According to the Today Show and other “news” outlets, I guess today is the day when people go back to work, fire up their computers, and use their company’s high-speed Internet access to buy shit online, killing what promises to be a veeeeeery long day back after a four-day weekend while looking like they’re being productive (or at least awake). I didn’t realize people needed an excuse to buy stuff online (or screw off at work), but I do know that today marks the start of “fuckoff” season here in the US. Productivity at most offices drops by at least 37% between now and mid April. I don’t have “statistics” or “studies” or anything to back that up, but it sounds true, which is all I need.

There’s a short uptick after the holidays (for about a week or so, until the whole “Joy to the World” crap wears off), but then it’s time to get serious about Super Bowl party planning (which is in February these days, if you can believe that). Then Valentine’s Day induced depression ensues, resulting in high absenteeism (not to mention suicide) rates for a couple of weeks. Workers return in large numbers to fill out their March Madness office pools (although turnout is understandably low on March 18), which keeps everybody occupied until April 5, but then it’s tax time, so nothing much gets done until that’s over with. But, whatever. All I know is I should’ve taken today off, ‘cuz I’m just not feeling it.

Krazy Jon Kyl compared Afghanistan to Vietnam yesterday on Fux News. Not in the way you’d expect (mainly, that it’s a stupid place to be at, is unwinnable because nobody knows what “winning” means, the people don’t want us there, and rather than expanding this fool’s war, we ought to be declaring victory and getting the hell out), but that we aren’t escalating things enough and ought to show our commitment to “git ‘er done” with a shitload of troops and just win this darn thing already. Apparently Jon kinda missed out on the whole half million US troops in Vietnam thing, over 200,000 of whom were killed or wounded before we declared “victory with honor” and ran like hell.

You’ll have to excuse Jon, because (like so very many Republican chickenhawks), he was pretty busy during Vietnam, what with graduating from college in 1964 and heading straight off to law school, and probably didn’t get a chance to read the papers. Oh, I reckon he could have enlisted after getting his law degree in 1966, but that might have interfered with his career plans. Though if they’d invented magnetic yellow ribbons back then, I’m sure Kyl would’ve been among the first to put one on his Cadillac.

Mike Huckabee might have been a longshot presidential candidate a couple of days ago, but today it’s starting to look as if his political life died along with those four Seattle police officers yesterday. It’s being reported that the “person of interest” police appear to have surrounded this morning (and believed to be wounded, if not dead), had what was essentially a life sentence in Arkansas commuted by then-Governor Huckabee.

Thanks for playing, Mike. But your record of compassion wasn’t really a good thing to have on the old wingnut resume in the first place, and this, well, this won’t look good. Can you say, “Willie Horton?” I thought you could.

Yesterday was a beautiful day here, but I squandered most of it doing laundry and kitchen demolition (just demolishing the kitchen, not the laundry). At least I now have room for the new refrigerator and “microhood,” though it comes at the expense of quite a bit of cabinet space. Looks like today is gonna be pretty crappy (40’s and rain – no end to our record snow drought in sight), though, so maybe going to work isn’t such a bad thing.

Speaking of work, looks like it’s time to go and buy shit be productive. Have a good one.

On Press the Meat today, homophobe Rick Warren is on to talk about Faith and Charity (two hookers he picked up last night, I think). Then Bill and Melinda Gates are on to tell us that when once you’ve got more money than God and have accumulated pretty much everything you can think of accumulating, you might as well give some of it away.

At CBS’s Faze the Nation, is a mostly Republican kinda day, with otken Democrat Carl Levin, the teabaggers’ best friend, Dick Armey on to face the woman whose candidacy Dick helped to flush down the toilet, Dede Scozzafava, and Ed Gillespie gets out of his closet to stretch his legs.

On Fux News Sunday, Weaselface Wallace talks Afghanistan with Jon Kyl and Evan Bayh, and health care with Howard Dean Mike “Huckleberry” Huckabee.

At the Goebbels network, George Snufalufagus has girly man, Lindsey Graham, VT Independent Boynie Sanders, and a roundtable with George :jerk: Will, Cokie “the hag” Roberts, Paul Krugman, Matty Dowd and “Douchebag Dan” Senor.

On CNN, Fareed Zakaria has Maziar Bahari, the Newsweek reporter who spent four months in a prison in Tehran and a conversation Google CEO Eric Schmidt.

Happy Birthday, Em!

Yesterday, we went out and stimulated the economy, buying new kitchen appliances in the never-ending attempt to renovate the kitchen. Of course, we bought a refrigerator that’s about six inches taller than the cabinets under which it’s supposed to sit, and a “microhood” that will also require dismantling some wall cabinets (not to mention I need to run a new water line for the fridge and a new electric circuit – from where, I do not know, at this point), so I not only spent enough money that I couldn’t sleep last night (the fact that I didn’t have any beer didn’t help much either), but I also made more work for myself. On the bright side, the old fridge will go downstairs to become a dedicated beer refrigerator, so I won’t have to go up and down the stairs so often (I just need to get a big funnel for the floor drain).

A word of advice to all you gents out there: if you’re gonna fool around on your supermodel wife, hide the damn golf clubs. And always keep your eyes on the road until you’ve made a safe getaway. Oh, wait, she was just using the golf club to smash in the rear window and get him out of the vehicle. OK 🙄

Move over Bill O’Reilly, the idiots have elected a new king. Yes, Sean Hannity’s “news” show was #1 last week, though that may be a one-week wonder thanks to Sean’s interview with teabag queen, Sarah Palin.

SU’s football season mercifully comes to an end today at Connecticut. It would be nice if they could pull out another miracle win the way they did last week, but I’m not holding out much hope (their roster is so depleted, they aren’t even carrying a full Division II squad these days). Good thing it’s basketball season.

Oh well, lots to do today, so I guess I’d better get going. Feels like Sunday, doesn’t it?

I’m not sure what’s more stupid – the fact that the local news station is doing “live remotes” from Target this morning, or the fact that the store was already packed with long lines at the checkout at six o’clock in morning. I shouldn’t actually even be up yet, but when I went to bed last night and turned off my alarm, I apparently managed to set an alarm for 4 AM (a bugle playing revelery, no less). I managed to shut that one off, but then my usual 5:30 Sedition Radio alarm went off, and I figured sleeping in just wasn’t in the cards. It was snowing like crazy when I got up (very pretty, like being inside a snow globe), but that seems to have tapered off now, and it looks like we’re about to break the record for most consecutive days without at least an inch of snow (if we make it through today, it will be 276 days). In other news…

My German isn’t that great, but this story caught my eye (mostly, I like the picture). Near as I can make out, it appears that an Australian farmer called the fire department, thinking there was a gas leak, but it turned out to be pig farts. The best quote is from the farmer, who says “Ich glaub’ mein Schwein pfeift,” which translates to “I believe my pig whistles,” but is (according to dict.cc) an idiom for either “blow me down,” or “I think I’m going off my rocker.” I can hear Popeye now, “Ich glaub mein Schwein pfeift, Olive!”

The Huffington Post has pictures and video of a 6’8″ model named “Amazon Eve.” Kinda brings out the Edmund Hillary in me.

Oh well, time to go to Wal-Mart (not).

Yeah, I know this is too obvious, but…

So, Happy Thanksgiving Day to everybody. I hope there are no Republicans or teabaggers off today, since it was their evil nemesis Franklin Roosevelt who officially signed this holiday into law in 1941. Get your goddamn asses out there and go to work today, you Conservative sons of bitches, lest you be seen celebrating a Socialist Holiday. Come to think of it, Thanksgiving has some pretty darn socialist origins – people of different races getting together, sharing food, giving thanks, and acknowledging that the only way they managed to survive was due to the kindness of strangers (strangers they’d soon attempt to eradicate from the planet, in keeping with Christian tradition), and because everybody pulled together and helped each other out – those who had some, gave some, and those who needed some got some (exhibited today with the whole “need a penny, take a penny” thing). I find it hard to believe that the free-market, keep the government away from my Medicare, tea-partier crowd would stoop so low as to take part in such an evil tradition.

I’ve been trying to think of things to be thankful for today (not personally – there are plenty of those – but on a more global scale). So, let’s see. I’m thankful that Bush and Cheney left office peacefully, when they were supposed to. There was a time when I had some real doubts about that, and wouldn’t have put it past them to manufacture some terrorist event, declare martial law, and suspend the elections. So, I’m glad they went away, even if they did leave a big mess and Cheney doesn’t get that he ought to just shut the fuck up and go away. Bush, eh, he’s fairly harmless. An evil little man, but I don’t think he’ll be too dangerous out there on the old motivational speaker circuit.

Cheney, though…that’s a different story. He’s got his evil tendrils into everything, left moles embedded throughout the federal government, and has that demonic progeny of his poised to fulfill his legacy. When the Konservative morons get done playing with their Caribou Barbi dolls, don’t be surprised when Liz Cheney become the new teabag darling.

What else? Well, I’m grateful the USA finally managed to break through the white guy barrier and elect a non-white guy as President. It’s a good thing to have gotten behind us. I guess technically that was one for last year, but, well, nobody’s taken a shot at him yet, so I’m thankful for that. Sure, I wish he’d turned out to be that stealth Liberal we were all kind of hoping he’d turn out to be, but, well, that’s life. Funny, I honestly think if he did suddenly “go rogue” and exhibit Socialist tendencies, he’d have a successful presidency (as opposed to what I predict will be kind of a failed, Clintonesque one), but, well, what do I know?

I’m thankful that teabag asshole (hmm, that conjures up a disturbing image) Doug Hoffman lost in the NY 23rd, wasting the millions that the Hair Club for Growth put into his campaign (not that they don’t have plenty more where that came from), and showing that here in good old New York State, getting endorsed by the likes of Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck is more the political kiss of death than a guaranteed win.

I’m glad this swine flu thing apparently hasn’t turned out to be one of those natural “culling” disease things that wipes out half the human population (which might not be a bad thing, really – as long as I get to decide which half). I’m also glad it doesn’t seem to be one of those “oops” accidental biological warfare lab release things that wipes out 99.4% of the human race. That would be kind of a bummer – and stinky, too. Although I do confess to fantasizing about being one of the lone survivors from time to time (ever since I read “Earth Abides” back in 9th grade). I’d get me a generator and move into a nice house somewhere in between a library and a Blockbuster (and near a good source of canned food, I guess).

Uh, let’s see. I’m running out of ideas here, and I have to go get the dogs tired out. So if you want to add to the list, that’s cool. Otherwise, I hope you and yours have a happy holiday. Rest up; gotta be at Wal-Mart bright and early tomorrow morning.

I had to skip the Obama’s Bollywood-themed State Dinner last night, due to a conflict with the Syracuse basketball game (where my alma mater beat Keith Olbermann’s alma mater). Not that I actually went to the game either, mind you. Instead, I finally got around to watching the new (OK, maybe “latest” would be more accurate) Star Trek movie. I won’t post any spoilers here (to protect both those who haven’t seen it yet, and those who really don’t give a shit), but I will say a couple of things. First, Uhura was pretty darn hot back in her academy days (not that Nichelle Nichols wasn’t good looking, mind you, but Zoe Saldana, oh my; a good reason to go see Avatar, even if she is just computer generated).

Saldana’s body isn’t even in Avatar; Cameron used motion-capture technology to transform her into Neytiri, a blue, 10-foot-tall kung-fu-fighting creature. But she didn’t just read lines in a sound booth. “Motion capture isn’t like shooting,” Saldana explains. “You’re in a suit with all these dots on you, and whatever you do, they get it. Sam and I did all sorts of stupid shit. If you burp, your character burps. I’d shake my booty, and you’d see my character shaking her booty.”

Indeed. I see great potential in this technology.

Also, why did they cast Billy Bibbit as Chekov? And the Sulu in this movie didn’t look at all gay. Not that it matters, I guess, except for historical accuracy, and the fact that anybody who is trained in fencing ought to be at least a little bit flamboyant, don’t you think (I mean, you gotta put the swash in swashbuckling, no?). Anyhow, it was a good movie – perhaps the best of the Trek bunch. And if they cheated a bit with the Trek time line, at least they came up with a creative way to explain it away. Too bad Mark Lenard wasn’t still around to be in it (since when does Sarek have a British accent?).

There have been a bunch of news stories on this morning regarding the danger of sharing more than food across the holiday table. Yes, that’s right: go to Thanksgiving Dinner tomorrow, and you run the risk of contracting (and therefore dying of) something even worse than the dreaded swine flu. The way I understand the science, swine flu has the potential to jump onto and embed itself into your turkey’s dead flesh (be especially careful with the gizzards, and for God’s sake, don’t use pork stuffing), thereby causing it to mutate into a form of zombified swine-avian flu (the terrifying SDCMG – Sus Domestica Cadavarus Meleagris Gallopavo – virus, :omg: seen here under an electron microscope) – potentially causing a pandemic of unprecedented proportion. If it spreads, soon millions – perhaps billions of people will begin sneezing their brains out, which they will then feel compelled to devour.

I’m usually not much for all this fear mongering stuff, but, in order to protect my relatives, I’m willing to make the supreme sacrifice of staying home tomorrow and watching some crappy football (Dallas and Detroit…why is it always Dallas and Detroit? Though there’s a night game this year between the Giants and Denver that might not be bad) after a quick trip to the dog park.

You see, my in-laws aren’t regular Americans, and therefore I don’t get to indulge in the T-Day tradition of consuming copious amounts of poultry, with the menfolk waddling off to the couch to watch football while the womenfolk wash the dishes and prepare the coffee and pumpkin pie (instead, I’ll probably have to suffer through a showing of the 1954 musical classic “The Student Prince,” starring “the singing voice of Mario Lanza” – where I’m supposed to suspend my disbelief sufficiently enough to pretend that a bunch of 40 year old men in lederhosen are German university students).

Oh, how I love musicals. :barf:

Oh, well. If you’re traveling today, you have my deepest sympathies. If your relatives are coming to your home, my advice is: run. Now. It isn’t too late yet, but you’re gonna have to hurry.

As for me, time to head to work. I have to drop Star Trek in the mailbox; maybe they’ll get my next one here by Friday.

A new report shows something I think we all pretty much knew – most teachers (63%) use their own money to buy food for their students. I predict that Republicans will draw two conclusions from this: teachers make too much money, and school lunch programs need to be cut in order to lower taxes on rich people (and by rich people, I mean multimillionaires, not those overpaid teachers).

The folks over at New Left Media went to a “Going Rogue” book signing in Columbus, OH, to ask the policy wonks in line just what it is they love about Sarah Palin. Surprisingly, they seem to have had some trouble articulating anything specific about Palin that they think is so great. She’s the “rock star” of the Conservative Movement (CM – like BM, only more difficult to pass), she digs “freedom,” and “free speech,” and of course she’s “real.” Well, I find myself relating very much to these people. I don’t know what they see in Palin either. Not surprisingly, those in the throng weren’t big fans of Barack Obama (though of course they couldn’t really come up with specifics on why).

HHS has a web page up detailing – state-by-state – what the current Senate health care reform bill would mean for residents. For example, in Texas,

* 6 million residents who do not currently have insurance…

(by the way, that’s roughly 25% of the population of Texas)

and 1.1 million residents who have nongroup insurance could get affordable coverage through the health insurance exchange.
* 3.3 million residents could qualify for premium tax credits to help them purchase health coverage.
* 2.8 million seniors would receive free preventive services.
* 493,000 seniors would have their brand-name drug costs in the Medicare Part D “doughnut hole” halved.
* 223,000 small businesses could be helped by a small business tax credit to make premiums more affordable.

This, clearly, is socialism at its most insidious, and needs to be stopped. Especially in Texas, which already gets more Federal money than they send to DC. Fortunately, we can count on the Lone Star State’s congressional contingent to not only oppose reform, but quite possibly secede from the Union.

Carl Kasell is retiring from the news reader’s chair at NPR’s “Morning Edition” (a title which parodies a now defunct Air America morning show). Don’t worry, though, you still have a chance of winning Carl’s voice on your home answering machine.

The weekend’s come and gone, it’s Tuesday already, and I know what you’re thinking: “I thought Kreepy Konservative Krybaby Doug Hoffman was gonna announce how ACORN, Unions, and Democrats stole the election from him.” Well, no word from Dougie – now behind by about 3,400 votes with another 600 or so absentee ballots left to count – so far, but he promises to announce his plans today.

I get that some politician’s kid – especially if it’s a Democrat’s kid – driving drunk would be news. But why is it news that Alexandra Kerry got pulled over, took a breathalyzer test and wasn’t drunk? Oh, wait she had an expired registration. I hope they throw the book at her (and show lots of pictures of her in that see-through black dress she wore at Cannes, too)!

Speaking of criminals, I’m shocked and dismayed at federal prosecutors filing charges against terrorist dude Omer Abdi Mohamed – aka, “Brother Omer” – in Minneapolis. I can’t beleive they’re going to put this guy on trial in the US. It isn’t safe – especially at this time of year. Not only is the Mall of America a target, but so is the HHH Metrodome what with old man Favre and the Vikings kickin’ ass this season. These people are clearly suffering from a 9/10 mentality.

Oh well, off to the salt mines. What the hell, I need to work on my Netflix queue anyway.

I don’t know if you had a chance to watch Bill Moyers’ Journal on Friday night (if not, you can watch it online here), but Bill – a White House Assistant in the Johnson Administration – used LBJ’s phone tapes and Moyers’ own personal memories to give viewers an inside look at Johnson’s deliberations on escalating the Vietnam War. When JFK was killed 46 years ago, there were 16,000 US “advisors” in Vietnam. War hawks warned Johnson not to “dither,” lest the whole of Southeast Asia fall to the Commies (the boogieman of time) and LBJ took the bait. By 1968, there were over half a million Americans in Vietnam, dying at a rate of about 1,000 a month. Johnson might have been remembered as the Civil Rights President, or for his War on Poverty, or his “Great Society,” or federal funding for education, or Medicaid and Medicare. Instead, he’s remembered for Vietnam. Moyers concluded:

Now in a different world, at a different time, and with a different president, we face the prospect of enlarging a different war. But once again we’re fighting in remote provinces against an enemy who can bleed us slowly and wait us out, because he will still be there when we are gone.

Once again, we are caught between warring factions in a country where other foreign powers fail before us. Once again, every setback brings a call for more troops, although no one can say how long they will be there or what it means to win. Once again, the government we are trying to help is hopelessly corrupt and incompetent.

And once again, a President pushing for critical change at home is being pressured to stop dithering, be tough, show he’s got the guts, by sending young people seven thousand miles from home to fight and die, while their own country is coming apart.

And once again, the loudest case for enlarging the war is being made by those who will not have to fight it, who will be safely in their beds while the war grinds on. And once again, a small circle of advisers debates the course of action, but one man will make the decision.

We will never know what would have happened if Lyndon Johnson had said no to more war. We know what happened because he said yes.

I hope Barack Obama was watching. It’s funny, while I voted for Hillary Clinton in the New York Primary, one fear I had was that she’d be easier for the war mongers to manipulate into a military entanglement to prove she was “tough.” While I knew Obama would be no flaming Liberal (if only he really was the scary socialist that Republicans make him out to be), I thought he was smarter than that.

I hope I was right.

Over the weekend, the Senate voted to allow its health care reform bill to be debated. That’s nice, I guess, though it seems unlikely to get to a final vote if people like Blanche Lincoln and Ben Nelson have anything to say about it. The sad part is it takes 60 votes for cloture, so even if some horrible, tragic accident were to befall the DINOs and sad sack Joey Lieberman, it wouldn’t help. Oh, you folks in Nebraska, Arkansas, and Connecticut must be so proud of your Senators. Not as proud as you Okies, though. Your bold (and extremely intelligent) Senator James Inhofe has declared himself a big winner in the battle against the hoax known as Global Warming, telling Barbara Boxer, “we won, you lost, get a life.” Indeed, Senator, indeed. And well said, too. Of course, you’ll be dead before the effects of climate change really take hold (and, really, how much worse can it get in Oklahoma anyway?), so who cares? Take the money and run.

Like most people, my happiness and sense of self worth are tied to the success of my sports teams (though maybe not as much as this guy). As such, it was a pretty gosh gosh darn good weekend. Not only did our hoops team crush two highly-ranked teams in Cal and last year’s National Champs, North Carolina, but our poor beleaguered football team – which didn’t exactly start out the season “deep” and has lost something like 10 starters over the course of the season (including six over the past two weeks) – beat the crap out of a ranked (though obviously overrated) Rutgers. It’s a sad sign of how low our football team has fallen when beating the Scarlet Knights is a big deal, but hopefully order will soon be restored to the world, and beating pissant teams like Rutgers will once again be the norm. Next up, the final game of the season at UCONN (which got the “biggest victory in its history” on Saturday against Notre Dame). Hard to believe beating a crappy team like ND in double OT is that big a deal (hell, even SU beat ND last year, and didn’t need OT to do it).

Ah, well off to work. At least it’s a short week.

Oh, and Happy Birthday, Dr. Who!

I don’t know if any talking head idiots will bother to mention it today or not, but it was 46 years ago today that John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, TX. What would have come to pass had JFK survived? Supposedly, Kennedy – no dove – had come to see what a steaming pile of crap Vietnam was, and was ready to get the US the hell out. I don’t think, in hindsight, many people would disagree with that, or that we’d have been a lot better getting out of Southeast Asia back in 1964. Certain other Presidents out there today might want to give that some thought.

As for the boobleheads, today’s bunch includes…

Press the Meat: Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchinson (R-TX), Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL), Susan G. Komen for the Cure founder Amb. Nancy Brinker, NBC’s Chief Medical Editor Dr. Nancy Snyderman

Faze the Nation: Sen. Jon Kyl (R-AZ), Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY) and CBS medical correspondent Dr. Jennifer Ashton

The Goebbels network’s This Weak with George Snufalufagus: Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE), Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL) and a roundtable with ABC’s George :jerk: Will, evil spawn Liz Cheney, Aspen Institute’s Walter Isaacson and former Clinton Labor Secretary and The American Prospect’s Robert Reich

Fux News Sunday: Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN), Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO), Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA), Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and former director of the National Institutes of Health Bernadine Healy

CNN’s GPS with Fareed Zakaria: Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Newsweek’s Maziar Bahari.

Have a good Sunday.

Big day in the Senate today, as it’s up to one or two douchebags to allow the Senate to actually talk about health care reform. Not whether to pass it – or even to allow a vote on passing it – but to allow it to come to the floor for debate and amendment. Pretty stupid system, but one you’ll never see changed as long as it serves to give egomaniacs like Joe Lieberman a form of “power.” On the bright side, it appears that there’s been an agreement on the “Wyden Amendment,” which would allow people – not all people, of course, but some – to opt out of their employer’s insurance plan, and opt in to a public one.

It’s also a big weekend for the teabaggers, who will be storming DC in an effort to give aid and comfort to the enemies of reform. Not only that, but their hero – Doug Hoffman – will be deciding on whether or not to contest the election for NY’s 23rd District, based on his claims of ballot tampering (he’s got evidence – honest – but will only make it public if and when he decides to contest the election that he’s un-un-un-conceded.

In related news, Roy Williams would like to un-concede his North Carolina Tar Heels 87-71 loss to Syracuse last night.