President Flipper

Gotta laugh at the continued incompetence of President Quagmire. Yesterday, He says the War On Terror can't be won, at which point the Democrats immediately began humping his leg. Oops .. Today he recants ("made a boo-boo"), and says the War On Terra can be won. What a flip-flopper!

This reminds me of the time when The Penguin Dick Cheney bashed Senator Kerry for using the word "sensitive" and then President Quagmire used The S Word about 24 hours later. Good thing those two work So Well Together. Oops .. forgot that Team Thing was just a façade .. more CFRP Spin Doctoring. Oops .. that's redundant, isn't it?

Gotta give the CFRP credit: every speech sounds like every other speech (they've become the Masters of Talking Points), so .. if you've heard one Kerry-bashing, you've heard them all. This goes back to the awful days of Ronald Reagan, when he Governed By Sound Bite, as if everyone in America suddenly contracted Attention Deficit Disorder and couldn't think for themselves.

It helps to balance what they say, by what you see with your own eyes. Supposedly the Swift Boat Liars For Bush only spent $2M, versus $42B (!) spent by MoveOn.org .. although the Swift Liars must be getting a great TV rate, since I haven't seen much-if-anything from MoveOn. I must be watching The Wrong Channel again.

The CFRP says the Democrats made themselves out to be something they're not - tough on terrorism (in Boston) and then turn around and made themselves out to be something they're not - moderate (in New York) barely 30 days later. These Radical Rights are trying to make themselves look like Normal Human Beings, when in reality they're being dragged around by their nose rings by the (Fundamentalist) Radical Right death squads of their party. Both parties just reek of slime, although only one party has Made Slime Into An Art Form.

Bizarre web site of the week: JohnKerryIsaDoucheBagButImVotingForHimAnyway (thanks to Michelle for the spot)

I think I'll just watch cartoons for the rest of the week, until New York is returned to the residents. Trivia: Democrats outregister the CFRP 5:1 in New York City.

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I spotted something about BlogOn 2004 in someone's LinkedIn profile, so .. curious me .. I tracked it down. Turns out the event was July 22-23. Oh well ...

Deep Thoughts on a Sunday Night

amusing lapel button of the week: 86 43; I wonder how many people will understand the (political) reference?

I watched an episode of Airline (UK edition) which follows EasyJet (similar in concept to our Southwest Airlines). Jolly Good! Last week, I watched a UK version of the game show [The Weakest Link] where the prizes were in Pounds Sterling. Also Jolly Good.

Then there is the "Most Borrowed Library Books" list for the week ending 28 August. Fascinating. Awe-inspiring. Also, there is this: the American Library Association's Most Frequently Challenged Books of 1990-2000. These are the books that parents have demanded that libraries remove from their shelves. Flashback to Fahrenheit 451. Not Jolly Good.

Best laugh of the night: the Speech Generator on BushSpeaks.com (close 2nd: Passion of the Swift Boat Liars for Bush)

If they've lost Garrison Keillor, they've lost middle America.

One of the many RSS feeds I watch pointed to We're Not in Lake Wobegon Anymore (subtitled "How did the Party of Lincoln and Liberty transmogrify into the party of Newt Gingrich's evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk?).

In case you don't know, Garrison Keillor is the genius behind radio's A Prairie Home Companion which begat the book Lake Wobegon Days, and is (IMHO) one of America's great authors.

Comment #1: Garrison needs to work on shorter subtitles.

Comment #2: If the GOP has lost Garrison Keillor, they've lost middle America. (okay, so I took poetic license with LBJ's famous VietNam war-era quote "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost middle America.")

Thai a yellow ribbon round the olde oak tree ...

I attended one of the CareerConnection meetings today (specifically the International Business Professionals Group) which appears to be more into business networking than international issues, but .. they're an active group (17 attended today's session).

This networking session worked a lot like the Candidate Networking Lunch at Right Management on Tuesday; both reminded me of Group Speed Dating (you talk to 4 others for about 12 minutes, then switch tables). I'm not sure I made any contacts that will help on The Job Hunt, but .. you never know which will strike paydirt. After the meeting, four of us went to Noodle Wave in Richardson and had a yummy Thai lunch. They're also listed on DFW Thai.com which is a directory of Thai businesses - not just restaurants - in the Metroplex.

can you spell h-u-m-i-d-i-t-y ?

Breathe a sigh of relief: Sundry on Thursday (week 12, no less) is now posted.

Okay, so I've heard of PC-based flight simulators for about 20 years, but what about one for 18-wheel tractor-trailers? Gotta git me one of these Interactive Truck Driving Simulators! It looks like a swell Christmas present.

I laughed when I read Taking a closer look at the War Medals of George W. Bush. Somebody has too much free time. I watched [The Daily Show] on Comedy Central on Tuesday night (John Kerry) and Wednesday night (Ed Gillespie, Führer of the Radical Right) and noted the similarities: both wore ties and walked on 2 legs (unlike Max Cleland, who showed up at GWB's Crawford ranch yesterday and was Shown The Door by the Secret Service)

It's not for everyone (something like 97% of all browsers are Microsoft's Internet Explorer) but for those seeking an alternative, check out the Browse Happy site.

Olympic Athlete Veterans for Truth

The time (earlier this month) when GWB showed he had no clue what Tribal Sovereignty meant was bad enough (see the Q&A with Mark Trahant, widely available on the web). It was like watching a high schooler asked to define a word he'd never heard before.

Now GWB can't even admit he hasn't watched the Olympics. What is so hard about him telling the truth, even for something this inconsequential? He could've answered "I really haven't watched the Olympics," but noooooo ... he had to (try to) lie:

REPORTER 1: You're not going to Athens this week, are you?

GWB: Athens, Texas?

REPORTER 1: Nope, the Olympics, in Greece.

GWB: Oh, the Olympics? No, I'm not.

REPORTER 2: Have you been watching them?

GWB: Oh, yeah, yeah, it's been exciting.

REPORTER 2: Any particular moment stand out?

GWB: Umm -- particular moment? I like the -- let's see -- uhhhh -- Iraqi soccer. I liked -- I liked seeing the Afghan woman carrying the flag coming in. I loved, uhh -- you know, our gymnasts. I've been watching the swimming. I've seen a lot, yeah. Listen, thank you all.

-- 23 August 2004

A President Aday Keeps the Meatloaf Away?

Word is that Marvin Lee Aday will accept a write-in vote for President. Wonder if that's possible on the electronic voting machines during Early Voting?

Google du juor: Bush "most corrupt" points to John Dean's Worse than Watergate book. Dean was Richard Nixon's legal counsel, so he presumably knows about corruption! Now age 65, Dean claims that the Bush administration is more secretive, deceptive and politically cynical than even Richard Nixon. Hmm .. strong words.

I might blow him off, if it weren't for numerous similar books by people like journalist Bob Woodward (Plan of Attack); journalist (and Pulitzer Prize winner) Ron Suskind's The Price of Loyalty; former Republican strategist Kevin Phillips' American Dynasty; investigative journalist Craig Unger's House of Bush, House of Saud, and the list goes on and on and on. Sure, they're all trying to sell books, but these are not people who are out of the loop, and all are putting their credibility on the line. Well, I'm not planning on purchasing any of them. Perhaps I should join a book discussion group and just listen to what others got out of these missives?

The New York Times 2004 Election Guide paints a very different picture than ElectoralVote.com and ElectionProjection.com. I wrote off Texas as a rational state a long time ago; people here confuse loyalty with morality, and the Yellow Dog Republican voters can't be reasoned with; they'd vote for Bush even if he was caught with an intern in the Oval Office.

The states I'm watching more carefully include Ohio, West Virginia and Michigan (where the Swift Boat Liars - VietNam Veterans who can't understand why we hated their war - funneled their money). The Radical Right must think the voters in Ohio, West Virginia and Michigan are complete morons, in the "repeat a lie often enough, and enough people will believe it to sway an election" rationale (which does work, sadly .. but it doesn't make these slimy tactics morally right). Having watched the CFRP smear campaigns for the past dozen years or so, none of this surprises me; they have turned into a "win at any cost" party and may have lost my vote for years to come.

1:30pm news flash: GWB says the Swift Boat Liars For Bush should stop their ads. This is a Catch-22: if they do stop, they will show that GWB was indeed pulling the strings. If they don't, they'll upset their Führer. My, oh my .. what will happen next?