the Bush administration have proven to be incompetent managers of the American system, and so they are being removed. It's that simple. They screwed up a war that all of these people wanted, turned public opinion against the dumbed-down militarist politics that until recently was good business for everybody. And so they have to go. Mistake any of this for ideology or principle at your peril.

In one sense "staying the course" amounts to little more than stubbornness in the face of reality. But in another it is kind of admirable. Bush may be a monster. But perhaps he isn't the biggest monster of all.

Friday Comics Blogging

2006-11-03T18:56:00.000-06:00

Friday Random Ten

2006-11-03T18:50:00.000-06:00

Dave Matthews Band - Don't Drink the Water
The Gourds - Pickles
Daikaiju - The Final Phase
Dixie Dirt - Teeth
The Beach Boys - God Only Knows
Superdrag - Who Sucked Out the Feeling
D12 - Filthy
Woven Hand - White Bird
Pedro the Lion - Let Down (Radiohead cover)
Jenny Owen Youngs - Fuck Was I

Yowza

2006-11-02T21:42:00.000-06:00

Want to make $100? Watch the video...

The Joke Heard 'Round The World

2006-11-02T17:26:00.000-06:00

By now you know that Senator John Kerry botched a joke earlier this week. The result has been outrage. Outrage!

Apparently reading someone's comments in the context they were actually spoken is too hard. Apparently it's much worse to inadvertently imply that soldiers are uneducated than it is to manipulate intelligence to start a war. Apparently the fact that a large percentage of the armed forces in the U.S. are poorer, from rural communities, and in some instances less educated is reason to be mad at John Kerry. Apparently this is a major issue, unlike the planet running out of seafood in 50 years. Apparently Republicans who didn't fight in Vietnam have a right to criticise Democrats who did. Apparently, as Streak noted, a Democrat mangling a sentence is a sign of poor leadership (while the President mangling a sentence is called Tuesday). Apparently the media can't bother with something like, I dunno, actual journalism.

And apparently Keith Olbermann once again nails the entire thing:

Gay Marriage

2006-10-31T21:24:00.000-06:00

Same-sex marriage has kind of been a buzzword again lately. I'm not sure why. It's been legal in Massachusetts for a while now. So far as I can tell, despite what James Dobson claimed, civilisation hasn't yet crumbled.

But since some people still have their knickers in a twist over the issue, I thought I'd post this. It's an oldie but a goodie, straight from Kung Fu Monkey with love:

Here's the problem -- and I really do believe that misunderstanding this is the root of many issue in America today:

Your beliefs are not your rights. The government is in the job of enforcing your rights, not your beliefs.

The government does not belong in the bedrooms of the nation. It does not tell you who to marry, how to marry, who to love, what God to worship, what books to read ... that is not its job. The government's job when it comes to marriage is to make sure the legal mumbo-jumbo is observed. All the things that make marriage "marriage", all the emotional and religious context, that's up to the individual couples and their communities, be those communites Catholic, Protestant, Muslim, Jewish, civil ...

If you belong to a church which is against same-sex marriage, fine. If this judgement stands, your church will not be forced to marry gay people. Do you know why? Because, and I will take this slowly, odds are gay people are not going to your church. Strange gay people are not going to paratroop in and occupy your vestry. This law will not make you have to look at gay people, or associate with them, or like them. You will not have to forgive them, or even agree with them. The special vows that make marriage a holy institution to you, they will not be saying them in your church, changing the meaning of those vows to you. They do not change what "marriage" means to you. You can continue to argue that gay people are bad or wrong or evil in God's eyes, and do so freely. Do you understand? Your. Life. Does. Not. Change. Your rights are not abridged. And so, your right to find them objectionable or icky or evil ends where their right to enter into a legal contract begins.

You may have excellent moral, or religious, or personal arguments against same-sex marriage. But you do not have a single decent legal one. And that is the government's reach, and no farther.

All that, of course, is me trying to convince someone with silly things like logic. For me personally, it quite simply boils down to this:

Christianity survived the death of its founder, centuries of brutal persecution by the most powerful Empire on earth, Crusades, corruption, bad popes, multiple schisms -- and still spread and thrived, converting over the course of its history hundreds of millions of people from wildly diverse, often hostile cultures.

It'll survive two guys sharing a life insurance policy.

Free Movies

2006-10-31T08:33:00.000-06:00

Just a brief Halloween reminder: Archive.org has public domain movies available for free download. That includes movies like the original Night of the Living Dead and Nosferatu.

The Lessons Of September 11

2006-10-30T20:32:00.000-06:00

Someone once told me that hating him would be like drinking poison and hoping someone else would die. -- Rudy Tomjanovich

George Bush refers to something he calls "the lessons of September 11." I'm not sure what these lessons are (although others have offered some suggestions). As best as I can tell, the President seems to think that "the lessons of September 11" means "fighting them over there so we don't have to fight them here."

There is, of course, a much better lesson to be learned from September 11. The Amish know this lesson. They taught it to us all earlier this month. When a 32-year old milk-tank truck driver shot and killed five young girls, the Amish community in Nickel Mines, Pennsylvania did something unthinkable: they forgave the murderer. Even more extraordinarily, that Amish community reached out to the family of the murderer, going so far as to set up a college fund for his children.

In doing so, this Amish community has acted in a way that few other U.S. Christians have in the five years since September 11. They have responded as Jesus might have.

By The Numbers

2006-10-26T21:48:00.000-05:00

The media, like the Lord, works in mysterious ways. For all its purported liberalism, the U.S. media sure makes you read between the lines. You'd think ye olde liberal media would beat us over the head with certain stories.

Take Newsweek's recent "Republicans are in trouble" poll article. It's a pretty standard rundown of data (60 percent of white Evangelicals will vote Republican in the midterm elections, the President's approval rating is 35 percent, yada yada yada).

But what is arguably the biggest news of the story is buried near the very end:

Other parts of a potential Democratic agenda receive less support, especially calls to impeach Bush: 47 percent of Democrats say that should be a “top priority,” but only 28 percent of all Americans say it should be, 23 percent say it should be a lower priority and nearly half, 44 percent, say it should not be done. (Five percent of Republicans say it should be a top priority and 15 percent of Republicans say it should be a lower priority; 78 percent oppose impeachment.) Rolling back some of the Bush tax cuts would be contentious too: 38 percent of Americans say the Dems should make that a top priority; 28 percent say it should be a lower priority; and 28 percent say it shouldn’t be done at all.

For the mathematically challenged, 28 percent of Americans plus 23 percent of Americans equals 51 percent of Americans. That means more than half of the country wants to see the President impeached.

Given, polls are inaccurate, and you have to take the margin of error into account. Nonetheless, compare that 51 percent with the President's 35 percent approval rating. And compare that with Bill Clinton's numbers at the time of his impeachment. Only 35 percent of the country felt the House made the right decision in impeaching him. And his approval rating after the fact was 73 percent, the highest rating of Clinton's presidency at the time (and a higher approval rating than Ronald Reagan ever had).

Sadly, impeachment is something you aren't likely to see in the liberal media's newspaper headlines anytime soon. Well, at least for a couple more weeks.

Walking The Walk

2006-10-24T15:21:00.000-05:00

Daily Kos reports some interesting findings. The nonpartisan Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America took a look at more than 300 legislative votes in the last five years which affected American troops and veterans. The proposals included veterans' benefits, healthcare, medical research dedicated towards injured soldiers, and so on. Based on these votes, IAVA calculated which congressmen and senators had a history of supporting the troops, and which didn't. The results were then graded on a curve.

You can see the full results of the report here. But it's the Senate results that are the most shocking. Every Senate Republican, without fail, scores a "C" or lower. And every Senate Democrat, without fail, scores a "B-" or higher.

It appears that Senate Republicans support the troops the way abusive husbands love their wives.

Assimilated Press

2006-10-24T14:51:00.000-05:00

I stumbled across a new blog today, called Assimilated Press. It's basically satirical political news stories. Think The Onion back when it was funny, only not as funny.

I haven't read many of the posts on the blog yet. But many of the headlines alone are reason for stopping by. Here are some gems:

Republicans Oppose Masturbation Before Marriage
Supreme Court: Midnight Kidnappings of US Citizens Legal
Nation Stunned As Bush Tells Truth
Halliburton Given Contract to Develop Fuel From Human Remains
Bush Vetoes Recent Supreme Court Decision
Panic Spreads As Gay Sharks Attack Missing White Women
Bush Orders Closure Of American Border With Venezuela
Wal-Mart To Offer Outpatient Surgery In New Superstores
Vice President Cheney Bites The Ambassador From Liechtenstein
Mississippi River Becomes Ronald Reagan River
Cheney Spends Vacation Clubbing Baby Seals
White House OK's Use Of Torture In Public Schools
Speaker Hastert Claims He Was Molested By Bill Clinton
Neocons Prepared For Iraq War By Reading Chicken Entrails
McCain Blames Clinton For Influenza Epidemic Of 1919

Nail In The Coffin

2006-10-20T11:46:00.001-05:00

Enter into the fire, into the bloody gates of America,
The great, the fate, the late. -- Saviour Machine

Naivety: 2 Church: 0

2006-10-15T23:54:00.000-05:00

Via McCarty Musings.

Friday Random Ten

2006-10-13T21:19:00.000-05:00

Smashing Pumpkins - Here Is No Why
M83 - Teen Angst
Nathan Ryan - Preacher
Sole - Da Baddest Poet
Oasis - Stay Young
The Mountain Goats - Southwood Plantation Road
Kim Taylor - Troubled Mind
Sufjan Stevens - Chicago (live)
Mashup - Jimi Hendrix vs. Jay-Z
Pearl Jam - (Sittin' on) the Dock of the Bay

Friday Comics Blogging

2006-10-13T07:52:00.000-05:00

Faith Based Fictives Part 2

2006-10-12T21:32:00.000-05:00

Part two of Keith Olbermann's report on David Kuo's Tempting Faith.

Faith Based Fictives

2006-10-12T10:47:00.000-05:00

Their big success is now their biggest failure
Their golden child has been dethroned
Their reputation is now in ruins
Their tower to heaven has come tumbling down
And all the while
The good Lord smiles
And looks the other way
And looks the other way -- Pedro the Lion

Last night on Countdown, Keith Olbermann discussed David Kuo's new book, Tempting Faith. In it, Kuo says what many of us have been saying for a long time, that the Bush White House is using Christians to get elected, and nothing more:

Author David Kuo's conservative Christian credentials are impeccable; his resume sprinkled with names like Bennett and Ashcroft. Now, as the Foley cover-up has many evangelical Christians wondering whether the G.O.P. is really in sync with their values, "Tempting Faith" provides the answer: No way.

Kuo, citing one example after another of a White House that repeatedly uses evangelical Christians for their votes — while consistently giving them nothing in return;

A White House which routinely speaks of the nation's most famous evangelical leaders behind their backs, with contempt and derision.

Furthermore, Faith-Based Initiatives were not only stiffed on one public promise after another by Mr. Bush — the office itself was eventually forced to answer a higher calling: Electing Republican politicians.

Kuo's bottom line: the Bush White House is playing millions of American Christians for suckers.

According to Kuo, Karl Rove's office referred to evangelical leaders as 'the nuts.'

Kuo says, 'National Christian leaders received hugs and smiles in person and then were dismissed behind their backs and described as 'ridiculous,' 'out of control,' and just plain 'goofy.' "

This echoes the comments Tucker Carlson made recently. I wonder if conservative evangelicals will start to wake up, or if they will simply view this as just another liberal plot against them. Could it be that George Bush isn't God's golden boy after all?

And they called Bill Clinton slick.

Not For The Easily Offended

2006-10-11T17:04:00.000-05:00

Am I the only one who finds this song stinkin' hilarious?

Christmas, Christmas Time Is Here

2006-10-10T11:50:00.000-05:00

It wouldn't be Christmas without a new 7-inch release from David Bazan on Suicide Squeeze Records. This year Bazan takes on "Away in a Manger" and "O Little Town of Bethlehem." No word on whether he'll add verses to the songs, as he did last year with "Silent Night" (see above) and "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen." It's only $6 and it's a small, 1,000 copy release, so this won't last long.

~~Relevant~~ Status Quo Magazine also has a two-part interview with Bazan (part one here; part two here). It's semi-insightful.

And, while we're on the subject of Christmas, be sure you download Sufjan Stevens' "Sister Winter" and "That Was the Worst Christmas Ever."

Speaking of Christmas, is the War on Christmas™ still going on? Or did they send all those troops to Iraq?

Focusing On The Family

2006-10-08T13:16:00.000-05:00

Media Matters reports that James Dobson has expanded on his commments about former Republican Congressman Mark Foley:

As it turns out, Mr. Foley has had illicit sex with no one that we know of, and the whole thing turned out to be what some people are now saying was a -- sort of a joke by the boy and some of the other pages.

So let's review. Gay marriage will destroy civilisation. Children shouldn't watch SpongeBob SquarePants. But a Republican member of Congress asking an underage page about masturbation techniques, his sexual habits and the size of his genitals is "sort of a joke."

Good to have that clarified.

Friday Random Ten

2006-10-06T09:07:00.000-05:00

The Postal Service - Brand New Colony
Larry Norman - Prince of Peace
Superdrag - Who Sucked Out the Feeling
The Arcade Fire - Sonata
David Wilcox - Blow 'Em Away
Modest Mouse - The World At Large
The Advantage - Ghosts 'N' Goblins (Intro)
The Beatles - I Will
Kosmos Express - I Don't Have A Gun
RobinElla - Little Boy

Jon Stewart On Foley Scandal

2006-10-05T23:09:00.000-05:00

The Daily Show's continuing coverage...

Addicted To Mediocrity

2006-10-05T11:24:00.000-05:00

And you never ask questions when God's on your side. - Bob Dylan

There's a movie out right now called Facing The Giants. It is one of those inspirational Christian films. In other words, it's probably awful.

Here is the movie's description from Wikipedia:

Coach Grant Taylor at Shiloh Christian Academy has never had a winning football season. His car breaks down frequently, his house is falling down around him, and he and his wife are infertile. When he overhears school parents plotting to have him fired, he reaches a crisis point and prays. Reluctant at first, Coach Taylor resolves to get serious about his faith, and challenge his players to do the same. Events and situations work themselves out in a way that the entire school and community is touched, encouraged, and convinced that "with God, all things are possible."

I haven't seen the movie, but I'm guessing that in the end God takes time out of his busy schedule to help Shiloh Christian Academy win some football games. God is, after all, deeply concerned about the outcome of high school sporting events. The true test of faith is not whether Christians feed the poor, but whether they believe that God will help them score more touchdowns than the opposing team. I guess all the people starving and dying of thirst in Africa just aren't praying hard enough.

At any rate, the movie isn't exactly getting rave reviews. As of the moment, it's only got a 14 percent rating at Rotten Tomatoes. Even Josh Hurst at Christianity Today gave it a one star review. And, as Looking Closer notes, that isn't sitting well with a lot of readers.

Here's a comment from Christianity Today reader Dave Peterson that is par for the criticism the review has gotten:

Your review of Facing the Giants is disgusting. This was one of the greatest movies I have ever seen. The audience seemed to agree with me also. There were cheers, whoops, laughter (in all the right places, not as you stated at the actors), and the inspirational parts were, well, flat out inspirational. I think your reviewer needs to be more in touch with the average Christian rather than set themselves up as a movie critic. I see this is one more example of Christianity Today going further away from the Bible and moving toward a liberal theology.

This is very telling of Christianity in the United States. It is also extremely sad.

For many Christians, the purpose of art is to reflect truth. I would agree with that, but not in the way they mean it. What they often mean is that art must somehow point people to Jesus. Or it must communicate a "Christian worldview." Or it must be inspirational. What this particular group of Christians does not care about is whether the art in question is actually good art. It is more important to them that art either bring people to salvation or that it win some arbitrary battle in the so-called culture war.

With a mindset like that, it is easy to see why George W. Bush is President. These particular Christians have little patience for quality, for nuance, or for the complexities of real life. They do not have time for moving beyond a superficial black and white view of the world. It is more important to them that a man be a Christian than that he be able to do his job well.

These Christians would prefer to rot their brains with Audio Adrenaline than listen to John Lennon. These Christians would prefer to visit a Christian doctor, even if he is not a good doctor. I would rather visit an atheistic doctor who knows what he is doing. These Christians would rather have a Christian President. I would rather have a Muslim President who is not an incompetent jackass.

Of Sex Scandals

2006-10-05T10:24:00.000-05:00

Today the Chicago Sun Times printed comments by Newt Gingrich saying that Democratic sex scandals are worse than Republican ones. Gingrich, you'll remember, was one of the primary members of Congress to criticise Bill Clinton after Lewinskygate. Gingrich, you may also remember, has been married three times, and cheated on his wife while she was bedridden with cancer. (For some reason the always-liberal media failed to mention those facts. I guess they must not be relevant.)

I'm not sure how one would measure the severity of sex scandals along party lines. Nonetheless, I hope Gingrich hasn't forgotten the following gems:*

• Republican County Constable Larry Dale Floyd was arrested on suspicion of soliciting sex with an 8-year old girl.

• Republican judge Mark Pazuhanich pleaded no contest to fondling a 10-year old girl and was sentenced to 10 years probation.

• Republican Party leader Bobby Stumbo was arrested for having sex with a 5-year old boy.

• Republican Mayor Philip Giordano is serving a 37-year sentence in federal prison for sexually abusing 8- and 10-year old girls.

• Republican Mayor John Gosek was arrested on charges of soliciting sex from two 15-year old girls.

• Republican County Commissioner David Swartz pleaded guilty to molesting two girls under the age of 11 and was sentenced to 8 years in prison.

• Republican legislator Edison Misla Aldarondo was sentenced to 10 years in prison for raping his daughter between the ages of 9 and 17.

• Republican anti-abortion activist Howard Scott Heldreth (the guy who tried to take Terry Schiavo a glass of water) is a convicted child rapist in Florida.

• Republican zoning supervisor, Boy Scout leader and Lutheran church president Dennis L. Rader pleaded guilty to performing a sexual act on an 11-year old girl he murdered.

• Republican anti-abortion activist Nicholas Morency pleaded guilty to possessing child pornography on his computer and offering a bounty to anybody who murders an abortion doctor.

• Republican United States Senator Strom Thurmond had sex with a 16-year old black girl which produced a child.

• Republican pastor Mike Hintz, whom George W. Bush commended during the 2004 presidential campaign, surrendered to police after admitting to a sexual affair with a female juvenile.

• Republican legislator Peter Dibble pleaded no contest to having an inappropriate relationship with a 13-year-old girl.

• Republican advertising consultant Carey Lee Cramer was charged with molesting his 9-year old step-daughter after including her in an anti-Gore television commercial.

• Republican lobbyist Craig J. Spence organized child sex parties at the White House during the 1980s.

• Republican fundraiser Richard A. Delgaudio was found guilty of child porn charges and paying two teenage girls to pose for sexual photos.

• Republican activist Mark A. Grethen convicted on six counts of sex crimes involving children.

• Republican activist Randal David Ankeney pleaded guilty to attempted sexual assault on a child.

• Republican Congressman Dan Crane had sex with a female minor working as a congressional page.

• Republican activist and Christian Coalition leader Beverly Russell admitted to an incestuous relationship with his step daughter.

• Republican Judge Ronald C. Kline was placed under house arrest for child molestation and possession of child pornography.

• Republican congressman and anti-gay activist Robert Bauman was charged with having sex with a 16-year-old boy he picked up at a gay bar.

• Republican Committee Chairman Jeffrey Patti was arrested for distributing a video clip of a 5-year-old girl being raped.

*Apologies if some of the links don't work. I first posted this list nearly a year ago. If you find a link unclickable, use Google. All the kids are doing it.

I am also well aware that Democrats have had sex scandals of their own, involving children and otherwise. This is not a pissing contest, but a reminder that the Republican Party, despite what it implies, does not have the market cornered on moral values, whatever those are.

Moral Relavitism

2006-10-04T21:31:00.000-05:00

Streak quotes the always on point Tony Campolo:

For years [the Religious Right] have argued against situational ethics. They have stood for absolutes and contended that those absolutes should never be compromised. With conviction they have declared, loud and clear, that the end never justifies the means. Now, with the war on terrorism on our hands, they support torture when interrogating suspects.

A prominent scholar recently polled a dozen top leaders of America’s Religious Right, who were unanimously in favor of using torture “given the situation at hand." When it suits them, it turns out, the end does indeed justify the means.

If they have changed their minds and are ready to refute the golden rule, then it is time for them to say plainly, “For the most part we agree with Jesus, but there are special circumstances when we must ignore His teachings.”

Of course, these leaders ought to recognize the implications of their decision to support what they might call “necessary evils” in special circumstances. For instance, can they still tell a teenage girl who is pregnant by rape or incest that abortion is always wrong?

I’m not ready to answer such questions, except to say that the Religious Right can’t have it both ways. They can’t say that righteousness must never be compromised, and then add “except in certain situations—like torturing our enemies in times of war.

A Good Way To Start A Wednesday

2006-10-04T08:30:00.000-05:00

Live cuts of David Bazan putting his spin on "Silent Night" and "God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen." Plus Sufjan Stevens' recent New York show. And some other stuff. Over here.

More On Foley

2006-10-03T08:59:00.000-05:00

Dobson Vs. Dobson

2006-10-03T08:37:00.000-05:00

Here’s what James Dobson had to say when Bill Clinton got a blowjob in the Oval Office:

"When assessing the legacy of Bill Clinton, we can't overlook his shameful sexual behavior in the Oval Office, and then, his lies under oath to the American people to cover it up. Indeed, it is my belief that no man has ever done more to debase the presidency or to undermine our Constitution -- and particularly the moral and biblical principles upon which it is based -- than has William Jefferson Clinton."

Here’s what James Dobson had to say about Congressman Mark Foley, who appears to have a fetish for 16-year old boys:

"This is not a time to be talking about politics, but about the well-being of those boys who appear to have been victimized by Rep. Foley. If he is indeed guilty of what he is accused of, it is right that he resigned and that authorities are looking into whether criminal charges are warranted.

"This is yet another sad example of our society's oversexualization, especially as it affects the Internet, and the damage it does to all who get caught in its grasp."

Is it just me, or does there seem to be a different standard for Democrats and Republicans?

(h/t: Streak)

More Moral Values

2006-10-02T19:11:00.000-05:00

Sigh. Another week. Another Republican scandal. This time it's a Congressman who also appears to be a pedophile. And Congressional leadership may have looked the other way. But they're against abortion, so it's OK, right?

Irony

2006-10-01T19:37:00.000-05:00

Earlier tonight 60 Minutes had a piece about the disturbing trend in which teenagers physically assault, and often kill, homeless people, for the thrill of it. Often these teens videotape the brutal beatings. Ed Bradley, the 60 Minutes correspondent who filed the report, seemed unable to fathom why teenagers would do such a thing.

What I find interesting is that we keep hearing stories about soldiers in Iraq who torture, rape and kill the citizens there. And now our government has sanctioned torture. And we wonder how our children can do such things.

Thanks for your moral leadership, Mr. President.

A Good Way To Start A Sunday

2006-10-01T09:57:00.000-05:00

So someone on the Pedro the Lion message board I frequent posted an Over the Rhine show from December 2003. I have a few live Over the Rhine shows. This one isn't incredibly notable, except in one way.

It's got a few Christmas tunes, which is kind of cool I suppose. But better than that is David Bazan singing a cover of The Beatles' "Let It Be" with Karin Bergquist. Yowza.

Here's the set list. Here's the full show. Or just get Let It Be. It's at YouSendIt, so I don't know how long it will be up. Get it while you can.

American Blackout

2006-09-29T09:44:00.000-05:00

This may be the most important American film that comes out this year.

Responding To Anonymous

2006-09-28T20:58:00.000-05:00

So I got an anonymous comment extolling the virtues of voting Republican, as apparently this is the Christian thing to do. Normally I don’t put much stock in anonymous comments. I have the balls to back what I write up with an email address and an established location on the Web. I have little patience for people who leave comments without doing the same. It strikes me as cowardly.

That said, this anonymous commenter managed in three paragraphs to satisfy nearly every stereotype about conservative U.S. Christianity’s relationship with Republican politics.

To whit:

As a Christian, I will support the Republican party every time I head for the polls. And I don't really feel like I need to research the candidates.

The reason is, like it or not, Republicans best represent the moral values of Christians.

Which moral values? Election fraud? Lying? Tax cuts for the rich? Unjustified wars based on falsified evidence? Adultery? Fearmongering? Racism and xenophobia? Torture? Increasing the national debt by trillions? Or do the ends justify the means in such a way that all these things are acceptable and necessary to accomplish the greater good of ending abortion?

There is no such thing as a pro-life democrat!

Because you say so? You should speak to Tony Campolo, Billy Graham or Jim Wallis. Or my mother. Or my grandmother. They would all tell you differently.

The abortion issue, I think, is the most important issue to be considered. I may not agree with all the policies of a particular party, but one that endorses the killing of innocent children purely out of self-interest is not a party I can endorse, no matter what other issues.

Except, apparently, the killing of innocent children who live in Iraq.

Who will support heterosexual marraige?

You tell me. Christians have higher divorce rates than non-Christians. Many of the Republicans who will be in the ’08 presidential race are divorced. Massachusetts, that immoral blue state that supports gay marriage, has the second lowest divorce rate in the country. Maybe conservative Christian Republicans should be taking marriage lessons from godless liberal Democrats.

Who will protect unborn children from abortion and being sold for stem cell research?

Stem cell research can be done on fetal tissue that is already earmarked for destruction. It’s not as though fetuses would be harvested specifically for the purpose of stem cell research. It is tissue that will be discarded anyway. It sounds like you should start doing research.

Most Republicans will support the Christian values which are most important.

What are Christian values? Do they differ from regular values, or are they special? Perhaps these values have been saved?

Democrats will not.

If the current Republican administration represents Christianity, I’d rather be an atheist.

And don't talk to me about social justice issues either, because Democrats play that card to get votes.

But Republicans play the abortion card because they are so virtuous and moral? Funny that in 33 years of standing up against abortion they haven’t been able to do a damn thing to stop it. Funny, too, that abortion rates dropped more significantly under Bill Clinton than they have under George Bush. And funny that Jesus talked about those social justice issues all the time, but didn’t have a thing to say about gay marriage or abortion.

Government assistance is handing out so much money to generational welfare recipients, it is rediculous.

That’s the Christian position, is it? I seem to recall Jesus saying to sell your things and give the money to the poor. He didn’t qualify that position. He didn’t say give your money to the poor only if they deserved it, or only if they could prove they were looking for work.

Just Resting My Eyes

2006-09-25T16:42:00.000-05:00

Not dead yet. I'm out of town, working on a freelance writing assignment. The folks at Panera Bread are probably sick of me by now. Consequently, I'm a little too fried to write anything else. I'll post again. Maybe sooner than later. Or later than sooner. Stay tuned.

Ugh

2006-09-19T23:01:00.000-05:00

So I forgot to record Prison Break last night. Fortunately I use Shareaza to download television shows from channels we don't get (which seems to make a lot more sense than paying for cable). So after I finish downloading, I double click on the video to make sure it's the right episode. It isn't. In fact, it isn't Prison Break at all. Oh, the file was named Prison Break. But it's really a naked guy touching himself. And he's wearing a top hat. I'm not kidding.

This And That

2006-09-19T21:54:00.000-05:00

• Gorilla vs. Bear reports that Sufjan Stevens played a new song at his Austin show last Friday. It's called "Majesty Songbird," and you can watch a video clip here. Stevens has already written a song called "The Lord God Bird." Could a bird-themed album be far behind?

• Expect a "new" J.R.R. Tolkien book next year, involving elves and dwarves.

• Over the Rhine reported at their show last weekend in Chicago that they'll have a new Christmas album out this December. And a new studio album in the spring.

• Sol.iLLaquists of Sound are amazing. And in town Friday. That is all.

Friday Random Ten

2006-09-15T23:47:00.000-05:00

Over the Rhine - Ohio
Nada Surf - I Like What You Say
The Soft Drugs - Crack in the Lens
Otis Redding - Satisfaction
Scout Niblett - Hot to Death
Bob Dylan - With God On Our Side
Tim Easton - J.P.M.F.Y.F.
Counting Crows - Angels of the Silences
Eminem - Freestyle
The Postal Service - We Will Become Silhouettes

Olbermann: 2 Bush: 0

2006-09-12T21:08:00.000-05:00

God's Own Party

2006-09-07T20:14:00.000-05:00

A recent post at Jesus Politics caught my eye. The post quotes a middle aged woman from Georgia named Clydeen Tomanio. Here is what she said:

There are some people, and I'm one of them, that believe George Bush was placed where he is by the Lord. I don't care how he governs, I will support him. I'm a Republican through and through.

There are really two separate positions here. The first is that God places world leaders where they are, and that we ought to support them, no matter what they do. The second is that when God fills out her voter registration card, she checks the box marked Republican.

There are probably quite a few Christians in the United States who believe the first position. This is curious. You will understand the reason why this is curious when you take the words "George Bush" out of the quote above and replace them with "Saddam Hussein" or "Adolf Hitler."

As for the second position, if you believe that God is a Republican, I can only offer you this:

Orwell Rolls In His Grave

2006-09-06T22:40:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week, President Bush gave a speech urging those in the U.S. not to underestimate Osama bin Laden. As such, it was a delightful piece of irony.

Said Bush:

History teaches that underestimating the words of evil and ambitious men is a terrible mistake. Bin Laden and his terrorist allies have made their intentions as clear as Lenin and Hitler before them. The question is: Will we listen? Will we pay attention to what these evil men say?

That's a fair question. But it's not a question he should be asking us. Rather, it is a question we should be asking him.

After all, it was Bush, and not us, who failed to take seriously a briefing entitled bin Laden determined to strike in U.S.

It was under Bush's leadership, and not ours, that dozens of warning signs went unheeded in 2001.

It was during Bush's presidency, and not ours, that planes were hijacked and crashed into buildings.

It was Bush, and not us, who afterwards said that he "doesn't spend that much time on bin Laden."

It was during Bush's presidency, and not ours, that a CIA unit set up to hunt down bin Laden was disbanded.

It is Bush, and not us, who has in five years failed to capture the man he declared he would get dead or alive.

It is Bush, and fortunately fewer and fewer of us, who considers his dismal failure to be a resounding success.

Olbermann: 1 Bush: 0

2006-09-06T08:23:00.000-05:00

Today, in the same subtle terms in which Mr. Bush and his colleagues muddied the clear line separating Iraq and 9/11 — without ever actually saying so — the President quoted a purported Osama Bin Laden letter that spoke of launching, “a media campaign to create a wedge between the American people and their government.”

Make no mistake here—the intent of that is to get us to confuse the psychotic scheming of an international terrorist, with that familiar bogeyman of the right, the “media.”

The President and the Vice President and others have often attacked freedom of speech, and freedom of dissent, and freedom of the press.

Now, Mr. Bush has signaled that his unparalleled and unprincipled attack on reporting has a new and venomous side angle:

The attempt to link, by the simple expediency of one word—“media”—the honest, patriotic, and indeed vital questions and questioning from American reporters, with the evil of Al-Qaeda propaganda.

That linkage is more than just indefensible. It is un-American.

Read the rest of the transcript...