Eight Comebacks Is Enough / 12-10-10

I'm kind of not up for a full post, with research and flow and a three-point outline and all, so here are ochoremarks directed at news headlines from today.

(It's possible I may briefly stray from this blog's holy trinity of politics, spirituality and sports.)

House Democrats "Just Say No" to Tax Deal: Good for them. Someone needs to step in front of the Senate Republicans' Bus To Bankruptcy and remind us that more tax cuts for the rich is a stupidiotic and dumtarded idea. (Yes, I have a second installment of this type of headline later in the post.)

New Clothing Line Reminds TSA of the Fourth Amendment: Brilliant, I say. Check out these T-shirts that have the Bill of Rights' prohibition of unreasonable searches printed in metallic type, so they show up on the scanners. Brilliant.

Miley Cyrus Video: Partying With a Bong: Good for her. She's 18 and the stuff in the bong (salvia, not to be confused with saliva) was legal. If you have a problem with her doing this "because think of all the children who look up to her, omifreakingosh," then I have two semi-rude things to tell you. 1) Those kids aren't Miley's, so she has no responsibility in their upbringing, and 2) If you're not prepared to talk to your kids about things like bongs, then maybe you shouldn't have brought kids into this world, which contains bongs, in the first place. Maybe some other world would suit you instead.

Should You Accept Mom & Dad's facebook Request?: As a facebook-American who has recently accepted a parental friend request, I urge you to read the flow chart at the page to which I linked. Laughing is optional yet inevitable.

Gingrich Calls Assange an "Enemy Combatant": And calls the ongoing Wilileaks leaks an "act of war against the United States." I'm not a fan of Assange's crusade to expose the inner workings of diplomacy. I think his actions are ill-advised and bound to increase the instability of an already unstable world order. Lives may well be lost as a result. But do I think the U.S. should try and stop him, using force? No. I swear, for an intelligent guy, Newt is from another planet sometimes.

Tax-cut plan digs deeper deficit hole: No kidding. Ya think? That's why it was easily Baby Bush's most destructive, anti-American move. (And that's saying something.) Our unrealistically low taxes need to end at some point. And maybe the opening stages of sputtering economic recovery is not the best time for reality to set in, and for us to buck up and begin to pay our share. But the status quo is irresponsible, and practically immoral. Anything is better than our present course.

Newton should accept, then return his Heisman: Right. The Auburn QB should win the highest honor in his field, then pretend he doesn't want it? Ludicrous. (At least the blog's author admits "this won't happen anywhere but in the super-awesome dream lobe of my brain.") The sad truth is, Newton should have been suspended long ago. The NCAA rulebook states a player loses his eligibility if a person even simply *solicits* money on his behalf, let alone accepts it. Not only that, how is anyone supposed to believe that Newton's family turned down $180k from Mississippi State so the dude could play at Auburn... for free? No, sorry, the mind does not stretch that far. Go Ducks. (Blech.)

Halliburton May Pay $500M to Keep Cheney Out of Prison: This is a no-lose situation. The former "vice" president has been charged with 16 counts of bribery by Nigerian investigators. Either he stands trial or his beloved company forks out half a billion. Side note: One of the companies concurrently charged in this case already pleaded guilty to the same bribes last year and paid a hefty fine. Ah. I feel better already.

(Yes, I'll eventually post something about DADT. I'm getting there. But I have to work through some anger first.)

144 or Less, Vol. VI / 11-28-10

Openly Gay Republican Running For GOP Presidential Nomination! Read All About It!

My confidential sources tell me it's possible to be homosexual AND a functional member of the Republican Party. Besides, in an ironic twist, the Democratic president's Justice Department is currently fighting a conservative group (the Log Cabin Republicans) for the right to keep enforcing the military's homophobic DADT policy. More on that some wordier day.

Which got me thinking: what would disqualify one from capturing the Republican nomination? Badmouthing the NRA, I'd think.

Which got me thinking: if the gun nuts run the R caucus, which interest group owns the D party? My conclusion: the teachers' union.

Which got me thinking: I'd much rather be held hostage by the people trying to educate the country than by the people trying to put bullets in anything that moves.

(Word count: 142)

Music:Spirit :: Spirit:Music / 11-16-10

When I can't contemplate, worship, or philosophize, I still have a way to reach for God/Spirit/Tao/Meaning. It's by making music.

And in alarmingly increasingly oftenly times, I find myself unable -- or unwilling -- to dedicate the time to accomplish any decent contemplation, worship or philosophery. I can do each of those in a halfway indecent manner all the time. Almost well enough for them to be worthwhile. But not quite.

Fortunately, to rescue me from myself, there's music.

Lots of humans before me have praised music-making for its creative nature. You'll probably have heard someone say, about art, that to make it is to commune with the Creative Force responsible for our very existence. (It's permissible to call that Force "God." Plenty of people do so.) And we can start there, but I have a much more mystical destination I'm aiming for. With lots and lots of verbal darts.

Because creativity IS, after all, a big part of what makes us unlike the other two-eyed, four-cheeked mammals out there. Everything you see when you look out the window, no matter how ugly it might be, is the result of natural forces or artificial creativity. (Except the second-generation Hummers. Those beasts are the result of evil. Pure, no sugar-added, evil. The bad kind of evil. Look away.)

Writing a song, painting, producing a novel, sculpting: these are so quintessentially human activities that they rise above human. They become quasi-divine abilities. (Blogging is somewhat beneath that level, I admit.)

And now that I've made my quota of jokes for this post, I'm going to temporarily raise the serious level a couple of notches.

To investigate one layer deeper, it's not enough that these creative juices exist. It's their just-out-of-our-grasp-to-explain-ness that strikes me as so very special.

What moves me most about music (and you can substitute other forms of art if they're more your thing) is:

Its not fully known path. "What will come from this? Where is this headed?"

Its wind-like nature. "You can feel it, but you can't grab it."

Its water-like nature. "It moves, it ebbs, it flows, it builds, it progresses. It can fill a space. Its power can be used in so many ways."

Its omnipresence. "All observed and observable societies employ it."

Its omnipotence. "All can receive blessing, happiness, joy, revelation -- and maybe even meaning -- from it."

(Funny, these all are ways people have chosen, for millennia, to illustrate what they call "spiritual" or "divine.")

Before I return to music as water, I want to make a couple more pointlets.

Music has immediacy. It has presency -- a Johnvented word which I define as its "being present in the present and not elsewhere or even elsewhen." It's here, you can sense it, but you can only have it in the moment. You can remember it, but that's not the same as experiencing it happen. Like the present, it only exists while it exists, and it doesn't exist out of that bar-less cage. A plan or an outline or instructions for the performance of music, those things exist at all times. The instruments themselves continue to exist when we're not playing them.

But the music only takes place at its moment. If you miss it, tough beans. That portion of it is gone, forever. It is when it is.

Also, music has a way of acting as a metaphor for our bodies. Music is physical and physics-based, as there are sound waves involved, so far as we can tell. Just as our bodies obey a number of physical laws simultaneously in order to function, music can exist only when the right waves coalesce at the right time. And yet there's something non-physical going on in both cases, right? We experience consciousness, whatever that is, and we gather it's not purely a chemical reaction. We experience music, and the waves resonate in our inner ear and transmit messages to our brain, and the brain conjures up emotions to accompany those messages, but there's more than simply that chemical reaction going on.

I can teach kids that a C-E-G combination creates a major chord, which suggest happy or bright feelings, but those feelings don't flow just from the wave patterns or the accepted conventional associations that go with major chords. They seem to happen on another level, which is probably good, since they're feelings and sensations, not equations. (Feel free to write an algorithm for "peace" to disprove me.)

And then, crucially for me, the way we talk about music has a way of sounding like the way we talk about the Tao.

It's adaptable. It's malleable.

It fills areas. It envelops them too.

It works around stuff. It even moves around walls and people and objects of relative animateness.

It escapes definition. Playfully, almost.

Its source is hard to find, but its effects are easy to observe.

It can be used, harnessed, wielded, yet remains impossible to hoard.

Hm.

To wrap this up, ponder bad music. To you, bad music might mean opera, country, a kid singing out of tune, grunge, or an hour spent watching America Idol. But I'm not talking about matters of personal taste here. As much as I dislike certain brands of music, I know a good performer when I hear one, despite the medium.

I mean consider poor music: poor in effort, poor in creativity, poor in originality, poor in execution.

It just... it just feels so dirty, so wasteful, so irresponsible. So sacrilegious.

And you could say the same for other forms of art, no? Life Theory Moment: The reason so many people despise modern art is that they feel cheated by it, like it ought to do something special, accomplish something, set something in motion, like it ought to turn wheels in their head, at least make them quizzical, but NOT make them indifferent.

So something done wrong feels like sacrilege... then its opposite, that same thing done right, I'd like to call sacred. So it is for music.

144 or Less, Vol. V / 11-16-10

I like to avoid calling people hypocrites -- it's never too long before that kind of talk whips around and bites you in both buttcheeks.

However, if I see another "I don't value riches" type of slogan on an pricey piece of luxury, the irony is going to kill me instantaneously.

Across the bumper of a shiny new Benz today: "Don't let the car fool you -- my treasure is in heaven."

Thirty seconds later, on the lawn of an immaculately landscaped gated home, sitting on a one-acre lot, complete with speedboat in arched driveway: "Our treasure is in heaven."

Like I said, hypocrisy ain't the issue. It's the denial. People should buy nice things if they like spending their money on nice things. Freedom! America!

But don't wallpaper your materialism with anti-materialist slogans. That just looks dumb.

(Word count: 142)

Please Expalin / 11-04-10

I'm not succumbing to early-onset dyslexia.

No, I just need something expalined to me. What is it that makes a former Alaska governor so attractive? Not physically, of course. I mean politically, yeah, that's what I mean, uh huh.

It is, though. I'm no longer trying to be cute here (at least for a few paragraphs). I'm posing an honest question.

What is it that makes you believe Sarah Palin has anything to offer as a candidate for high political office?

I get that she's a symbol. She represents right-wing ideas. She stands for smaller, more efficient government. Although her track record belies such a statement, she subscribes to fiscal conservatism.

I get that she's a woman in what is largely a man's arena -- right-wing politics. If you're into identity politics, she brings a different perspective to male-dominated debates.

I get that she's clever and snappy and full of attitude, and she considers herself a maverick. Those can be fine qualities in a public figure.

I get that she's clearly one of the pre-eminent Tea Party personalities. And God knows we need a third party ASAP. (Sadly, even God can't break the stranglehold the R's and D's have on our country.)

But what makes her palatable as a potential executive or legislator? I've always figured a serious politician has to be more than a symbol -- that there has to be some substance underneath all that coiffed hair and all those perfect teeth. And finding something below her surface has been a challenge, for me, that is.

So what does she bring to the table that makes her a viable member of the executive branch of government, or even of Congress?

It's an honest question, and I'm honestly requesting an answer that will provide me with some closure.

Please expalin.

Before the Night is Through / 11-02-10

Six random and unrandom thoughts as the election progresses.

1. Democrats may well have won the expectations game. Everyone and their dog's fleas saw the GOP House takeover coming. But there were three main story lines for tonight: Will the R's take the House? And how about the Senate? How many Democratic statehouses would flip?

By conceding the first point, then winning point two and scoring a couple crucial victories in point three (CO, CA, MA), the Democrats salvaged something of a split decision. Not in true value of seats won or lost, but in the expectations department. Don't misquote me: tonight was a bad, bad, bad night for the left. Bad. (At least for left-leaning incumbents.) But they still control one and a half branches of government, while pulling off a couple high-profile gubernatorial wins.

In short, they avoided a repeat of 1994.

2. Colorado Republicans are shooting themselves in the foot. Less than 10 percent for their gubernatorial nominee (and it's going to be close) means they receive minor-party status on the 2012 ballot, and share space with the Greens and others. Not a disaster, for sure -- motivated conservatives will find the dude with the R next to his name no matter where they put him. But Floridians can tell you that ballot design has a knack of finding a way to matter.

3. Tea Party successes (Paul in KY, Rubio in FL) figure to nudge Sarah Palin closer to a 2012 run. Please. Do it Sarah. For all the "Real" Americans out there. Best way for the R's to lose their hard-earned House? Put the least respected candidate in recent memory at the top of the ballot. I used to fear she would win if nominated. Now I am fairly certain she will not. So bring it on, Grisly Mama.

4. Locally, 65 percent of Washingtonians are rejecting an income tax that would have been levied strictly on those earning more than $200k (or $400k per household). Great. Now we too can inch closer to bankruptcy, just like the people from two states south, whose example we love to emulate. Way to go.

5. Oh boy, Nevada and Alaska could be lots of fun tonight. And tomorrow. And into December.

6. This is our third straight "wave" election. This doesn't happen in American political history, uh, ever. Well, now the GOP has to help govern. They've been really good at saying "No" without voters asking them why they want the unemployed to lose their home, children to go without health insurance, and Wall Street to be able to run wild again.

Maybe now the voters will see what "ideas" the R's have, and we can start to build momentum for a fourth wave in 2012... but first, my conservative friends, enjoy your partial victory for a day or so.

Surprise! 11-01-10

Something in tomorrow night's election results will shock the world.

Actually, the way things are going in elections nowadays, the lack of a high-profile shocking result somewhere would probably be... shocking. (Gotta find me a thesaurus.)

But the real point here is that according to these historical poll numbers, the 2010 midterm congressional election is quite unlike its most recent sibling, the 2006 overthrow of the Republican House and Senate.

(Click on the link if you want to be confronted with 136 trillion numbers in pretty little tables, or if you're a nerdgeek like me. Keep reading if you trust me to share some interesting highlights.)

In 06, anti-Bush sentiment swept D's into control of Congress.

This year, almost as many voters say they're motivated to vote to support Obama as those who say they're excited to vote against him.

In 06, Democrats were winning the "Likely Voter" battle by 10-12 points.

This year, Republicans seem to hold a 4-6 point edge.

In 06, Iraq and the economy were the biggest issues, by far, on voters' minds. Terrorism came in a distant third.

This year, it's the economy, health care, and "D.C. is broken," in that order.

In 06, about 5 out of 7 voters wanted to see Congress change hands. About 60 percent of voters disapproved of the job Congress was doing

This year, it's 4 out of 7. And yet 75 percent disapprove of Congress.

There's more coming, but I want to pause for analysis.

A) There are more D's than R's in the electorate, but R's are more likely to turn out. So they say. And history bears this out, at least as far as midterms, whose voters tend to be older, more white, and -- shocking! -- more conservative than the population at large. And yet... President Obama enjoys much more midterm support than Bush did in '06, when Democrats won 30 seats. If R's win "only" 30 seats, they won't take the House. 40 are necessary.

B) Democrats turned out like crazy in 2006, and won 30 seats. Republicans will turn out like crazy this year.

C) People are pissed at Congress. Not just at the D's in Congress. At the R's too. Just look at how many moderate conservatives got primaried this year by far-right folks like O'Donnell and Angle and Rubio. To say that only Democratic seats are at risk is, well, a risky statement. Nobody is safe this time around.

Everyone has a So-and-So as their congressman. The Democrats have more So-and-So's. (Obviously.) And the electorate is very, very angry with all the So-and-So's. Therefore, many more Democrats will fall tomorrow night. But look for some incumbent Republicans to go down, too.

D) Polling is interesting now. You have to REALLY want to answer a poll to participate, what with cell phones and do-not-call lists and various call screening techniques. Roughly a quarter of American adults rely exclusively on their mobile phones for, uh, phone calls. (Some of the new phones still offer number-to-number dialing. You can use them for that purpose, according to their manuals. Who knew?) The chart ten paragraphs down in this story is useful information. All this to say, even the polls that claim to include cell phone respondents... can you take their results at face value? This seems like a very, very big thorn in pollsters' sides, and it's only going to get worse. For them.

E) That being said, anger is a powerful motivator, and if making conclusions based on only the information above, I'd have to say the R's will win on the order of 35-40 seats. We might not know until 2011 who controls the House.

Back to poll facts. So I can change my conclusion. (I waffle! I flip-flop! I'm ready for office!)

More than half this year's projected voters see a candidate's affiliation with the Tea Party as important to them. Yet more than half of those voters specifically cite Tea Party affiliation as a reason to vote AGAINST that candidate. Jab at the right wing!

64 percent of Obama voters claim they're "certain" to vote this year. 79 percent of McCain voters make the same claim. That's a blow to the head for Democrats. Factor in that the independents believe the country is on the wrong track. Another uppercut.

Then ask yourself which voters are most likely to have changed their minds since '08. The folks who voted for the R during an economic meltdown, or the folks who chose the new guy for a change of political scenery?

Independents favor Republicans handily. And the number of independents keeps growing. The good news for Democrats? Independents tend to change their minds. The bad news for Democrats? Independents have done their mind-changing for the cycle, and not in a leftward direction.

So let me amend my earlier conclusion. Republicans will take the House. 48 seats in all, a handful more than they need. But the 70-seat tsunami some conservative pundits are crowing about -- the numbers don't bear that out.

(P.S.: Bonus analysis, founded in feeling, not fact: Democrats will keep the Senate, probably 53-47. Patty Murray and Barbara Boxer aren't losing this year, and one of them has to be terminated for the Senate to flip. But again, I'm just some dude sitting at his computer, in the most beautiful state in the union, in the best-educated city in the nation, surrounded by a bunch of liberal hippies. So what do I know?)

144 or Less, Vol. IV / 10-23-10

An interesting thing has happened as the 2010 campaign winds down.

With Republicans offering several immoderate candidates (Miller, O'Donnell, Angle, Paladino, Toomey) for Senate, two familiar figures have emerged as leaders of their respective parties.

President Obama for the D's; Sarah Palin for the R's. The former has been crisscrossing the country to help liberals retain the Senate; the latter has encouraged voters to elect Tea Party-approved candidates and give conservatives control of the House.

Both will probably succeed at their tasks -- which is a result I love.

Not because it divides government. But because an emboldened Palin, flush with kingmaking success, then becomes THE face of the right. And 39 percent of Republicans think she'd make a good president. Not 39 percent of Americans -- only counting R's here.

Just 25 percent of Americans view her favorably.

So keep visiting Iowa, Sarah.

(Word count: 143)

Stupidiocy / 10-21-10

Today, 2010 Elections Class, we learned:

That Rand Paul and Jesus Christ are the same dude.

That fearing random Muslims is profitable.

That answering questions is an optional exercise for Senate candidates.

Let's do these in reverse order, because oh my, the Paul one is so juicy, I have to make it this post's dessert.

So the appetizer first: Joe Miller is running for Senate in Alaska. After beating the incumbent in the Republican primary over the summer, why should he have to deal with the press at all? Better to handcuff reporters when they get too frisky. Better to not honor interviews.

Yeah. When 40 fellow Alaska Republicans are asking you, in an open letter, to get your act together, and calling your campaign out for "unacceptable" behavior and "not a winning strategy," you should probably not say things like "We've drawn a line in the sand. You can ask me about background, you can ask me about personal issues -- I'm not going to answer." But what do I know? I'm not trying to lose a practically unlosable election.

Entree time. Juan Williams. Ahem.

Visiting with Bill O'Reilly recently, Williams, an NPR reporter, generously offered this up: "I mean look, Bill, I'm not a bigot. You know the kind of books I've written about the civil rights movement in this country. But when I get on the plane, I got to tell you, if I see people who are in Muslim garb and I think you know, they are identifying themselves first and foremost as Muslims, I get worried. I get nervous."

I totally believe Williams. He isn't a bigot. He's just a guy who gets irrationally afraid that because there are Muslims with different-looking outfits on his flight from Atlanta to Chicago, the plane might end up crashing into the Pentagon instead.

That sounds sarcastic. And it is, a little, but it also isn't. It's very, very difficult to begrudge someone for admitting that the Different makes them nervous. Lots of people struggle with that. When I'm walking down a dark alley at night (one of my favorite activities!), I don't want the three guys I cross to all be 6'6", 320 pounds, with prison tattoos across their knuckles. I just don't.

(Hey, did I mention Williams is black? Not that I have a great deal more to say on that count.)

At the same time, it's worth remembering a couple things.

1. The 9/11 hijackers were wearing jeans and T-shirts.

2. Women in burqas have successfully piloted zero planes into tall New York buildings.

So I can safely pencil Williams in for irrational behavior and poor timing when it comes to honesty... but probably not much more. NPR fired him, by the way, after hearing of the remarks. I'm supposing they felt he had seriously harmed his objectivity and/or his credibility.

In any event, all's well that ends well for Williams. His friends came to his rescue.

Mike Huckabee: "It is time for the taxpayers to start making cuts to federal spending, and I encourage the new Congress to start with NPR."

Sarah Palin: "NPR defends 1st Amendment Right, but will fire u if u exercise it. Juan Williams: u got taste of Left's hypocrisy, they screwed up firing u." That might be one of her tweets, or that could also be how we're doing transcripts for her nowadays.

And then, just found out that Fox News has offered him something marginally better than an unemployment check: a 3-year, $2 million contract to join them. Good for him. Now we all know what the reward/punishment is for misunderstanding other religions (and I'm being charitable). Glad to have that out in the open.

Hope you left room for the grand finale.

KY Senate candidate Rand Paul, earlier today: "In my entire life, I've written and said a lot of things. I've never said or written anything un-Christian in my life."

Now after months and months and months talking constantly in the public spotlight, under the constant stress a campaign like Paul's surely brings, people are apt to say things, that upon further reflection, they wish they could take back. Either they misspeak, they take an analogy too far, they forget which group they're speaking to, they make up facts, they stretch the truth, they say too much, or they outright lie. (Politicians do this? Whoa.)

But I pay pretty close attention to politics, and most of those instances are explainable. The candidate thought he could get away with a falsehood. The candidate embellished a story. The candidate was on the spot, and made up some numbers. The candidate said she can't tell Latinos and Asians apart. (Go ahead, click the link. I couldn't make stuff this good up if I tried.)

Oh yeah, what Paul said. Let's get back to that. It's hard to even give him credit for what he could have and should have said, which, naturally, is "I am a Christian and always have been. I've made lots of statements, oral and written, and I've always wanted to be Christlike in everything I say and write. For my opponent to imply otherwise is tasteless and vile." He missed that perfect response by a light-year or two.

Instead of crafting a sensible retort, he claimed perfection. Not recent perfection. No no. A lifetime achievement award. Not a single word against Christian principles. In his life. In other words, godlike flawlessness.

(I guess the lie he told by making that statement, that lie must have been his first. Bummer to ruin a good streak like that, on a technicality no less.)

To be fair, Paul was baited. His opponent, Democrat Jack Conway, just put out an ad exposing a college escapade Paul took part in during his days as a member of an anti-Christian club. (The story came out in a recent issue of GQ. Take that for what it's worth.) In the ad, Paul and a buddy stand accused of tying up a woman and forcing her to worship something called the Aquabuddha.

The ad's in terribly poor taste. It's inconsquential to the issues at hand, and irrelevant at best. It's nasty and full of innuendo. It misleads. But Paul's response tells so much more than Conway's sleazy move. It tells us that when the full-court pressure is on, in the heat of the closing weeks of a contentious campaign, the Republitarian political newbie folds.

Man, election season makes people do stupidiotic things.

144 Or Less, Vol. III / 10-18-10

This conversation took place last week. See if you can spot which speaker is aged 36, and which one is 7.

"Those are graves. But they don't look like graves."

"Yeah, there weren't any headstones."Pause.

"It's hard to know what happens after you die."

"Probably because nobody ever comes back to tell us what it's like."

"Hm."

Death: the great conversational equalizer. Turns out pretty much everyone can talk about it with pretty much the same level of expertise.

(Words used: 83)

144 Or Less, Vol. II / 10-14-10

A federal judge just declared DADT unconstitutional. Naturally, the Democrats running the Justice Department will appeal.

Huh?

Saying they want to proceed with already-laid plans to phase out DADT, administration officials will fight the ruling.

Yeah. See. There exists no bad time to end discrimination, no bad way to restore dignity to soldiers who volunteered their very life to their country. Take the gift, Barack. Run with it.

Appealing makes zero sense, politically. Obama's choice to deliver the death-blow to DADT himself dampens left-wing enthusiasm and costs the D's precious midterm votes. Not a single rabid anti-gummint whiner will read today's headlines and find his mind changed or his passion to defeat the Black Socialist Secret Muslim abated.

So -- pardon my French -- BHO had better make damn well sure DADT is toast very, very soon, or he can start perusing want ads.

(Word count: 144)

144 Or Less / 10-8-10

(This category of post has a 144-word limit. Political snark exclusively here. And prefacorial parenthetical statements don't count against the count. So don't count them. Also, don't ask about the 144 thing.)

In my Congressional district, Washington's 1st, Democrat Jay Inslee is the incumbent.

Alongside his ubiquitous green-on-blue campaign placards, other signs have surfaced among the weeds -- ones not planted by his people. (The weeds OR the new signs, hopefully. Although he IS the incumbent, therefore by nature evil, and thus inclined to have a soft spot for weeds.)

The signs read:

"Jay Inslee

Bankrupting America Since 1992"

He's been in office 18 years. True story.

But funny thing, he's only been bankrupting America since 2000. Before that, he was helping Bill Clinton craft roughly balanced budgets, as the country's public debt FELL in nominal dollars (wikistats here) during Inslee's first eight years in D.C.

I wonder what in 2000 prompted Inslee to begin writing federal budgets that sent us closer to bankruptcy? What a turd. Throw him out indeed!

(Words used: 142.)

Yet More Proof the Brits are the Funniest Species of Human / 10-6-10

Amidst my relentless visits to the International House of Internets, I dug up this little gem.

Rather than simply link to it and make you travel microseconds away, I'm going to reprint it below, with full credit and attribution and everything.

Plus, it's effing hilarious. And if you perchance follow the link, the comments section is superb.

Plus, I'm eventually going to copy this parody, only as a political "story" late in a campaign, because why should this dude have all the fun?

Plus, that's all.

From the guardian.co.uk and author Martin Robbins:

This is a news website article about a scientific paper

In the standfirst I will make a fairly obvious pun about the subject matter before posing an inane question I have no intention of really answering: is this an important scientific finding?

In this paragraph I will state the main claim that the research makes, making appropriate use of "scare quotes" to ensure that it's clear that I have no opinion about this research whatsoever.

In this paragraph I will briefly (because no paragraph should be more than one line) state which existing scientific ideas this new research "challenges".

If the research is about a potential cure, or a solution to a problem, this paragraph will describe how it will raise hopes for a group of sufferers or victims.

This paragraph elaborates on the claim, adding weasel-words like "the scientists say" to shift responsibility for establishing the likely truth or accuracy of the research findings on to absolutely anybody else but me, the journalist.

In this paragraph I will state in which journal the research will be published. I won't provide a link because either a) the concept of adding links to web pages is alien to the editors, b) I can't be bothered, or c) the journal inexplicably set the embargo on the press release to expire before the paper was actually published.

"Basically, this is a brief soundbite," the scientist will say, from a department and university that I will give brief credit to. "The existing science is a bit dodgy, whereas my conclusion seems bang on," she or he will continue.

I will then briefly state how many years the scientist spent leading the study, to reinforce the fact that this is a serious study and worthy of being published by the BBC the website.

This is a sub-heading that gives the impression I am about to add useful context.

Here I will state that whatever was being researched was first discovered in some year, presenting a vague timeline in a token gesture toward establishing context for the reader.

To pad out this section I will include a variety of inane facts about the subject of the research that I gathered by Googling the topic and reading the Wikipedia article that appeared as the first link.

I will preface them with "it is believed" or "scientists think" to avoid giving the impression of passing any sort of personal judgement on even the most inane facts.

This fragment will be put on its own line for no obvious reason.

In this paragraph I will reference or quote some minor celebrity, historical figure, eccentric, or a group of sufferers; because my editors are ideologically committed to the idea that all news stories need a "human interest", and I'm not convinced that the scientists are interesting enough.

At this point I will include a picture, because our search engine optimisation experts have determined that humans are incapable of reading more than 400 words without one.

[This picture has been optimised by SEO experts to appeal to our key target demographics]

This subheading hints at controversy with a curt phrase and a question mark?

This paragraph will explain that while some scientists believe one thing to be true, other people believe another, different thing to be true.

In this paragraph I will provide balance with a quote from another scientist in the field. Since I picked their name at random from a Google search, and since the research probably hasn't even been published yet for them to see it, their response to my e-mail will be bland and non-committal.

"The research is useful", they will say, "and gives us new information. However, we need more research before we can say if the conclusions are correct, so I would advise caution for now."

If the subject is politically sensitive this paragraph will contain quotes from some fringe special interest group of people who, though having no apparent understanding of the subject, help to give the impression that genuine public "controversy" exists.

This paragraph will provide more comments from the author restating their beliefs about the research by basically repeating the same stuff they said in the earlier quotes but with slightly different words. They won't address any of the criticisms above because I only had time to send out one round of e-mails.

This paragraph contained useful information or context, but was removed by the sub-editor to keep the article within an arbitrary word limit in case the internet runs out of space.

The final paragraph will state that some part of the result is still ambiguous, and that research will continue.

Related Links:

The Journal (not the actual paper, we don't link to papers).

The University Home Page (finding the researcher's page would be too much effort).

Unrelated story from 2007 matched by keyword analysis.

Special interest group linked to for balance.

We Killed Him / 9-29-10

On Wednesday, September 22, 2010, we killed Tyler Clementi.

Clementi, a Rutgers freshman, jumped off the George Washington bridge last week. His body was recovered today, on the 29th.

He told us he was going to do it; he posted his plans on his facebook page earlier that evening.

Technically, Clementi did take his own life. We didn't push him off the bridge. Technically, we were sleeping, or working, or laughing with our significant other, or watching Jersey Shore, or chomping down McNuggets, or doing a million other things that didn't directly murder the fragile young man.

And you can be certain he was a tortured guy on the inside, because it takes that type of person to jump.

But we still killed him.

43 percent of us believe gay sex is morally wrong. (Poll results here.)

58 percent of us don't want to allow gays to marry. (Poll results here.)

Upwards of 90 percent of us watch videos online, including everything from Euro soccer highlights to dancing babies to classical music to Anime porn. Susan Boyle's audition for "Britain's Got Talent" garnered 100 million hits in its first nine days. It's not just because she's got talent and is British.

So when Clementi's roommate secretly filmed him having sex with another man, then posted it online, the twig he was... it just snapped.

At the intersection of omnipresent technology, voyeurism, homophobia, curiosity and immaturity, we find Clementi.

That's our address. We killed him.

And he didn't have to die. We could be a better society already, one that allows gay men and women to love each other openly in the same way straight men and women do. But we aren't. We could be a different society, one that places certain loose restrictions on online content. But again, we aren't. We could even be living in an age without the Internet. But we have it.

Indisputably, we could nurture troubled teenagers better.

Instead, when the planet dumps a Clementi in our lap, we kill him.

Still in Sea-Shock / 9-29-10

The Seattle Seahawks, your favorite sports team of all time, just won a game in which they:

A) Allowed 379 yards of total offense. In the second half. That's basically impossible to do whether you're winning or losing, or playing any sort of defense or offense at all. The top three performances for most yards gained in a game by one team were all set in the 40's and 50's, and they're all in the 680-750 yard range.

(In essence, last Sunday, the Seahawks were the worst team, defensively, in the history of the sport, as measured by yards allowed, for a half. Their only competition is teams from 60 years ago. Those teams' dead players would have done a better job last Sunday at Qwest.)

B) Gained 10 yards of offense through the air in the second half and 26 yards total after halftime. Yes, the Chargers outgained the Hawks 379-26 in half number 2. Yeah. 379-26. That's correct. A factor of 14.6 to 1, you were about to say.

C) Fumbled away a sure touchdown less than one yard from the goal line, resulting in a touchback. Those are worth no points. They sound like a touchdown, except they are a million billionty times worse.

D) Scored zero points after a second and goal from the 2 with 20 seconds left in the half.

E) Allowed a safety and a two-point conversion and threw an interception at the goal line.

(None of those events in C), D) or E) overlapped, by the way. They were all separate events.)

They shouldn't have won the game, except that they should have. Because they also:

A) Returned two kickoffs for touchdowns. Again, in the second half. Leon Washington scored twice and finished with 253 return yards. He's still sucking on oxygen as we speak.

B) Sacked Philip Rivers four times, hit him nine more, and tipped or intercepted eight of his attempts.

C) Were the beneficiary of five San Diego turnovers, including three fumbles. (They scored a measly 10 points off those giveaways, but still, this is the positive part of the post, so shut up already, me.)

D) Picked off the potential game-tying or game-winning TD pass with 10 seconds left.

E) Had 67,000 screaming fans behind them who forced two false starts and two delay of game penalties on the Chargers' last possession.

That was the most entertaining-infuriating-frustrating-exhilirating-undeserved-deserved-heart-stopping win I've seen. Ever. In any sport.

I don't think this team is very good. It imploded in the second half, and it absolutely could not defend once its top corner, linebacker and defensive lineman left with injuries. Pete Carroll donated three or seven points to San Diego with an epic mismanagement of the closing seconds of the first half. It lucked out by winning two out of three instant replay reviews. And it won't always get Leon to generate 14 points all by himself every week. (Duh.)

Here's the box. Here's the best recap I read so far. Here's to a boring win next Sunday in St. Louis.

Mediawful / 9-27-10

(Preventative Strike: Here's the link to the full article in question. It is less than four hours old as of this precise moment. Here's the link to an analysis of the survey results being discussed.)

Stop The Presses. Never got a chance to say that in my newspaper days. Nowadays, of course, it'd be Stop The Upload, or Sever The Connection, but those have a decidedly less dramatic ring to them.

What are we press-stopping about? Why, beloved readers, it just so happens that American atheists and agnostics (informally known as the AAA) have outperformed Christians on a test of religious knowledge.

Boom-shakalaka!

By now, the three of you who are still reading despite my incomparable nerdiness, you guys will have skillfully predicted where I'm going with this. Coming up in fifteen seconds: violent rant on how Christians don't even know as much about their own faith as non-Christians! What a sorry spiritual state we occupy, even as we strive to be God's chosen people, blessed in every way and entrusted with the holy mission of showing the heathen the error of their ways. What a failure we are as a, nay, THE Christian nation.

That would be some serious ironic, sarcastic fun. But I'm not going there.

Instead, I'm compelled to rant about how this article sums up the sorry state of journalism in 2010.

The writer's opening paragraph (the "lede" for all you non-reporters):

"If you want to know about God, you might want to talk to an atheist. Heresy? Perhaps."

I know lame when I see it, and that's lame lame megalame lame. With a false equivalency thrown in for good measure. Come on. The survey we're getting to measured respondents' knowledge about religious facts. Not about the nature of God. There's a difference, pinhead.

And how is that heresy anyway? Maybe irony. Maybe.

And why is the "Perhaps" there? To hedge your bets? To not offend? To seem even-handed? To be extra-super lame?

Later in the same story:

"The Pew survey was not without its bright spots for the devout. Eight in 10 people surveyed knew that Mother Teresa was Catholic. Seven in 10 knew that, according to the Bible, Moses led the exodus from Egypt and that Jesus was born in Bethlehem."

It's a "bright spot" that 20 percent of believers can't remember that Mother Teresa was a Catholic nun?

Oh wait, that just what the writer was implying. That's not an actual correct interpretation of the data. That number was for the public at large, of which 82 percent correctly answered the question. And how is it good news for "the devout" that 71 percent of people know that the Bible claims Jesus was born in Bethlehem? What makes that good news? (Let's leave aside the fun fact that Jesus, according to most biblical scholars, was born in Nazareth. Had to mention that. Sorry.)

The article's stupid conclusion:

"For comparison purposes, the survey also asked some questions about general knowledge, which yielded the scariest finding: 4% of Americans believe that Stephen King, not Herman Melville, wrote "Moby Dick."

So the "scariest finding" of all is the comforting fact that 96 percent of the population correctly knows that Stephen King did not write "Moby Dick."

Oh good. Now I can sleep at night. (Must confess, for a while there, I was worried that maybe 4 percent of Americans were trying to check out Herman Melville's "It" from the public library.)

I feel more knowledgeable, yet dumber, for having read that story. Stop hurting my brain, mass media outlets!

Revolution or Insurrection? / 9-15-10

Electoral Threat flags. I'm passing them out. Get yours now!

1. A yellow one to fellow Democrats everywhere rejoicing that extremists (it's unfair to call them Republicans - these Tea Partiers are something else altogether) are on the ballot anywhere. You/We aren't very popular at this time, so there's no telling who can and can't beat you/us. Just because it looks like the wild-eyed revolutionary on the other side will lose doesn't mean he or she will, in fact, lose. American political history is (WARNING: please select your own cliche) sprinkled/littered/dotted/peppered with events that once seemed improbable.

2. A red one to Republicans everywhere. Your party is in grave danger of being overrun by people who have no business holding office on the local urban planning committee, much less in the United States Senate or the House Judiciary Committee or Appropriations Committee or Armed Forced Committee or anything rhyming with Blummittee.

There are three types of R's these days. Segment One: Those folks who have left the GOP and now call themselves independents, though they'll vote for an R 98 percent of the time. Segment Two: Social Conservatives, i.e. Christian fundamentalists. Segment Three: Tea Partiers and Libertarians, with views that don't fit into the mainstream and cannot win electorally absent a miracle.

This is a losing coalition, if you can call it that. It is fated for doom. Maybe not right away, but it cannot last. It's like a meal of potato chips, french fries and mashed potatoes. They all make really good sides, but where's the beef?

3. A green one to folks who would seize this moment to launch a new populist party. Voter anger is at an all-time high. Few non-Republicans want the GOP back in power after Bush/Cheney/Rove ransacked the nation for eight years. Few non-Democrats want the current crop of liberals to remain in power. Usually, swing voters swing in a swinging way from one side of the political spectrum to the other, helping to keep the parties honest and the blood relatively fresh in D.C.

This time, the swingers are looking for another target of their affection. I'd just as soon have it be a real party with real ideas, as opposed to the TP's fantasy world in which we can eliminate Social Security and balance the budget by cutting off aid to Israel and letting the Middle East blow itself up.

A as-of-now fictitious Liberty Party, built on responsible levels of taxation, spending and involvement overseas while maintaining budgetary prudence and respecting civil liberties... that party would clean house this cycle. If only it existed. Right now. Yesterday now. (We Democrats are supposed to be that party, by the way. We really should let more people know.)

Anyway. The flags mean whatever I want them to mean. Like the terror threat levels, I use them at my convenience to accomplish my own ends.

Oh yeah, and 4. A rastafarian-looking one to me. Equal amounts of red, yellow and green. I am tempted to interpret the Tea Party's ascendancy as bad for the GOP, therefore as good for the country, but if these people get in office, God help us all. Also, I would be one of the folks easily wooed by a new party that promises new solutions to our looming budgetary problems, when in actuality, I just need to continue to support the D's, who are the party which seeks to champion the middle class, after all. Get a grip, John!

Give Me Taxes Or Give Me Death, Part II / 9-14-10

Well well, look who's not really serious about the deficit after all.

Republicans screaming "Save the tax cuts for the rich," that's who.

Summary: Bush tax cuts for everyone are set to expire at the end of the year. President Obama wants them to expire - for those individuals or families making more than $250k, but not for the middle class. He's fine with extending that portion of the tax cut. Republicans say they'll fight that course of action if congressional Democrats try it. The tax cuts will expire for everyone and tax rates will return to 1999 levels if no agreement is reached.

It is that simple. All other commentary is helpful, but not crucial. It comes down to, whose side are you on? And most the D's are, yet again, as almost always, on the side of 98 percent of the population, and all the R's are, yet again, as almost always, on the side of 2 percent of the population. (Follow the link. Do it.)

Looking at pure numbers, the President shouldn't have a terrible time selling his preference to Americans, except that his White House couldn't make itself look good if it invented cold fusion and brokered permanent peace in the Middle East while solving world hunger on the side.

All BHO has to say is something like this, right?

"We were a more prosperous, more responsible nation while President Clinton was in office. I believe the tax rates that were reasonable in the nineties remain reasonable now for our wealthiest citizens. George Bush's tax cuts were reckless and unnecessary, and should they survive, they would grow the deficit to an even more dangerous level. You can't have it both ways, my conservative friends. You can't spend the last two years harping on the deficit your party's presidents created, then decline to raise revenue when the opportunity presents itself in the natural way it has. Either you're for deficit reduction or against it. Time to choose. I've chosen my route, and I am proud of it, and I trust the American people to support a more responsible course of action than the one they've grown accustomed to seeing from their leaders.

"Therefore, you will join me in letting the tax cuts expire for only the wealthiest Americans. Or you will show yourselves to be the deficit enablers you have been for the past 30 years."

Instead, we got:

"But we’re still in this wrestling match with John Boehner and Mitch McConnell about the last 2 to 3 percent, where, on average, we’d be giving them $100,000 for people making a million dollars or more — which in and of itself would be OK, except to do it, we’d have to borrow $700 billion over the course of 10 years. And we just can’t afford it."

It's a start. But we're not in a wrestling match, Mr. President. A power struggle you should be winning, but aren't. Yet. Partly because there are five numbers in that sentence. And while I followed what you were saying, most people tuned you out after $100,000, before you got to the important part: the "we just can't afford it" part. That's the lead. People understand "we can't afford it." Nowadays, it rings true and urgent. Start there, mix in a jab about how Republicans only care about the deficit when it gives them an excuse to block legislation aimed to help the middle class, then give numbers for support.

(I sound arrogant, but mostly I'm just annoyed with how the facts and public opinion are on the D's side and yet the fight goes on.)

Here are some more encouraging responses from Democrats, all from Massachusetts.

Rep. Michael Capuano: “We either have to give Republicans everything they want or they’ll take their ball and go home? Well, go home then."

Rep. Jim McGovern: “I would be happy to listen to any ideas that my Republican friends have that won’t explode the deficit and which would actually help create jobs — like tax credits for small businesses and incentives for manufacturing.’’

Rep. Richard Neal, a key member of the House Ways and Means Committee: “If there’s a compromise that we can live with that protects the middle class, I’m open to it,’’ adding he wants to dedicate revenue from expiring tax cuts to begin to pay down Iraq war debt.

Let's see if THAT message gets out.

Two and Two / 9-10-10

Realistically, that's about what we can expect out of the Seattle Seahawks this season. Two wins, and two losses. Mmmm? What's that you say? And as for the other dozen games? Bpthfffff. Who knows?

I'm somewhat knowledgeable about sports, somewhat able to tell when a team is going to suck and when it's going to unsuck. Most the time.

This Hawks squad leaves me perplexed. Pergoogleplexed. (There are lots and lots of English-speaking people in the world, and lots of them say goofy things, so I'm going to conclude that very, very VERY sadly, there is a thirtysomething dad out there who has also invented that exact same word. He's a dork and a loser, whereas I am supercool.)

Who's to say how this season will be any different than the last, when they went 5-11 and looked exactly as bad as their record?

I'm to say that things are different.

The defense that looked like it was playing 8-on-11 last year will be better organized, more healthy and better in pass defense this season.

The reliable QB who got hurt and missed half the season will play more games this season.

The offensive line that lost 14 left tackles to injury last year (I joke, but the Hawks did use their fifth-string guy for a while) will perform better, with the development of new blood and improved coaching.

If those three improvements hold, and the division gets even weaker with Arizona's perceived step back (they have no quarterback or receivers left), then I could see Seattle picking up two or three more wins than last year.

But at the same time, there's the stunning turnover from '09 that weighs on my mind, and I find myself wondering, with half the 53-man roster gone, including important contributors like T.J. and Josh Wilson, will there be any semblance of continuity? And if, Tao forbid, anyone important gets re-hurt, could this team be two or three wins WORSE than last year?

And then, there are these 3,256 other questions left to be answered:

(I'll pick just 10.)

315. Will left tackle Russell Okung ever see the field this year?

666. Why the h*ll did our offensive line coach, widely regarded as the best in the business, quit a week before the opener?

777. What if everyone stays healthy? Is 10-6 out of the question?

1,002. Is Golden Tate for real?

1,003. Is Aaron Curry for real? Will he ever be?

1,974. Who exactly will be rushing the passer?

1,976. Who exactly will be rushing the football?

2,011. What if Whitehurst takes more snaps than Hasselbeck?

2,987. Is 8-8 enough to win the division?

3,256. You know, Jim Mora was a pretty good college coach too.

That's all I've got. Go Hawks!

EDIT after Sunday's season opener: The O-line looked decent, the receivers were better than good, we created a pass rush, Hasselbeck made only one mistake all day, lots of guys carried the ball in acceptable fashion, and the rest of the division looks awful. Carroll completely outcoached Singletary, and now I have to aggressively remind myself: IT'S JUST ONE GAME dude.

Give Me Taxes Or Give Me Death / 9-5-10

There are only three options left.

Either we:

1. Raise taxes to pay for our social programs;
2. Reduce entitlement benefits drastically for all citizens, beginning now;
3. Install some combination of 1. and 2.

All other paths, including our elected officials' perennial favorite, 4. Stay The Course, lead to financial ruin and the end of the nation as we know it.

I'm sick and tired of 4.

I want 1.

I want more taxes, and I want them yesterday. I want the rich to pay more than the non-rich, because the reverse is cruel and ineffective. And I want the media to expose relentlessly how lower taxes are only possible if we aggressively slash Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security and every other bit of spending the government undertakes.

There exists no option 5., called "Cut taxes and pretend we can save money in the great 'elsewhere' of the federal budget. Like foreign aid. Or 'waste.' Or earmarks. Or pork." That plan's not viable, not possible, and it's high time its predetermined failure was properly publicized. We can't have social programs and low taxes. And anyone who claims otherwise should be ridiculed as an untrustworthy power-hungry liar. There is no room in the budget for that reckless financial fantasy.

Anyone who claims we can trim government revenues without touching the social safety net's benefits is unfit to lead the country.

I have numbers.

Medicare/Medicaid costs 779 billion annually.
Social Security costs 694 billion.
National defense and wars set us back 680 billion.
Federal pensions: 195 billion.
Foreign aid checks in between 20 and 25 billion.
Earmarks? 17 billion.

(These stats can be found all over the Internet at all sorts of nonpartisan places. You can dislike them, but you can't quibble with them.)

If every earmark and all bits of foreign aid were eliminated from the budget every year, we'd make a hole in the overall debt of less than one-third of percent, which would be instantly gobbled up the following year by the interest on our new debt anyway. That's assuming we kept tax rates stable.

The government (federal and state) receives about $3.34 trillion annually in taxes. The debt has grown by at least $500 billion annually since 2003.

We need to pay more taxes, or we need to tell our seniors and our poor to forget half their entitlements.

Or we could not go to war, ever. Or defend ourselves against anyone, ever. Or provide any basic services, ever.

Only a combination of higher taxes and lower benefits, or simply higher taxes, will save the nation from insolvency, followed by skyrocketing interest rates, followed by partition of the United States of America.

I like America. I love America. I don't wish her death. I'd like my grandkids to be Americans, not Pacificans.

Either way, if we want the country we have, we're going to get higher taxes. And if that's going to happen, I'd just as soon we were the kind of people who support their citizens appropriately in their infirmity and old age.

I am completely, unapologetically requesting to have my taxes raised as soon as possible. Well, not just mine. Everyone's. Mine don't stand much of a chance in a cage match with a $20 trillion, $30 trillion, $60 trillion national debt. (We're at 13.4 trillion and counting.)

I'm not poor. I won't win some sort of personal mini-lottery from a system that ensures survival of the safety net.

I'm also not rich. I can't afford a lot more in taxes. I can barely afford the ones I have to pay right now.

I'm also not at all bothered by the prospect of system fraud. I believe we should catch welfare cheats and Social Security scammers, make them perform loads of community service and fine them heftily, because I'm willing to let the police chase down the guy who does 55 mph in my residential neighborhood rather than petitioning to have the speed limits revoked.

I am bothered, now to the point of seething anger, by the notion that our present borrowing levels and deficits are OK.

I am bothered tenfold by the notion that REDUCING the government's revenue is somehow the answer. Especially when a politician says -- lies -- that we can trim the fat from a bloated budget while cutting taxes. Unless that politician specifically calls for steep cuts in our entitlements programs alongside those irresponsible tax cuts (and I mean steep cuts, on the order of 30 or 40 percent), then you can assume said politician is misleading you.

It is critical that persons with megaphones call out those who would lead America to the financial precipice. And that we call out the media for not doing its job in this arena. Its job, in this case? Forcing politicians to address the issue, but not in generalities. Asking the questions that expose empty promises and unrealistic so-called solutions.

Is my anger visible enough?

Anyway. When my debt reaches dangerous levels, and it has done so at times because my career path has been... voluptuous, those are the times I curtail my spending, rework the terms of the debt if I can, and find ways to make more money. If I don't end up doing at least one of those things quite well (and probably two at a time are necessary), I run the risk of losing my house, my cars, then being forced to skip two meals a day, and even then, I might still be crushed under the consequences if I'm not careful.

While I realize personal finance guidelines don't always apply on a national scale, the moral from the previous paragraph is that there is a limit to how much debt you can handle without it crippling you. If one individual finds that tipping point, trips over it carelessly and is broken by the circumstances, that's a tragedy. If that were to happen to a whole country, we'd need a new word to describe such an inconceivable event.

Why would we even want to come close to that point?

I will enthusiastically support an influential politician who realizes I can handle the truth, then tells me something like this:

"The days of easy entitlements are over. Financial realities dictate that we must cut benefits and raise taxes, or risk our very sovereignty. Prudence dictates that we start down that road sooner rather than later.

"I wish it were not so, but wishing won't make the facts go away. I am no longer willing to pretend that a crisis does not loom on the horizon. Please join me in an era of sacrifice that will strengthen the long-term financial prospects of the Unites States of America while preserving the principles for which she stands.

"If you want to be mad at me for telling it like it is, go ahead. But I'm going to be part of the solution, not the problem, and the solution incorporates, without a doubt, higher taxes for all Americans. My hope is that you, whether you consider yourself liberal or conservative or in between or neither, that you will journey with me down the road that saves our very nation. Thank you."

Of course, I'm not holding my breath.

So I wrote this little novel / 9-4-10

Those of you who speak with me on a semi-consistent basis know I finished my first novel last summer and have been resting on my laurels ever since. Kidding aside, I'm proud of that accomplishment. The book is short, only about 20,000 words, which makes it really just a novella or a long short story, but no apologies; it feels quite good to finish a project of any length. (And any quality.)

So I thought I'd post a chapter here. By clicking on that there link, you're sent to writerscafe.org, a website designed to be a community of creative minds. The chapter you'll read there is the second one, in which our protagonist experiences an event that shapes his outlook on life.

Later on, in subsequent super-secret double-dog-dare chapters, he interacts with girls, both two- and three-dimensional. (They say you should write about what you know. To which I clearly say, "Yeah right.")

In any case, the story, overall, it's about a guy. He's doing his best to act normal in every situation. Every situation. It comes easy sometimes... and sometimes it doesn't. His life story, from age seven all the way up to his imminent death, is told with the aid of his personal guardian angel. Duh.

The book is titled

"Uncommonly Normal

or

Extra Ordinary."

Sometime soon, I'll self-publish it and/or make it available for downloading. Once I finish tweaking the second half of it to death.

That's all for now. Back to our regularly scheduled programming. (Blogramming?) A long-promised post on the spiritual value of music is near completion and will soon be subject to your usual mockery.

I Knew I Picked the Right Guy / 9-1-10

I haven't posted on the Depressors, I mean, the Mariners, in a while.

But this upcoming chart I got from one of my favorite sites, ussmariner, and I have to brazenly steal it and bring it to you, my fellow sufferers.

The next time I hear someone complain that Ichiro, of all people, is bringing the team down, I swear I will plead temporary insanity at the resulting trial.

See what I mean:

(Each line includes the batter's spot in the lineup, then how that Mariner has performed, then how the league has performed on average, and the difference.)

Batting average

1. / .308 / .269 / +.039

2. / .240 / .265 / -.025

3. / .221 / .275 / -.054

4. / .244 / .276 / -.032

5. / .210 / .269 / -.059

6. / .244 / .255 / -.011

7. / .206 / .250 / -.044

8. / .212 / .242 / -.030

9. / .222 / .244 / -.022

On-Base Percentage

1. / .360 / .332 / +.028

2. / .328 / .335 / -.007

3. / .303 / .355 / -.052

4. / .293 / .349 / -.056

5. / .262 / .339 / -.077

6. / .311 / .318 / -.007

7. / .284 / .315 / -.031

8. / .283 / .305 / -.022

9. / .271 / .302 / -.031

Slugging Percentage

1. / .391 / .366 / +.025

2. / .285 / .402 / -.117

3. / .374 / .441 / -.067

4. / .384 / .476 / -.092

5. / .302 / .450 / -.148

6. / .376 / .415 / -.039

7. / .281 / .399 / -.118

8. / .345 / .379 / -.034

9. / .318 / .353 / -.035

I could comment further on the historically stinkacious abhorrency of some of these stats, but the pluses and minuses kind of speak for themselves, no?

Abort, Retry, Fail? Your Choice / 9-1-10

Those old PC's from the turn of the decade -- no, not that decade... or that one... yes, THAT one -- had a tendency to, um, crash from time to time. (That's been fixed in the last 20 years, right? Right?) When a person (we'll call him "Me") would ask the computer, nicely, to execute an illegal order, the computer (we'll call it "Satan") would respond with a deceptively unpleasant multiple-choice conundrum:

"Abort, Retry, Fail?"

Never, "OK, Great, Jawohl!" No. Just three bad options.

Abort: Give up. Kill the operation before it even has a chance to flourish.

Retry: Yeah right, that'll work.

Fail: Basically computer language for "I win, you lose. Again." What next, "Master"?

Boy, nerdy computer jokes from the 80's sure do make a perfect lead-in for a subject as lighthearted and airy as abortion, don't they?

According to polls spanning 35 years, 47 percent of Americans currently describe themselves as "pro-life." 45 percent, meanwhile describe themselves as pro-choice. (I think maybe the other 8 percent call themselves either "Stupid-from-the-T-shirt-I'm-with-Stupid" or "swing-voters" or "pro-indecision" or "pro-go-f*ck-yourself.") Not only that, but the trend seems to unmistakably indicate a steady movement toward the pro-life position over the course of the last 15 years.

So yeah, here's the thing: I dispute the facts contained within the polling. (Maybe I even wreckon they aren't true.)

I would like, instead, to submit the completely unverifiable opinion that 95 percent of American parents are pro-choice. If the question is asked the right way.

Maybe if it were phrased a little like this:

"Do you support or oppose the opportunity for your 14-year-old daughter to end a pregnancy resulting from rape committed by a family member?"

Go ahead. Oppose that one. Try.

Try harder, maybe?

No? You'd like her to make up her own mind here? You think the molested kid ought to have a say in the outcome? Maybe you believe she should make the decision as to whether the fetus is brought to term? What's that, you say? You'd like her to "choose" whether to keep the baby?

Yeah, I thought so. It will not only take a special type of person not only to suggest that your daughter give birth in that situation, but then to MANDATE it... that's cold and harsh. That's not even tough love. That's, what, just tough, I guess.

You can call me on my extremism, and say that I'm using the most far-fetched example to support my case. I freely admit I am. You pose the question, "Should rich snotty promiscuous women living in Manhattan be entitled to the right to casually murder their viable unborn children, up to thirty seconds before delivery, and celebrate with martinis afterward?" and you're probably going to get something less than 95 percent support. Do they even allow negative numbers in polls?

But you make it personal -- your kid is the one seeking deliverance from an impossible situation -- and I confidently assert that almost every parent suddenly (miraculously) converts to the pro-choice camp.

Not because abortion is SO COOL. But because there comes a point where ideology fails, and you have to resort to unconditional compassion for your living flesh and blood, over whatever ideals you might subscribe to in your ivory towers. And because you can't really make this decision for her. And if you can't make it for her, you necessarily support her right to make it for herself. Hey: You've just earned your pro-choice merit badge.

You can call abortion "murder" or "the easy way out" or "a coward's choice" all you want, until it's your kid facing that dilemma.

Even my friend "Donald" (not his real name), who claims he and his wife have agreed in advance to not abort a child resulting from her being raped, has to consider whether he'd really tell his teenage daughter that she's not permitted to choose in that case.

(That's a real conversation I've had recently. "Don" sticks to his pro-life guns -- my word, there's an exquisite phrase -- even when his wife is hypothetically victimized. This is laudable. If abortion is murder, it's murder no matter the circumstances, and murder cannot be condoned. I respect and almost admire Don's ethical consistency. He's a good guy, deep down, even if like all of us political animals, he suffers from a lack of perspective at times.)

Anyway. Other people have made this exact same point before, no doubt. Some probably more eloquently than me, and some probably even more sarcastically than me. (No, I think that's possible. Barely. But it can be done, with Hulkulean effort.) But this is the first time I've gone down this road, so thanks for bearing with me.

If it's you or your kid, do you support the right to choose abortion? In any case? In some cases? And if you think you wouldn't go the abortion route in the end, do you support other women having the same choice? Or do you believe that life begins at or near conception every time, in which case your pregnant daughter's out of luck... or even then, do you allow her the chance to see things differently?

Parting thought, then: Instead of viewing abortions as expensive birth control for the callous and the careless, how about we spend some time thinking of them as painful choices for our daughters and sons?

(Maybe I should have been a preacher after all.)