TREASON!

Listen:
Post by post,
Point by point,
Understatment by understatement,
The noose is starting to close.

A blogger named Josh Micah Marshall
Is bringing down the Vice Presidency of the USA.
Post by post,
Point by point,
See Here
         And here
            And here.

To put Cheney's current situation in blunt terms
Is to state unequivocally
Via the unfolding of Marshall's posts:

The Vice President of the USA is a TRAITOR.

I need to say that again,
Louder and in different tone,
Because I need you to feel its import
In proper non-partisan form.

So listen up:

You are not a liberal.
Not a conservative.
Not a blogger.
Not a boor.
You are neither...
Bovine or Ovine.

Rather...
You are just a
    Simple,
      Decent,
        Old School,
          American.

Now read it again:

The Vice President of the USA is a TRAITOR!

Chew on that statement a bit.
How does it make you feel?

Sick in your guts?
Devastated?

How about:
Wanting to cry for the what's happened to your good country?
How about:
Wanting to sob for what's been done in your good name?

All of those
And more
I hope.

Because...
America the Beauty
Is arguably now suffering her worst cancer;
This is way past devastating,
Way past demoralizing,
Way beyond disgusting.

Cheney has done to America what
Bin Laden himself,
Could not do:

Cheney has taken a crooked rusty blade
To the smooth face of Our Lady of Liberty.

He has ruined her
With a grin and a growl...

And then...

Cheney,
That sick evil bastard
With a tumor for a heart.
Shit in Our Lady of Liberty's sliced-up face.

Cheney is guilty of deliberate
    Malicious,
        Malignant,
            Malversation.

All done,
Behind our backs;
And all done,
In our good names.

None should dare now hesitate
To call it what it is:
TREASON!

A Bush-league liar

Is the world asleep?

Kevin Drum says It's all about the Nukes...
And Josh Marshall agrees with him?

If today's grafs in the NY Daily News are true:

If...
"An angry President Bush rebuked chief
political guru Karl Rove two years ago for
his role in the Valerie Plame affair."

If...
"Published reports implying Rove had deceived
Bush about his involvement in the Wilson
counterattack were incorrect and were leaked
by White House aides trying to protect the
President."

If...
"Bush did not feel misled so much by Karl and
others as believing that they handled it in a
ham-handed and bush-league way."

Then...

Bush repeatedly lied to the American people
About what he knew
And when he knew it.
Not only that...
He abetted the crime by participating in it's coverup.

The evidence literally,
Litters the internet:

10/7/03:

"I don't know if we're going to find out the senior administration official. I don't have any idea."

2/11/04:

"If there's a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. If the person has violated law, that person will be taken care of. I welcome the investigation. I am absolutely confident the Justice Department will do a good job. I want to know the truth. Leaks of classified information are bad things."
He added that he did not know of "anybody in my administration who leaked classified information."

2/03/04:

"I've told our administration that we'll fully cooperate with their investigation. I want to know the truth, and I'm willing to cooperate myself."

So,
If the story is true...
The clock to Bush's impeachment starts ticking right now:
Drip, drip, drip...
Tick, tick, tick...

Mark your watches everyone,
And get ready to bang your gongs.

Wilma Rang Blog

Wilma! Wilma! Wilma!

Has anyone else noticed that
Global Warming
rearanged is:
Wilma Rang Blog?

Probably not.

Which I suppose is my way of saying
That all this
penny-ante
   psuedo-learned
      political bullshit

Is just...
   Sound and Fury
      Signifying nothing.

I mean really...
Shouldn't we get on with it?

Shouldn't we be talking about global warming
And the energy crisis
Almost 24/7/52?

Or are the most popular blogs
Simply going to ignore it?

(Except for a post now and then
About how the government ALSO does nothing?)

I mean really...
Isn't every other subject
About as trivial as a USC football game?

---

¹ The three links are to consecutive Kevin Drum posts.
Which are best described as
penny-ante
   psuedo-learned
      political bullshit

Random Quotes Friday.4

Are there any ideas you deem
Worth dying for?

Probably...
Hopefully...

Hopefully,
And perhaps probably,
You've already thought this question out
On you own,
Both clearly and deeply.

After all,
You ought not to die for just any old idea...
Or for that matter
Die for another person's concept
Of which ideas are worth dying for.

Clearly,
If there is any question which requires
Your own deep thinking...
This is the one.

I, of course, have thought this question out.

And there are only two ideas
I deem worthy of dying for:
The Integrity of Democracy
And...
The Integrity of Science.

Today's quotes are about Science.

And they get at some of the reasons why...
I believe it to be a cause,
Worth dying for.

All the following
Are from Pasteur and Modern Science by Rene Dubos:

---

Take interest, I beseech you, in those sacred institutions which we designate under the expressive name of laboratories. Demand that they be multiplied and adorned; they are the temples of wealth and the future. There it is that humanity grows, becomes stronger and better. There it learns to read in the works of nature, symbols of progress and of universal harmony, whereas the works of mankind are too often those of fanaticism and destruction."

---

"Science knows no country, because knowledge belongs to humanity, and is the torch which illuminates the world. Science is the highest personification of the nation because that nation will remain the first which carries the furthest the works of thought and intelligence."

---

"Young men, have faith in these powerful and safe methods of which we do not know all the secrets. And, whatever your career may be, do not let yourself be discouraged by the sadness of certain hours which pass over nations. Live in the serene peace of laboratories and libraries..."

---

Amen...
Brother Pasteur,
Amen.

You've done more to help humanity
With your Science-enhanced mind...
Than any Sword,
Spear,
Or Swastika
Any time...
Any where...
Any when.

Revisting: My first post (I told you so...)

Almost exactly one year ago I began this blog with a post about podcasting and the inevitablity of ipod videocasting.

I even taunted:

"Shouldn't Steve Jobs rethink his ideas about a video enabled ipod?"

Well he should, and he did.



Let me now make another prediction:

The future of education has just been radically altered.

Not only will "Distance Learning" never be the same, but learning itself will never be the same.

You heard it here first.

(And you can expect me to revisit this post about one year from now...)

Random Quotes Friday.3

A very cool saying:
The Pen is Mightier than the Sword.
It's usually misinterpreted to mean:
"That words and communication are more powerful than wars and fighting."

Perhaps.

But I suggest a second meaning:

If you can control
Words and feelings,
Images and rhyme
In some superior way...
It's possible you can
Create a future,
That will last
Forever.

That is precisely
What Dante did
To a contemporary,--
Filippo Argentil,
In his immortal "Inferno."

Dante places his real-time rival,
A local politician and
"Chancellor of wrath"
In the sixth circle of Hell.

Make no mistake.
Filippo Argentil
Really is in Hell,
And will never escape Hell
Because Dante's Pen really is
Mightier than Arthur's Excalibur.

Here is the quote from the John Ciardi translation,
It begins with Dante addressing his guide-- Master Virgil:

---

And I: "Master, it would suit my whim
   to see the wretch scrubbed down in the swill
   before we leave this stinking sink and him."

And he to me: "Before the other side
   shows through the mist, you shall have all you ask.
   This is a wish that should be gratified."

And shortly after, I saw the loathsome spirit
   so mangled by a swarm of muddy wraiths
   that to this day I praise and thank God for it.

"After Filippo Argentil!" all cried together.
   The maddog Florentine wheeled at their cry
   and bit himself for rage. I saw them gather.

And there we left him. And I say no more.
   But such a wailing beat upon my ears,
I strained my eyes ahead to the far shore.

---

Thank you Senor Alighieri...

Would that I had the talents to emulate,
   I'd place Chancellor Rove 'neath hot slick slime,
   there forever to scrub his foul fat hide.

Despotism or Democracy?

A brilliant Encyclopedia Britannica film from 1946:

Jumping the meme

Oh these truly are happy days^†
Joy is trickling down...
As everywhere reality
Drips,
Drips,
Drips
From blogs,
And newspapers,
And radio...

Suddenly,
It is a feeding frenzy
Of biblical proportions,
As shark fins churn
Up a changing sea.

Aye maties...
George W Bush,
Every White Man's favorite chum,
Is now officially being grounded up,
And used as chum...

Aye,
There is aristocratic blood in the water:
New Haven, Conneticut's finest headless brew.
And so for conservatives,
This is now their
Eat or be eaten
End time.

Watch closely as these
Republican creatures of the abyss
Exercise their watery memories....

Here first is the The Carpetbagger
Taking scent of George Will's shiftiness:

"I knew conservative deference for Bush had slipped of late, but for one of the nation's most widely read conservative columnists to question, in print, the president's "ability to make sophisticated judgments" is a very pleasant surprise."

Here next is Josh Marshall
Sniffing out Senator Brownback's re-posturing:

"Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) questioned Tuesday whether Supreme Court nominee Harriet Miers has a 'firm commitment' to what he called the framers’ 'original intent' of the Constitution, saying that President Bush’s knowledge of her “heart” didn’t end the need for tough questioning."

And here is a short transcript from a radio link at Crooks and Liars
That shows Limbaugh snorting and shuffling and stinking:

"I started out by saying that what bothers me is that this is a pick [Miers] that comes from a postion of weakness. I just grilled the Vice President on why didn't you pick people you know we could count on..."

Hee-Haw...
George Will questions Bush's brain
         Senator Brownback questions Bush's heart
               Limbaugh questions Bush's courage.

You see where this is headed don't you?

The predators are clearly
Jumping the ship
Jumping the shark
And most importantly
Jumping to a new meme.

They have to
Because clearly the country is
Sunk in Iraq
And sunk in debt at home.

So they need a new theme...

Their new slogan,
Will read,
(or should I say: "will dogpaddle")
Just like this:

"Y'all need to vote for...
Real Conservatives next time around.
Because...
Conservatism itself
Wasn't responsible
For the floundering,
The failing,
The sick flailing feeling
We all feel
As our country drowns a little deeper
Day by day
By day,
By day.

In other words:
Conservatism is good.
Bush is bad.

In other words:
They are,
Jumping the meme
Jettisoning the Bush...

Clearly,
It's eat or be eaten time boys,
And so the pigs at the trough
Have morphed into
Sharks in a wave's trough:
Bush be damned,
It's every dogfish for himself.

Sink or swim boys...
Sink or swim.

†Jumping the shark -- a metaphor used by US television critics since the 1990s. The phrase ... is used to describe the moment when a television show or similar episodic medium is in retrospect judged to have passed its "peak" and shows a noticeable decline in quality ... The phrase refers to a scene in a three-part episode of the American television series Happy Days first broadcast on September 20, 1977. In the "Hollywood" episode, Fonzie — wearing swim trunks and his trademark leather jacket — jumps over a tank containing a shark while on water skis. Many have noted the shark episode as the moment when they realized the show was no longer worth watching, when it became impossible to maintain a certain suspension of disbelief.