Friday, October 22, 2004

TV, AYE
I had resolved to doze in front of the TV and avoid watching cable news all day at all cost, but TV and homie don’t play that, because all this stuff kept happening, as in...

All these nice people have been coming by from the new link at smirking chimp (see below) and finding me temporarily as smart as an egotistical post and as scattered as an intellectual diaspora. When I should offering them metaphoric cake (or death?) to insure that they all come back real soon, I’m sitting around in my cybernetic longjohns scratching myself.

Then Letterman showed a clip of a small boy who, while being used as backdrop for a Bushbite, began to shake his teddy bear to death with his teeth. I can only suggest Ritalin for the problem – but have no idea what to do for the small boy. (Rimshot!)

Earlier I watched Fidel Castro fall over in the shadow of a highly heroic statue of Che Guevara and break his arm and knee. A Bush spokesthing seemed to feel that it was a omen for the return of freedom to Cuba (like in Iraq?). When asked if he wished Dr. Castro a swift recovery, the creature snapped "No!" Ungracious I thought. DOC 40 SAYS GET WELL SOON, FIDEL.

(Also get well Jett!)

And then I caught the rumor that Bill Clinton wants to be Secretary General of the United Nations, when Kofi’s deal runs out in 2006, which seems like exactly the right gig for him. Should (horror upon horror) Bush be returned to power, we may need those unmarked black helicopters to save us from the Waffen FBI when Ashcroft starts the cultural cleansing.

Ron Suskind’s lengthy piece on Bush in last Sunday’s NY Times has been scaring the shit out of many. A clip...

"And for those who don't get it? That was explained to me in late 2002 by Mark McKinnon, a longtime senior media adviser to Bush, who now runs his own consulting firm and helps the president. He started by challenging me. ''You think he's an idiot, don't you?'' I said, no, I didn't. ''No, you do, all of you do, up and down the West Coast, the East Coast, a few blocks in southern Manhattan called Wall Street. Let me clue you in. We don't care. You see, you're outnumbered 2 to 1 by folks in the big, wide middle of America, busy working people who don't read The New York Times or Washington Post or The L.A. Times. And you know what they like? They like the way he walks and the way he points, the way he exudes confidence. They have faith in him. And when you attack him for his malaprops, his jumbled syntax, it's good for us. Because you know what those folks don't like? They don't like you!'' In this instance, the final ''you,'' of course, meant the entire reality-based community."

The full story (but hurry, I don’t think it’ll be free much longer)...
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/17/magazine/17BUSH.html?pagewanted=all&position

And for our Vulcan readers...
UNDER BUSH WE WILL NOT PROSPER AND MAY NOT LIVE LONG.

Check the thoughts of Chairperson hipspinster – http://hipspinster.blogspot.com/

The secret word is Kenny

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BUY A BOOK, SAVE AN AUTHOR.
http://www.borderlands-books.com/ usually has my stuff in stock
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The email is byron4d@msn.com

CRYPTIQUE -- I'm beyond aroma therapy



Thursday, October 21, 2004

COOL
Yesterday’s cover story I wrote for the local rag got itself reprinted (is that the word?) on Smirking Chimp. Damn am I proud. Especially so because it’s right next to a piece by Jimmy Breslin, my boyhood hero among columnists, who I once met in the bar of the Mayfair Hotel on Central Park West.
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=18356

I also got a note from BBC Radio 2 that something I wrote about the Rolling Stones in 1971 (gulp) will be read by an actor on the new Rock’s Back Pages radio show.

Now I am not so depressed.

The secret word is Implement

Wednesday, October 20, 2004

A BRIEF HISTORY OF RAT FUCKING
Here’s a link to the thing I’ve been primarily working on and making myself nuts with for the last ten or so days. Not a subject that one wants to address while attempting to quit smoking and get in somewhat less sorry shape. If the War on Bush is to be conducted in a series of hopeless but romantic Jacobite charges, this is mine. For what it’s worth...

http://lacitybeat.com/article.php?id=1316&IssueNum=72

(And if one more chic liberal tells me – with that in-the-know tone – that a Bush victory has always been a forgone conclusion, I will personally, viciously, and without warning put a big major, Tony-Soprano hurt on the individual. For the reason that (A) it makes me depressed, and (B) it doesn’t get out the vote.)

The secret word is Snarl

Tuesday, October 19, 2004

PHEW...
Well, I finished my election opus (all being well, it will be out on Thursday and links will be provided) and it almost seems like it’s all over for me, but here are two clips from The New York Times, by way of a little decompression, and because the bloody fight is still going outside the window...

IF BUSH PACKS THE SUPREME COURT
"If Roe is lost, the Center for Reproductive Rights warns, there's a good chance that 30 states, home to more than 70 million women, will outlaw abortions within a year; some states may take only weeks. Criminalization will sweep well beyond the Bible Belt: Ohio could be among the first to drive young women to back-alley abortions and prosecute doctors. If Justices Scalia and Thomas become the Constitution's final arbiters, the rights of racial minorities, gay people and the poor will be rolled back considerably. Both men dissented from the Supreme Court's narrow ruling upholding the University of Michigan's affirmative-action program, and appear eager to dismantle a wide array of diversity programs. When the court struck down Texas' "Homosexual Conduct" law last year, holding that the police violated John Lawrence's right to liberty when they raided his home and arrested him for having sex there, Justices Scalia and Thomas sided with the police." – Adam Cohen
Full story...
http://www.smirkingchimp.com/article.php?sid=18303&mode=nested&order=0

THE DRAFT
"The reality is that the Iraq war, which was intended to demonstrate the feasibility of the Bush doctrine, has pushed the U.S. military beyond its limits. Yet there is no sign that Mr. Bush has been chastened. By all accounts, in a second term the architects of that doctrine, like Paul Wolfowitz, would be promoted, not replaced. The only way this makes sense is if Mr. Bush is prepared to seek a much larger Army - and that means reviving the draft." – Paul Krugman

And an old friend is blogging at...
http://stashdauber.blogspot.com/

And here’s a nice story about bears from Mr MR...
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3749604.stm

The secret word is Honey

CRYPTIQUEDon’t go up to the castle.