Viewing Obama’s victory on television was eye opening because it showed how much I’ve let the birthers, Tea Partiers, and 1% define my reality. On Tuesday night I watched Fox News because that is who I wanted to narrate my election returns. Call me a masochist. I couldn’t find the Fox station – a funny commentary on my news viewing habits, since I have no problems finding the channel for other shows. I settled on MSNBC. Love that Rachel. I never doubted that Romney would prevail because I’m that jaded. I lost hope early in this election. At 10:00ish on election night, I was explainingRead More →

ColorOfChange.org is sponsoring a successful boycott of Fox New’s Glenn Beck. I read AOL’s “Politics Daily” blog on occasion. The audience is heavily conservative, so the comments are vitriolic, vituperative, and vigorous (I needed another v-word for balance). They make me point-laugh. Yesterday, Carl Cannon wrote some stupid BS about the boycott, claiming that it’s censorship and not good citizenship. Well, after reading pages of comments, I got totally frustrated and I actually posted a comment. I suppose it’s just a means of blowing off steam. It’s buried 5,000 comments in, so I doubt a soul will read it. But it was fun and itRead More →

According to a new report from the government, teenage birthrates are rising. Bloomberg.com points out that this is the first increase in fifteen years. Although the article doesn’t make any sort of reference to sex education, I’m afraid that the information will be used to increase support for the Bush administration’s abstinence only programs, even though studies have shown that these programs are dismal failures. See, for instance, this Fox news article for a “fair and balanced” report. For a humorous look at this failure, see Susie Bright’s take on it. She ends her commentary with the following: Clearly, more needs to be done toRead More →

I finally finished reading Breach of Faith (by Jed Horne) for the One Book, One Community dialogues that are going on. The man is an amazing writer. His ability to evoke images is impressive. One of the librarians here said in regard to the BRCC book club discussion of the book that most people found the first part of the book compelling, but they didn’t like the second part. The second part is where Horne gets political. Not in a ranting sort of way, but in a narrative style that shows how Kathleen Blanco was set up by the Bush administration again and again. Horne’sRead More →

  I am not the first to think that George W. Bush looks like a chimpanzee. Smirkingchimp.com raised that idea ages ago. As has Bushorchimp.com, which has been up since 2000. But I do think that a quick review of Bush’s simian-like visage as displayed on Netscape’s front page over the past month will demonstrate that A. he does indeed look like a chimp, and that B. Netscape News is not too fond of W. Here are seven pictures that I collected randomly from Netscape over the past month. They range from George Bush picking his nose to a floating George Bush head. IMO, theyRead More →

The word ‘democratic’ has such positive emotional valence … so they politicize it to use it as a term to describe a group of political rivals.”
“Democrat Party” is not common usage in Texas, Hart said, noting that the only people he had heard use it were “sitting Republican legislators.”

– Dr. Rod Hart, Communication Studies Professor and Dean, University of Texas, Austin,
in an LA Times article on Bush’s gaffe in the State of the Union

I told Congresswoman Pelosi that I look forward to working with her and her colleagues to find common ground in the next two years. As the majority party in the House of Representatives, they recognize that in their new role they now have greater responsibilities. And in my first act of bipartisan outreach since the election, I shared with her the names of some Republican interior decorators who can help her pick out the new drapes in her new offices.

– George W. Bush

I saw the movie Jesus Camp yesterday. It depicts Evangelicals teaching their kids to be soldiers for Jesus. They even pray over a cardboard effigy of George Bush, asking for Jesus to help Bush lead us to a right wing country. George Bush is not God’s representative on earth. If anything, he’s a false prophet bringing the apocalypse closer, which I suppose most Evangelicals think is a great thing. Thankfully, Jesus Camp has closed down. Of course, the scandal with Ted Haggard, who is featured in the film, might have had something to do with the camp closing. Here’s Jon Daily on Ted Haggard.

I enjoyed V for Vendetta yesterday. The Wachowskis’ commentary on the Bush regime is obvious, whereas in the Matrix movies, the philosophy is garbled and multifarious. What’s equally interesting is the reviewers’ commentary. You can tell who is conservative and who is liberal by their take on the movie. In any event, one reviewer made a very disheartening comment: But this is not the movie, and these are not the times, for sophisticated arguments. If now is not the time for sophisticated arguments, then precisely when would that time be? Have we really become so dumb that any movie wanting to make a political pointRead More →