Michelle, My Belle

Over at TimeMagazineMSMConglomerate.com, Andrew Sullivan has taken a few days off from his now-predictable drain circling to allow some substitutes to post in his place. One of those substitutes, Michelle...um...I think it's Tractenburg, who played Buffy the Vampire Slayer's little sister (and what a fine, adorable little job she did, sprinkle of freckles across her button nose and all) wonders "why Democrat/liberal types seem to freak out over hypocrisy more than their conservative counterparts?"
Well, gosh, maybe it's because those Dem/lib types are just more highly attuned to detecting or just engaging in a wholesale inventing of hypocritical behavior to attribute to those on the other side of the political spectrum? Now, if you'll excuse me, I have a lot of liberal neighbors who own SUVs and I need to stop them from smashing in the windshields, spraying the interiors with kerosene and setting them on fire in order to avoid rents in their moral fabric...

Who did you bl*w in the war, Mommy?

The always classy Nina Burleigh offers this carefully considered look at the way we live now. What a life: half the year or so in Paris and the other half in upstate New York, pretending that one lives in Nazi Germany. Here's a suggestion: take life lessons from your child, you helium head: he seems to have more of a sense of proportion. (Note: the title of this post derives from Burleigh's infamous reaction to the Monica Lewinsky scandal. As any soul can tell, the entrance exam for the MSM includes a bar that isn't set very high).

One Long, Sustained Whatever From Maryscott O'Connor...

...And don't "long" and "sustained" mean pretty much the same thing?
And shame on the Washington Post's photographer, taking photos during this story on lefty blogs. I mean, look at the picture accompanying this article.
It should be obvious that this bathrobe-clad Thomasina Paine, in mid-rant, was about to reach the point where some particular vein was throbbing along the ridge of the forehead and one of the eyes was about to start moving independently of the other; maybe towards its twin, maybe away, in a most eccentric orbit. And the hapless photographer missed it! Such an opportunity lost! Well, anyway, she wrote a post about Darfur and a few dozen other impotent loons with poor-to-middling communication skills chimed in with comments. At least that really makes a difference to those suffering in Darfur.
A very sad and very, very pathetic picture it paints. Hope to revisit this tomorrow and plumb its depths...

The Greatest Love of All

I want to dance with some appliance that loves me:

Singer Whitney Houston is addicted to crack and spends her days locked in her filthy bedroom abusing drugs and pleasuring herself with sex toys. This is the startling allegation in next week's issue of the National Enquirer, which boasts an exclusive look inside the diva's drug den.

You know, it's like I have a twin.

Low Security Officer Tolerance

Hold on, Cynthia McKinney. You once accused a member of your own party, Al Gore, of suffering from "low Negro tolerance." (And who doesn't remember the non-stop press coverage of that particular assertion?) Now, the worm seems to have turned. Mayhaps you suffer, Congresswoman, from low security officer tolerance?

Roses are Red, Vampires are Another Color

Little seven-year-old poet Autum Ashante is just as cute as a little
button. However, cute isn't everything. Her supporters have a point about Autum's free speech rights but they may have bigger problems to deal with very soon.

You see, one of the state's senators, a woman with the last name of Clinton, was recently warning about school vouchers and the possibility of those leading to the establishment of a "school of the White Supremacist." It's probably only hours before the lady's finely tuned antenna picks up on this outrage and she's in full cry on all the media outlets on the subject of racism in schools. But, in the final analysis, don't hold Autum responsible for her poetry: are we really supposed to believe that a seven-year-old used the word, "paradigm?"

Road Worrier

There may be something to the idea that, when the weather improves, people drive differently; a bit more carefree as warmer temperatures and abundant sunshine act to spur greater speed and lesser caution. In the 15 minutes, it took to get home, I saw a person driving while on a cell phone (illegal here in New York State) who'd inched out just a bit too much into traffic and stopped, causing a large cement truck to screech to a halt at an angle, blocking traffic in several lanes and two folks barrelling through a supermarket parking lot at a really imprudent 30 or more miles per hour. It was when I saw the, ahem, rather obese man driving his enormous Lincoln in said parking lot that I had the epiphany. This guy had his car seat moved back a good three feet from the steering wheel so he could lean back and relax as if he were on his couch. Of course, driving that way makes it impossible to observe such niceties as the lines painted on the asphalt as you make large looping turns that cut everyone off and bisect the parking space areas. In a sense, this guy really was on his couch, his own personal space in which he was to relax and do whatever the hell he damn well pleased. Cell phone guy and the parking lot speeders? Safe to say that the same principle was operating with them. Individuality is a great thing but, everyone, how about a little more sense of community as we drive?

Like a Raving Stone

Actress Sharon Stone reveals she has early-onset Alzheimer's.
Sad, really.

The Passing of a Giant

Polish science-fiction author Stanislaw Lem has died. Strike the "science-fiction" qualification: Lem was one of the finest, smartest and most humane authors of the 20th century and, sadly, one of the least read in America. Track down and read the Cyberiad, any of the Tichy books like The Star Diaries or the Pirx the Pilot books and you will find yourself increased immeasurably. I recently re-read his masterpiece, Fiasco, and was stunned at how damn good it was, better even than my memory of it from 20 years ago.
Rest in peace, Stanislaw Lem.

Null and Void

Former Liberian dictator Charles Taylor has vanished while in Nigeria. He is, as an NPR report asserted this evening, the first former African leader to be indicted by an international tribunal for his violations of human rights. As the Washington Post story says, President Bush may refuse to meet with Nigerian president Olesegun Obasanjo Wednesday if answers about the disappearance are not forthcoming. Let's hope that Bush declines the meeting and not just for the obvious reason that pressure should be put on Nigeria.

For Oa, it brings to mind that James Taranto last week cited Daily Kos blogger SusanG for this statement regarding Saddam Hussein (first item):

Progressives were screaming into the void about Hussein's human rights violations, his gassing of the Kurds, his terrorizing of political opponents long, long, long before it conveniently bubbled up into the consciousness of the neocon right.

To be fair, a quick search of the Kos site shows me that they have from time to time mentioned Charles Taylor but only as a brief scenic stop on the highway that leads to the destination of bashing Bush. I'm surprised that the progressives aren't screaming into the void right now about the execrable Taylor's flight. And, of course, I won't be surprised that, if Bush declines to meet with Obasanjo, the main point at the Krazy Kos Kavalkade will be to tsk-tsk that Bush is a johnny-come-lately to the human rights party. Of course, I could be wrong. Maybe the Kos Kids will be pressing the progressive fight for human rights and spotlighting the Taylor story like nobody's business for the next 12 hours or so. But I seriously doubt it.

Saddam and Osama

It would be premature to say this is definitive proof in any way. Still, it makes it harder to believe in one of the more pernicious secular religions of our time: the idea that Saddam Hussein never would have cooperated with al Qaeda. Presumably, those who kept pushing this idea felt that the two parties involved might have their delicate sensibilities offended if one had to deal with the other. Why cling so desperately to this assertion?
One might even trace the relative decline of quality on the Daily Show to the time some years ago, before the Iraq War, when they carried footage of Bush asserting that you couldn't say that a secular Saddam wouldn't cooperate with a jihadist Osama. Cut to Jon Stewart literally saying that as balloons and confetti fell from the rafters. Forced and unfunny. Oh well. Can we agree that this may be some sort of general principle: poorly thought out ideology = lame comedy?

Clooney's Oscar Blarney

Good for George Clooney on his Oscar win but to clarify on his defense of Hollywood for being "out of touch" and for talking about AIDS when no one else was: those with long memories will recall all the way back to 1984 when Burt Reynolds was injured on the set of his movie City Heat.

During his long recovery period, the very sensitive Los Angeles rumor mills geared up to the effect that Reynolds was falsely rumored to have AIDS. At that point, to official Hollywood, Reynolds became a pariah and no one would even call his house to wish him well. (A notable exception, reportedly, was Johnny Carson, which speaks volumes about the kind of man he was).

As a postscript, Reynolds got well again and, a few years later, at the Emmy Awards where Dan Quayle was a punching bag for his comments about Murphy Brown's single motherhood, Burt Reynolds was in the audience looking particularly unamused throughout. He'd gotten a good look at Hollywood's sensitivity and compassion up close. Now, go back to your moral preening, George.

Science Fiction Roundup

Small Beer Press, best known for publishing Kelly Link's work, is having a
sale. I've yet to read any of Link's stories but, following the endless raves she's gotten for her new short story collection Magic For Beginners, I plan to rectify that mistake soon. And for those who don't know the work of Howard Waldrop, please pick up one of his books and enjoy the almost infinite amount of fun that the man can generate.

On a sad note, the brilliant author Octavia Butler has died. I'm only familiar with her shorter fiction, all great, but a fitting tribute to the woman would be an extensive tour of her work.

If You Teach a Man to Fisk...

This ninny progressive teacher in Denver is already being pilloried throughout the blogosphere, and appropriately so, but let me add a few thoughts.

1) This guy is a geography teacher and yet he's ranting at length with the standard BusHitler diatribe thoughout his class? No wonder kids today can't read a map.

2) What is it about Colorado? First, Ward Churchill; now this. With Bennish being put on leave, allow me to paraphrase Prof. Churchill: it's a case of the chickens coming home to roost involving this kind of anti-intellectual nonsense.

3) As an example of the slovenliness of this guy's political thought, how could one actually determine to a certainty which is the most violent nation on earth? Which standard does one use? I guess you could go with gun crime but didn't we find after Michael Moore's disastrous Bowling for Columbine that Canada had a disproportionate amount of gun violence in terms of its size? Sorry, Canucks: Bennish has your number. Couldn't Mr. Bennish, just for giggles, put one of the more egregious human rights violators in the world at the top of the charts, #1 with a bullet, when it comes to violence? As far as I know, Cuba is still imprisoning homosexuals and North Korea is still engaged in a policy of mass starvation for its people. Why is this Bennish so insensitive to violence perpetrated against gays and Asians? I smell a civil rights lawsuit right around the corner.

4) Why do loons of this ilk have to reason in such a circular fashion? You know the drill: Bush is against terrorists but I, as the perceptive left-wing deconstructionist, insist that Bush is the terrorist. Why doesn't this genius just criticize Bush on substantive grounds and save the sobriquet of "terrorist" for those who actually practice terrorism? This type of thing is, after all, an elementary distinction: as a working definition, a terrorist is someone whose means are, and end is, the creation of terror in others through violent or threatening acts. It's terror for its own sake. One may disagree with, say, the invasion of Iraq or call Bush's various reasons for doing so misguided, unfounded or even bogus. But why insist that it was done to generate terror? Did the invasion of Iraq instill terror in anyone? Areas of Iraq are often violent due to the insurgency but doesn't that make the insurgents the terrorists? This stuff is obvious and damn tiresome. Easier to put "BusHitler" on a sign or blog post.

5) Still, the bleatings of a mediocre mind are ultimately amusing; regarding Bush's State of the Union: "If you listen to his body language." And my favorite: "...we're a democracy. Quote-unquote." Way to mock the status quo, Mr. Super-Smart Guy, with your clever quote-unquote tagline. That'll show 'em. I'd like to see the look on the face of the white male power structure when that quote-unquote thing nails them right between the eyes.

6) So how hard is it to get a teaching certificate in Colorado anyway?