The Bard of Wherever

Well folks, this is how it is done.  If they can do it to William Shakespeare, they can do it to anyone.  Here's a guy, wrote 36 plays unparalled in excellence, are known the world over, are the bases for "hit movies," changed literature and human thought forever, but if The Powers That Be decide they want to take away what is yours, well, too bad, you lose.  It could be Justice Stevens denying Shakespeare, or it could be the Bush clan denying the plainly-spoken will of the American people -- it's all part of the same continuum of lies, betrayal and theft.

I am sickened.

Deep thought of the day

The economy, like certain women, disdains "nice guys" and gladly throws itself after "bad boys."  Do good work and follow the rules, like Circuit City, and the economy leaves you in the lurch, you find yourself out of work and out of cash and having to rent your spare bedroom out to a grad student.  But if you're a muscle-bound, bullet-headed rule-breakers like AIG, you find yourself continuously showered with economic affection no matter how much damage you do to people's homes.

Mad Max Beyond Divorce Court

It looks as though Braveheart will finally get his "FREEDOM!"  But it will cost him a little more than being drawn and quartered by the British crown.

I've been looking around through some boxes left over from my move, but I can't seem to locate the tiny violin I'd like to play for Mr. Gibson.  A woman leaves you with $500,000,000.00?  That's so sad.  How about a woman who leaves you with a set of curtains, a cat whose fur doesn't match any of your clothes, and a hole in your heart?

But, of course, we love them.  We must.  That's what we do.  Regardless of the consequences.  That's the true meaning of manhood.

The Phantom Senator

Idea for the supporters of Norm Coleman: let him win.

Build him a little senatorial office of his own, maybe in a back yard somewhere, give him a staff, tell him he's won and let him move in.  Since his primary motivation is playing at "being in power" rather than actually governing a people, let him do that.  Let him play.  It's all a game to him anyway.  

He can play at "making decisions" and "voting on important issues" and "making back-room deals with corrupt industrialists," all the little games that politicians like to play. Certainly his wealthy fat-cat supporters could supply him with an office and a staff and a car.  He could dress up for "state dinners" at the local IHOP and "give speeches" to the kids at the park and write his name on pieces of paper.  He'd be happy, and what's more, he'd be doing more for the people of Minnesota than he would be if he were actually senator.

Note to the governor of Texas

Threatening to start a second American Civil War probably is not a very good way to stop the Obama/Lincoln comparisons.  Just saying.

The big question

Why do we have a branch of the federal government dedicated solely to keeping secrets in the first place?

Mr. Snootles reports

Mr. Snootles takes a dim view of teabagging.  And he's not happy about conservative anti-tax protests, either.

Pertinent question

If one brings Oolong to a "teabagging" demonstration, is that a statement of dissatisfaction regarding Obama's stimulus package, or a statement against Chinese control of the American economy?

I can't believe I just used the words "teabagging," "stimulus" and "package" in one sentence.  And we haven't yet gotten to Dick Armey yet.

Letting the genie -- or the ketchup, at least -- out of the bottle

The New York Times reports on the ground-breaking story that the Heinz Ketchup bottle is good design.  And I can certainly imagine the scene in the Style editor's office when the ace design reporter burst in the door and said "Stop the presses, chief, I got a story's gonna set this town on its ear!"  The searing nature of this revelation was probably pushed off the front page so as to not rattle cages too large for the Times to deal with.

(/snark)

But in a real sense, my concern is: The Heinz Ketchup bottle is good design -- for the Heinz corporation.  For the rest of us, for the people, not so much.  How many man-hours of our GNP have been lost to our collective attempts to dislodge ketchup from a Heinz bottle?  If I eat a hamburger a week (or, in my case, a soyburger), and I spend an average of 90 seconds trying to get the ketchup out of the Heinz bottle, and you multiply that by the number of Americans who eat hamburgers every day (due to the beef lobby's abilities to control America's eating habits) the time squandered in this pursuit is incalculable.  Why must the American working-class (and, let's face it, it is the workers who consume the fast majority of hamburgers, I'm not telling tales out of school here) be forced to labor harder to garnish their meals simply so that the Heinz corporation can continue to reap obscene profits? Isn't this what government oversight is all about?

And I say this with full awareness of John Kerry's role in all this.

What is the point of the FDA, if not to protect American workers from the predations of the food lobbyists?  Food manufacturers will do anything they feel they must in order to maintain high profit margins, whether it's putting ground glass into our food or putting ketchup into an inefficient bottle because it's "popular."  Who cares if it's "popular," the worker needs to be protected or else what is the point of a federal government at all?

The White House goes to the dog -- or is it the other way around?

So, a particular dog is having its day -- specifically, the Obamas' new dog, the Portuguese Water Dog named Bo (after 10 actress Bo Derek).  And this is, of course, a good thing for the two little girls who wanted a dog.  However, I cringe at the thought of the impact Bo's arrival will have on the pet world.

A few years ago, Finding Nemo created a world-wide demand for clownfish as the worlds' children clamored to their parents to get them their very own living, breathing Nemo for their home fish tank.  As a result, the gentle, colorful clownfish was desperately pursued by an army -- or navy, rather -- of greedy, amoral tropical-fish hunters, their eyes only on profit.  The clownfish was fished to the brink of extinction, and the coral reefs they live in were irrevocably damaged by the rampaging hoardes of fishmongers.  (Coral is a living thing, and a vital component of the reef ecosystem.)

Now we have a similar problem looming with the Portuguese Water Dog.  Just as, last November, millions of American babies (and Kenyan, no doubt) were christened "Obama," the pet world must now gird its loins for the impending demand of millions of Portuguese Water Dogs.  The business of the breeding of dogs is as cutthroat and short-sighted as the business of fishing, and the over-breeding of a dog often leads to the breed's demise.  Who can forget the Akita distaster of the 1980s?  Akitas were sold by corrupt breeders to nouveau riche New Yorkers as "the perfect Yuppie Puppy," and the subsequent demand for the animal corrupted the breed almost to its extinction.

President Obama promised at one point to obtain a shelter dog for his new home, and a mutt at that, as a symbolic gesture to his heritage and to the bright beacon of hope he brought to tens of millions of Americans.  How I dearly wish he had remembered and kept that promise -- it would have saved millions of mongrels from our nations' shelters.  This was one of our new President's earliest challenges, and in this instance it appears he has failed his principles.

Yo ho ho?

I'm happy that everything turned out more or less all right for Captain Phillips and President Obama this week -- the fewer Americans lost at sea due to pirate attacks the better, I suppose. 

I'm less happy about the way the media has portrayed the story.  To me, there has been a troubling lack of coverage about the Somali pirates themselves, and the socio-political-economic forces that required them to resort to a life of piracy.

What man, in the 21st century, wakes up one morning and says "By gum, a pirates life for me!" No man does this, because, as Dryden said, the life of a pirate is nasty, brutish and short.  That was true in the 1600s and it's just as true now.  Certainly, behind all the crowing and breast-beating surrounding the rescue of Captain Phillips, there is a tragic story to be told about the desperate men whose lives gave them no choice but the life of an outcast.

For, in our illegal times, who is truly the pirate and who is truly the pirated?  Aren't the Wall Street bankers who pillaged and plundered our economy the real pirates?  How is it that these men, this team of no-hope Somali sailors, are killed for their crimes while the pirates of Wall Street continue to profit indecently?

Welcome!

It is my great pleasure to leap with both feet into the blood-soaked arena of online political discourse.  My goal in doing so is not to lop off more heads than my competitors, but rather to prevent as many loppings as possible.  The great Greek philosopher Anaximander brought reason and common sense to his savage and brutal time, and I intend, in my own humble way, to soldier on in that tradition.  My job is not to bring low the powerful or punish the wrongdoer.  My job is only to shine the light of truth in an age of darkness.  This will, no doubt, be seen by some as an act of insurrection.