June 2007 Rants

The First Post

6/29/07 - I always knew that Casey O’Stengel would make a good President.

6/28/07 - Even Washington claimed Executive Privilege, but he did it correctly

6/27/07 - The Hard Little Planet With The Soft Center

6/26/07 - Hurting Cheney where it counts

6/25/07 - Getting the WTF Endorsement in 2008

6/21/07 - Stem Cell Terrorists

6/20/07 - The missing e-mails wanted by Henry Waxman

6/19/07 - The Electability of Hillary Clinton

6/14/07 - Barry Bonds and the Home Run Record

6/13/07 - Hypocritical Checks and Balances

6/8/07 - the War on Non-Christians

6/7/07 - Scooter Libby as a Prison Bitch

6/6/07 - Republicans don't support the troops. They've lied to you

Next Month's Rants

WTF Front Page

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6/29/07 – Contempt of Congerss

Yeah, I misspelled it. I’m actually quoting the great old comic strip Pogo. It’s part of an extended punch line that involves holding Congress in contempt. The reply comes back “How else can you hold it?” Something like that.

Before I get into the main point of my article here, have you noticed that the titles of the links above do not match the titles of the articles? It’s no accident that I do this – I always have the two titles relate to the content of the article I’ve written. However, today I’ve decided to be obscure. Only someone who has read Pogo inside and out is going to get this reference. Maybe. Anyway, back to the show.

Fridays tend to be slow news days, because anything worth reporting gets withheld until the last minute so that it gets lost in the weekend fluff stories about the parole of Paris Hilton, Tom Sizemore going to jail, and the poor soul who was pushed off a moving train for the sin of trying to find his insulin in his luggage. But early in the day Senators Leahy and Conyers announced that they will start proceedings to hold President 200-word-vocabulary and his administration in contempt of Congress. Good for them – hold the bastards in contempt.

But I’m starting to notice a deeper trend – one that bodes ill for the Democratic Party in the election of 2008. It looks to me like the President and his staff is positioning themselves to allow his successor to become Harry Truman. Or to at least use him as a mantle for their own Presidential run.

If you’re any sort of political junkie (and I’m sure you are if you’ve gotten so far down the food chain that you’re reading me) you know the story. The Republicans ran Dewey against Truman by saying that Truman hadn’t done anything. Truman in turn ran a campaign against what he called the “do-nothing Congress”. He was right about it, but he only barely squeaked out a victory. You’ve seen the famed photo of Truman holding up the newspaper that declared Dewey the winner after the Electoral College had finally weighed in with Truman’s victory.

Anyway, based upon everything that has happened so far, The Democrats have been barely able to get any of their agenda done, despite an invigorating first 100 hours and lots of talk. They caved on funding the war (big mistake), have held tons of hearings, were unable to get immigration reform going, passed a doomed stem-cell research bill… in short the actual work of governing the nation hasn’t been altered all that much by the Democratic majority in Congress. Not too big a shock really. Bush doesn’t compromise on anything despite claiming that he always does. People always get indignant about the little lies, but they almost always buy the big ones. Thing is, locked horns means the bulls don’t get to mate – something that the Republicans in the Senate understand very well. They’ve been obstructing progress that was made by the House on almost every turn, and blaming Nancy Pelosi for the lack of results.

But the big test comes up next, as the bills that run the nation come due – the annual budget. Bush needs a budget to keep things going in the nation as a whole, and this is the Democrats first real big chance to shape policy. But the precedent has already been set that the Democrats will eventually cave – so what is stopping the next Republican contender from running not just against his opponent, but Congress itself?

This Democratic Congress (well, held by a slim majority at any rate) needs to dome some fast work here. While it would be silly to assume they could get any sort of heavy agenda through without having enough votes to override any vetoes, they need to step up and show some leadership. Make their own proposals and then use them as a basis to begin compromise – compromise that must take place. Nancy, my own Representative, I’m calling upon you not to just make speeches, and not just to bring down the White House – both things that need doing admit. I’m calling upon you to govern. I’m calling on you to shame those who obstruct for the sake of creating a congress that the “Republican Truman” can run against.

Please, don’t be a Congress we have to hold in contempt. We’ve had enough of those in this administration already.

(On a side note, I just discovered after finishing my first draft of this article that Tucker Carlson compared Dick Cheney to Truman on his show this week. Somebody please, please, please bring back “Battle of the Network Stars” as a cable edition so that Lewis Black can smack this idiot in the nuts with a baseball.)

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6/28/07 – On The Gripping Hand

I took that phrase from a Larry Niven novel. It basically means “on the other hand” but when there are 3 possible ideas involved. There are 3-armed aliens too, but today I’m only going to talk about executive privilege.

As you may already know, Congress yesterday bitch-slapped the Executive Branch and issued subpoenas. Today the White House reacted with venom, saying they would not comply, and even withdrew items they had previous offered, all under the concept of “Executive Privilege”. Every President from the first to the present has used this concept – defined initially by George Washington and his cabinet (although the phrase wasn’t coined until Eisenhower) as the right of the Chief Executive to withhold certain information that leaked publicly may cause harm to the American public and American interests. Washington’s own words were, "the Executive ought to communicate such papers as the public good would permit, and ought to refuse those, the disclosure of which would injure the public," allowing the executive to "exercise a discretion”.

There is a good point to this. Washington and his cabinet came up with the concept when the congress of that time wanted papers in regards to a failed expedition authorized by the White House. Washington first exercised the right when the House wanted to launch an investigation into how treaty negotiations were done with Briton to settle some territorial disputes left over after the Revolutionary War.

Even in an open and transparent government, you can see the point and the value of executive privilege. Even a person like me, who believes that as much as possible must be open, can see the value. But there is a problem with the whole concept, which originates back to the founding days – who defines what qualifies under Washington’s admittedly vague concept?

Answer – the courts. Specifically, the Supremes, and they’ve already done so – 33 years ago. I’m going to give you an example of everyone’s favorite whipping boy, Richard Nixon. Nixon wanted to withhold the tapes he recorded of every conversation during Watergate. He refused, citing executive privilege. It went to the Supreme Court, which ruled 8-0 (Rhenquist abstained – he was a friend of Nixon’s and that was the right thing to do – take note, Scalia) that he must turn over the tape. Again, allow me to quote Chief Justice Warren Berger from his own ruling, "when a claim of Presidential privilege as to materials subpoenaed for use in a criminal trial is based, as it is here, not on the ground that military or diplomatic secrets are implicated, but merely on the ground of generalized interest in confidentiality, the President's generalized assertion of privilege must yield to the demonstrated, specific need for evidence in a pending criminal trial and the fundamental demands of due process of law in the fair administration of criminal justice." The court further ruled "The President's broad interest in confidentiality of communications will not be vitiated by disclosure of a limited number of conversations preliminarily shown to have some bearing on the pending criminal cases."

Now you’re going to love this – I took those quotes (all of the ones used above) from an editorial by Michael J Cantanzaro written in 1998 for “Human Events” in which he spelled out why President Bill Clinton was wrong to invoke executive privilege to keep certain discussions about the Monica Lewinsky affair away from the investigators. Cantanzaro correctly argues out the point that based upon the precedent set by the Supreme Court that Clinton was wrong. And Clinton was wrong. I believe to this day that impeaching Clinton was bone-headed and wrong, but on this so was Clinton. Please – “depends upon what you definition of ‘is’ is?” Probably his worst moment as President.

And now, using the exact same precedent, so is Vice President Bush... er, Supreme Court Appointed President Bush. What congress is attempting to do in its many investigations and so far very few subpoenas is to determine if any laws were broken. Just as during Nixon’s time. Just as during Clinton’s time. This is congress’ job. Oversight is a sizeable chunk of what we pay them to do. Because the congresses of 2001 – 2006 failed in this responsibility the current “executive” branch (where does Cheney claim he lives today?) does not give the White House the right to ignore the law now. Hey, just because I haven’t been caught speeding in the last 15 years doesn’t mean that I won’t have to pay the ticket if I get pulled over tomorrow. The cop is supposed to pull me over.

Going back to the title of this essay - there are supposedly 3 branches to our government. Which hand has been doing the gripping?

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6/27/07 – Something Witty for the Top

Interesting news day. Guilianni runs for President by attacking…. Oh, let’s take a wild guess here… Bill Clinton! (Please, that is so last century). A respected pro (ahem) wrestler kills himself and his family, and the blame is on…. Wait for it… steroids. Bruce Willis’ character of John McClain is back, and he can’t say “Yippi-kay-yay Motherfucker” because the movie is rated PG-13. Cheney (see previous post) caved. But not really. Ann Coulter (where’s my saddle?) got back on TV and was roundly bitch-slapped by John Edward’s wife (she deserved it too – she called her husband a “faggot” and made fun of the death of her son)… and then the Edwards campaign used it as fund-raising material within hours. Tony Blair stepped down today and was rewarded for his role in fucking up the Middle East by… becoming the U.K.’s envoy to the Middle East. Barack Obama, having served 4 years in the U.S. Senate claims… wait for it… that Hillary Clinton, with 8 years in the Senate, doesn’t have enough experience. Apparently, it is against the law to not mark up the price of Gasoline in Wisconsin. Several 9/11 heroes are facing charges for leaving the country and going to Cuba for treatment they couldn’t get in the U.S… or are they facing charges for going with Michael Moore?

Ah, irony. I could spend the whole day finding examples. Yesterday internet radio played nothing but silence in protest of the RIAA’s draconian royalties system, and I forgot to listen.

But this brings up something – how do I decide what to rant about? Well usually it’s the thing that makes me angriest that the most obvious point has been lost. Sometimes people catch up, such as how Patrick Leahey issues subpoenas for sizable chunks of the current administration to talk about warrant-less and unwarranted spying. Sometimes it’s so goofball that you shake your head to understand it – such as Alberto Gonzales today moving a public press conference to a private office to avoid the public, and then to commend the location he just abandoned.

But let’s go to something more basic for today – the idea of the conservative movement that the country needs to be brought to a “Judeo/Christian” set of values. Although I’m an atheist, I was raised Christian. There are members of my family who are Jewish. I pretty much understand that “Judeo/Christian” is used as buzzwords these days for the pushing of the far rights evangelical agenda, but can we examine a basic truth here? I’ve never liked how these people have hijacked the idea that religion should be used to push a single agenda, but I want to look at a basic concept: what is right about that agenda?

Here’s I’m actually going to quote Rudy Gulianni – “You can't possibly describe Judeo-Christian values in one lesson or two or three, but if there was one, it would probably be Jesus' admonition that you would be judged based on how you treat others…” Never mind for a moment that the three “great” religions view Jesus’ teachings quite differently, the basic premise I think stands. You can be judged on how you treat others. There are basic concepts you can derive from this – do unto others, be kind, be patient, seek justice, be just…

I will admit that I’m no expert, but aren’t these basic ideas also Islamic values? Aren’t they also Buddhist values? Toaist? Face it, how many religions are there out there whose basic tenant is to fuck over everyone else? The terrorists we have come to fear so much (thank you so much Mr. Cheney’s-hand-up-his-ass)are extremist Muslims. The Ku Klux Klan (also terrorists, I should point out) are extremist Christians. You cannot judge a society’s values by the extremists – extreme people get in the news while mainstream ones do not, but that does not make them representative. Hell, just showing up on television makes you a rarity. Mainstream people don’t stick out – and as such generally aren’t newsworthy.

So isn’t simply saying “Judeo/Christian” being racist?

I think we should eliminate that little phrase out of our national vocabulary. I know that it won’t happen, but I find it a bit amusing and a lot alarming that most of the people who spout those words as a mantra/code for the strict way they want things done would be scared to death – to the point of considering the KKK as a serious alternative – if a Jew (the “Judeo” part of that phrase) were the leader of the U.S. I can remember how clearly Jerry Falwell waffled when Larry King asked him in 1983, “I’m a Jew. Am I going to hell?” Face it - these people aren’t comfortable with any view that isn’t their own.

So I’m going to leave you with a bit of humor that isn’t mine, but rather that of Brooke McEldowney – the creator of the comic strips 9 Chickweed Lane and Pibgorn from his occasional strips entitled “A Locutionary Guide to Planet Earth (The Hard Little Planet With The Soft Center)”:

Tolerance (noun): The implicit affirmation that there is something about nearly everybody else that must be tolerated. 

Oh, and let’s throw in another one for fun:

God: Ours. A God: Theirs. 

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6/26/07 – I must quote today, because I could not possibly be more eloquent

First off, an apology. I have a great post for yesterday below about who I plan to support in 2008, but I seem to have forgotten to post it. Arrgh. So today’s post and yesterday’s are below. Sorry about that.

I’m going to quote from Tim Grieve’s excellent War Room column from Salon.com, the following two parargraphs (hyperlinks and all – italics mine):

Rep. Rahm Emanuel on Dick Cheney's argument that he's exempt from an executive order on the safeguarding of classified documents on the ground that his office is part of the legislative branch rather than the executive branch: Fine, but then there's no need for all that executive branch funding that goes to the office of the vice president.

Emanuel says he'll introduce a budget amendment this week that would limit funding for Cheney's office to the legislative branch money the vice president gets as president of the Senate. It isn't much, Emanuel acknowledges. But at least this way, he says, Congress can "ensure that the vice president's funding is consistent with his legal arguments."

I love Rahm Emanuel. At least I do today. How much more beautiful can it get? Cheney says “Fuck You” and Rep. Rahm says “Fuck You Back.”

How can I possibly improve upon that?

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6/25/07 – Who I will vote for in 2008

Retired Generals Robert Gard and John Johns are asking congress to do something that they did already a couple of years back – ban torture.  They did actually pass a bill banning the use of torture. It was spearheaded by a man who knows something about torture; Senator John McCain – a man who was tortured himself during his time as a Prisoner of War during Vietnam (it doesn’t qualify him to be President, but it sure as hell makes him a hero). President Mama’s Boy signed the bill, outlawing torture. Then he did something a bit extra – he added a signing statement that in effect says “I can ignore this if I feel like it.” (See December 20, 2005 note below in this same post. Ibid)

Yeah, fuck you Senator McCain – that’s what Bush II is saying here. It actually looks like he’s still trying to defeat him in the 2000 primary. Remember? Bush called you insane back then by insinuating that the torture you suffered made you unqualified for President. And you trusted him?

Signing statements are perhaps the most jack-assed thing to come out of the executive branch in the most recent times. I don’t give a rat’s ass that it’s been used for the past 4 administrations (which is true – Clinton did it. So did Bush I and Reagan). Bush has signed more than 10,000% more than every single other president combined. And the purpose of all these statements? To say that he has the right to disregard any law by whatever means he deems necessary.

No wonder he never vetoed anything. It’s a very slanted view of governance – like saying that the Vice President’s office is part of the legislative branch instead of the executive. Apparently Cheney never took civics in high school – or he failed the course.

Signing statements aren’t in the constitution. Go ahead and try to find them. I’ll wait. Their sole purpose is to subvert the checks and balances the framers of this country established over 2 centuries ago. Congress passes a law, and the President decides to either enact or veto said law. No line item veto, either a thumbs up or down. That’s the way it has been, and for the most part it works. Pretty much every president has asked for the ability to do what many Governors can do – cross out specific provisions of a bill before they sign it; i.e. a line-item veto. President Can’t Enunciate has given us pretty much every reason to never allow for any such thing with his use and abuse of signing statements.

Here’s a few examples (thanks to Tinsel Wing for grabbing this from the Boston Globe – I corrected some spelling mistakes – shame on you Boston Globe):

March 9, 2006: Justice Department officials must give reports to Congress by certain dates on how the FBI is using the USA Patriot Act to search homes and secretly seize papers.
Bush's signing statement: The president can order Justice Department officials to withhold any information from Congress if he decides it could impair national security or executive branch operations.

Dec. 30, 2005: US interrogators cannot torture prisoners or otherwise subject them to cruel, inhuman, and degrading treatment.
Bush's signing statement: The president, as commander in chief, can waive the torture ban if he decides that harsh interrogation techniques will assist in preventing terrorist attacks.

Dec. 30: When requested, scientific information "prepared by government researchers and scientists shall be transmitted [to Congress] uncensored and without delay."
Bush's signing statement: The president can tell researchers to withhold any information from Congress if he decides its disclosure could impair foreign relations, national security, or the workings of the executive branch.

Aug. 8: The Department of Energy, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and its contractors may not fire or otherwise punish an employee whistle-blower who tells Congress about possible wrongdoing.
Bush's signing statement: The president or his appointees will determine whether employees of the Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission can give information to Congress.

Dec. 23, 2004: Forbids US troops in Colombia from participating in any combat against rebels, except in cases of self-defense. Caps the number of US troops allowed in Colombia at 800.
Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can place restrictions on the use of US armed forces, so the executive branch will construe the law "as advisory in nature."

Dec. 17: The new national intelligence director shall recruit and train women and minorities to be spies, analysts, and translators in order to ensure diversity in the intelligence community.
Bush's signing statement: The executive branch shall construe the law in a manner consistent with a constitutional clause guaranteeing "equal protection" for all. (In 2003, the Bush administration argued against race-conscious affirmative-action programs in a Supreme Court case. The court rejected Bush's view.)

Oct. 29: Defense Department personnel are prohibited from interfering with the ability of military lawyers to give independent legal advice to their commanders.
Bush's signing statement: All military attorneys are bound to follow legal conclusions reached by the administration's lawyers in the Justice Department and the Pentagon when giving advice to their commanders.

Aug. 5: The military cannot add to its files any illegally gathered intelligence, including information about Americans obtained in violation of the Fourth Amendment's protection against unreasonable searches.
Bush's signing statement: Only the president, as commander in chief, can tell the military whether or not it can use any specific piece of intelligence.

Nov. 6, 2003: US officials in Iraq cannot prevent an inspector general for the Coalition Provisional Authority from carrying out any investigation. The inspector general must tell Congress if officials refuse to cooperate with his inquiries.
Bush's signing statement: The inspector general "shall refrain" from investigating anything involving sensitive plans, intelligence, national security, or anything already being investigated by the Pentagon. The inspector cannot tell Congress anything if the president decides that disclosing the information would impair foreign relations, national security, or executive branch operations.

Nov. 5, 2002: Creates an Institute of Education Sciences whose director may conduct and publish research "without the approval of the secretary [of education] or any other office of the department."
Bush's signing statement: The president has the power to control the actions of all executive branch officials, so "the director of the Institute of Education Sciences shall [be] subject to the supervision and direction of the secretary of education."

Basic bottom line: I can do what ever the fuck I want and to hell with all of you. I especially love the one where the President is allowed to decide that a law is “advisory in nature”.  And there’s the other Dec. 30 note that says in essence that scientific research can be withheld for political purposes. When I was growing up we had a word for people like that – Sunofabitch. The good news is that our current president will eventually be gone. But the precedent has been set – use signing statements to do whatever the hell you want to do.

So I tell you what. While at this precise moment I have not made a decision as to whom I plan to vote for I will say this: I will support the first candidate of my party who will commit to asking congress to outlaw signing statements. And if no candidate of my party will do so, then I will commit to the first candidate PERIOD who will do so. Even if I disagree with everything else that candidate says. Because we need to restore the most basic and guiding principle our government has ever had – checks and balances.

Anything else is treason.

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6/21/07 – Stem Cell Research and the 1% Doctrine

I have to ask, what the hell is the big deal about using Stem Cells for research? I can honestly say that I’ve never fully understood President Crusader’s whole fascination with the concept that federal funds cannot/should not be used for this sort of research. It simply does not make sense to me.

Now let’s define a few things – first, I can understand arguments that I do not agree with. A well reasoned, well supported argument that goes against everything that I believe is still one that can be understood. I don’t agree that ethanol is going to save our asses, for example, but I do understand the appeal and desire of it. But an argument made upon a false premise or a false hope simply does not compute, and on this issue I can use Bush’s own logic to make him seem like an asshole. Oh, and another thing to define – what stem cells are; they are abandoned cells from embryos that without any other sound usage will be discarded. They are embryonic little match girls.

The whole argument is that we will not use federal funds to support the destruction of the potential of human life. The exact same argument that the anti-abortion freaks use. However, unlike the anti-abortion argument, this one holds no water at all. The cells in question are going to be destroyed anyway. Are you saying that any way other than medical research is going to be a more humane way to destroy cells that weren’t going to become people in the first place? Dude, when I had to have my thyroid removed I donated it to science, and it had a lot more cells than a stem cell chain.

But let’s stick to the argument. Because of the potential – the small possibility of life, we cannot support destroying it. I wonder how he feels about animal testing? Anyway, this is a fairly consistent philosophy on the part of President Crusader. He went to war in two separate countries based upon the very idea that we need to strike out at terrorists first because there is the potential – the small possibility – that they will try to kill us. It’s called the 1% Doctrine, and I believe that it was Cheney and his gang of li’l rascals that first put it out there. If there is even only a 1% chance that these people might attack us, we absolutely MUST attack them first.

You could also call it the Lottery Theory for the same sort of likelihood, but that’s just mean. Hey, there’s a 1% chance I could eventually develop lung cancer because my father smoked, so I am now hereby justified in destroying every tobacco company on the planet. Please people, that’s just nuts.

But let’s assume for a second that it’s not nuts. I say that if these embryos were allowed to germinate, grow and become people, there’s a 1% chance that one of them might become a terrorist. You can’t disprove that, can you!

Nearly the entire argument of the 1% theory is backed up by the whole concept that you cannot disprove it. Anyone who has taken a civics class (which should be all of you out there) can tell the rest of you that this doesn’t actually prove your case. It’s why people are innocent until PROVEN guilty. Can you imagine some prosecutor (played by Eric Idle in the movie) walking up to the judge and/or jury and proclaiming for the world to see, “You can’t prove he didn’t do it, no can you?”

He has no bucket.

Nope – one of the basic principles of this nation is that you must PROVE guilt. You must make your case. You shouldn’t govern by “what if”. But Bush et al have made this a guiding principle of their government since 9/12/01. Remember how before then all we had to worry about was whether or not the Vice was in cahoots with big energy?

Anyway, under my colliery to Bush’s theory of why you cannot destroy stem cells, you absolutely must destroy them all. That 1% chance and everything. And why not take that one more step – just like we do with our political prisoners – and torture them too? Donate their zygotes and plasma for scientific research?

I bet that if you take this argument to him you can make him stammer. Or choke on a Pretzel.

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6/20/07 – Tony Snow is not one of the cool kids

As I don’t watch Fox News ever (of the two fake news channels out there Fox is the least funny) I never saw Tony Snow when he worked as a reporter/anchorman/lying son of a bitch. So I have no real idea if he acted the same way on television as he now does as the Mouthpiece of President Recovering Alcoholic… on television. But dear god man, Bill Clinton has been out of office for 6 ½ years now. Not even his fecal matter left in the White House septic tank is still around. Stop saying its okay for you to do things because Bill did them! Or didn’t do them! Or keep on blaming him!

What I’m talking about here is the fact that it appears that a lot of governing has been done over the last 78 months via e-mail. On servers that do not belong to the government, but in fact belong to the Republic Party. Yeah, I shortened the name on purpose to piss off Limbaugh. I use the word “apparently” because a lot of these e-mails have been destroyed. And the defense out of the off-white house? Bill did it too! Ahem, the “previous administration” did it.

Um, I’m kind of curious. Is he saying that it’s okay because the cool kids did it?

Actually, Bill didn’t do it too, and had his Chief of Staff circulate a memo telling everyone not to use personal or political accounts for government work, but who’s quibbling? Tony probably got a lot of practice lying back in his Fox days. He said that they had all these separate accounts in order to separate political from government work, so that the Hatch Act wouldn’t be violated.

The Hatch Act is named after Orrin Hatch, one of the Conservative leaders of the Senate and he’s been there for a very long time now. He sponsored the act to keep politicking out of government – sort of – after the Republicans first came back to power. You can’t campaign from the White House, you can’t solicit for money from there. Etcetera. I’m not a big fan of Hatch’s politics, but I have to admire his ethical standards on this issue. And he’s that increasingly rare politician who can be friends with people he disagrees with. He and Ted Kennedy are quite close on a personal level. Not that close – only Kennedy has a home in Massachusetts.

Anyway, there’s a hound dog of a politician named Henry Waxman (full disclosure – I lived in his district 15 years ago and voted for him) who now chairs a committee looking into whether or not the Hatch Act has been violated. So using the check and balances that a congress is supposed to have and use (and hasn’t for 6 years) he wants to see the trail of communications just to verify that everything is okay. The way this used to be done is that all relevant documents to the investigation would be turned over to congress. Paper trails, phone records, printed out e-mails. That seems easy, doesn’t it? When it comes to the e-mails just go to the White House servers and do a data dump – and take the discs to Kinkos. Actually, I would bet the White House has a bitchin’ copy room.

And now for the bad news. It appears that a sizable amount of communication happened on e-mail accounts that didn’t belong to the U.S. Government. They’re on Gmail, Yahoo, and The Republican National Committee’s servers instead. Or they were. According to the records so far released, Karl Rove alone had over 146,000 e-mails on the RNC servers. And I thought my spam filter sucked.

And many of those e-mails are now gone. Hmm… isn’t there a crime against destroying evidence?

It seems inconceivable to me that some of those e-mail did not have something to do with the day to day working of our government. It also seems ludicrous to me that at least a few of these e-mails weren’t fund-raising solicitations or official RNC business instead, sent out from the White House on non-White House accounts. Henry Waxman wants to verify this – he wants to know if the law has been violated, which is his JOB.

And the defense? We’re not doing anything different than what Bill did. A lie, but he still said it. Okay, I call bullshit on this one.

My dad, when he was in high school, rode a motorcycle into a library. To this day I can easily picture it even though if he were still alive he would be in his 70s now. He didn’t get in trouble for it because friends of his basically covered for him. Now, should I expect to be able to do the exact same thing because my father got away with it?

I don’t think there has ever been a judge or jury anywhere in America that let someone get away with a crime just because that person believes that someone who came before him also got away with that same crime. If there is, let me know so I can grab my motorcycle.

And someone in the press please start calling out Tony Snow for the lying little lemming that he really is. He really isn’t one of the cool kids.

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6/19/07 – And now, Ms. Clinton

Being a liberal and a proud Democrat, you would think that I believe that having Hillary Clinton in the race is a great thing. I was raised by my mom and freely admit that I favor a feminist agenda. She’s smart, quick, and formidable. And she doesn’t stand a chance in hell of becoming President.

Ms. Clinton (and I’m going to try to avoid calling her just Hillary – we don’t refer to Obama as Barak, or Edwards as John) has the same problem that Bob Dole, John Kerry, and just about anyone else who has run for the office and lost on the national level has – she isn’t very likable. At least her public persona isn’t.

It’s a fucked up thing, but every leader I can remember from Jimmy Carter on got elected because he was likeable. Jimmy before his first term had that smile, while Ford was still hurting from his association with Nixon. Reagan had oodles of charm despite his countless flaws – something I know first hand as I met him in 1988. Bush the first was kind of a limp plant, but he wasn’t Mondale and people still associated him with Reagan. Bill Clinton…. man… he could sell ice to an Eskimo. The “Slick Willy” appellation was well deserved.

And do you remember the ads from when Georgy Boy was running against Gore? Who would you rather sit down and have a beer with? Never mind that President Cheerleader is a recovering alcoholic and reportedly a mean drunk.

Ah…. Why couldn’t Gore have won Tennessee? THAT’S why he didn’t become President – he didn’t win his home state. Screw the Florida crap.

Ms. Clinton can easily win the Democratic nomination. I don’t see that as being too far-fetched. She has strong ideas and has done her homework, and very few in the current crown of Democratic contenders can electrify a crowd that she already has in her hands. Obama can, and so can Edwards. But Mike Gravel? Come on!

(On a side note, have you seen that bizarre ad he’s running now on the intertubes? Script by David Lynch? Directed by Woody Allen from the early 1980s? Watch it turn out that he threw that rock on a fish, killing it.)

The problem becomes her image on a national level, and as much as it dismays me the Democrats alone are not enough for Ms. Clinton to win should she get the nomination. Same is true for whomever (cough*Thomspon*cough) gets the Republican nomination. There will be ground that will need to be gained on either side, and here Ms. Clinton’s personality will work against her.

She comes across as superwoman – a stereotype propagated long ago by men threatened by the rising power of women. She can be the loving wife, she can be the CEO, she can be smarter than me, but she must be a bitch to do so. Doesn’t matter if that’s true or not – it’s about perception.

Regardless of what you think of the woman, her accomplishments, her style, let me ask you one simple question: would you want her as your Mother-in-law?

That pause before your answer tells me (and you) all you need to know.

Al Gore couldn’t overcome the idea that he’s a stiff, despite good oratorical skills, a sense of humor, and a family that obviously adores him. John Kerry couldn’t overcome the position of being someone who waffles, despite the fact that he said the same things in his first and last speeches of the campaign. Perception drive much in modern politics, and the perception that we’ve had in this country for over 30 years that a strong woman must also be a bitch is a hard one to overcome. For now, I’m not sure it can be overcome. Men get to be tough and rugged. Women are bitches.

It isn’t right, but it is what it is. A woman must walk a fine (and nearly invisible) line in this society to be perceived as strong and unthreatening – to men. And men just don’t shut up. And men own the networks. And men hold a disproportionate number of positions of power.

And I don’t think an ad comparing her to Tony Soprano is going to help. Although I liked the ad. But the JOURNEY song should have been the campaign song, not a Celine Dion tune. And isn’t she Canadian?

Enough side-bars.

I would love to be wrong about this one. I just don’t think I am.

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6/14/07 – Stepping up to the plate

As in Baseball. I’m going to take a self-imposed one day break from politics and talk about a subject that I will admit I’m no expert about: Baseball. Specifically, Barry Bonds and the fact that some time in the next month or so he will probably become the all-time leader in Home Runs.

I want him to get that record. I’m a supporter on this one. I don’t give a rat’s ass about whether or not he used steroids. Already some of you are saying that it’s only because I’m a Giant’s fan – after all, I do live in San Francisco. For the record, although I have been to a few games, I am not a Giants fan. My team is the Diei Hawks in Japan.

When I was a kid I bled Dodger blue. I grew up around Los Angeles, and we had the great combo of Steve Garvey, Davey Lopes, and Ron Cey. These guys were personalities. They played well. I have fond memories of the day that Davey Lopes hit a ground rule double that bounced directly over my head in the stands. I ate Dodger dogs. I listened to Vin Scully.

But I was never a good player myself and eventually the draw of the sport lagged for me because of the lack of action in baseball. Think about it – a perfect game is one where one team never gets on base. In high school I discovered Basketball (just in time for the Lakers glory days, and Chick Hearn at the microphone) and then Hockey and I discarded baseball altogether. Later, when Fox bought the Dodgers, they ruined the team and I never saw a reason to go back.

But now I have a son of my own, and he enjoys baseball thanks to the arrival of players like Ichiro – a man who will swing at anything and will often connect. We don’t have any of those players on the Giants, but we do have Bonds. And Bonds is larger than life. Love him or hate him, he’s larger than life. He’s a personality, which baseball today has very few of.

Lots of people hate him and think that his record will be tainted, because of steroid use. But you know something, despite all the allegations he’s never been suspended for it, never been arrested for it, and despite what appears on the surface to be actual usage of body enhancing chemicals he hasn’t actually broken any of the rules of Baseball. At least as they existed at the time.

Let’s look back, shall we, at the other records. Babe Ruth was the standard for ages, and it’s well acknowledged now that he often played drunk. He was just a gifted slugger. I can remember when Hank Aaron broke the Babe’s record – I actually watched the game with my father. Do you remember that there were some idiots who complained about Aaron being able to set the record because he was black? At least we’ve gotten beyond THAT nonsense – at least where this is concerned. They also were saying things like that if the Babe played when Aaron did he would have had even more home runs, and that if Aaron had played when Babe did that he would have hit fewer. Never mind that in the black leagues of the Babe’s day the record for home runs was over 800.

It’s all a load of crap and here’s why – hitting home runs is HARD TO DO. Watch a home run in slow motion some time and see if you could do it. The batter has to commit to his swing when the ball is still about 40 feet away, approaching him at 90 miles per hour. Let’s do some math… that’s about .3 seconds to commit to and make the swing. Less than 1/2 of a second. Try doing it yourself.

I could take all the steroids in the world, exercise and get my body into perfect shape, and just for fun take 20 years off my age (although I’m younger than Barry by a few months). I couldn’t do it. I could never do it. Babe could do it drunk, Aaron could do it well, Bonds can do it with help that nearly everyone uses… that’s 3 out of how many pros now? 3 out of how many people who play the game on ANY level?

All of us have our specialties in life. Barry Bonds’ just happens to be smacking the living hell out of a baseball hurled at him at top speed. I can’t think of any good reason to deny that.

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6/13/07 – If The Shoe Were On The Other Foot…

You know, there are a lot of people who believe President Uplifted Chimp (with most sincere apologies to David Brin… but come on, just look at the man!) should have unlimited power to imprison “enemy combatants” in the war of terror. The 4^th Circuit Court says otherwise.

Prez: I has Enemy Combatants!

The Circuit: No you does not.

Prez: Enemy Combatants gets no trials!

The Circuit: No lunch for you.

Okay, look. I want us to be able to fight terrorism as much as the next guy. I knew someone who worked for the New York Port Authority on 9/11/2001. She never got out of the building. But I have said nearly every day since then that if we go the route that President Ook Ook and his supporters want to go down then the terrorists win. The whole idea that ANYONE can be held without the right to counsel, charges, trial, or anything else that makes up habeus corpus is so anti-American that I personally believe that the Chimpinator is a traitor.

But let’s set that all aside for a moment or two. Only for that long though, because the above should be point enough. However…

How many of these self-righteous Turds would be defending the President’s right to do whatever the fuck he wants to do if Al Gore were President? Or John Kerry? Or Bill Clinton?

Don’t try to kid either me or yourselves that you have the interests of the country at heart when you defend the right to deny due process. This is about a naked grab for power. Now excuse me for a moment while I wash my eyes at the mere thought of some of these people naked. Eww.

Okay, better now. The point being that I cannot imagine under any circumstances anyone on this planet wanting to give say… oh, I don’t know… ME… these same powers. I’m smarter than our current Prez (and have the grades/l33t skillz to back that up) but I’m pretty sure that having that much power would make me into (Church Lady Voice) SATAN! Even if I had Stephen Hawking-like mental skills I wouldn’t deserve such powers. It’s just not how it’s done in this country.

To paraphrase George Washington, we do not want a King.

Something that always comes to mind whenever these people got on their high horse about the trampling of the basic rights and privileges that make America so great, usually in the guise of National Security. That great Ben Franklin quote: “Those who deny liberty for the sake of freedom deserve neither”. Or something like that. Maybe the reverse. I’m too lazy to google it but the main gist is there, and if Ben Franklin didn’t say it then feel free to quote ME. Are these people going to continue to act this way with a Democratic President? Bet you $100,000 that they don’t. (And on the off chance that I’m completely wrong I’m betting the candy bar, not the money, but I think my candy is safe.)

We have political prisoners – something I had hoped I would never see in this country. Very few of them are on U.S. soil (does Guantanamo count as U.S. soil? If so then I need to revise that slightly) but they are all being held without trial. In order to redeem ourselves to ourselves, not to mention a chunk of the outside world, we need to either press charges and have public trials, like everyone else gets, or we need to let these people go. I sincerely hope that the next President we get does that.

I have heard as a counter argument to this that people in the Muslim world will see any trials as show trials, so why bother? My answer to this: what the fuck is wrong with you? We’re going to base our legal system upon what other people think of us? Are you THAT insecure? How the hell do any of these people breed? How do they even get dates? She/he won’t like me – I can see it in her/his eyes!

Please, people.

Now comes the objection about revealing classified information. Trickier, I must admit, but oddly enough we have experts for that – they’re called judges. We should do American jurisprudence the way we have always done it. Judge, jury, in open court. Let qualified judges worry about what to do with the classified stuff – that’s their job! I would bet some things come out that the government doesn’t want out, but I would bet that anything truly harmful to National Security would stay secret. I have some amount of faith in our legal system. It ain’t perfect, but it will do.

And you know what? The Republic will survive this crisis should we as a nation go back to doing things the American way. But if this shit continues it won’t, and the Visigoths and Vandals are waiting.

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6/8/07 – The Anti-Non-Christian Agenda

I read fark.com often. I love it. I find many links funny. I find several ironic. Two of my own posts have shown up there. But I really love it when the flamewars begin over “controversial” issues. For example – Christian parents in a school district in Albamarle County, Virginia, are up in arms because a rule they pushed through forcing the schools to allow them to use the school envelopes to send home their own private messages are also being used by non-christians, atheists and pagans to do the exact same thing, under the exact same rules.

I was reading through the forum comments on the piece and there were two great cartoons and a quote from Gandhi. I’ll put the Gandhi quote at the end of the article, but I’ll put the cartoons here. These are not my cartoons, and I do not own the rights to them. If someone can tell me where they came from I’ll happily try to get permission, and if the owners ask me to take them down I will.

I really love that first one, and the second one is a good illustration of the point I’m going to make. I also tend to hear the voice of Michael Palin in that speech balloon.

Bill O’Rielley (sp) loves to talk about the war on Christianity. Rush Limbaugh does it, Trent Lott does it, lots of others as well. I’m sure you’ve seen/heard some of them. Well, I’m an atheist and I have nothing against the Christians. Or any other religion for that matter. I have not declared any sort of war and am happy to have us all live in peace.

So why have they all declared war on me? On Rabbi Shulman? On Kareem Abdul-Jabbar? On John Travolta? All of us are non-Christians. And these people who believe we are attacking them are doing the infamous Cheney Doctrine – if there’s even the slightest change that we’ll be attacked, we’re going to attack first.

Do you see any of us attempting to foist our agendas (or lack thereof) on you and your families? So why do you insist that you must do exactly this to us?

These people want the 10 commandments in our courtrooms – a few of them want them made into law (I would love to know how they plan to enforce the “covet” commandments – not everyone has a myspace page). These people want prayer in schools – and not just the “please God don’t let me fail” kind either. They don’t want Rosie O’Donnell to get married. They don’t want you to have an abortion – as if they were available at 7-11. They don’t want you to look at the abstract art on the cover of two different Metallica albums (10 points to the first person to understand the reference). They’d rather you didn’t listen to them either, although that agenda isn’t being pushed so much these days.

I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.
---Mohandas Gandhi

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6/7/07 Scooter Libby becomes someone’s bitch…

Wishful thinking. Doubt it will happen. He’s already Cheney’s bitch. The only thing I feel sorry for him about is the fact that he has that name. I can just picture it now from some huge alpha in prison: “Scooter? That’s close to cooter! Yer purty!”

But the prison sentence is perfectly appropriate. 30 months. 2 ½ years. I am so cool with that, and so should the Law And Order (bum bum) party. Shame on you, Fred Thompson – apparently you only play a man who respects the law/legal process on TV.

Scooter has been found guilty. ‘nuff said. So why should anyone find any sympathy towards him? Why are all these people asking that he be granted clemency? Pardoned? Aren’t these the same fucks who think it’s okay for a man to go to prison for 25 years for stealing a pizza slice? Mandatory sentencing should apply only to someone who isn’t their friend?

Please, girlfriend, please.

There’s even talk out there now that the Deciderist should pardon him now, with his popularity rating in the sub-basement, if for no other reason than that things simply couldn’t be any WORSE.

In this country the way it’s supposed to work is innocent until proven guilty. I dislike Scooter Libby and virtually every thing he stands for, but unlike many of my liberal friends until the verdict came in I refused to pass judgment. I’ve been a juror before in a trial that made it into the media and I can tell you from this experience that what you see in the news is a tiny fraction of the evidence presented. You cannot judge someone’s guilt or innocence from news reports – it’s simply unfair.

Just because I believe/think that he’s guilty, and even that I want him to be guilty, doesn’t actually make it so. It might look bad, but that’s still not guilt. Think about that when you talk about Libby and Louisiana rep William Jefferson. Regarding Jefferson it looks bad – real bad – I mean resign your office and get your ass out of congress bad - but what the hell do I know? My information only comes from the news.

However, once found guilty the rules are different. Guilty is guilty. Guilty is a whole different game. Convicted. Judged by your peers and found wanting. 12 non-partisan people and a judge have weighed the evidence, and they have decided. There are different rules. In many states in our Republic people like Scooter cannot vote or hold public office. Unless the conviction is overturned on appeal, you’re Guilty. Even a pardon means you’re guilty – just forgiven.

So now the pleading comes that “oh, it wasn’t THAT bad a crime.” I call bullshit here. If you’re going to be all “Law And Order (bum bum)” about this sort of thing then consistency matters. If a guy goes to jail for 25 years for being hungry then Scooter can deal with 30 months (and probably a hell of a lot less with good behavior). But let’s look at the whole severity of the crime.

Scooter wasn’t convicted of outing a CIA agent, even though that is the whole crux of the matter. As sad as it is, no one has been convicted of that and it’s quite likely that no one ever will. Scooter was convicted of LYING under oath. The same thing the Republicans actually impeached a President for. I’d like you to compare outing a CIA agent to getting a blow job. Lying about which is worse? And don’t ask Hilary, she won’t be impartial about it – she’s one of only 3 people on the whole planet with that right.

I present to you that outing a CIA agent is worse. Now the argument has been made that Valerie Plame wasn’t actually a covert agent. Two questions then; why does the CIA itself define her as such (before her outing at any rate)? And even if it is known that she works for the CIA couldn’t certain aspects of her job be covert? It’s not like the CIA is going to tell anyone.

Ah, and there lies the heart of the matter. How do any of these people KNOW that she wasn’t convert? Other than the moment she was outed by non-CIA personnel no one has actually discussed the specifics of her job. And they won’t. Can’t. Because she worked for the friggin’ CIA for crying out loud!

And can we all notice that until names were named about who leaked the information that everyone – including The Deciderer – was up in arms (that means pissed off) that this had even happened? It wasn’t until it became clear that the information came from somewhere in Cheney’s office that people started backpedaling. It’s a crime! Off with their heads! Oh, it was done by a friend of mine?

To quote Emily Loutella (i.e. the great Gilda Radner): “Never mind.”

Fucking Hypocrites.

One final note – Scooter isn’t a pretty blonde heiress/celebrity. No get out of jail free card for you. (Although personally, I think Paris Hilton is ugly as sin – but that’s a matter of personal taste, not common sense, so I’ll let you have that one).

UPDATE (6/8/07): Well, they ordered Paris Hilton back to prison. She went kicking and screaming. There are Rabbis all over West Los Angeles saying, “See? See? God DOES have a sense of humor!!!” I may be an atheist but I can’t help but smile at that one.

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6/6/07 Iraq: Support the troops, because it hasn’t happened yet.

Some people out there right now think that there’s a pretzel in that headline. For all the talk Republicans and many Democrats have done about supporting the troops, none of them have actually done it yet. The Republicans own the argument that “support” means more money for the fighting in Iraq. It’s a false argument to be sure, but we’ve done a lot of funding now and because of the continued funding they own the argument right now. They own it so handily that a Democratic congress elected with a mandate from the people to Stop The War™ caved because they didn’t want to be seen as not supporting the troops. Any time Jon Stewart can shame you by simply telling the truth you know you’ve done something wrong.

Idiots.

You want a simple way to support the troops? A simple way to take the issue back? Speaker Pelosi, I’ll give you this one for free because I live in your district. Here it is, all boldened up: restore every benefit/program that the administration of Bush II has cut for soldiers and veterans. I’m sure that one of your staffers has a list.

Bush et al have done a lot to cut benefits for soldiers and veterans. He’s cut money for families left home while their soldiers are overseas. He’s cut benefits for survivors. He’s cut medical care. Simply restore all of them in a single bill as a supplemental spending initiative as a show of support for the troops. Democrats are supposed to be the spending party, so why not take advantage of that? Dare President Motherfucker to veto it. After all, he supports the troops.

King George III (I have lots of nicknames for The Worst President in our Nation’s History – I plan to use as many of them as I can – I find nicknames to be disrespectful and I suppose it’s why he uses them so much) can’t veto such a bill because he would be vetoing an initiative that supports the troops. And should it pass it might actually do something to support the troops, which in reality seems to be a novel concept. The shrinking number of WWII vets out there can tell you just how important this could be.

Getting sick of the boldface yet?

There’s another thing that the Democrats need to re-define and I admit it will be tougher to do. The Bush Administration has defined the argument in such a way that any pull out from Iraq will be an admission of Defeat in the war. That argument is a load of crap, but again he owns the argument.

We went to war in Iraq (based on false information) to remove Saddam Hussein from power and install a democracy. Guess what gang? We actually did that. We won the fucking war!!!!!

There is no war in Iraq; only fighting. Fighting in a political/religious language we barely comprehend. And fighting is the kind of thing that is almost impossible to withdraw from without putting your tail between your legs. Vietnam taught us that. We will have to withdraw some day and for the sake of the lives of American Soldiers the sooner the better. There is no good way to do it. Again, Vietnam showed that.

I suppose there are some people who are worried that Iraq will leave the same scars that Vietnam did should we pull out. There will be scars – of that I have no doubt – but not the scars of Vietnam. I’m old enough to remember Vietnam. There were vets living in my neighborhood where I grew up. And the scars of Vietnam were about blaming the troops for what happened over there. Okay, that’s a gross over-simplification but in any event I simply don’t see that happening here. After all, we support the troops.

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The First Post

So here I am. My name is Chris Reed; and I am a Liberal. I wear a Scarlet “L” on my shirt, and I actually LIVE in Nancy Pelosi’s district – which has been a disappointment lately. I had thought about doing this anonymously but it’s not like any of you out there reading this actually know me… probably… (Wow – I just heard the big empty echo on the internet!) Besides, I believe in taking credit for your own words.

Anyway, welcome to whatthefuckiswrongwithyou.org, also known as WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU DOT ORG!!!! (not to be confused with the “dot com” version that is run by someone else)

This space is going to be for ranting. Venom. Diatribe. It will be from a distinctly liberal viewpoint but don’t think that anyone is safe from my venting. I despise what “Republicans” have done to our country for the past 5 years, but “Democrats” have been complicit. This place is going to be political. Usually.

My plan is to divide this place into types of topics, eventually. War, terrorism, smart people doing stupid things, the law, elections, people in the news, and some others as I think of them, but mostly it will be about common sense – the lack of which has become frightening. Mostly I will be speaking on what I think is wrong with some topic or presentation of a topic. Eventually I’ll open up a forum for you to add your thoughts – not right away because I want to get my rhythm down. I’ll try to read all posts when they come but I don’t promise to respond to any; especially the anonymous ones. And if no one reads then you damned kids get off my lawn!!!

And no, I’m not giving you my e-mail address. The reason for that should be obvious by the time you finish reading this post.

And if I don’t make someone angry with every post, then I haven’t fulfilled my mission. For the record, my hero when it comes to this is columnist Ted Rall – especially when I don’t agree with him. I believe in questioning EVERYTHING.

This is NOT a blog, although it certainly looks like one. Acts like one, smells like one, a rose by any other name… It’s an opinion column that I publish myself. I don’t have a regular schedule for this yet but plan to have one. I used to blog. About 12 years ago I had a website called “The Daily Rant”. It was a good website. It featured an American flag with the words “The Daily Rant” spray-painted on it in black. A few people noticed it and it was fun to have a dialogue with people – even those who didn’t agree with me. Then came the “Iced-tea Post” and the deluge that it brought simply amazed me. It was the first time I had ever received death threats. I became so disgusted with the human race that I just stopped. I shut the web site down. If I had stuck it out I might be an internet celeb by now – I started early after all - but I bet you that I would have hated that.

I don’t apologize for that post, which I am recreating below, and I never will. To me it was just a post that explains global warming to all those morons who notice record snow storms and say that global warming is a myth. But the HATE it generated is something I still do not understand and probably never will.

I’ll tackle Iraq and give you a viewpoint I’ve never seen another soul express in print in my first “official” post, but for now, here is the “Iced-Tea Post”, from 1995. You can tell the age by the use of the word “didiot”. I never listen to Rush Limbaugh and never will – do people still use that term? Geeze, I’m getting old…

I’ll add a final comment after. Enjoy!

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The Iced-Tea Theory: Global Warming for Dummies

Every winter lately it happens; a huge ice storm or snow storm hits somewhere in the U.S. or Europe and someone out there (usually a didiot but congressmen and humans too) proclaims with a loud hollow thump on their chest “Global Warming Is A Myth”. You can actually hear that person using capital letters as if they didn’t take English in high school. There is scattered applause and when no one stands up to refute them they repeat the claim – even though it is 100% wrong.

These storms/cold weather actually PROVES that global warming is real. For those of you who took science classes in high school and college this can be fairly well reasoned out. For the rest of you (or for those of you who have forgotten those days of your misspent youth – and I imagine there are a lot of you. Seriously, high school was the best days of your lives? You have my pity) I have a simple little experiment you can practice in your own home that proves global warming is real. All you need is some instant iced-tea and some ice. And a glass/plastic cup – I shouldn’t have had to add that but you never know. Oh, and some tap water too.

Here’s how it works: take the instant powder or tea bag for the tea and put it in a glass or cup. Fill about 2/3 of the way with tap water. Cool, but not cold. Even luke-warm. It’s not a very palatable glass of iced-tea, but that’s okay; we can fix that. Take some ice – maybe 3 or 4 ice cubes worth – and add it to the glass. Touch the glass. Is it actually cold? Of course not – it takes some time for the ice to melt. To speed things up, let’s stir the drink to allow it to get colder faster. Done? Good. The drink is cold, and so is its container. The cold has transferred from the ice cubes to the tea, and from there even to the glass.

That’s it. You’ve proven global warming is real. And yes, from some parts of the country where they believe that Jesus broke bread with dinosaurs I realize that I’m hearing crickets, so I’ll dumb it down a bit.

You now have a glass of cold iced-tea; very refreshing on a hot day. But what has happened to the ice cubes? Have they melted some? Are they smaller? Has one of them split apart?

Those questions were observational. This one you need to pay attention to: what will happen if you leave the glass on your dining room table for about 4 hours? The ice will melt and the glass will start to heat up again, coming back to room temperature. Even hotter if you put it under a lamp. The level of liquid in the glass will also rise (everybody move inland! Now!) but I have a final question for you the whole thing into focus:

Can you get those ice cubes back?

The answer is obviously no. Your iced-tea is warm again and now without other ice cubes or a fridge it’s going to stay warm.

The polar ice caps are melting – that is indisputable. Greenland is shrinking – that is indisputable. Glaciers are receding. If you disagree take a look at some photographs. We have more storm/cold weather in some places because THE COLD HAS TO GO SOMEWHERE AS IT DISSAPATES. And like the ice cubes in your tea, as the cold dissipates the ice melts, never to return. That “never to return” is pretty important. We do not have a replacement supply of ice caps on this planet. There is no way to magically re-conjure up Greenland. The tea gets warm again - probably for good – unless you put it in a cold place.

The world is not in a cold place. The world is in an atmosphere that lets in radiation that heats things up. The ozone layer used to keep the heating element out – deflect the light of the lamp as it were – but we’ve damaged it. We need to do something NOW to mitigate the damage or even reverse it if possible. You can’t just spackle it the fuck over (gotta love Robin Williams – that’s his joke – can you imagine God saying “Who did this???”). It requires a change in thinking, which I admit is a difficult thing for even a liberal like me to do. Even though I spout a lot of liberalism, I don’t wear Birkenstocks and I like steaks. Rare steaks. It will be difficult and I don’t even pretend to know the answer.

But don’t deny that it’s happening. Because you’re wasting any money spent on your education if you do.

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That was it. The entire post. And people threatened my life over it. I’ve long passed the point in my life where I am amazed at how stupid people can get, but it still surprised me.

Anyway, on global warming I have required reading for you. Three science fiction books by Kim Stanley Robinson called “40 Signs of Rain”, “50 Degrees Below”, and “60 Days and Counting”. He’s a great writer, and he tackles everything you’ve ever thought about global warming and actually presents some amazing ideas. Don’t be turned off if you don’t like the term “Science Fiction” – there are no spaceships or laser beams or aliens. It’s a piece of fiction that invokes science; that’s all. And just to be snarky he floods Washington D.C. instead of New Orleans.

Next time: Iraq and how the Democrats blew it, and how they can still save it.

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