Papa Whiskey

2011-03-21T09:09:00.002-06:00

Another South By Southwest has come and gone. This is Austin's famous Springtime music festival. There is absolutely no music there that I would pay to see, but its worth an afternoon of wandering up and down sixth street just to gauge the turnout. This year was more tattooed. More pierced. More bruvvas and sistas than in the past.

Alejandro As A Troublemaker

2010-09-01T09:07:00.001-06:00

Testing to see if I still can drive this thing. Where's the starter button again....?

Doug Ross's Manifesto of The Silenced Majority

2008-10-21T13:32:00.001-06:00

• We believe that Barack Obama is a brilliant orator and a man possessed of more charisma than any politician since JFK.

• But we also believe that his philosophy of "spreading the wealth around" is an ill-disguised form of socialism that undermines everything America holds dear.

• We believe that a "tax cut on 95% of working Americans" when only 63% of Americans pay taxes is nonsensical.

• We believe that the Obama campaign's obfuscated funding for ACORN (originally described as "event planning") undermines the integrity of our elections and calls into question the legality of his tactics.

• We believe that Barack Obama's plan to form a "civilian national security force that's just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded” as our military is ill-considered at best.

• We believe that the Obama campaign's efforts to intimidate WGN (on two separate occasions) when it interviewed his political foes endangers free speech.

• We believe that Obama's choice of Joe Biden as VP runs counter to his twin aspirations of "hope" and "change".

• We believe that a man who could not otherwise receive a security clearance should not serve as Commander-in-Chief.

• We believe that Obama's 20-year relationship with his pastor, who he once described as his "spiritual adviser", displays a basic affinity for a racist ideology that runs counter to everything his candidacy should stand for.

• We believe that most of Obama's senate experience has been spent running for office; from the time he was sworn in as a U.S. senator to the time he formed a presidential exploratory committee, he logged only 143 days in the senate.

• We believe that Obama does voters a disservice by hiding his chairmanship of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (a $165 million dollar effort to improve Chicago's schools) when he used that service as his central experience in 2000 during his first run for Congress.

• We believe that Obama made a series of very poor choices by serving on boards and sharing an office with Bill Ayers (for three years); Ayers' organization killed three police officers, bombed numerous government facilities and nearly detonated a nail bomb at a Fort Dix Officer's Dance.

• We believe that, no matter Obama's relationship with Bill Ayers, his evasive and ever-morphing answers about their work together smack of a coverup.

• We believe that anyone -- no matter their position on abortion -- who supports killing an infant that survived a botched abortion is on the wrong side of any moral code.

• We believe that Obama's advisers and contributors -- from Tony Rezko to Valerie Jarrett to Allison Davis -- cost taxpayers millions in development fees for failed (and often uninhabitable) apartment complexes.

• We believe that Obama's Illinois state senate experience was insubstantial: it was, by his own description, a "part-time position" and he maintained two offices (one at the state senate and one at his law firm).

• We believe that Obama's state senatorial experience was further diluted by his 129 "present" votes, which, as NPR observes , "There's a saying in Springfield that there's a reason why the present button is yellow... [but] I don't think that Barack Obama was necessarily a coward for voting present on those bills..."

• We also believe that Obama's experience as a community organizer and as a trainer for ACORN are not qualifications for the presidency.

• We believe that the candidate has not been forthcoming with his background and the key influencing forces during his formative years.

We therefore believe that Barack Obama is ill-prepared and ill-suited for the Presidency.

Mountain Time

2008-01-15T12:57:00.001-06:00

Drove up to Roswell from Austin to visit my Uncle John last weekend. I took my Mom and my brother with me too. We spent four days up there with him. John is sick and I hadn't seen him in a long time. He's one of those geezers you see down on Main Street with the blue baseball cap that says "World War II Veteran" in gold writing. And he is one, too. 17th Airborne Corps, 82nd and 101st airborne divisions. Jumped in to France on D-Day. Battle of Ardennes Forest. Those guys are dying at the rate of 1500 a day. I've always wanted to ask him about it but, as a vet myself, I know its sometimes better not to be asked about it. The telling is never complete. Better to keep things sometimes.

I saw the sights in Roswell. All of 'em. The museum and research institute on Main. The proposed development north of town with the new curbs and framed schmancy houses just going up. Yellow D8s growling around in the dust, wheeling and spinning enfilade left. The James Mustang Ranch where my cousin works. Hard. Some other stuff. I had a beer at a joint on Main in the afternoon. There was a GI there sitting at a table by himself and I told the waitress he was flirting with to put his stuff on my tab. He thanked me for it but I'll never be able to do enough for those guys.

New Mexico is different than Texas. Its got more of an edge to it. You can feel it when you cross the Texas line north of Pecos on the way to Loving. The wind is sharper. People look at you. Everybody smokes. There are plenty of hard stories with corners on them that bump your shin and hurt when you walk into them.

Folks are folks though. Everybody helps if they can. I met John's neighbor Bobby in the front yard. He runs Search and Rescue in Roswell. They're busy in the mountains in the winter. Lots of tourists think they'd like to get off the trail and do some cross country skiing. He'd been out all night trying to organize local resources to find for two kids lost in Colorado. They were found about dawn so he didn't have to mobilize. He was shaking his head about a call he'd received from a woman who wanted him to search for her husband. She said he was last seen at The Boot Scooter about 2 in the morning before they had a fight and he'd left. Bobby said no.

Who's The Rube?

2008-01-15T12:27:00.000-06:00

I received my monthly missive from the New York Tripe yesterday. They are searching further afield for that ever more elusive potential subscriber. I don't know. I probably won't subscribe again this time. This is the same "newspaper" that featured 146 front page articles about the humiliation suffered by prisoners at Abu Ghraib and not a single article about the humiliation suffered by my 8 year old nephew who was blindfolded, spun in circles and made to beat a paper donkey with a stick until candy fell out while his little friends laughted hysterically at him. Twenty nine front page articles about the United States Marine accused of murder in Haditha by John Murtha. When the charges were dropped for lack of evidence, it was reported by the NYT in a single paragraph on page 31.

They don't know very much about us hillbillys down here. We know everything about New York. So who's the rube?

As I always do, I opened the envelope and removed the postage-paid envelope from it. Then I stuffed their letter, their envelope and my latest golf scorecard into the postage paid envelope and put it back in the mailbox. They'll get it in a few days, courtesy of the efficient postal system we pay for. I wish more people would do what I do and return their unsolicited mail to the NYT. It is helpful and good for society on so many levels.

It keeps mailmen employed and out of trouble. Idle hands, you know.

It brings revenue in to Uncle Sam thru the Postal Service.

It contributes to the national recycling effort.

It helps keep Texas clean.

On the personal level it provides a sense of smugness you will find in no other beer at any cost.

Pols

2007-11-20T07:31:00.001-06:00

The political and commercial morals of the United States are not merely food for laughter, they are an entire banquet.
- Mark Twain in Eruption

As a rightist, I am only peripherally interested in the Democratic Party presidential campaigns and I have not dedicated much time or effort in studying them. This morning on the way into work however, I was surfing around the XM channels for something to listen to and came upon an interview with Bill Richardson on C-Span radio. The theme for the day was health care, something that I am perhaps as confused by as most Americans are but with nothing else to listen to I settled for the thirty minute in-depth treatment from The Man Who Would Be President.

I have to say I was surprised at the lack of intellectual depth of Governor Richardson. He seemed to have trouble understanding some fairly simple questions. Maybe he was distracted by something else. Maybe he was just tired.

He had some statistics memorized--the ones that fit his scenarios--and he had a littany of buzz-words at hand but when pressed to explain in greater depth some of the more difficult details: how he would propose funding the numerous initiatives he mentioned, or whether offering medicare benefits to everyone over 50 might lead to a overburden of the program by perennial sick people who could not otherwise get insurance, it seemed to boil down to "It's the right thing to do." or "Our children deserve better." or similar.

As I said, it was really a shock to see how very banal this fellow is and how very ordinary his intelligence is. I certainly expected more and now I wonder if all of them are so limited.

Still, I found this lengthy treatment very helpful in that my opinions are now informed (at least in the case of this particular candidate) by something more than the soundbite capture which seems to define virtually everyone on the current political stage.

I hope to hear more from other candidates.

I'm Back!

2007-10-26T13:55:00.000-06:00

Revenge is wicked, & unchristian & in every way unbecoming, & I am not the man to countenance it or show it any favor. (But it is powerful sweet, anyway.)
- Mark Twain, Letter to daughter Olivia, 12/27/1869

Wow! Ages since I entered anything here. What? A year? More? Nevermind, I'm back again. Fun flies when you're doing time. I took the photo in the Aquarium in Corpus Christi, one of my favorite towns in Texas. We went down to catch the last of the summer surf. We drove down the east side on the back roads and it was relaxing and fun. The idea of getting to the destination as quickly as possible, like prison rape, is vastly overrated. It was fun seeing the little towns with their post offices on main street, the cotton fields and the coast line as we got nearer to town. I love Corpus but for the wrong reasons. Its the only major city in Texas that has lost population since the Second World War. It has an infrastructure to support twice the population it currently has so you drive down these big empty boulevards feeling sort of like you've come out of the mineshaft to discover the city is empty. The people are nice there too. Eat at the Water Street Oyster Bar. You'll go back again.

Hamasistan

2006-01-30T15:54:00.000-06:00

...the size of a misfortune is not determinable by an outsider's measurement of it, but only by the measurement applied to it by the person specially affected by it. The king's lost crown is a vast matter to the king, but of no consequence to the child. The lost toy is a great matter to the child, but in the king's eyes it is not a thing to break the heart about.
- Mark Twain's Autobiography

There seems to be some hand wringing in Gaza these past few days. Hamas was voted in with an overwhelming majority but, as has frequently been the case in the past there, the electorate failed to evaluate all possible options from a balanced perspective. Somehow during all the fun, it was overlooked that Hamas is listed as a terrorist organization by the European Community and The United States too, and actions have consequences. In this case the consequence is going to be no more mooching off Uncle Sugar.

So now as the celebratory gunfire fades and as they queue up for their daily handouts of rice, flour and powdered milk, courtesy of Uncle Sugar (380 million semolians a year) and the EU (another 300) the realization slowly dawns upon the primitives that the endgate for the gravytrain could be nigh. Secretary Rice has made it clear that they will have to look elsewhere for their handouts. Saudi Arabia would be a good start.

"There's no work here," says Mustapha Baqer in a recent interview with a eurosimp. Well, no, Mustapha, you're right. There aren't as many jobs in Gaza today as there were before the Israelis pulled out, leaving behind functioning greenhouses which previously had provided 3500 jobs for the primitives. The market for the produce from that enterprise was the Jewish settler community, now back in safer territory. The greenhouses were looted of everything that made them work the very day after the Israeli retrenchment. http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2005-09-13-mideast_x.htm

Let them eat their gelignite.

If You're Not Outraged, You Don't Understand

2005-12-29T10:45:00.000-06:00

There is more real pleasure to be gotten out of a malicious act, where your heart is in it, than out of thirty acts of a nobler sort.
- Mark Twain in Eruption

The Financial Times reports that about 1/3 of the funds collected by the United Nations for tsunami relief has been spent by that organization on "overhead"--about $350 million. Sweet!

That's probably not out of line for the United Nations though. The UN workers need adequate housing at the site. None of them actually stay at the site of course, they will be living (on full expenses plus a juicy per diem) in the nearest metropolitan area. For tsunami operations, that would probably be Singapore or Bangkok. You won't lose much if you bet that the majority of UN employees who travel to tsunami areas (always, always, always first class), never actually visit the site. There are important meetings and dinners to attend in the cities. They could explain it to you but you wouldn't understand.

And how would you expect them to get around once in Singapore or Bangkok? Take a Taxi maybe? Bus? You must be joking! They need cars, people. And drivers. I've never seen a UN logo on anything except a Mercedes or a Land Rover. New ones. And they need clothing suited for the operation, all new.

A successful (successful = makes money, grows, retains and trains, etc) American enterprise that actually builds products or provides useful services that people pay actual money that they've earned for, generally establish 7% of revenues as a good target for overhead. It depends on the industry, of course but that's a fair number. (Oh, and the percentage doesn't go up with more revenues, the percentage remains the same.) A good BS artist will manage to get away with spending 9% for a while. Spend more and his bonus gets impacted. Edge up over 12% and he can expect to get moved off the line and into staff where he'll be teed up for that next "reorganization" rightsizing exercise.

But we're talking about the UN here which is the best example of how diversity works in this "Can't We All Just Get Along" politically- correct world we have. Africans have been in charge of the corner office at the UN since 1992. Outside of Africa (with the possible exception of the UN), corruption and graft are in their infancy. Not one African country is excepted. Every single one is managed by thugs, crooks, incompetents and criminals. No exception.

So where bettter to look for a manager for the world body that we want to put up as an example of how a diverse world should manage itself but Africa! And lets not expect the same performance from Africans as we do from anyone else. Lets excuse their excesses, their inabilities and their incompetence. Even their criminality. After all, they are Africans and as such, require a helping hand. Because they are not as developed as we are and it is our burden to tolerate inadequacy. Isn't it? If we treat them as competent and honest, maybe they will become that way. Through osmosis. There will be a quantum leap in ability if we only say its so. If we feeeeeeel hard enough.

I hope that if questions raised by the high expenses of tsunami relief are ever put to the UN formally and in a public forum, that the United Nations' official response is given by Mr. Jan Egeland, the UN undersecretary general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief coordinator.

The same Jan Egeland who said that Americans were a stingy people for not giving up more for tsunami relief.

http://www.opinionjournal.com/columnists/cRosett/?id=110007736

As Niels Bohr famously said about quantum theory: anyone who is not outraged by it clearly doesn't understand it.

I Used To Get Mad at My School

2005-12-21T10:29:00.000-06:00

I do not like work even when someone else does it.
-Mark Twain "The Lost Napoleon"

President Bush's recent decision to bitch-slap Harry Reid and the braying Democrats in public has resulted in an impressive increase in his popularity among registered voters. Evidently we like a stand-up guy and the rope-a-dope strategy wasn't working. While he had not sunk to the depths that President Lovetrousers had at a similar point in his tenure, he was flailing around somewhere in the lower thirties. The latest ABC poll shows him at 47% approval and moving up.

In a recent New York Times/CNN poll, a survey of registered mid- and top-level al Queda members who are still among the living, shows a job approval rating for Democrats at 91%, with 8% saying that Senate Democrats could improve, and one percent "not sure".

On Yer Bikes !

2005-12-19T16:18:00.000-06:00

Of all the kinds of sexual intercourse, this has least to recommend it. As an amusement it is too fleeting, as an occupation it is too wearing; as a public exhibition there is no money in it.

It has, in our last day of progress and improvement, been degraded to brotherhood with flatulence--among the best bred, these two arts are now indulged only in private--though by consent of the whole company, when only males are present, it is still permissible, in good society, to remove the embargo upon the fundamental sigh.
- Mark Twain, Some Thoughts on the Science of Onanism speech, 1879

The New York Transit Workers and their Labor Union are edging towards a strike in The City. And well they should. Somebody needs to speak truth to power, Right On!

Starting salaries for operators is an insulting $53,000/year. Before overtime. Cops and firefighters start at about $25 grand, but they don't have to work underground in those inhumane, cavelike conditions, deal with the surly public, or spend their working hours buzzed on dope and running over small children.

In the week following the firing of the Air Traffic Controllers by President Reagan, there were 45,000 applications for 11,000 openings. But that was under Reagan. Not a Bloomenegger RINO.

Power to the Correct People!

Beating The Rush

2005-12-19T11:10:00.000-06:00

I thoroughly disapprove of duels. I consider them unwise and I know they are dangerous. Also, sinful. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet retired spot and kill him.
- Autobiography of Mark Twain

The current price of $1.97 for gasoline notwithstanding, I would like to be among the first to get my licks in at the vicious and criminal oil companies who are planning to raise the prices of home heating oil this winter.

I don't wish to save my complaint until the last minute when every little grouch without a propane space heater will have piled on the bandwagon, moaning and cursing the loathsome Exxon-Mobil, because by then, gripe inflation will have set in and the value of my crankiness will have devalued by some amount. Dissatisfaction also has a net present value and I am a value investor.

Pop Quiz : Using what you've learned from your readings this semester, and in fifty words or less, answer this question:

Why don't the oil companies just raise the price of heating oil in the summer when it won't be so noticeable? And don't be boring and say "greed". Greed is not a factor in this equation. Actually it is a factor of course, but (speaking from experience), greed is a constant with the oil companies. They are not more greedy today than they were last year or even last summer. Greed is a net wash.

Keep your eyes on your own paper and do your own work.

I Vote

2005-12-19T11:03:00.000-06:00

I have no race prejudices, and I think I have no color prejudices or caste prejudices nor creed prejudices. Indeed I know it. I can stand any society. All that I care to know is that a man is a human being--that is enough for me; he can't be any worse.
- Mark Twain "Concerning the Jews"

The New York Times today reports that America ranks sixth in the world in the number of journalists jailed. This is disgraceful. There is no excuse for it. Not one excuse.

Of the 227 countries, we are the third largest in terms of population. Not sixth.

We spend huge amounts of our tax and treasure to ensure we are well policed from sea to felonious sea. We spare nothing for our boys in blue. We have law enforcement agencies ranked first in the world for technology, equipment and training. Not sixth. First.

And we have, by far, the most media outlets. The Texas Media Index lists sixty pages of media outlets for the city of Houston alone. We have the most newspapers and the most newspapers per capita than any other country in the world. We are number one in this regard. Not number six. Number one.

And the best we can do in terms of journalists jailed is sixth? It makes me want to vomit. The Ronnie Earles of this world would much rather spend their time indicting Congressmen and shaking down little old blue haired ladies at the airport for their knitting needles than to invest in the tough police work which results in getting journalists out of the city room.

I'll be voting.

Por Todo el Mundo, ...y Parte de Bolivia

2005-12-19T10:58:00.000-06:00

Whenever the literary German dives into a sentence, that is the last you are going to see of him till he emerges on the other side of his Atlantic with his verb in his mouth.
- Mark Twain, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court

Wonderful news from the Southern hemisphere greets us this beautiful morning: Evo Morales has won the election in Bolivia! There are a number of reasons this is good news for us here but off the top of my head, here are just a few:

1. Morales campaigned on the promise that he would make
Bolivia "America's worst nightmare." So no longer must we worry about nuclear devices being smuggled into our cities through our porous ports. Gone are the logistical and cultural problems dealing with the hordes of underprivileged streaming across our southern borders or lashing themselves to inner tubes to wash up on our shores...about a million a year apparently. No more foreign entanglements with primitives. Maintaining economic growth will be a worry we won't have. Our very worst scenario will be dealing (or not!) with a tin pot lefty from a two bit country. Now that's a hell of a Christmas present.

2. And there are immediate financial incentives too. No need to look further for savings to fund the tax cuts for the most wealthy of us here. About ten billion is suddenly on the table. Talk about windfall profits!
http://www.iisec.ucb.edu.bo/papers/2001-2005/iisec-dt-2003-10.htm

3. Every few years, the stoned denizens of the fantasy world of the latino left need a new cautionary tale and why not Bolivia? It's fresh, it's got the Indian piece for color, and Bolivia is exotic enough to be amusing for fifteen minutes. Fidel took Cuba from highest GDP in Latin America to last. Argentina had the sixth highest standard of living in the world before Peron. Allende and Danny are a big snooze. We need a new drug and Evo is going to legalize the cultivation of coca.

I find it dryly humorous whenever the strutting poseur of day,
Hugito, Lula or this new clown, threaten to use oil as a weapon against us. I wish they would, just once, make my day and refuse to sell us any oil. OH please...oh please!

Look, like 99% of all Americans, I couldn't care less who the
president of Bolivia (or any other country, for that matter) is or what his agenda might be. If he wants to drag his people back to the stone age (they're pretty close already), if he wants to govern with voudou, if he wants the women there to dress up like batman or to wear plants for clothing, or if he just wants to create headlines in order to make a name for himself, just dial 1-800-I-DON'T-CARE. Just so long as he keeps the miserable little world he builds over there and doesn't attempt to export it to me.

People get the government they deserve. Good luck to them.

Constancy of Purpose

2005-09-19T07:37:00.000-06:00

The average American may not know who his grandfather was. But the American was, however, one degree better off than the average Frenchman who, as a rule, was in considerable doubt as to who his father was.
- quoted in "Stories of Mark Twain," C. D. Williard, Pacific Outlook, 4/30/1910

I think the biggest constant on the left is the lack of courage. The lack of intellectual courage in the liberal leadership is mirrored in the lack of courage in the rank and file.

Whether it is in the Congress, where virtually all of them voted against a resolution to pull out of Iraq immediately, although they were all clamoring for it a week before, or on the neighborhood street corner,the liberals have no courage of conviction.

The Supreme Court will soon hear a case in which Moonbat University will not allow military recruiters on campus. Rewind the tape to 1994. In that year, and in response to a similar case, Congress passed a bill stating that universities that did not obey equal opportunity laws would lose federal funding. Predictably [yawn], the liberal university prostitutes decided that discretion was the better part of valor and that, in fact, they didn't really oppose recruitment all that much if it meant they couldn't feed at the government trough any longer. In other words, if there is no cost to it, they have principles but as soon as a decision point is reached and they are required to demonstrate the courage of their convictions, they scuttle back under the refrigerator to fight another day. I am sure they liken themselves to the Viet Cong.

My bold prediction is that when the Supreme Court upholds the EEOC laws, the universities will courageously decide to carry on using only the funding provided by the outrageous tuition fees and endowment distributions.

Oops. Sorry. Wrong page. Let me do that one again:

My bold prediction is that when the Supreme Court upholds the EEOC laws, the universities will change their collective minds and decide that military recruiters on campus fulfill a vital function dear to the liberty of our nation.

The Center of The Universe

2005-09-09T15:42:00.000-06:00

The thing which has made Labor great & powerful is labor-saving machinery--& nothing else in the world could have done it. It has been labor's savior, benefactor; but Labor doesn't know it, & would ignorantly crucify it. But that is human & natural. Every great invention takes a livelihood away from 50,000 men--& within ten years creates a livelihood for half a million. But you can't make Labor appreciate that: he is laboring for himself, not the breadless half million that are issuing from his loins. They are somebody else's children; he fails to reflect that his own are among them.
- Mark Twain, Letter to W. D. Howells, 3/31/1888

Hark! Is that the sound of a weekend approaching? Busy this week tending to business in the beanfields of Texas among other things. No chance to post anything and, as usual, I don't have anything of relevance to say anyway.

Peep Stoners

2005-09-02T08:36:00.000-06:00

Before I had chance in another war, the desire to kill people to whom I had not been introduced had passed away.
- Autobiography of Mark Twain

In olden times (pre-Buddy Hollie) certain people claimed to be able
to foretell the future by means of a special stone called a Peep
Stone, or a Seer Stone. The soothsayer would put this special stone
in the crown of a hat and bury his face in the hat, shutting out all
light. He would then `peep' at the stone, sometimes for hours,
until it delivered up its forecast to him.

In his callow youth and prior to his more famous religious
endeavors, the founder of the Mormon faith, Joseph Smith was
tarred, feathered and run out of a few towns for using this technique
to reveal the burial site of certain treasures to paying customers.
It was possibly this same stone which revealed to Smith the location
of the golden plates which form the basis for the theology for which
he is better known.

Like people who see the future by peering at glowing stones, or by
examining the entrails of dead animals, making rain or reading
palms, there are seers about who pretend to be able to see the hand
of Global Warming in the recent terrible hurricane. All the signs
are there. Its obvious.

Robert Kennedy announces yesterday that God is punishing us for
torpedoing the Kyoto agreement.

The Boston Globe: "The hurricane that struck Louisiana and
Mississippi on Monday was nicknamed Katrina by the National Weather Service. Its real name is global warming."

All to a chorus of the walleyed primitives who enlist the aid of "The
Terrorist Katrina" to visit suffering upon us infidels. Allahu
akhbar.

And I can now confirm that in the days prior to the hurricane, Air
Force One was spotted seeding tropical cumulus clouds in the gulf
with silver iodide, the better to roil them up and produce the
horrible consequences that we have all witnessed recently. It must
be true, I saw it on the internet.

So, mildly curious and eager to find the tripartite nexus, I went to
the National Hurricane Center's website http://www.nhc.noaa.gov/pastdec.shtml
and did extensive research there. About 45 seconds worth. As it
turns out, the incidence of serious hurricanes (Categories 3,4 and 5)
is decreasing over the past hundred years. Not increasing.
What? Not increasing? How can that be? Something is fishy here.

OH WAIT! Just a dang minute. I see now. In the fine print at the
bottom of the page it says that the National Hurricane Center is fully
funded by Halliburton. That tears it. I've had enough. I'm
emigrating. Not to Canada though. They have too much acid rain and
mad cow disease there because of Bush and his Saudi family friends.

The Fighting Liver Eaters

2005-08-19T08:00:00.000-06:00

"Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits."

--All's Well That Ends Well (II, i, 145-147)

The NCAA, always on top of the issues, is shoving aside such trivial matters as the inability of basketball players to read or write, athletic thuggism and use of steroids by young athletes, and has decided that the issue most requiring attention is the shameful habit of naming college athletic teams after Native Americans. I see where my own alma mater has now undertaken an extensive "study" to determine the ethical propriety of calling the football team The Tribe.

This is going on all over the country and the NCAA has announced that no school with an “incorrect” mascot or team name will be permitted to play in post-season bowl events. Academe is in turmoil, of course. Presumably the University of South Dakota will be looking for a mascot to replace The Fighting Sioux. The Utah Utes and the Fighting Illini will also disappear. Indians, Seminoles. Braves. Warriors. All soon to be packed off to the happy hunting ground.

Our university football team was a perennial loser. Big time losers. Not even the likes of the great Lou Holtz or Marvelous Marv Levy, the two coaches who were there when I was a student, were able to deliver winning teams. I think we beat a Japanese trade delegation one year and we defeated Richmond Deaf and Blind in a squeaker, but those were the only victories I can remember. How we celebrated! In any event, neither Lou or Marv hung around longer than it took to sign lucrative contracts at greener pastures where the alumni associations were more generous to the scholarship fund and the coaching staff. Well done.

Teams have Native American mascot names because our culture subscribes to the collective and false myth that the Indians were great and fearless warriors. Braves we call them. In an effort to inspire the traits most admired in winners, we have assigned our sporting teams the names of certain tribes. Seminoles. Braves. Indians. Redskins. Choctaws. We think this will inspire them to great victories.

It goes beyond academe. Our most lethal weapons of war have Indian nomenclature. Blackhawks. Tomahawks. Kiowas. Apaches.

Its probably not helpful then to point out that the Native American tribes were all a bunch of losers and got whipped pretty roundly all over the hemisphere by just about everyone, so if the idea is to honor a winning tradition or totem, changing the names of football teams as well as weapons systems to something less ethnic is probably a good idea. In the case of William and Mary of course, RETAINING the name would be, if not inspiring, at least appropriate in that sense, but the NCAA won’t hear of it.

So I am toying with the idea of writing to the college with my own suggestion for a mascot. They are always eager to hear from me, particularly during the fund season. The name for our college team should be one that evokes a bold and winning tradition, the better to inspire the players on the field. A name associated with victory and conquest.

There are many, many choices not associated with losers. The Palefaces would be fine with me. The Huns. The Vikings. The Norsemen. The Slaving Bastards. I like Los Conquistadores a lot but it wouldn’t fit my school. Maybe it would be better for a campus in the Southwest.

The name the Crow Indians gave to Jeremiah Johnson would be a good one too. It would inspire the team and hopefully strike fear into the hearts of the opponents. They called him The Liver Eater because when he killed them, he ate their loser indian livers. Go Team!

Long Live Israel

2005-08-15T07:42:00.000-06:00

"What's gone and what's past help
Should be past grief."

--The Winter's Tale (III, ii, 223-224 )

The hair tearing of the pundits, the wild eyed outrage of the settlers who have invested their lives and the portentous date notwithstanding, I am unable to understand why anyone would argue the adviseability of keeping 8000 Israeli citizens in a decomposing, hate drenched and fetid desert surrounded by 1.3 million primitives.

I salute those brave men, women and children who have dedicated a big part of their lives towards this noble experiment, but now it is time for the nation of Israel to pull back, reinforce the wall and soldier on in order to defeat the bigger threat.

Long live Israel!

If You're Gonna Cock it, Better Throw It.

2005-08-12T10:12:00.000-06:00

"This thing of darkness I Acknowledge mine."
--The Tempest (V, i, 275-276)

The recent trouble with the Russian mini-sub was the subject of a conversation at my favorite neo-con watering hole, The Insensitive Neanderthal, on South Congress (SoCo to the cool hep cats) a couple of nights ago.

Fat Karl wondered why the Russian navy, until recently such a mighty force to be reckoned with, is now unable to unsnag its own subs in just 600 feet of water. "Unless I'm wrong, free divers go that deep." he said. "The Russians have to have the enemy to come and rescue them. The Big Red Machine is now just a floating bucket of bolts where the officers are frequently drunk, sailors go unpaid for a year at a time and cruel hazing sends raw recruits to hospitals routinely. Not so long ago, the top of the line Russian attack submarine shot itself in the crankshaft with a torpedo killing 120 sailors. The torpedoes were ancient in the first place, and hadn’t been rotated out of the tubes for maintenance since they were loaded. The electronics were rusted and faulty. And this is the best they had."

Johnny B chimed in. “It’s not just the Russian Bear whose muzzle is greying . It’s all of Europe with the particular exception of Great Britain. The best French soldiers are foreigners. The Dutch Marines are a joke. You can see them lolling around the beaches of Curacao and Aruba taking smoke breaks while playing beach volleyball in their speedos and giggling like a bunch of homosexualists. The Spanish and Italians? Please. Empty uniforms. The European Armies for the most part are now just generals, admirals and bands.”

“Ya know why this is?” asked Big Stick Dick, speaking softly. "There’s a reason they're not funding the support functions--modern warfare doesn't require it to address the threat. The nukes have given them a false sense of security. Why should they go to the trouble and expense of having a standing army? First of all, Uncle Sugar is there for the heavy lifting (and to pump billions into the economies of Britain, Germany, Italy, Spain) and secondly, if they can’t negotiate their way out of trouble, there is always el nuko grandote. It takes the worry out of being close. No need to pay for a huge army when ya have nukes to settle any serious dispute.”

“So where does that leave us?” Donny wanted to know. “Isn’t it about time to reevaluate the catalogue and rethink the doctrine? I’ve studied these things. The history of warfare is a history of expensive campaigns that require a commitment to logistics, maintenance and expensive lubrication of the combat trains. War is complicated, expensive and technologically sophisticated. Did I mention that it's also very expensive? So how long do we get to go on observing these artificial “rules” which no one else seems to be aware of or care about, while the enemy gets to use a different play book? How long do we go on shouldering the burden of cleaning out the world’s stables using a golden shovel? The primitives don’t have to maintain field hospitals, dust-off choppers, messhalls or a standing million man army. So why do we? Does this make sense?”

“I agree,” said Johnny B. “We need to change the game. It’s time. Instead of making little incremental changes to training and doctrine, we need to make one big one to remind the primitives how the cow ate the cabbage. Forget about a shot clock. Forget about putting in a three point rule. We need to change the shape of the ball and the size of the field. We need to confront the primitives about all these wrongs, slights, injuries and insults they are perpetrating on us. We need to get their attention. We need to nuke the snot out of them. We need to make an announcement that the next outrage that is perpetrated on us will result in the loss of a city to be named later. Tehran maybe. Damascus. Medina.”

Dick knows his history: “The bombs of Hiroshima and Nagasaki played an important part in getting the Japanese to listen to reason. Six weeks earlier in the battle of Okinawa we had lost 12,000 marines and soldiers with three times that many wounded. The Japs lost over a hundred thousand dead. And that was just defending Okinawa, which was really the red-headed stepchild among islands by the Japanese—different language, different history, inferior people and culture etc. And the Japanese 4th graders on the four main islands were being trained with sharpened sticks to repel the Americans invaders during the expected invasion. So what do ya think happened to put the chill on that fanatic and fundamentalist determination sixty years ago?

“Well, I'll remind ya. Two juicy nukes refreshed the parts of the emperor’s attention that other methods couldn’t reach. Five days later they surrendered. We need to remind the primitives of what is really important--preserving our Judeo-Christian way of life and culture, even if that means wiping out the primitives and theirs."

Don said, “You got it, C-man. “If you’re gonna cock it, ya better throw it.”

Cowboys and Euros

2005-08-11T08:44:00.000-06:00

"Do you think I am easier to be played on than a pipe?" - Hamlet, Act III, Scene II

The Euros, having wrestled the issue away from the cowboy Americans in order to show the yokels how effective diplomatic negotiations can be when properly conducted by cultured professionals, seem to have run into an obstacle while attempting to negotiate the Iranian islamofascists into withdrawing their plans to build a thermonuclear bomb.

The Islamos' reply to the EU (pronounced Eeeeeewww) was essentially this:

"Eff off, infidel punks".

But the message was delivered in a subtle and nuanced way, which is important for everyone’s self esteem and helped the Euros validate themselves and to feel warm and nurturing to the negotiating partners.

Upon closer analysis of the Iranian “position” however, the euros have detected what they suspect to be a camoflaged rejection and now the whispered suggestion is that the entire affair might be referred to (cue the Star Wars theme) THE SECURITY COUNCIL OF THE MIGHTY UNITED NATIONS! The same United Nations that was so successful in getting Saddam to cease and desist in the past. Yes, that one. The United Nations of the 17 resolutions. That one. (Segue to Thus Spake Zarathustra! And heavy on the timpani.) That’ll show those primitives just how the cow ate the cabbage!

Can we fast forward this one past the previews and get to the part
where The United States does the needful for europe? Again?

Foiled

2005-08-08T09:03:00.000-06:00

Why, then the world ’s mine oyster,
Which I with sword will open.
The Merry Wives of Windsor. ACT II Scene 2.

I don't like spiders and snakes. I killed a cottonmouth last night that was as long as your leg. His eyes were dull and black. Sashka spied him trying to get into the garage and alerted me. I immediately went into the Chinese Fighting Stance of Death which I had practiced a few times after watching Bruce Lee films back in my untamed youth. I have never been able to get the piercing "YI-YI-YI" Chinese shriek of impending attack down accurately, but I did my best last night and it worked out pretty OK. I got his attention and then I tricked him with the old "HEY! LOOK OVER THERE!" ruse and when he looked away, I conked him with the old garden shovel of doom maneuver. I could have kicked him with a Kung-Fu high kick to the throat but since a. he was lying down on the ground already so that would have been unsportsmanlike and b. the risk of missing his throat was too chancy, so I opted for whacking him Cosa Nostra style with a shovel which I had previously bought at a garden store for another purpose. You go to war with the weapons you have.

In other news, I failed in my bid to go see the Rollerderby last night and Austin's own team, the indominatable Putas Del Fuego. In a cruel twist of fate, the season ended two weeks ago and no one had the common courtesy to call and tell me. So that's another pleasure denied me, although killing the vicious cottonmouth made up for it in a weak and diluted sort of way.

Neito-san and Jiru-san called last night from Kobe and alerted us to the new and fast growing Japanese fad of owning fighting Rhinoceros Beetles. Neito-san thoughtfully forwarded a photo of one of these beasts feasting on a shallow dish of a gelatinous bloodlike product. He then forwarded a photo of himself eating a Skippy peanut butter sandwich onto which he was slathering the same Beetle food. Personally, I am not so adventurous but I understand you have to eat the food you go to war with, so well done, Neito.

Copenhagen Comments

2005-08-01T11:52:00.000-06:00

"Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
Which we ascribe to Heaven."

--All's Well That Ends Well (I, i, 231-232)

I went to The Country Store outside of Seguín on Saturday afternoon to get a sack of ice and an eskimo pie. Two old cowboys were on the front porch killing time and waiting for it to cool off enough to go home and kick the dog. One was sitting on a bench drinking a coca cola out of a can (co-cola you call it here). The other was squatting on his haunches leaning up against the wall. Elbows on his bony knees.

"How's it goin', guys?" I said by way of greeting, stopping on the steps. Neither of them looked at me but by reply, the first one said, "I haven't felt this good since the last time I felt good."

"And I feel a lot better now than the last time I felt this way." his partner said.

I stuck around to chat a little and chew on my toothpick. "What's it like around here?" I asked. "Is this a good place to live?"

A considered silence for a while and then the first geezer said, "Well, I reckon we got two problems in Seguín. We got too much Johnson grass and we got too many baptists."

"Well, at least we know how to get rid of the Johnson grass." said the other one, standing up to kick the kinks out of his knees. I could hear them grate and pop. "We pour whiskey on it and them baptists chew it down to the nub."

They snickered and gave each other the geezer equivalent of high five. I wondered how many times they'd used this line on a stranger.

A long way down the road we could see an old truck coming our way. The heat shimmered off the asphalt in front of it making it dance in the air.

The Strange Man

2005-07-29T06:50:00.000-06:00

"Though this be madness, yet there is method in 't."
--Hamlet (II, ii, 206)

There is a memory I have that I would like to share with old friends, and this is one that I have never spoken of before although it stands out starkly and foremost among all the memories of Mexico for me.

My family had arrived in the Summer of `63 from Buenos Aires, and we were, each of us, trying to get used to the new life and the new routines. My mom learning the ins and outs of how to maneuver a Mercedes 180-D up and down the hills of Lomas, my Dad on the road constantly to the far flung corners of his business world, and we three kids trying our best to fit in, meet new friends and not stand out like proud nails, as new kids on the block always will.

The first weeks of November of that year were cool—and wasn't that a surprise to a newcomer? I had never thought that Mexico would be cold...It was always a pleasantly surprising thing, after the first snow of the winter up in the mountains, to see the first cars coming down from Toluca up above the snowline with the little snowmen on the hoods. The skies were purple at night and on clear days, those two gorgeous snowcapped ladies clearly visible from my house.

This particular November night, a schoolnight, I was in the bedroom that I shared with my little brother. Very late, I was awakened by the unmistakeable sound of a car coming up the driveway into the courtyard. The flagstones made a good sounding board and the sound was quite clear in the cool mountain air. I heard a door slam and
muted voices below. I got out of bed and crossed to the window just in time to hear the doorbell ring downstairs. In the courtyard was a taxi and the driver was waiting. He'd cut the engine and was sitting there in the darkness smoking. From time to time, a dim red glow would light his face as he took another drag on his cigarette and the smoke curled out the open window.

As I stood at the top of the stairs I could hear my father speaking to the visitor in perfunctory tones to which the replies were indistinct but excited. Fully awake now and unable to check my curiosity, I began to creep down the circular wrought iron stairway taking care to avoid the steps that creaked and not to awaken our
Scotty dog, Shadrack asleep under the stairs and chasing rats in dog dreams.

When I got to the bottom, I sat in the dark on the bottom step and was able to look into the living room at the two men sitting next to the fireplace. My father with his back to me and a slightly disheveled young man with a receding hairline who was facing him. My father still in his suit from work but with the jacket off and the
young man wearing a black nylon windbreaker with a white t shirt under it. My father was speaking calmly and in measured tones and occasionally he would be interrupted by the young man who would wave his hands urgently and smack his fist into his palm by way of emphasis.

Suddenly the young man stopped speaking in mid-sentence and looked straight at me as if he could see me through the cover of darkness huddled there at the bottom of the stairwell in the cold. My heart pounded and leaped into my mouth and only by clenching my teeth could I keep it from falling out onto the floor. He was an
unexceptional looking man but as he stared towards me for a full five seconds, his face was burned into my mind. I would never forget him, as unremarkable as he was that night, and who could blame me as the events of that month unfolded. Two weeks after my 14th birthday, this young man's face appeared on the front pages of every
newspaper in the world. Bruised and swollen and unkempt he appeared in the news photos, and on the grainy black and white television films, but there was no mistaking the face of Lee Harvey Oswald.

Hardball

2005-07-28T13:41:00.000-06:00

"I am not bound to please thee with my answers."

--The Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene I.

I support Congressman Tom Tancredo's suggestion that we bomb Mecca if the islamic primitives manage to sneak a nuke in over here. A really big, clear message is what is needed. The primitive mind seems unable to elevate to consciousness the incremental messages. The first strike should probably be a neutron weapon and if that doesn't do it, a nice juicy hydrogen hardball to keep both Mecca and Medina
uninhabitable for a couple of thousand years or until the return of the
expected Mahdi.

Putas Del Fuego

2005-07-25T17:19:00.000-06:00

"I am Sir Oracle,
And when I ope my lips, let no dog bark!

--The Merchant of Venice, 1. 1

Austin's own Rollerderby team is unable to get its name published in the paper. Whenever we defeat Lubbock or Fort Worth or some other team, it always gets reported something like this, "AUSTIN [expletive deleted] DEFEAT DALLAS 66-13".

We deserve better than this. A better newspaper, I mean.

I'm Sorry, So Sorry

2005-07-19T12:15:00.000-06:00

"Cowards die many times before their deaths,
The valiant never taste of death but once."

--Julius Caesar (II, ii, 32-37)

Everybody wants somebody to apologize for something these days. The moslems want us to apologize for advancing civilization past the 15th Century and also for everything that happened following the second siege of Vienna. First they want us to apologize for it and then they would like us to die.

Every 'journalist' has to precede his `question' at the White House with a request for an apology. If they don't follow this protocol, Newsweek or CBS will withdraw their press credentials and it's back to working the unfinished lumber aisle at Home Depot.

The Euroweenies want us to apologize for not offering a palette cleanser following the entrée to our guests at Guantanamo and Klansman Robert Byrd wants Trent Lott to apologize for wishing Strom Thurmond a Happy 120th Birthday.

Henry Waxman wants Halliburton to apologize for rebuilding Iraq and for losing more than one hundred men and women (so far) in the process. He seems particularly steamed that Tommy Hammill escaped from his abductors there and managed to avoid being beheaded thereby depriving Waxman of another video clip for his collection. It's galling to him and Hammill owes Waxman big time for that.

The barking moonbats want President Bush to apologize for liberating 55 million people in Afghanistan and Iraq. The negros want the non-negros to apologize on account of our people forced their people to give up a rich cultural life in Africa, abandon cannibalism, stop wearing plants for clothing and come over here to this place. They want us to apologize and then to give them money.

`Native Americans' the length and breadth of these Western continents want something similar in addition to apologies. So far they've been mollified. Some with casinos and some with not having to put up with border formalities upon entry. OK. Fair guys? No harm, no foul?

So joining in the spirit of things, I want my fair share of apologies too.

For starters, I'd like an apology from Mrs. Hartman for making me move to another desk on another side of the room from Mary Seay in Kindergarten because I was talking too much. I think, no I KNOW, that something beautiful was cut down then.

I want a big, fat, tearful apology from Anna Nicole Kerry for lying to us about his military record and thinking that the American people were dumb enough to let him get away with it. And while he's at it, I think we all deserve an apology from Anna Nicole for inflicting his loony tune wife on us. I still cringe.

I'd like a hearty apology from the Veteran's Administration for not making me sign up for any benefits.

I'd like seven apologies from seven RINOS who thought they could make nice with the dumbs and avoid the nucuelar option. They just delayed it. It coulda been a done deal by now.

I'd like an apology from my college for not having invited me to speak at a commencement yet. And speaking of college, I'd like an apology from Glen Wade for not having the common civility to tell me back then when she was plump and juicy that her name was really Glen Close. I'd have been a lot nicer to her then and I'd go see a lot more of her movies now. And in theatres too, not on pirated DVDs like some people I know. Marielena, you know who I'm talking about.

And lastly (for now), I'd like an apology from everyone who voted for a Democrat in the last couple of elections. You were wrong, so apologize now. And do it like you mean it.

There's more, but this will do for a start.

Freeze Dried Political Correctness

2005-07-09T11:28:00.000-06:00

"Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and howlet's wing,--
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble."

--Macbeth (IV, i, 14-15)

Guidance from the Canadian Broadcast Company to its reporters and
staff in the proper and politically correct use of the language:

"Avoid labelling any specific bombing or other assault as
a 'terrorist act' unless it's attributed. For instance, we should
refer to the deadly blast at that nightclub in Bali in October 2002
as an 'attack,' not as a 'terrorist attack.' The same applies to the
Madrid train attacks in March 2004, the London bombings in July 2005
and the attacks against the United States in 2001, which the CBC
prefers to call 'the Sept. 11 attacks' or some similar expression.
(The BBC, Reuters and many others follow similar policies.)

"By restricting outselves to neutral language, we aren't faced with
the problem of calling one incident a `terrorist act' (e.g., the
destruction of the World Trade Center) while classifying another as,
say, a mere `bombing' (e.g., the destruction of a crowded shopping
mall in the Middle East)."

So goes the guidance from the confused hanky twisters north of the
border.

In the off chance that I might be able to provide a simple ray of
light to illumine this difficult topic for them, might I suggest the
following definition of terrorist: ONE WHO WILFULLY TARGETS
NONCOMBATANTS.

It is understood that the moonbat contingent will be unable to get
over the preliminary hypothesis that American soldiers, sailors,
marines and airmen do not wilfully murder schoolchildren, teenagers
in discotheques or aging pensioners sitting at sidewalk cafes but the
moonbat's punishment, ultimately, is that he has to be himself and
who really cares what he's braying about anyway?

Expectations

2005-07-06T07:22:00.000-06:00

"Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits."

--All's Well That Ends Well (II, i, 145-147)

A Modest Proposal

2005-06-20T06:34:00.000-06:00

"Nothing can come of nothing: speak again."

--King Lear (I, i, 92)

Like many caucasian americans of a certain age, I can take the time
now to look back over the fading canvas of my life. I can remember
the successes with a certain measure of pride and I'm able now, with
the perspective of time, to smile ruefully at the near-misses and
even chuckle at the memory of those nights I ended up in the bar
ditch. (Like last week, for example. Lets not get into that here.)

Toting up the wins and losses it appears to be not too bad an inning.
It's tempting to sit back, feet up on the ottoman, a glass of
Glengoulie in hand and enjoy the sunset. But I am plagued, as I'm
sure you are, by certain niggling doubts. A phantom itch that can't
be ignored. And prime among them is this: what about our black
negro brothers and sisters?

Here we have a race of people who did all the work for us. They
carried us across centuries of toil and sweat and all the while,
whistling a happy tune and even dancing sometimes. And just what have we done as a nation to erase the ugly stain of slavery, the crime of eternity in which we must all share complicity? Nothing. Well, not enough anyway. I've done a little but you haven't done anything at all, it looks to me.

Many solutions have been proffered but none of them successful. Send them back to Africa! cried our forefathers. Well, we tried that and it just didn't work according to plan. The enthusiasm among the transportees was limited, to put it delicately. Among those selected for the exercise, some had to be dragged kicking and screaming, and those that willingly sailed for eastern skies ended up wearing plants for clothing and eating other people. The clip of Charles Taylor forcing the ex-Liberian President, Samuel K. Doe, to eat his own ears is a vision I cannot get out of my mind, or off my hard drive for that matter. Not successful.

So how about reparations then? Well, there are a number of obstacles
here and I won't go into the details except to say there is no
possible amount of money that could be paid to anyone that would
assuage the pain and the humiliation that this group of people have
had to endure across the centuries. So lets don't even try. Please
don't insult the negros by pretending that their dignity can be
bought. Pride has cost it is said, but no price.

I know what you're thinking. "Sure, sitting around in your armchair
criticizing the suggestions of others and just being obstructionist
is easy" you say. "So why'nt you come up with your own answer, if
you're so smart?!" And right you are. Pointing out fault is easy.
We've seen plenty of that on our national political scene. Much
harder to come up with a thoughtful and reasoned solutions to
difficult problems.

Here then is my proposal: every negro in these here United States of America gets awarded a Harvard MBA or a degree from Yale Law, their choice. These diplomas can be printed up and mailed out within a matter of months, suitable for framing. This problem is solved by the end of summer. As educated people, I don't have to tell you the value of that little piece of paper. Not to mention the prestige and power that is conferred. In one bold stroke, dignity is restored. Earning power is multiplied by orders of magnitude, providing honor and dignity to the recipients in this generation and wealth and comfort to their heirs. A solution that in its simplicity is the definition of elegance.

I hope that if you are a concerned caucasian american you will join me in petitioning your representative to support this elegant but simple solution to our ancient question. It's your duty. It should be your pleasure.

Gunsels

2005-06-15T20:20:00.000-06:00

"Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look,
He thinks too much; such men are dangerous."

~~Julius Caesar (I, ii, 194)

If you know someone who is licensed to carry a concealed handgun, then you could reasonably assume also that this individual has never committed a felony. You would also know that he is not been convicted of either a class A or a class B misdemeanor within the past five years. That he owes no back taxes and no child support. That he is not in default on any loan covered by the Education Act. That he is not currently restricted under any restraining order or protective order. That he has not been diagnosed by any physician as suffering from a psychiatric disorder. That he is not chemically dependent or a drug or alcohol abuser. In short, he is probably a swell guy. The sort you'd like to have for a neighbor.

Is That All There Is?

2005-06-13T11:59:00.000-06:00

"Let every eye negotiate for itself
And trust no agent; for beauty is a witch
Against whose charms faith melteth in blood."

~~Much Ado About Nothing (II, i, 178-180)

So its come to this has it? We are all to be denied the delicious spectacle of The Elephant Man being dragged off sobbing in chains to certain doom. And all because A JURY has decided there is not enough evidence to convict. So he's innocent. Is this a valid reason to withhold from us this great pleasure? Surely the greater good should prevail. A jury! A jury of birds! Of little people! Of Californians--a state populated by German bodybuilders and illegal bricklayers--but good ones! Another
pleasure denied us.A little something inside of me dies each time an opportunity for theatre such as this is missed. Pfft. Gone. Forever.

First Orenthal and now The Elephant Man. Another window closes. Another car door slams shut on my fingers. Hands up all out there who agree with me that the common citizens of this country can no longer be relied upon to give us the bread and circuses we need. Is there any better reason to examine ourselves? Our form of government? Is there any good reason NOW not to let the Joint Chiefs take over and see if they can improve the situation?

Cruel and Degrading Pinatas

2005-06-10T06:09:00.000-06:00

"By the pricking of my thumbs,
Something wicked this way comes."

~~Macbeth (IV, i, 44-45)

A secret source has delivered a sensitive document to Time Magazine in which the savage and cruel torture techniques of Guantánamo Bay are revealed.

The log purports to be the detailed notes of the interrogation and
cruel torture of Mohammed al-Qatani, the rumored 20th Hijacker who
was deported from the US just prior to the events of September 11,
forfeiting a prepaid vacation at Disney World, and later captured on
the battlefields of Afghanistan.

The torture journal describes the inhuman interrogation that al-
Qahtani was subjected to which included being forced to listen to
interminable dance tracks by Christina Aguilera and being made to
dance the funky chicken wearing only Nike running shoes and
the 'tighty whitey' undergarments favored by islamic terrorists.

Also detailed in the secret document is a bizarre torture technique
designed to humiliate the subject and make him the object of
ridicule. The technique requires that the subject be blindfolded and
spun around in circles until he becomes disoriented. The prisoner is
then required to manually position a cardboard cutout article
(in the salty jargon of interrogation it is known as the "tail of the donkey") onto a target (the "donkey") affixed to a wall in the room. While the subject staggers and attempts to complete the mission blindfolded, the observers taunt him, laughing at his clumsy missteps. This bestial torture technique is especially humiliating to moslems to whom the hindquarters of a donkey is considered to be particularly loathsome. It is a canon of islamic faith that all bottoms (and the faces of women) are required to be covered at all times.

A second and equally barbarous torture technique used on Al-Qahtani (You can call him Al) required that he again be blindfolded and disoriented. Once the subject has been "loosened up", he is given a broomstick and required to pummel a paper mache and crepe covered object which has been pre-filled with small trinkets and food and
suspended by rope/pulley mechanism. As the hungry subject flails
about blindly (and often in the wrong direction) with his broomstick in a vain attempt to recover the food, his jailers raise and lower the target by pulling on the rope. As in the first torture method, the observers laugh and taunt him in an effort to degrade him in a humiliating manner in order to get him to cough up the goods.

More on this breaking story to come as our stringers report in..

Behind The Wheel

2005-06-09T13:49:00.000-06:00

"Blow, blow, thou winter wind,
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude;"

~~ As You Like It (II, vii, 174-176)

Three semis racing a train. I took this picture from behind the wheel of a Ford F250 heading east out of El Paso at about six in the morning. I processed it to resemble something my favorite artist, Edward Hopper, might do if he had used a camera instead of a canvas.

Pretenders

2005-06-09T13:16:00.000-06:00

"All that glisters is not gold."
~~The Merchant of Venice (II, vii)

It's an on-and-off thing with me, but I've been collecting old maps since the middle seventies. This is a small detail of a map made by an English explorer in the 18th Century. Note the inscription commenting on the habits of the wily Persians. Some things never change, seemingly.