May 24 2009
Sometimes when I listen to General Colin Powell and President Barack Obama, I think – why don’t we let black folks run the country for a little while?
Then I remember Alan Keyes… and think, nevermind.
May 22 2009
Christopher Hitchens talks about his experience with waterboarding (aka drowning/aka torture) here: http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2008/08/hitchens200808
From the link: There was a paramedic present who checked my racing pulse and warned me about adrenaline rush.
Ok. So this would be a possibly fatal procedure for Vice President Cheney. He’s got a bad heart – we don’t want to kill him. But since this is merely harsh stuff, with no threat of death, and therefore reasonable for the US to practice, I say that Liz Cheney, VP Cheney’s daughter, should undergo the practice. She’s young and healthy, and can take it.
Vice President Cheney – I call upon you to put your daughter up for waterboarding – at least 3 times, because Hitchens did it twice.
May 13 2009
I hope that we can at least get public television and NPR in the room for the next and future White House Poetry Slams. How awesome is this! 
Taking it one step further – how gorgeous in Michelle? I can’t tell if that’s a blouse or a dress – but where are the fashionistas to comment??? She looks simply stunning!
May 08 2009
http://politics.theatlantic.com/mt-42/mt-tb.cgi/8241
via The GOP’s Action-Thriller Detainees Video – The Atlantic Politics Channel.
“Action-Thriller” is Mark Ambinder’s tongue-in-cheek description of the video that commences immediately upon accessing the link. For people who were directly affected by the events of 9/11, these videos may trigger trauma reactions. Hence, my warning in the title. For myself, the stress headache that comes on everytime I have to watch 9/11 footage is probably a very mild post-traumatic stress disorder symptom – and I was only marginally impacted by the 9/11 attack on the World Trade Center.
In fact – this is the perpetration of high-tech terrorism against the American people – video reminders – cue scary music on top of genuinely scary footage of real life events – and then make a political demand. Al Qaida thanks the republican party for their high-tech, state of the art advertisement. People in New York City, and perhaps in DC or in Pennsylvania near the United 93 crash site, might be deeply offended by this crass display – but people who were more remote from the events of the 9/11 terrorist attacks will be terrorized by this – and perhaps manipulated by their fear.
I hope some high-tech visual folks with good sense oppose and call the republican partisans on this – in defense of the American people.
Editing to add: this seems to be a good time to promote some mental defense against this kind of garbage:
I’ve blogged previously about Bob Cesca’s book, “One Nation Under Fear” – I highly recommend it (again!) if you haven’t read it.
Editing to add: Here’s the link to the book: One Nation Under Fear: Scaredy Cats and Fear-Mongers in the Home of the Brave (And What You Can Do About It)
QT
Apr 07 2009
Elvis Dingeldein, who I’ve blogged about on one other occasion, is something of a comic genius, and he has posted a fun bit of silliness on Bob Cesca’s site here: http://www.bobcesca.com/blog-archives/2009/04/elvis_dingeldei.html.
Well, my reaction was a little on the serious side, so I decided to post here, rather than spoil the fun:
On this day in history, 4/7/1915, my grandmother, Elizabeth, was born in North Carolina. A great woman who counted Shirley Chisolm and Howard Golden as colleagues, she owned her own property in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn as early as 1974, which frequently provided shelter to her two children, my aunt, and my dad. That the family was unable to keep up her material legacy is one of my most profound sadnesses. That I may yet live up to her legacy of character and dignity is my most fervent hope.
(Sorry – I laughed myself silly reading your “Today in History” stuff… but when I read your ironic tag “For Whitey” I wanted to think of something that was good for brown folk. My grandmother was.)
QT
Apr 02 2009
Well – Michelle Obama’s Royal Opera outfit as a whole is charming The sweater specifically is a disaster. How on earth to rate this? I voted “love it”, because overall, she looks engaging, sweet, and powerful, all at the same time.
QT
More on Michelle Obama Style
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost
Mar 07 2009
http://www.politico.com/politico44/perm/0309/obama_i_rarely_read_blogs_70410d8b-b283-4f6e-b74f-51982c34306d.html
Key quote:
And part of the reason we don’t spend a lot of time looking at blogs is because if you haven’t looked at it very carefully then you may be under the impression that somehow there’s a clean answer one way or another – well, you just nationalize all the banks, or you just leave them alone and they’ll be fine, or this or that or the other.
That reflects well something I just said…
Mar 06 2009
This is long overdue. Thank you, Judge Robertson!
Mar 06 2009
This post gets the cleverest sneak in of “Obama” award. Well done.
And yes, I concur. I had the biggest school-girl crush on Michael Jackson back when I was 16 – that was when Thriller was out. After that my ardor cooled a bit… and by the time I was an adult, with a child, no less, and Michael Jackson had ceased looking like anything recognizable, I thought I’d turned my back on him forever.
Then “You Rock My World” happened. Age of the internet and all – I saw the video online… and that old familiar pang came back. I couldn’t believe it! The man is just … bizarre! Who could like him, much less love him! Blech! Except that by the time he started dancing, I was wishing I had the talent to be the lady on the other end.
I hope we get some good youtube videos of the tour…
