Happy Anniversary! Yes, it was five months ago – November 28th, 2005 – when this blog (and the rest of the site) first went online. I don’t know about you, but it seems like a lot longer than five months to me. And what a five months it’s been. If you recall, at the time it was just beginning to sink in that they really were going to kill Morning Sedition (even after the letters, emails, calls, and petitions). There were just three more weeks of shows to go, with only a couple vague hints at the possiblility of new show. And now look – some 40 Marc Maron Shows are “in the can,” and the promise of syndication – or maybe something better – is in the air with the removal of Danny Goldberg. Granted, AAR seemed go out of their way to dick us around with the Maron show, but, looking back, it all happened rather quickly. A lot more quickly than I’d thought it would, five month ago.
And Scooter Libby resigned in disgrace and under indictment, with Karl Rove hopefully not far behind. Tom DeLay isn’t seeking re-election (and hopefully he’ll be joining his pal Duke Cunningham in prison before too long). Snotty Scotty is out, and the White House finally admits that Fox News is just its farm team by calling up Tony Snow. And Impeachment isn’t just a word for crazy people anymore, as dubya’s “approval” ratings are possibly the worst ever, and the debate isn’t about whether Bush is a terrible president, but whether or not he’s the worst president ever.
Of course, not all the news has been good. Things in Iraq just keep getting worse – for every “purple finger moment,” thousands of Iraqi and American live have been shattered. The Senate is now saying that FEMA – trasformed under Bill Clinton from what had been a crony-filled joke into something resembling an efficient model of a government agency – is now, just five years later, so thoroughly destroyed that “we have concluded that FEMA is in shambles and beyond repair, and that it should be abolished.” And, of course, the Democrats continue to turn down the opportunity to energize progressives by running away from Russ Feingold’s resolution to at least censure Bush for breaking the law, and refusing to filibuster yet another lying, right-wing zealot appointed to the Supreme Court.
But, there is definitely hope for the future – much as we, on this side, have learned never to get our hopes up too much. My hope is that, in another six months and 11 days, we’ll be listening to the Marc Maron Show live, at a time when most of us can actually manage to listen without having to call in sick the next morning. Marc and Jim will hopefully be consoling a weepy Lawton Smalls as we wait in anticipation of the installation of the 110th Congress, as soon- to-be House Judiciary Chairman John Conyers vows real investigations into Iraq, NSA spying, 9/11, and more, in anticipation of drawing up articles of impeachment, which, if they don’t lead to conviction, won’t be the fault of the new Junior Senator from Connecticut, Ned Lamont.
Let’s see what happens.
Oh, and Happy Birthday Kevin! :cake: