Spooney's encounter with HOT LAVA!

So Spooney goes to a job interview last week. Once he got there, he found out that the company is called Diskeeper, and they make a defragging software that is included in many versions of Windows.

What he notices immediately is that there are copious amounts of Scientology literature posters, calendars, etc. placed EVERYWHERE throughout the offices.

He was also informed that because office hours end at 3:30, employees are expected to attend “classes” after work, on their own time.

Classes in being a Scientologist, of course.

He was also given a copy of the infamous “free personality test” and asked to complete it in order to be considered for the position. He got 20 questions into the 200 question “test” before asking himself "What the fuck am I doing?", and left.

What I am curious about is how a company like this, albeit a privately-owned company, is allowed to impose a “religious” test upon their employees. I’m going to be generous here and allow that they truly are a “religion,” and not a “crazy cult,” or a “criminal organization.”

In a cached version of the Wikipedia web page on Diskeeper, a statement that 95% of the corporation’s employees are Scientologists, and that new employees are required to read the “Scientology bible,” is still visible. A more recent version of the page has the statement scrubbed, I going to guess by one of the faithful.

What is not disputed is that the company reneged on a service agreement with a drug company once they found out that the company manufactures Ritalin, a drug they oppose, and that they do not offer support services to any companies connected with psychiatry, which is a field I’ve heard the Tom Cruise is very well versed in.

In Germany, where they’re still a tad touchy about cults that traffic in paranoia, doing business with Scientology-owned businesses is illegal, and the government conducted an extensive investigation into whether the Diskeeper software could transmit user data. They concluded that it did not, but the dispute was resolved when Microsoft allowed for Diskeeper to be removed from their OS by users.

Sure, it’s easy to conclude that Germany was overreacting, but don’t say that to Jon Atack, a former member whose life has been ruined by Scientology and their policy of “Fair Game,” wherein their enemies, or “suppressive persons” may be attacked any number of ways with impunity. Or in the words of L. Ron himself, a suppressive person: "May be deprived of property or injured by any means by any Scientologist without any discipline of the Scientologist. May be tricked, sued or lied to or destroyed."

Dang. And Spooney thought his last boss was a pain in the ass.

Taxes & Death

Oh, Leona. I'm so disappointed in you. You always said death was something only the little people do.

In absentia

My fine local daily, the LA Times, was criticized yesterday by many bloggers for burying the lede in a story on the progress of “the surge” in Iraq.

28 paragraphs into the article, which suggests that Petraeus will recommend repositioning troops rather than decreasing their numbers, this little nugget can be found:

Despite Bush's repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government.

Yeah.

The White House will definitely be getting inputs from the military. Definitely inputs from the military.

It’s no surprise that the LA Times, or the “Los Angeles Dog Trainer,” as political satirist Harry Shearer frequently calls it, might bumble a story. After all, this is the paper whose corrections page is frequently so unintentionally hilarious that Shearer devotes a feature of his radio show to it.

And if I can digress for just a moment on that point, take a look at these two items from the August 8th LAT online corrections posting:

Immigration legislation: An article in Friday's Section A about new immigration legislation introduced in Congress identified Rep. F. James Sensenbrenner Jr. as an Ohio Republican. He is from Wisconsin.

Um, how do you get that wrong, exactly? If you’re a political reporter, you have to know where Sensenbrenner is from. He’s been in the House since 1979, and was, until recently, the Chairman of a little thing called the House Judiciary Committee. And jeez, if you didn’t know what state he’s from, wouldn’t you look it up? Wouldn’t your fact checker look it up? Cripes, even Wikipedia got it right.

Anyhoo, error number 2:

Spy agency operations: An article in Saturday's Section A on the scramble to pass legislation before Congress' summer recess referred to the Foreign Intelligence Services Act. It should have said the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

Okay, I know it was the Saturday paper. NOBODY reads any Saturday edition of any paper, anywhere, let alone the Saturday LA Times, but c’mon! FISA is all about surveillance! That’s why it was controversial, because it was concerning the surveillance of Americans. How can you be writing about FISA, and not know that the word “surveillance” is in the freakin’ name of the stupid freakin’ thing? Jeezy Creezy, you ask my cat, she could tell you what FISA stands for, for fuck’s sake.*

But I digress.

My point, I believe, was that the LAT is no stranger to journalistic lapses.

But they’re hardly alone in that. Even today’s Washington Post article on the September report of the surge, while acknowledging that it is a HUGE DEAL that the surge report will be coming from the same chefs that cooked the intelligence that got us into the war in the first place, and while reporting in-depth on BushCo’s machinations to keep the “on the ground” people from speaking in public on their findings, still managed to hide this morsel of choice towards the very end (emphasis mine):

Petraeus and Crocker have said repeatedly that they plan to testify after delivering private assessments to Bush. U.S. military and diplomatic officials in Baghdad appeared puzzled yesterday when told that the White House had indicated that the two may not be appearing in public. They said they will continue to prepare for the testimony in the absence of instructions from Washington. "If anything, we just don't know the dates/times/or the committees that the assessment will be presented to," a senior military official in Baghdad said in an e-mail yesterday.

(sigh)

Words fail me.

I guess I’m not the only one.

*Okay, I’m talking about my more intelligent and politically aware cat, Violet. The Banana only reads the real estate listings.

Now, get out of my face. Hey, look, over there! Is that Morrissey???

To the trio of Squeeze fans who sat directly in front of me last night at the Squeeze/Fountains of Wayne concert at the Greek last night in Los Angeles:

Boo.

First of all, I get it, okay? You do not like Fountains of Wayne. This was made abundantly clear by your exaggerated fake “Ooh, aren’t they good?” hand-clapping and head-bobbing, followed, after an interval sufficient so as to establish your little skit of faux-fandom, by sullen eye-rolling and chair-slumping.

I get it. You think Fountains of Wayne is beneath you. Yeah, who the fuck do Fountains of Wayne think they are, anyway, with their jangly guitars and their awesomely funny lyrics and their infectious pop melodies? Why, they’re not fit to grace the same stage as the GENIUSES who gave us “Tempted by the Fruit of Another,” a song so amazing it was used in a BEER COMMERCIAL. And not domestic beer, either. Imported.

Actually, I’m not going to diss on Squeeze, because I mostly like them, and my Spooney LOVES them. I got no problem with the Squeeze, but listen, you pretentious little twats: Squeeze is a pop group, okay? They’re not fucking Tchaikovsky, so stop pretending that 40 minutes of Fountains of Wayne is akin to being strapped down and waterboarded by the CIA. You were not brought to the Greek by extraordinary rendition. You bought the ticket. You drove here. You paid $15 bucks for stacked parking to get to the venue early enough to catch the opening act, so shut the fuck up and – here’s an idea! Try enjoying a song or two. Can I recommend the lovely Hackensack, or if you prefer a more rockin’ song, how about Red Dragon Tattoo?

And don’t give me that “Stacy’s Mom” bullshit. First of all, every group, no matter how long they labor undeservedly in obscurity, deserves their Dead Skunk moment. Secondly, although I think Stacy’s Mom is one of their least interesting singles, it’s still pretty freaking funny and sweet, although I’m sure you’ve never stopped to consider that there might be something more to the song than the declaration that “Stacy’s Mom has got it goin’ on.” If I thought about music the same way, I could just as well declare that songs about shucking bivalves bore the shit out of me.

Seriously, my recommendation is that you remove that 80s Brit pop stick from your ass, clean it, whittle it down into some kind of utilitarian household item that you can then sell to buy some music that was written after 1995.

Karl Rove resigns in order to spend more time with his severely underdeveloped sense of shame

Karl Rove is resigning effective August 31.

He is claiming, with a straight face, that he wants to spend more time with his family, that is, his wife and son. The son is in college, so I'm not sure how he's going to swing all that daddy face-time, but ours is not to question why, apparently.

And in the interview during which he declared his intentions, he couldn't resist making the assertion that he was sure Hilary Clinton would be the Democratic presidential nominee.

Because that's exactly what they want, of course.

And I can't help but feel like that's a good reason why Democrats should NOT want it.

And all of it so easily preventable

Okay, so I saw No End in Sight last night (god bless the Laemmle!) and it was really fucking well done. First of all, because it’s about the whole war: the lead up, the occupation, the insurgents, and the cost in lives and dollars. Secondly, in spite of its ambitious subject matter, the film itself never feels like a shallow or cursory exploration.

The people who participated in the invasion and occupation who agreed to be interviewed for this documentary are clearly there because the failures of our government have cost them dearly. They were invested in success, both personally and professionally, and they want to understand and explain, if they can, how it all went so wrong.

Clearly, the blame for the insurgency and the collapse of the rule of law in Iraq belongs squarely on our heads.

First of all, because we never imposed martial law. And after the Iraqi army surrendered, our forces were under orders NOT to act as police or law enforcement officials.

“Fine,” you say, “let the Iraqi police enforce order.”

Except, of course, there were no Iraqi police in the days and weeks following the surrender. We told them to put down their guns and go home. We didn’t allow them to do their job, and yet we refused to do their job, either.

As a consequence, the subsequent looting of their capitol broke the spirit and the hearts of the Iraqis, and became the first large brick in the wall that now irreparably separates us and keeps us from winning.

Think about it. If an invading force took over our country, let’s say for a well-intentioned reason, like, for instance, ridding us of a leader that was a danger to us and to the world at large? Try to imagine that.

Imagine that the US armed forces surrendered to that army, and all the civilian law enforcement officials disbanded, even though our former leader, as a last “fuck you,” to us and to them, had emptied all the jails of criminals. Imagine that the invading army stood idly by while our most beloved institutions were looted, largely by those same common criminals. They stood idly by while thieves carted off Stuart’s painting of George Washington, and the Star-Spangled Banner flag, and the hat Lincoln was shot in, and even the freakin’ Spirit of Saint Louis.

Then they burned down the National Archives, and our precious Declaration of Independence, and our Constitution, and our Bill of Rights, and our Emancipation Proclamation were all gone forever.

While they stood by, doing nothing.

And then the guy who was in charge of their army went on tv, called us “Henny Penny,” and laughed at our losses and made fun of our misery.

Saying that we were just upset about a bunch of vases in a museum.

And then, while they refused to enforce the law, or claimed that their numbers were insufficient to do so, they disbanded our army completely and permanently. Hundreds of thousands of pissed-off and heavily-armed men and women, now unable to support their families, were told that they were no longer needed, even though huge stores of munitions lay all around our cities, completely unguarded.

And every single member of our former leader’s political party were told that they could no longer work for the government in any capacity at all, not even as a teacher or librarian, for the rest of their lives.

Sure, we’d be happy to be rid of our former leader, but how long do you think we’d remain grateful? How long would our good will last, as we suffered through month after month after month of no utilities, no security, and the installation of new leaders who encouraged the denial of our rights, depending on what political party we belonged to?

Okay, that last part we’re already experiencing now, but you get my point.

We would be rioting in the streets. We would rise against the forces of oppression and neglect, and assert ourselves.

Or, we would try. Mostly we would fail, because we are too fat and too scared and too selfish. Our Budweiser-swillin’, McDonald’s-snarfin’, Croc-wearin’, monster truck-drivin’ asses would try to fight the power, but because that would be too difficult, we would mostly be left to fight each other. Democrats would kill Republicans because of the crimes committed against them while the former leader was in power, and Republicans would kill Democrats because they were unhappy about being driven from power. Evangelical Christians would be killed because it was their faith’s fundamentalism that allowed the former leader to control us, Evangelicals would kill those of other faiths because, well, because some asshole would rise up and tell them that God wants them to.

And even those that were actually capable of fighting the occupying forces would not be able to make any real headway. They would take their beloved guns and their stockpiled ammo and make their way, like so many plump, waddling baby ducks, through the barricaded neighborhoods toward the centers of occupational power. But they would be gunned down on the streets before they could even do more than take out a few innocent civilians along the way.

Why? Because their numbers would be insufficient. Because the enemy would be more powerful. Because their position would have been given away by their bulky fluorescent rubber footwear.

No End in Sight

For chrissakes, if you don't live in a major city where this movie is playing, (click the "theatres" link), go and reserve it for your Netflix queue or something.

Why should you see yet another devastating documentary on the war in Iraq? Sidney Blumenthal for Salon:

The release of a documentary on the administration's failures in Iraq, "No End in Sight," directed by Charles Ferguson, has the White House spooked. Bush's aides are not worried because the film is brilliantly shot and edited, or because it is compelling, but because of what -- or whose appearance -- it might augur to upset their September rollout.

The film features three former administration officials speaking on camera as unreserved critics of prewar and postwar planning: Powell's former chief of staff, Col. Lawrence Wilkerson; Powell's former deputy secretary of state, Richard Armitage; and former U.S. ambassador Barbara Bodine, a senior member of the Office of Reconstruction and Humanitarian Assistance in Iraq, closely aligned with Powell.

Wilkerson and Bodine have spoken out before. But Armitage's debut in particular has the White House fuming and fretting that it somehow signals Powell's emergence as a full-throated critic in the middle of the September P.R. offensive. National Security Advisor Stephen Hadley, according to sources close to him, has voiced anger and concern about whether Powell will step forward and what he might say, and other presidential aides are wondering how to cope with that nightmarish possibility.

Armitage. Freakin' Armitage. I don't know how they got him or whether or not this really means that (his close friend) Colin Powell is really ready to spill it, but I gots to hear what that motherfucker has to say.

Quid pro quo

Since BushCo now has unprecedented expanded powers to spy on citizens of the United States of America, I hereby propose that the citizens of the United States of American demand the same powers to oversee the activities of BushCo. In particular, I would like to monitor communications between the White House and the administration of Pakistan’s President, Gen. Pervez Musharraf. Because I suspect that American lives might be at stake.

Musharraf has been playing both sides against the middle for quite some time now, telling the US that he is doing everything he can to roust terrorists (including a certain someone responsible for the deaths of 3000 Americans), while at the same time assuring anti-American militants in his country that he is actually not helping the US at all. Unfortunately, the truth is much closer to the latter than the former. And Resident Bush, The Decider, has decided to not only let him get away with it, but to actually support the two-faced, coup-lovin’ slyboots.

Why would BushCo so unfailingly support Musharraf? Good question, and one on which I hope the White House wiretaps will shed some light. Meanwhile, Musharraf continues to ass-kiss his benefactor by 1) canceling a trip to Afghanistan to attend a meeting on curbing cross-border terrorist movements, and 2) threatening to declare a state of emergency in Pakistan based on some remarks by a Democratic presidential candidate.

Yes, in a move that is clearly a big, gooey valentine to BushCo, Musharraf is pretending to be so alarmed by Sen. Barack Obama’s hypothetical remarks regarding Americans entering Pakistan to deal with terrorist targets, that he is asking us to believe that he not only doesn’t understand the difference between the president, and a presidential candidate, but that he also can’t comprehend that Obama is about as far, politically, from his buddy Bush as two mainstream politicians can get.

Now BushCo gets to release statements in which they will cast themselves as a moderate force and the voice of reason, and talk about how ignorant the Democrats are on issues of terrorism & foreign policy. And the talking heads will swallow it hook, line, and sinker, never-minding Republican presidential candidate Tancredo’s recent remarks about bombing Islamic holy sites, which are at least an order of magnitude more idiotic than Obama’s could ever be construed to be.

And Hilary will move up in the polls.

If you would like to support my call for warrantless wiretaps of the White House, I suggest you contact one or more of the following Senate Democrats who voted for that piece-of-shit bill:

Bayh (D-IN)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Conrad (D-ND)
Feinstein (D-CA) – the bitch strikes again!
Inouye (D-HI)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lincoln (D-AR)
McCaskill (D-MO)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Pryor (D-AR)
Salazar (D-CO)
Webb (D-VA)

Oh, and let’s not forget Lieberman (ID-CT).

Also, you could contact one of the 41 Democratic members of the House who bent over their desks and took it up the ass on this one.

Uh-oh

Thanks to The Simarco Letters for the link to this site.

Relax! Try the guacamole.

Keith Olbermann recently named Bill O'Fuckface the "Worst Person in the World" for the following remarks he made on immigration reform:

"Most Americans don't want to hurt any poor Mexican people. They want to know who they are. They want to know where they are, what they're doing. They don't want them clustering in neighborhoods and changing the tempo of the whole neighborhood."

Bill, look, I know you don't read my blog. Because first of all, I'm a small fry. A minuscule fry, in fact. Secondly, there's the whole "Fuckface" thing, which I probably should apologize for, and I would! I totally would. If you weren't such a fucking fuckface, I would TOTALLY APOLOGIZE.

But I feel bad that you're out there on a national tv news network, well, okay, it's Fox News, but still. A lot of people watch it, I imagine, when they're not patrolling their neighborhoods looking for brown-skinned people, or when they're not skimming the Bible for references that support the burning of homosexuals.

Oh, and of course when they're not cruising for BJs in the restrooms of public parks.

Anyway, like I said, I feel bad for you, because CLEARLY you misunderstand.

Because those Mexicans you're refering to? You know, the ones who are "clustering," and "changing the tempo"?

They're DANCING, you fucking idiot. Dancing.

Bueno!

Many of you are familiar with my sister's obsession with the Margarita Authentica. When my sister comes to visit, I make sure to have some good tequila on hand so she can make me one.

Similarly, my sister always wants me to whip up a batch of guacamole. And if I dare throw a party without making my guacamole, believe me, I hear about it from my guests.

So since sis has shared her recipe with you, I thought I might do the same.

First of all, you will need a molcajete. Oh, look, here's a good-sized one at a pretty good price. There are also some tips on the linked page for cleaning and seasoning your molcajete. While you do not have to pre-season your molcajete (using it will season it naturally), you do need to clean it as vigorously as possible before using it or the guac will come out gritty. A wire-bristled or other stiff brush will work.

Do not buy anything that is not made of volcanic rock, or is smooth inside. Unlike a mortar and pestle, the molcajete and tejolete (pestle) should be very rough textured.

I learned how to make real guacamole when a Mexican chef was kind enough to teach me. It is so simple, but you do need to use a molcajete or it just will not come out as good. Also, you really do need to make it right before you serve it. Guacamole just does not keep very well. If you do have to keep it for any length of time you should coat the top surface with a thin layer of lime juice and then put plastic wrap over it, pushing the wrap down into the surface of the dip, leaving no air in between.

The Recipe:

First, you take a big pinch of coarse salt and throw it in the molcajete. Coarse sea salt is good, but you can raid that little plastic sombrero you have in the back of your cupboard for some margarita salt if you have to. Add a good handful of cilantro leaves (some stems are okay), 4-5 scallions and one jalapeno (size is up to you), roughly chopped. Pulverize all with your tejolete until it is a gooey mush.

Now, what kind of avocados you want to use is up to you. Living in California, my farmer's market usually offers several different kinds, and to me they are all good. Ripeness is the only necessity.

Drop in the flesh of two large or three small avocados, one at a time. Use the tejolete to crush the flesh into your base mixture. Squeeze the juice of one good-sized lime over the avocados as you add.

Next, dice one medium ripe tomato. Add the flesh only (not the juice & seeds) to the mixture and stir gently. You may want to use a spoon for this part.

You're done. Eat a lot of it. Make it for your guests or eat it all yourself. Yum.

Fear of a black BJ

So check it out. The above Florida State Rep., Bob Allen, was arrested in a public restroom in a park after soliciting an undercover cop for sex. Specifically, he wanted to pay the cop $20 to be on the receiving end of a BJ from Allen.

Of course Allen, a pro-life Republican who is married and has a 90% voting record with the Christian Coalition, is claiming he is innocent. He contends that he only offered to pay the officer to receive fellatio because, well, let's let him speak for himself:

"This was a pretty stocky black guy, and there was nothing but other black guys around in the park," Allen, who is white, told police in a taped statement after his arrest. Allen said he feared he "was about to be a statistic" and would have said anything just to get away.

Apparently, "anything" included twice peering at the cop inside a bathroom stall, entering the occupied stall without being asked, repeatedly remarking that the bathroom was too public and that they needed to go to another location, and inquiring about what the cop was "into."

Seriously guys, this story just made my fuckin day. Another fuckin religious asshat hypocrite bites the dust. Awesome. Happy fucking Friday, everyone.

The best things in life are free

For the last couple of weeks, I have been trying to whip up a little sympathy for all those lovers of the Wall Street Journal who are dreading the paper’s takeover by Rupert Murdoch.

After all, the WSJ is a revered institution of the fifth estate.

Yeah, and that and 2 bucks will get you a dozen donuts.

But mostly, I’ve come up dry. I mean, what is everyone so afraid of? That the WSJ will become a right-leaning newspaper? That they will make editorial decisions based on dollars instead of, you know, whatever vague, do-good notions about journalistic…ahem, integrity that the other big papers claim, with mostly straight faces, to be operating under these days?

Please.

The WSJ has always operated under one premise: money rules. And if money is what you love, then forgive me for not getting all misty-eyed when your journalistic baby ends up sacrificed on the altar of profit.

Besides, we all know what their little hissy fit is really about, anyway.

Murdoch’s not classy enough for them. And they’re afraid that he will take their baby and tart it up like he did The Sun and the NY Post. Maybe by this time next year the WSJ will feature big-boobed Page 3 girls, rendered in the WSJ’s trademark tasteful line drawings, of course.

The WSJ has always been the paper you simply must have delivered to your office, and tucked under your arm at lunch, and have carelessly flung upon the gleaming surface of your darling little Phillipe Starck coffee table, if you wish to be accepted as belonging to the ranks of the American nobility. How will the monied advance beyond nouveau riche, if Murdoch turns the WSJ into the ink-and-paper version of Fox News?

If you ask me, that’s what all the hand-wringing is really about. Yes, everybody on Wall Street wants to trumpet Murdoch as their favorite self-made tycoon, but nobody wants him actually picking out their china pattern.

Gimme back my money, bitch

According to Salon and The Boston Globe, the party-neutral Congressional Budget Office is estimating that our current expenditures in Iraq (500 billion) will double before the war is over.

That will, of course, put the price tag at 1 trillion. One fucking trillion dollars.

$1,000,000,000,000.00

If you can stand it, think for a minute about what we could have done with that money.

The security systems we could have improved in seaports, airports, power plants and public places.

The cops/FBI officers we could have put on the street. The raises we could have given our armed services personnel. The improvements made to the medical care given to our veterans.

We could have made ourselves so much safer from the attacks that would have been so much less likely anyway, because we wouldn’t have been off in the Middle East playing Lord of the Flies.

We could have funded education at decent levels in every state. We could have paid for universal health care several times over.

All that, and we could even have let those fucking rich selfish fuckers keep their fucking tax break, too.

We’d have money to spare in that Social Security lockbox that Al Gore used to speak of so lovingly in his campaign speeches.

We could wipe out the budget deficit, and perhaps experience the kind of boom in business and opportunity that we experienced in the 90s.

Yeah, the 90s. When that horrible immoral BJ-likin’ asshole ruined our country and dragged us through the mud with his LIES ABOUT IMPORTANT THINGS, and his TAX AND SPEND ways, and his GENERAL OVERALL SLICKNESS.

Remains

This morning I was listening to interviews with survivors and witnesses of the Minneapolis bridge collapse. As seems to always be the case, their thoughts, once past the logistics of escape, turn inevitably to the providence of fucked up events like this.

It's natural for humans to search for meaning, otherwise...

Well, it's very frightening, otherwise, isn't it, and let's just leave it at that for now. I have no desire to criticize anyone who walks away from shit like that and is seeking a little psychic comfort.

But this wonderful poem popped into my head, as I was listening to them, and I thought I might share it with you. It's really a wonderful poem. It's called "The Post-Rapture Diner," and it was written by Dorothy Barresi:

A thought you cannot call back
and empty shoes like
exclamation points
on every road from here to Tuscon.

Who will knock their boots against the doorjamb
now
and enter shyly?
Who will peel the vegetables?
Pie domes cloud over. Old sugar

makes a kind of weather in there—
webbed, waiting.
Tiers of doughnuts go woozy with collapse.

We deed and we will.
We bow to what providence we understand
and cede the rest: our lies and doubts, our human,
almost necessary
limitations. Probably I should have,

we whispered more than once, shaking our heads.
Probably. Now what’s left of the past
hangs in a walk-in freezer,
fat-shrouded, bluing,

and all we know of the present
is a spatula in a coffee can
on a cold grill, pointing to heaven.

Spongeworthy

The sponge is back, ladies. Yeah!

Like Elaine, I was seriously pissed when my favorite contraceptive left the market over ten years ago, and also like her, as my supply of the sponge dwindled, my standards for who was worthy of the use of a sponge became, well, let's just say that I actually had to adopt some standards.

Talk about put out.

Back in the day, they cost about twelve dollars for a box of a dozen, and they were so popular amongst my friends that we actually had a nickname for them: buck-a-fucks.

Of course now with the re-release of the product, the price has gone up to 30 bucks a dozen, which may necessitate for some women a new fiscal-based worthiness test.

But don't worry, Spooney, you're definitely worth $2.50 a pop. No question.

Making the world safe for feet that do not resemble fluorescent meatloaves

The wise infection control manager at Pittsburgh's Mercy Hospital has banned the wearing of Crocs by staff because the ventilation holes allow sharps (needles and the like) to penetrate the shoe, thereby posing a safety risk. Some non-hideous-footwear-challenged nurses are opposing the ban, but it appears the tide may be turning against the most egregious shoe crime since the invention of Uggs. Some Swedish hospitals have banned the things, claiming that the static charge that can build up in the shoe was causing electrical instruments to malfunction. Also, there are those escalator incidents.

I'll have a colortini, please.

Tom Snyder is dead.

I saw him once in Los Angeles, at the dog park at Mulholland and Laurel Canyon.

I saw him amble by with a large, ancient English Sheepdog, and I said out loud to a few dog park acquaintances standing nearby, “Hey, that’s Tom Snyder.”

No one knew who that was.

I supposed that to them he was just some tall, old schlubby guy wearing a corduroy sports jacket and hard-soled shoes to the dog park.

Okay, sure. But he was also the guy in the 70s, that guy with the hair that was ten different shades of brown and two different shades of gray who went toe-to-toe with Charles Manson without looking like he was about to piss himself. He was simultaneously self-deprecating and so completely full of himself that you would’ve changed the channel if it didn’t mean you’d have to get up and cross the room and find those pliers that you had to use since the knob busted. He wasn’t afraid of anyone that I ever saw, from Ayn Rand to Jimmy Hoffa to Johnny Rotten. He loved his job, and he was good at it. And he didn’t care how high or drunk you were, he was going to get an interview out of you, goddamn it, ha ha ha ha ha!

Poor old Tom. Some guys would look back at his career and be proud. I always got the feeling that Tom Snyder, finally forced into retirement by the network suits, just wanted to keep working, and that part of him couldn’t believe that no one wanted to watch him do that anymore.

P.S. hari-kari party at my digs later

How about a little walk down memory lane?

C'mon! It's fun.

Especially on a day like today, when our Attorney General, our nation's top law enforcement official, asserted that he "doesn't know" whether Karl Rove briefed Justice Department officials on Republican National Committee business and talking points, and he's "unsure" how many federal attorneys were fired not because they couldn't do their jobs, but because they wouldn't do the RNC version of their jobs.

In these fast-paced days of ours, when the accusations that BushCo has very nearly turned our government into a subsidiary of the RNC are flying faster than you can say "special prosecutor," wouldn't it be nice to return to a simpler, less stressful time?

And what a time it was: 1996! A time when the best scandal we could dig up about the current administration and their politicization of the government was that the Vice President used his office phone to call a donor.

Used his office phone! His official Vice-Presidential phone!

No, the taxpayers didn't pay for the call. He charged the call to the DNC. But still, you know, wear and tear. Also, he might have twisted the cord around his finger, okay, and then maybe his assistant had to untangle it or something. And the untangling might have taken valuable tax-payer-financed minutes to complete.

It was an important scandal that took up much of the media's time and energy. And we all paid attention to it, because maybe it meant that the Vice President wasn't a man with our best interests at heart.

Aaaahhhhh.....yes, that's it. Now, just let the bitterness and the irony just slide down your throat and settle into your gut. Yeah... Ruminate on it, baby, and then clench your fists and your gut tight, and hold onto that feeling, revel in it, because you still got another 16 months to go.

Whew!

Sorry, readers, but what with the release of a Harry Potter book AND a Harry Potter movie on the same day, Los Angeles had temporarily become a swirling vortex of geeky kiddie fantasy media. The smell of Clearasil and crushed adolescent hopes was so thick in the air I was forced to strap myself to the couch next to a cooler of beer and bust out the skanky 80s porn in order to avoid regressing several decades into someone who actually gives a shit about that fucking dink.

But I'm back now.

What theists can't fathom

Last Friday, former speechwriter and general cheerleader for BushCo Michael Gerson wrote a truly jaw-dropping little bit of religious smuggery called What Atheists Can’t Answer for the Washington Post. And WaPo, whose standards these days are a bit unfathomable to me, deemed it fit for publication. I deem it fit for my own personal brand of passive-aggressive ridicule, and so…well, you know the drill:

British author G.K. Chesterton argued that every act of blasphemy is a kind of tribute to God, because it is based on belief. "If anyone doubts this," he wrote, "let him sit down seriously and try to think blasphemous thoughts about Thor."

Wow, let’s just dive right into the deep end of the pool of logical fallacy, shall we?

The problem with blasphemy is that, just like any of your garden variety of gods, it is defined by those who believe that it exists. Me, I don’t believe in God, therefore, I don’t believe that blasphemy is possible. I’m aware that other people believe that it is possible, and, when I’m in the room, even likely, and occasionally I do try to curb my language so as to try to keep from offending what in my experience are some overall pretty fucking touchy people.

And for the record, Thor’s so-called “mighty hammer”? It ain’t all that, sisters.

By the evidence of the New York Times bestseller list, God has recently been bathed in such tributes. An irreverent trinity -- Christopher Hitchens, Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins -- has sold a lot of books accusing theism of fostering hatred, repressing sexuality and mutilating children (Hitchens doesn't approve of male circumcision). Every miracle is a fraud. Every mystic is a madman. And this atheism is presented as a war of liberation against centuries of spiritual tyranny.

I suppose if you’re an uptight, defensive member of the my-way-or-the-lake-of-fire-way set, then yeah, I bet you do view works such as those written by the above authors as declarations of war. Me, I view them as an assertion of my right to exist on an equal basis with my more pious brethren, and also, perhaps more importantly, as an assertion that the religious emperor has, in fact, precious few bits of clothing. Like maybe a thong or a g-string, at the most.

I say that because although religious organizations and their collections of dogma and ideals are as deeply flawed as any secular group of yahoos and their respective precious scribblings, we are, as a society, forbidden to say so. Because the very nature of a religion means that it is above criticism. Because it is a RELIGION, it cannot be criticized. You cannot say, for example, that you oppose Christianity, or Islam, or the Jewish religion, because their theology requires that a woman’s status be beneath that of a man’s. If you do say so, you are a bigot. You can level that same criticism about the KKK, or Skull and Bones, or the Augusta National Golf Club, but you can’t say that you oppose a religion, no matter what fucked-up shit is written in their scrolls.

Proving God's existence in 750 words or fewer would daunt even Thomas Aquinas. And I suspect that a certain kind of skeptic would remain skeptical even after a squadron of angels landed on his front lawn. So I merely want to pose a question: If the atheists are right, what would be the effect on human morality?

Does anyone else get the feeling that having squadrons of angels landing on the lawns of atheists is some kind of wet dream for Mr. Gerson?

If God were dethroned as the arbiter of moral truth, it would not, of course, mean that everyone joins the Crips or reports to the Playboy mansion.

I believe Mr. Gerson means that not all atheists are like Snoop Dogg.

On evidence found in every culture, human beings can be good without God. And Hitchens is himself part of the proof. I know him to be intellectually courageous and unfailingly kind, when not ruthlessly flaying opponents for taking minor exception to his arguments. There is something innate about morality that is distinct from theological conviction. This instinct may result from evolutionary biology, early childhood socialization or the chemistry of the brain, but human nature is somehow constructed for sympathy and cooperative purpose.

Why the kid glove treatment from Gerson for the known godless heathen Hitchens? Is it because he still continues to publicly support the war in Iraq? Maybe the human brain is also constructed for ass-kissing, hm?

But there is a problem. Human nature, in other circumstances, is also clearly constructed for cruel exploitation, uncontrollable rage, icy selfishness and a range of other less desirable traits.

I understand Mr. Gerson worked closely with Vice President Cheney, so he should know.

So the dilemma is this: How do we choose between good and bad instincts? Theism, for several millennia, has given one answer: We should cultivate the better angels of our nature because the God we love and respect requires it. While many of us fall tragically short, the ideal remains.

And while many of those falling tragically short are also those who claim the highest levels of piety and communication with their respective gods, what is one to think of this so-called “ideal”? The truth is, that most mainstream religions are based on the carrot and the stick. Be good, go to heaven, be bad, go to hell.

And the trouble with that is, that just like prison, people who believe in hell never seem to believe that they themselves are going there, no matter what heinousness they perpetrate upon their loved ones or on society at large. It seems to me that most Christians, for example, believe that all that is required to stay in the good grace of their god is merely to proclaim oneself a Christian. Hating, killing, raping, stealing – everything else will come out in the theological wash.

Atheism provides no answer to this dilemma. It cannot reply: "Obey your evolutionary instincts" because those instincts are conflicted. "Respect your brain chemistry" or "follow your mental wiring" don't seem very compelling either. It would be perfectly rational for someone to respond: "To hell with my wiring and your socialization, I'm going to do whatever I please." C.S. Lewis put the argument this way: "When all that says 'it is good' has been debunked, what says 'I want' remains."

And yet, as Mr. Gerson has already admitted, there are plenty of moral atheists. So it seems that C.S. Lewis has an affinity not just for books that inspire boring, overrated film versions of themselves, but also for statements that sound all fancy-like but are actually quite obviously wrongity-wrong-wrong.

Some argue that a careful determination of our long-term interests -- a fear of bad consequences -- will constrain our selfishness. But this is particularly absurd. Some people are very good at the self-centered exploitation of others. Many get away with it their whole lives.

I’m not going to name any names…but the number 43 springs to mind.

By exercising the will to power, they are maximizing one element of their human nature. In a purely material universe, what possible moral basis could exist to condemn them? Atheists can be good people; they just have no objective way to judge the conduct of those who are not.

See, because, religious types judge people objectively.

The death of God has greater consequences than expanded golf time on Sunday mornings. And it is not simply religious fundamentalists who have recognized it. America's Founders embraced public neutrality on matters of religion, but they were not indifferent to the existence of religious faith. George Washington warned against the "supposition that morality can be maintained without religion." The Founders generally believed that the virtues necessary for self-government -- self-sacrifice, honesty, public spirit -- were strengthened by religious beliefs and institutions.

First of all, I got to call a huge, huge BULLSHIT on that last sentence. All the biggies in the Founders club were pretty fucking cynical about organized religion, especially Christianity. But let’s not quibble about what Jefferson meant when he said "History, I believe, furnishes no example of a priest-ridden people maintaining a free civil government. This marks the lowest grade of ignorance, of which their political as well as religious leaders will always avail themselves for their own purpose,” or what Madison meant by “A just government, instituted to secure and perpetuate liberty, does not need the clergy.” The larger point here is that Gerson is faulting a material universe, when in fact a material universe requires not just repentance, but actual good works as evidence of morality. And what is a moral act? Why, one that benefits humanity. It’s not rocket science, Mr. G, it’s evolution. Human beings have a stake in seeing ourselves prosper. Which is why, perhaps, it is difficult to view an actual human being suffering, but less difficult to know that human beings, somewhere outside of our own personal experience, are suffering. The former tends to trigger a primal response in us, perhaps, and the latter, as Mr. Gerson’s former bosses know so very well, does not.

None of this amounts to proof of God's existence. But it clarifies a point of agreement -- which reveals an even deeper division. Atheists and theists seem to agree that human beings have an innate desire for morality and purpose. For the theist, this is perfectly understandable: We long for love, harmony and sympathy because we are intended by a Creator to find them.

Wow, considering that theists aren’t any more successful at finding love, harmony and sympathy than atheists are, doesn’t that make the Creator kind of a dick? Or a serious underachiever?

In a world without God, however, this desire for love and purpose is a cruel joke of nature -- imprinted by evolution, but destined for disappointment, just as we are destined for oblivion, on a planet that will be consumed by fire before the sun grows dim and cold.

At last, a member of the Bush administration acknowledges global warming!

Seriously, though, I guess he means to make that point that humans are less disappointed by the vagaries of life when they know that there is some paternal being out there hurling those disappointments at their feet like emotional hand grenades, instead of the love and purpose that they are seeking (at the express wish of that same being)? Does that make any sense to you?

Yeah, me neither.

This form of "liberation" is like liberating a plant from the soil or a whale from the ocean. In this kind of freedom, something dies.

First of all, Mr. Gerson, let me tell you, sincerely, that my desire for love and purpose is not a cruel joke of nature. Believe it, if you can. I cherish this life that I have, and I find happiness everywhere, and in the most unusual places, and I wish the same for everyone on earth, and will assist them in finding it if I am able, and none of it is because of a god compelling me to do so. Let me tell you, it feels good to know that I am a moral person even though there is no after-life reward waiting for me for being one. I do not choose evil, even though no threat of eternal hellfire hangs over my head to prevent me.

How can you not understand how good that feels? And how can you not see that as sorry as you must feel for poor, doomed little me, that I also feel sorry for you, who cannot choose between good and evil without a superfluous being to justify your choice?

If what you want is a belief structure that enforces good behavior with the threat of reward, or punishment, may I suggest a belief in Santa Claus? Because, as I recall, that dude seemed like a whole lot more fun.

101 South

Last Thursday night, as Spooney and I were driving home with my brother, who used to be an EMT in rural New Jersey, I saw that maybe a half a mile ahead of us that a big rig appeared to be standing still in the middle of the freeway. It was late at night and there were few cars in front of me but a small pack of them behind me, so I started tapping my brakes to warn them, and I slowly worked my way over to the #1 lane (the furthest left of 5 lanes) because it appeared to be unencumbered. I noticed my brother in the passenger seat was paying close attention to my actions.

As we slowly approached the scene, I saw in front of the big rig was a crumpled airport shuttle van. It had taken quite a beating, and was caved in on both sides, although in different places and at different angles. I also saw that the center divider had been smashed pretty good in one place, and that chunks of concrete had been strewn across all of the oncoming lanes on the other side.

It had clearly happened shortly before we arrived. There was not even a backup of cars yet except for the big rig. There were no emergency vehicles on the scene. When my brother took note of that fact, he told me to pull over. I was expecting him to say that, and yet somehow not really prepared for it at the same time. Doing my best to avoid the larger chunks of broken glass, I pulled over in front of the van and threw on my hazards.

Spooney and I watched my brother work the scene for maybe half a minute, and then it occurred to me that if he yelled for me or needed help, that I would not be able to hear him from inside my car. I got out and stood behind my car, and Spooney followed me. Together we watched my brother as cars drove by him a little too fast and with only a foot or two to spare. Spooney told me that he wished I would get back in the car, and I knew he was right, but I just said “He might need me.” Now, I knew better than to think that my assistance might actually be valuable in such a situation, but somehow, sitting in my car when my brother was doing what he was doing just felt wrong to me.

But I’ll let my brother pick up the story from there:

Looking back at the last few days, I’ve reflected on just how many times I have walked through the crunch of glass and metal to survey what could be anything between a close call and a tragedy. Hundreds of times I have made that walk and the only true variable of that night would be what I would find inside that particular vehicle. The fact that I was far from home deprived me of my jump bag and the knowledge of the whereabouts of the nearest appropriate facility but other than that I knew this script well, I have played my part over and over until there are no surprises… or at least very few.

The center lane of 5 lanes, a shuttle bus that has clearly stood on its nose and was capable of holding many people, maybe as many as 10, there were no downed wires, no fire, and my ears cataloged the crunch of moving traffic across the median as opposing traffic drives through a concrete debris field. I guessed that the accident started and ended on this side of the divider from the fact that there is concrete blown 30 yards across the opposing lanes, but the reality is I have seen too many unguessable situations that I don’t put much stock in what it looks like might have happened. How it happened doesn’t much change how I will treat a patient for the first 5 minutes.

I automatically checked for a gas puddle, ignition sources and cries from within as I approached, none were present. The semi-trailer blocking traffic in the lane moved on leaving the lane exposed to oncoming highway traffic, I remember noting the increased risk without the truck in place. This time the vehicle was empty no one knew where the driver was and the two wrecked vehicles upstream of the accident yielded no injuries. I gave the very brief out-of-state-retired-EMT report to the CA cop that pulled up using as little bandwidth as possible as it was, after all, just the opinion of someone driving by on a Thursday night.

I ramped back down easily enough, again, practice, though I wondered for over a day where the hell the driver went in such a short time as I estimated that we were on scene within 1-2 minutes of the event. While I have seen plenty of drivers book from a scene, they typically weren’t shuttle bus drivers.

It is nearly impossible for me to drive by during that time between crash and help arriving. I literally had to take my hand off the car door handle to prevent myself from exiting while the car was still in motion while my sister staged her car exactly right, upstream of the site and protected from oncoming traffic.

I still don’t know the name of the highway that I found myself standing in almost 3,000 miles from home that night.

All in all this was a good night, zero patients is a good number.

As we left the scene and eased back into traffic, we all couldn’t help but speculate on what had happened to the driver of the vehicle. As he was going to fly out the next day, my brother asked to look at the news and let him know what had happened. I had to explain to him that in Los Angeles, this kind of event didn’t make the news, and that I had often felt frustrated myself and left wondering why, for instance, the police helicopters circled my block with searchlights veering crazily down the street and through my backyard for the better part of an hour, only to have them fly away suddenly without so much as a word of explanation. It is part of the random nature of life in the big-ass city, I guess, that so much of the bad shit seems to appear out of nowhere, fuck intensely with your life for a while for no discernible reason, and then disappear just as suddenly as it appeared.

Dear Republican Majority,

I have SO changed my mind about the whole immigration reform thing.

This country has got to start enforcing some kind of standard for admittance.

Nothing like Palm Springs in July!

Except for Hades. I believe Hades is very similar to Palm Springs in July.

And Palm Springs is where I am headed. Lord knows why, since I am allergic to both golf pants and old people.

I'll be out for a week or so.

Take care while I am gone, gentle readers. Play nice.

Where's MY HOV lane?

The Los Angeles Times today published a story about how scientists off the coast of Baja California have noticed that a significant portion of the gray whale population is too skinny, due to the effects of global warming on its arctic food supply.

So, allow me to beat you to the punch, all you lame-ass comedians and right-wing industry apologists:

In LA, even the whales are skinny! Har har.

You know what else is funny? Drowning polar bears and dying coral reefs!

Hilarious!

And the people that care about all that shit...you know what they are?

Fucking bleeding heart losers. Fucking whiny little vegetarians who are so weak from the lack of good ole' American fucking red meat that they fall to the ground, disoriented, and unable to use the stink of their patchouli incense to find their way back home.

They're dying of liberal colony collapse disorder, just like those fucking bees.

Some day, people in the future will look back at us, and our time, and they will say, "Jesus fucking Christ, what the fuck were those fucking people thinking?! Talk about heads up their asses! What the fuck did they THINK was happening to all those animals and plants and whole entire fucking ecosystems?!? Did they think it was just some kind of crazy fucking coincidence??? Were they all just fucking stupid, or did they just not give a fucking rat's ass?? Holy fucking Christ on a motherfucking cross!!"

Okay, okay, people of the future! Cripes, you kiss your mother with that mouth?

So recently, I was having lunch with some scientists in the energy tech industry, and the subject of global warming came up, as it do tend. After we talked about carbon emissions, I brought up the fact that methane is also a greenhouse gas, and that livestock production contributes more to greenhouse gas emissions than any other source, including transportation.

"Yes, but methane dissipates more quickly in the atmosphere," one scientist said.

"Okay, maybe," I said, "but we don't need many years and new technologies to cut down on methane production. A serious reduction could be achieved in a much shorter space of time than by any other means we've discussed."

"But," said another of them, "you can have transportation without carbon dioxide. You can't have cows without methane."

He flashed a small smile to the others.

"You can have food without cows," I said.

My remark hung in the air like a fart in an elevator. Everyone looked at me like I had just taken a giant shit on their plate. After a few moments, one of them started to chuckle quietly. I wasn't sure if it was because he thought I was tres amusing, or whether he was acknowledging that I had managed, without the benefit of a Ph.D., to say something insightful.

I'm not a scientist, and so I usually don't stick my neck out like that when I'm around groups of scientists, because they tend to have a lot more facts at their fingertips than I do.

But jeezy creezy, when are we going to wake up to this simple and important part of the global warming equation? Vegetarians contribute the equivalent of 1.5 tons fewer of carbon dioxide per year than meat eaters. It's as simple as that.

So, tomorrow, while you're watching Sting butcher and jazzify some great vintage Police song at that dang lame Live Earth concert, and one of the musicians there, probably Melissa Etheridge, asks what YOU are doing to stop global warming, stand up and lift your beer and proudly exclaim "I'm eating some crappy little dried-out veggie burger, okay? Happy now, Al Gore? Huh? Happy?!?"

Dear King George,

Just wanted to cc you on a little missive I got going around the world.

Purely FYI, you know.

I'll let you get back to deciding now.

Sincerely,
Vikkitikkitavi


p.s. please kill yourself

The Declaration of Independence

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

Happy Birthday, America! Hope you like bile rising in the back of your throat!

President Bush, in a move that galls even though it was 100% guaranteed to happen, commuted Scooter Libby's sentence today.

Saying that he respected the jury's verdict even while he was pissing on it, Bush made Scooter's jail term go away, while leaving the fine and the probation part of the sentence in tact. He called the sentence "excessive."

Which is interesting, because last month the Supreme Court upheld a decision supporting a 33-month sentence for a man who had served many years in the military, but who had been, like Libby, convicted of obstruction of justice and perjury.

Libby had been sentenced to 30 months.