huh?

I have no idea why you have to scroll all the way down to find the previous post. EDIT : and apparently this one as well. WTF, blogger?

Privatizing 9/11

Well, we knew that was the plan all along. A national tragedy has co-opted to become the private fund-raising event for the exclusive use of the GOP.

Bush has always known that 9/11 was his lucky day, the day he 'hit the trifecta'. He knew it as soon as mid-September, '01, according to his own budget director.

Soon it became fodder for tawdry transactions of a more financial nature - send at least $150 to the GOP and we'll send you this Commemorative Photo of our Glorious Leader, at the Helm of State on 9/11.

Now the GOP has made it clear - 9/11 as an event and a historic turning point is their sole property, to be used to beat those who diagree with them over the head at will.

So what if many of the 9/11 dead were liberals or democrats? Death transformed them into glorious fodder for the use of the GOP, and I'm sure they're all proud of the use that has been made of their deaths.

Lies, damned lies and statistics

I'm out of town but I just had to commandeer my hostess' computer to vent on this news story:

Married men earn more if wives do the chores?

Married men earn more than bachelors so long as their wives stay at home doing the housework, according to a report Wednesday from Britain's Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER).

Academics Elena Bardasi and Mark Taylor found that a married man whose wife does not go out to work but is primarily responsible for the cooking and cleaning earns about 3 percent more than comparably employed single men.

But that wage premium disappears if wives go out to work themselves or don't do most of the housework.

...

He said analysis suggests there could be two explanations for the results:

A marriage might allow a husband and wife to focus their activities on tasks to which they are most suited. Traditionally, this would result in the man concentrating on paid work enabling him to increase productivity and in consequence his wages.

There's so much wrong here I don't even know where to start, but I'll just pick one...

Three percent? Excuse me, three percent? You're getting all exercised over THREE FUCKING PERCENT????

Let's do some simple math, people. Say the guy is a hard-charger making 100K a year. If wifey stays home and caters to his manly needs, he can potentially up that to a whopping... 103K. Wow.

Look, in what universe could she NOT go out and get a job making significantly -more- than 3,000? Even if she clerked or taught and made a modest 23K a year, the family UNIT is still up by 20K. So any guy looking to use this study to keep her barefoot in the kitchen should frankly shut his yap.

And "A marriage might allow a husband and wife to focus their activities on tasks to which they are most suited."??? What year was this study commissioned in, 1950?

Where's the study that shows how well women do when they're not married to paleolithic morons?

You want fries with that crow?

Walter Jones, of 'Freedom fries' coinage, changes his tune:

A prominent lawmaker who prompted cafeterias in the US Congress to change the name of their french fries to "freedom fries" in anger over France's opposition to the Iraq war, has now turned against the conflict and wants a firm schedule on the withdrawal of US troops.

Representative Walter Jones, a North Carolina Republican, has written more than 1,300 letters of condolence to the families of soldiers killed in Iraq and will introduce legislation this week calling for a firm timetable on the withdrawal of US troops, ABC's "This Week" said Sunday.

...

He added: "When I look at the number of men and women who have been killed -- it's almost 1,700 now, in addition to close to 12,000 have been severely wounded -- and I just feel that the reason of going in for weapons of mass destruction, the ability of the Iraqis to make a nuclear weapon, that's all been proven that it was never there."

The really sad thing, Walter, is that most people knew at the time that George Bush and his cabal were lying, and they said so.

If you're known by the company you keep, you're judged by the people you choose to put your trust in. While I'm glad your gullibility has its limits, I wish you'd found them earlier.

Oh, I'm writing...

I'm just not writing very much HERE.

Here's some recent additions to my oeuvre:

Is Owning a Store Your Dream? Then act like it.

Commercial Real Estate's Dirty Little Secret

Quick and Easy Graphics for writers: Text types and styles - shadows, fuzzy shadows and embossing

Also visit my metaphysics site for info on moonstones, moon signs and the pagan summer solstice festival known as Litha.

Don't get it.

I just don't get it. Dr. Dean says the Repubs are mainly the party of white Christians and everyone has the vapours. Reeling and writhing and fainting in coils.

Was he wrong? Is the Republican Party sensitive to the plight of minorities in America? a bastion of religious freedom and tolerance? A beacon of light shining hope on the upturned faces of the downtrodden?

Have you been smoking? Of COURSE they're the party of white Christians. Anyone who gets all outraged at this needs a hypocritectomy.

Word

It's funny because it's true.

American politics is a lot like a killer standing at the border clutching a bloody chain saw. With fundamental questions about the conduct of the Iraq war still looming, along with the specter of widespread pension failures, layoffs at GM, a suspiciously low settlement with Big Tobacco and rampant congressional corruption a la Tom DeLay, you'd think the border guards could manage more salient questions than: "Why is Howard Dean saying mean things about Republicans?"

Read the whole thing here.

Family Values

Okay, now we know what the cut-off is:

In May, Jim Stelling, the Republican Party chairman in Seminole County, Fla., won a lawsuit for defamation against an intraparty official who had accused him of being married six times, which Stelling said he found particularly insulting, since he “believe(s) in family values.” Stelling said he has been married only five times. (The judge ruled that Stelling was not defamed enough for money damages.)

Married six times - sleazy and cheap. Married five times - fine upstanding proponent of family values.

Press gangs

Read this story about modern military recruiting techniques. I'm serious - read it and then forward it to everyone you know who has teenage kids.

Say it loud! Say it proud!

We're number one! We're number one!

One-quarter of all Americans met the criteria for having a mental illness within the past year, and fully a quarter of those had a "serious" disorder that significantly disrupted their ability to function day to day, according to the largest and most detailed survey of the nation's mental health, published yesterday.

Although parallel studies in 27 other countries are not yet complete, the new numbers suggest that the United States is poised to rank No. 1 globally for mental illness, researchers said.

U.... S.... A.... U.... S.... A....YOU... ESSSSS ..... AAAAAY

Opinions you should have

Heh. Paul Revere A Despicable Tattletale, Says GOP

Republicans today criticized Paul Revere for his famous ride, saying that he had violated professional colonial ethics by divulging military secrets in violation of his duty to his lord, the King of England.

...

Conservatives all over America pointed out that Revere also endangered people's lives by riding willy nilly all over Massachusetts at a full gallop in the dark of night. "He could have trampled someone," said Bill O'Reilly. "Paul Revere was a reckless and irresponsible nazi," he added.

Pat Buchanan derided Revere as a "coward" and a "snake" who was unwilling to be direct with the British government regarding his complaints about the monarchy. "There were channels," he said.

Peggy Noonan shook her head. "There's nothing sadder than Americans who have no respect for the rule of law," she said.

Thanks to the Poorman for the redirect.

This is our best candidate?

More emerging on UN-ambassador-nominee Bolton:

John R. Bolton flew to Europe in 2002 to confront the head of a global arms-control agency and demand he resign, then orchestrated the firing of the unwilling diplomat in a move a U.N. tribunal has since judged unlawful, according to officials involved.

A former Bolton deputy says the U.S. undersecretary of state felt Jose Bustani "had to go," particularly because the Brazilian was trying to send chemical weapons inspectors to Baghdad. That might have helped defuse the crisis over alleged Iraqi weapons and undermined a U.S. rationale for war.

...

The Iraq connection to the OPCW affair comes as fresh evidence surfaces that the Bush administration was intent from early on to pursue military and not diplomatic action against Saddam Hussein's regime.

...

After U.N. arms inspectors had withdrawn from Iraq in 1998 in a dispute with the Baghdad government, Bustani stepped up his initiative, seeking to bring Iraq — and other Arab states — into the chemical weapons treaty.

Bustani's inspectors would have found nothing, because Iraq's chemical weapons were destroyed in the early 1990s. That would have undercut the U.S. rationale for war because the Bush administration by early 2002 was claiming, without hard evidence, that Baghdad still had such an arms program.

And if you recall, one of the Bushites' main 'rationales' for war was that Saddam 'wouldn't let the inspectors in'.

Read the whole think - it's lengthy but worth it.

Saudi wannabes among us

Incredible.

A state senator who once said that giving women the vote was a symptom of weakness in the American family now wants to be Kansas' top elections official.

Sen. Kay O'Connor announced Wednesday that she is seeking the GOP nomination for secretary of state next year. O'Connor, 63, has served in the Legislature since 1993.

In 2001, O'Connor received national attention for her remarks about the 19th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1920, which gave women the right to vote.

"I think the 19th Amendment, while it's not an evil in and of itself, is a symptom of something I don't approve of," she said at the time. "The 19th Amendment is around because men weren't doing their jobs, and I think that's sad. I believe the man should be the head of the family. The woman should be the heart of the family."

If I were a Kansas voter, I think I'd give ol' Kay a pass; she's pretty much admitted she's unqualified to be the head of anything. Now if she wanted to be, say, the Morale Director or the State Nurse, or something else suitably feminine...

I wonder where she stands on the all-important women-driving issue? (Thanks to Shakespeare's Sister for the link.)

Will no one rid me of this meddlesome priest?

The recent outing of Watergate's Deep Throat is the occasion for more Nixon image rehabilitation by the Usual Suspects. Here's unindicted co-conspirator Henry Kissinger applying some Kingly Gloss: Nixon's only flaw, apparently, was excessive loyalty to overzealous henchmen.

Our pals

News about our best buds, the Saudis:

He just wanted his colleagues in the government's legislative arm to discuss the possibility of conducting a study into the feasibility of reversing the ban on women drivers — the only prohibition of its kind in the world.

But Consultative Council member Mohammad al-Zulfa's proposal has unleashed a storm in this conservative country where the subject of women drivers remains taboo.

...

Conservatives, who believe women should be shielded from strange men, say driving will allow a woman to leave home whenever she pleases and go wherever she wishes. Some say it will present her with opportunities to violate Islamic law, such as exposing her eyes while driving or interacting with strange men, like police officers or mechanics.

...

Many women activists also welcomed al-Zulfa's suggestion. But others lashed out at him for using the issue to project himself as a reformer.

In a strongly worded article, Wajiha al-Huweidar said Saudi women will not allow "the intellectuals to shine and their names to glitter at our expense.

"We will not permit anyone and we have not appointed anyone to speak on our behalf," she said.

Explain to me again why this cretinous country, whose citizens flew planes into the twin towers and which gave birth to bin Laden, is our best friend?

Gagging on Deep Throat

Excellent comparison of the Nixon Apologists smears on Mark Felt and the Bush Regime's tactics can be found here.

Peak Oil

Kevin Drum has been covering the Peak Oil issue this past few weeks; it's nice to see one of the Big Bloggers addressing this. He has very informative posts here, here, here and here.

If I have any fault to find with his coverage, it's his touchingly innocent belief that 'market solutions' will keep us from the total collapse of civilization that the alarmists are predicting.

There are many people, including a high percentage of the current administration, who would include the conquering of oil-producing nations under the category of 'market solutions'. Hey, our supply just got bigger because we took it from someone else. Problem (temporarily) solved.

If you kill enough people, you have to share with fewer and what's left goes farther. Also a 'market solution'. Is this one we want to embrace? I sure don't, but I'm not sure about those other people.