Liberalism and Conservatism

Jeanne of Body and Soul has written a post titled Democrats, Aristocrats, and the Torturer's Assistants. In the post, Jeanne examines those things, but she also ponders the fundamental differences between liberals and conservatives, or rather between liberalism and conservatism, from a liberal's perspective. When Jeanne publishes a philosophical post, whoever reads it is well rewarded.

Steve
   PermaLink     

No To Gonzales - Again

The Liberal Coalition, the blog alliance of which I am glad to say I'm a member, has issued a formal statement in opposition to the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general. The Liberal Coalition has also joined with literally hundreds of other bloggers in opposing the nomination.

Once again: Gonzales is not just another unfortunate Bush nominee. His willingness to subvert the law in order to condone torture... let's call it what it is... makes him not merely unqualified to be attorney general but shows him to be the sort of outlaw a well-intended Justice Department should pursue. His confirmation must be stopped. If you're in a state with Democratic senators, call them and urge them to vote NO on Gonzales.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Success?

On the whole, this appears to be good news...

Millions of Iraqis defied a surge of bombings and suicide attacks yesterday to go to the polls in greater than expected numbers for the first democratic elections for 50 years. The electoral commission's provisional estimate of turnout was 57%.

... though this is not...

Despite an extraordinary security crackdown in which all cars were banned from the streets and most roads were blocked by soldiers and coils of razor wire, more than 40 Iraqis were killed in attacks.

At least nine suicide bombers, most with explosives strapped to their chests, detonated themselves near polling stations in Baghdad. Several other targets were hit by mortars and explosions echoed across Baghdad throughout the day, but still crowds of Iraqis turned out to vote.

... and this is predictable enough...

Speaking from the White House after the polls had closed, President Bush said: "The world is hearing the voice of freedom from the centre of the Middle East. By participating in free elections, the Iraqi people have firmly rejected the anti-democratic ideology of the terrorists."

Of course I'm delighted at the turnout. No citizen of a longstanding democracy such as ours, be that citizen liberal or conservative, Democrat or Republican, could fail to respond to the spectacle of large numbers of people defying threats of violence... some threats actualized... to vote for their leaders.

That said, I wish I could share Mr. Bush's optimism. As he crows, effectively, "I told you so," I ask, "what exactly did you tell us that is in fact coming to pass?" The success of this election has yet to be determined. The U.S. military lockdown continues. The chances of the U.S. leaving any time soon as a result of a "successful" election are small. And at least one expert, Juan Cole (who is most certainly no lefty, by the way), says this is not Bush's victory to claim:

Analysts also noted that the Bush administration initially resisted the idea of holding elections this soon and only succumbed under pressure from Iraq's most powerful cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani. The original plan, designed by then-U.S. administrator L. Paul Bremer, was a complicated formula of regional caucuses to select a national government, which would write a constitution, and then hold the elections.

"It was Sistani who demanded one-person, one-vote elections. So to the extent it's a victory, it's a victory for Iraqis. The Americans were maneuvered into having to go along with it," said Juan Cole, an Iraq expert at the University of Michigan.

Yet according to another expert, the possibility of a quicker American exit may be one reason so many Iraqis turned out:

Other analysts said recent opinion polls indicate that many Iraqis viewed the election as one way to accelerate the U.S. withdrawal rather than as a vindication of U.S. policy. "They realize that the quickest way to get the United States out of Iraq is to create a new government," said Henri Barkey, a former State Department policy planning staff member now at Lehigh University. "Not to vote would mean a continuation of the status quo. So the election is not a vindication of U.S. policy."

And James Zogby, "president of the Arab American Institute and an analyst with Zogby International," reminds us not to count our chickens:

"We shouldn't get hysterical with hyperbole, we shouldn't have a 'mission accomplished' moment," said James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute and an analyst with Zogby International, a New York-based polling firm. "Our polls show that the divisions are quite deep."

He compared Iraq's election to the 1860 U.S. election, which paved the way for the Civil War after Abraham Lincoln won -- and South Carolina seceded. "This election could exacerbate the divide," Zogby said. "You can't have 20 percent of the population feel disenfranchised."

The process of creating a constitution could be difficult:

If the constitution is approved in October, an election will be held by 15 December and a fully constitutional government will take power by 31 December. If the constitution is rejected, there will be a new assembly election by 15 December, and a further year is then allowed for the whole process.

There is also provision for a delay of six months if not enough progress is made on the constitution by 1 August.

We Americans at least have a Constitution, even if our current administration ignores it whenever it proves inconvenient. Iraqis don't have even that much yet. Even if this election is valid, even if it doesn't deepen divisions and provoke even more bloodshed, Iraq has a long way to go before anyone can claim it has a functioning democracy. Bush, I'm certain, doesn't give a damn, any more than he gives a damn about democracy in America. All he wants is his "'mission accomplished' moment."

I will say this: DarkSyd was correct about the courage of the Iraqi people. Whatever the actual outcome, and whatever their reasons for voting, even if it was merely to get rid of the Americans occupying their country, one has to admire their courage.

---

Here are a couple of basic references on the Iraqi election. You may already know all this, but I certainly didn't:

BBC News Q&A: Iraqi Election

CSM: How Iraq's election will work

Steve
   PermaLink     

No To Gonzales

I have posted three times in recent months in opposition to the confirmation of Alberto Gonzales as attorney general. It is, however, more than a mere formality when I sign on to the Daily Kos bloggers' statement of Jan. 25, whose signatories are now being tracked by NewsFare.

John Ashcroft was the most dangerous attorney general in modern times. His principles seemed to require him to shred the Bill of Rights on a regular basis, to conduct as much Justice Department business as possible in secret and to push the already relaxed limits of the dubiously constitutional PATRIOT Act to invade the lives of ordinary Americans in unprecedented ways.

Gonzales could be worse.

I do not say that lightly. Ashcroft appeared to have evil principles contrary to those of our founders; Gonzales appears to have no principles apart from this one: "serve George W. Bush's ambitions, by any means necessary."

As with my opposition to Ashcroft, this is far from a partisan matter. (Regular readers know that when I make partisan assertions, I freely admit to doing so.) Having a man like Gonzales as attorney general, a man who not only ignores laws when they inconvenience his plans but also assists Mr. Bush in ignoring them from his seat of executive power, is dangerous to the well-being of the United States, harmful to its government supposedly of laws not individuals, and dangerous to our citizens as they interact with the world community. Gonzales has betrayed the nation he serves by deliberately advocating the violation of the law he claims to love so much. He probably belongs in jail for what he has done, but I'll settle for this:

Gonzales must not be confirmed.

(Reposted to correct links to my own site. Sheesh! Of all the things I should get right...)

Steve
   PermaLink     

Democracy On The March

DarkSyd at Unscrewing the Inscrutable has written a very moving post in praise of those who will attempt to vote in Iraq tomorrow. While I applaud his thumbnail history of democracy, and share his enthusiasm for that form of government, I'm afraid I have to differ with his conclusions. Among other things, DarkSyd asks this of us:

I'd like to ask a favor: Regardless of one's political inclination, irrespective of your confidence in the electoral process employed, or the decision to invade and occupy Iraq, no matter what the outcome, let us all stand united in our admiration for those courageous Iraqi's who will brave gunfire, RPGs, bombs, and reprisal, to determine their own fate? For they choose to do so in bold defiance of promised violence and certain intimidation.

While I agree with many of the sentiments expressed in DarkSyd's post, I do not agree that tomorrow's election in Iraq is a good thing. It does not mark the beginning of democracy in Iraq: that beginning will come with the first free and fair elections held after U.S. occupation ends. Elections held under a military lockdown by an occupying power, a power still battling an insurgency (insurgents? the resistance? freedom fighters? it's hard for us to use positive terms for people who kill U.S. troops, but it's important to realize not everyone views these people as we do), elections with candidates selected by dubious processes, elections in which even more citizens stay home than do in U.S. elections, can hardly be expected to reflect the will of the people. To my regret, I expect the occupation to last a long time, and the first genuine elections in Iraq to happen years from now, if ever. I also expect those first genuine elections to have outcomes not to Bush's liking.

But Iraqis have to deal with tomorrow first. And tomorrow has little legitimacy in my opinion. Therefore I do not blame Iraqi citizens who choose not to participate. From the outset, a free and fair election is impossible. Anything less is not worth dying for. Specifically, George W. Bush's political need to exhibit a "catastrophic success" is not worth the deaths of any more Iraqis... or Americans. Bush has killed enough people already for his own political purposes.

My prayers are with the Iraqi people, and of course with our own troops as always. As for George and his "democracy on the march," here's a clue: ill-begun is half undone.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Friday Cat Snapping

Samantha licks her chops after a snack.

---

Tabitha, pensive as usual.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Bush's Little White Lies

OK, big white lies. But since they are lies told about African Americans, to African Americans, by a Caucasian, they are most certainly white lies.

Josh Marshall is all over Bush's Social Security privatization attempt these days. If you care about your retirement, or your parents', or that of your spouse when you leave this world, you should be reading Marshall every day. In the linked post, he points us to an editorial in the Star-Tribune about Bush's lie to African Americans. Here's the lie, as quoted by the Star-Tribune:

African-American males die sooner than other males do, which means the [Social Security] system is inherently unfair to a certain group of people. And that needs to be fixed.

A truly pernicious lie, says the Star-Tribune, which goes on to show where the Heritage Foundation study Bush is referring to has since been thoroughly debunked:

     ...

Bush didn't make up this phony line on his own; it comes from the Heritage Foundation, which a number of years ago did a study purporting to show that because African-Americans have a shorter life expectancy than whites, they get less in return for the taxes they pay into the Social Security system.

But when the Heritage study was examined by actuaries at the Social Security Administration and by the Government Accountability Office, serious methodological flaws and numerous bad assumptions were uncovered. For example:

• Heritage failed to factor in the progressivity of Social Security benefits; on a taxes-paid to benefits-received ratio, those with lower incomes get more back. Blacks tend to earn less than whites, and thus their Social Security benefits are larger in comparison to taxes they pay.
• Social Security is more than retirement benefits. It also includes survivor and disability benefits. Blacks benefit disproportionately from those programs. While blacks are 11 percent of the workforce, for example, they are 18 percent of those receiving disability benefits. Almost half the blacks receiving Social Security -- 47 percent -- are getting disability benefits or survivor benefits.

The Social Security actuaries found that Heritage had exaggerated substantially the amount blacks pay in Social Security taxes and low-balled the benefits they receive. "In fact," the actuaries said, "results from more careful research reflecting actual work histories for workers by race indicate that the non-white population actually enjoys the same or better expected rates of return from Social Security than for the white population."

The GAO reached the same conclusion. It said that, "In the aggregate, blacks and Hispanics have higher disability rates and lower lifetime earnings, and thus receive greater benefits relative to taxes [paid] than whites."

     ...

I have to rush off to do some work now. Draw your own conclusions. Mine, in brief: Bush will lie about anything whatsoever to get what he wants, especially if what he wants is big, expensive and hurts a lot of people very badly.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Blogdogging

• Mustang Bobby has a new blog, Bobby Cramer, named after his novel in progress and containing his posts about writing.
• blogAmy is truly snowed under in Boston.
• Body and Soul explores, among other things the hypocrisy of Bush's inaugural speech.
• NTodd says NO to Alberto Gonzales: "A vote for Gonzales is a vote for torture."
• oldwhitelady has been reading the Beeb about the psychological horrors experienced by prisoners in solitary confinement for long periods of time.
• Michael aches all over after walking around Paris viewing museums. Life is tough!
• President Boxer is getting lots of attention from everyone... including the right-wing nutjobs. Thanks to Mad Kane for getting this much-needed effort started.
• Josh Marshall explores Republican opposition to privatizing Social Security.
• DarkSyde gives us his breathtakingly long but quite interesting "Sunday Op-Ed."
• Bryan offers Some Things Considered, including an article about the brain's response to anger, and the possible political significance of same.
• NewsWriter is name-calling the name-callers.
• vaara may be going to Iceland on vacation, er, holiday.

As usual, there are hundreds of posts out there that are worthy of linking, but I have time and space for only a few. Who knows, I may start doing regular blogarounds. Or I may not. Either way, enjoy those linked above.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Spooky

And I'm not referring to Fox Mulder's nickname. Try this instead:

Secret Unit Expands Rumsfeld's Domain
New Espionage Branch Delving Into CIA Territory
By Barton Gellman
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, January 23, 2005; Page A01

The Pentagon, expanding into the CIA's historic bailiwick, has created a new espionage arm and is reinterpreting U.S. law to give Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld broad authority over clandestine operations abroad, according to interviews with participants and documents obtained by The Washington Post.

The previously undisclosed organization, called the Strategic Support Branch, arose from Rumsfeld's written order to end his "near total dependence on CIA" for what is known as human intelligence. Designed to operate without detection and under the defense secretary's direct control, the Strategic Support Branch deploys small teams of case officers, linguists, interrogators and technical specialists alongside newly empowered special operations forces.

Military and civilian participants said in interviews that the new unit has been operating in secret for two years -- in Iraq, Afghanistan and other places they declined to name. ...

Sen. John McCain is not happy with this course of events, and plans to hold hearings:

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said the Senate Armed Services Committee will hold hearings on a Washington Post report that the Defense Department is reinterpreting U.S. law to give the secretary broad authority over clandestine operations abroad.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld has created a new espionage unit called the Strategic Support Branch, according to the news report, but McCain, speaking on CBS's "Face the Nation," said he doubts Rumsfeld has broken any laws.

"I'm always sorry to read about things in The Washington Post when they affect a committee that I am a member of," McCain said.

Pentagon spokesman Lawrence T. DiRita issued a carefully worded statement yesterday that appears to dispute parts of the Post article.

"There is no unit that is directly reportable to the secretary of defense for clandestine operations as is described in the Washington Post," he said. In addition, DiRita said, "the Department is not attempting to 'bend' statutes to fit desired activities, as is suggested in this article."

     ...

Note that DiRita doesn't say it isn't happening; he says only that it is not "as is described in the Washington Post."

Does all of this make you feel more secure?

I can't wait to read what Bryan of Why Now has to say about this one.

---

UPDATE: Bryan has his say, and as always, his insight is deep and his conclusions are exactly on target. I knew he would come through!

Steve
   PermaLink     

No Crisis

At long last, I have placed a link to the site There Is No Crisis on the sidebar. I am torn between resisting the site's aggressive self-promotion and recognizing that their message is right on target, and that they are doing a pretty good job of tracking which members of Congress, pundits, etc. have come out as opposing, or at least suspicious of, Bush's attempt to privatize (read: end) Social Security. My compromise is to link them, but to ditch the flashing animated part of their logo. I detest things that flash on this blog, because they distract from my own content. Just in case anyone ever suspected otherwise, I was not paid for this "ad," nor have I ever been paid for any link from this site, commercial or otherwise. (Trust me: my blog is a money sink, not a source.)

From where I stand, I scarcely even need to write more on this subject. Paul Krugman has been on the case for the last few weeks, and the message couldn't be clearer: Bush's plan, at least as much of it as he has chosen to reveal, would reduce benefits for retirees, result in massive debt, fail to solve the problem of the baby boom and (surprise) make the purveyors of private retirement plans wealthy with taxpayers' money diverted to management fees. Meanwhile, between the SSA's estimate and that of the CBO, it is clear that there is not even a real problem until 2042 or 2052, let alone a crisis right now.

I am sure I will remind you of this issue for as long as it is in the public arena. I am of course concerned for my own retirement, having paid into the system for over 35 years now, but I am even more concerned at the prospect of seeing the most effective social insurance program in our nation's history destroyed, and countless seniors likely relegated to the poverty seniors knew before Social Security came into being, just to satisfy the ideological obsessions and raw greed of the Bush administration and its cronies.

Steve
   PermaLink     

New Blog: President Boxer

Humorist Mad Kane and a few of her compatriots are "celebrating" Bush's coronation by starting a new group blog called President Boxer. The blog's mission, simply stated, is this: overcome Democrat blahs by placing a liberal fighter of unquestioned credentials and courage... Barbara Boxer... in the White House in 2008. Many of us who have no idea whom we will actually support in 2008 have signed on to post on President Boxer, because we need a strong figure around whom to rally the flagging liberal wing of the party, the "Democratic Party wing of the Democratic Party," as the late, great Sen. Paul Wellstone used to say. Here's my first post over there, cross-posted (and slightly edited) from President Boxer.

---

I praise the great Senator Barbara Boxer!
No timid Tom Daschle, she takes the hard knocks. Her
Courageous assault on election fraud rocks. Her
Strong questions to Condi just blew off my socks. Her
Good looks in her sixties... she's still quite the fox. Her...

Look, they don't call me the Yellow Doggerel Democrat for nothing; I could go on like that for quite a while. Fortunately, I won't, because there are more important things to discuss.

I am a liberal and a Democrat. Those two aspects are not as inseparable in the public mind, even the Democratic mind, as they once were, say, 50 years ago. I want to see those attributes, "liberal" and "Democrat," reconnected. I want to see Democrats stand their ground on the liberal issues that were once their signature. I want them to exhibit courage in the face of administration browbeating and internal attempts to shove the party rightward. I want them to put up an incredible fight when the franchise is in danger, or the validity of an election is in question. I want them... I want them to act like Barbara Boxer.

It's early days, and I have no idea whom I'll support for president in 2008. But because it's early days, I feel free to back the most visible symbol of courageous liberalism in the Democratic Party today: Barbara Boxer.

You gotta problem wit' that? Watch yer mouth; or I'll start rhyming again...

Steve
   PermaLink     

Water Is Like Peace

"Water is like peace - you never really know just how valuable it is until someone takes it away." - Riverbend.

Riverbend's household has had no water for six days. After calling around, she concludes the situation is much the same elsewhere (in Baghdad or in all of Iraq; it's not clear from her wording). She does not know why this is happening, but she cannot help thinking the scarcity of water is deliberate. I have no way of knowing if that is true, but true or not, if Iraqis are thinking that, if they're whispering the words "collective punishment," it is bad news for everyone... everyone. Please go read about the situation in Riverbend's own words.

Whether a deliberate U.S. act or the negligence of an incompetent Iraqi government, this failure to keep the most fundamental part of the infrastructure working cannot possibly go unnoticed. Remember when Germans recalled Hitler fondly because he kept the trains running on time? What will Iraqis remember about Saddam Hussein and the water supply?

(Update: the farmer of corrente reminds us that Mussolini was the one who actually took credit for the on-time trains. I've also heard Hitler in this context, from a primary source when I was in Austria; see the comment thread.)

Steve
   PermaLink     

Jelly Roll

Take your pick. The confection... not among my favorites. The pianist and composer, Ferdinand Joseph Lemott, a.k.a. "Jelly Roll Morton" (1890-1941), a legend in his time, for a very short time. Or his famous Jelly Roll Blues.

This post is about Jelly Roll Morton and his blues. As I witness the American period of democratic government pass into oblivion before my very eyes, I feel a need to spend some time with the American cultural contribution to the world. As with everything American, our artistic endeavors do not span millennia, but much of our opus over a couple of centuries is excellent. Morton's work certainly qualifies as excellent.

Stella recently surprised me with a gift of one of the many Hal Leonard books of jazz. Most of them are fake books, requiring one to "make up" most of the music, given a melody and some chord symbols. As an old continuo player on harpsichord, I enjoy those a lot. But this one is different. It contains fully written-out piano music. The level is not extremely challenging, which in my case is a good thing: a decent harpsichordist is not necessarily a capable pianist. Not entirely by chance, I chose Morton's Jelly Roll Blues as the first piece to learn from this book. For one thing, I'd heard of the piece for decades, without having any idea what it sounded like. For another, Morton's era succeeded the ragtime era by a few decades, and I've been a ragtime fan for years, though much of it is just barely out of my technical reach... not that I don't attempt it in the privacy of my apartment.

Not long afterward, Stella found a CD of Jelly Roll Morton playing his own works. I haven't heard it yet, but in anticipation, I did some web searching, and found this article by pianist Richard Trythall from May 2002, about... you guessed it... Morton's Jelly Roll Blues. The article is rather analytical and oriented toward performance practice; it's the sort of stuff I used to spend my nights reading. (Well, some of my nights.) Accompanying it is a link to Trythall's transcription of Jelly Roll Blues, which is probably a fair approximation of what Morton actually played on a recording, filtered through Trythall's excellent musical and pianistic mind.

What a surprise. I presume, without evidence, that the Hal Leonard edition reproduces the early published version of Jelly Roll Blues, or something close to it. If that is the case, what a world of difference there is between that and what Morton himself apparently actually played. And what a helluva pianist the man must have been. Trythall rightly points to Morton's imitation of a band style (as opposed to a more typical pianistic style), and notes the great sophistication with which Morton brings out the lines of what he must have conceived as individual wind players, whole sections playing block chords, etc. Orchestral reductions are always difficult (I speak from experience; ten fingers do not an entire ensemble make), but these are in no way reduced. They are conceived and performed so as to show a whole array of textures and densities, from a single line like that of a melody instrument to the whole raucous band screaming with everything it's got.

I wonder what Morton would have thought of the notion that people would be performing and analyzing his music more than 60 years after his death. I doubt seriously he ever imagined it.

We Americans are a breathtakingly creative people. If our nation goes the way of Nazi Germany, or worse yet, the old Soviet Union, channeling its most creative people's abilities to serve some ideological purpose, a great deal will be lost. America, if it survives long enough as the America we knew and loved, ultimately has as much to contribute as the much-maligned "old Europe." Poland gave the world Chopin; we gave the world Jelly Roll Morton. Who is to say which of these immensely creative, regrettably short-lived men was greater.

Long live America. Long live the free, open and democratic society that fosters artistic creativity rather than stifling it. Long live the liberal worldview that sees the arts as essential, not as some unfortunate byproduct of the drive to make money and dominate the world. Long live the Jelly Roll Blues.

(Minor editing applied after initial posting.)

---

UPDATE: some sources say Morton's name was Lamothe. Others offer even more suggestions, La Menthe, LaMenthe or Lamenthe. His baptismal certificate says Lemott. Apparently the great Alan Lomax erred in noting the various names. This is a scholar's kind of question, and I am not so much a scholar as a (retired) performing musician. Read the linked article if you are interested... sorry, but I'm not.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Exit Polls, One More Time...

I know, I know; but how can I get over Election 2004 when I still haven't gotten over sElection 2000? Anyway, from the WaPo, we have the following article about exit pollsters' analysis of their own alleged inaccuracies:

Report Acknowledges Inaccuracies in 2004 Exit Polls
By Richard Morin and Claudia Deane
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, January 20, 2005; Page A06

Interviewing for the 2004 exit polls was the most inaccurate of any in the past five presidential elections as procedural problems compounded by the refusal of large numbers of Republican voters to be surveyed led to inflated estimates of support for John F. Kerry, according to a report released yesterday by the research firms responsible for the flawed surveys.

The exit pollsters emphasized that the flaws did not produce a single incorrect projection of the winner in a state on election night. But "there were 26 states in which the estimates produced by the exit poll data overstated the vote for John Kerry . . . and there were four states in which the exit poll estimates overstated the vote for George W. Bush," said Joe Lenski of Edison Media Research and Warren Mitofsky of Mitofsky International.

     ...

Excuse my dumb question (or don't; I don't give a damn), but if those voters refused to be interviewed, how in the world did the poll takers know they were Republican?

Later in the article, we have this brilliant conclusion by the reporters:

     ...

The differences between the final exit poll results and the vote count revived criticisms of the exit polls fueled by consecutive election-night debacles in 2000 and 2002. They also fueled assertions that the exit poll results were accurate and that it was the vote count that was flawed or deliberately manipulated to deliver the election to Bush.

The analysis found no evidence of fraud resulting from the rigging of voting equipment, a contention made repeatedly by those who question the 2004 vote.

     ...

Excuse me again, but what qualifies the polling consortium to weigh in on the issue of fraud, vote rigging, equipment tampering, etc.? Just what is their claim to expertise? That doesn't stop the WaPo from offering the statement as if it were somehow evidence against claims of vote fraud. It isn't. This is just another bit of Bush-administration-friendly behavior by a major news outlet.

You know, I'll have four more years, if I live that long, to "get over it." Somehow, I don't think that will be long enough. Oh well; if I die, and the 2004 election is later proved legitimate, maybe I'll have the opportunity to see Hell freeze over.

Steve
   PermaLink     

Friday Tabby Faking

We arrived at Stella's place a couple of days ago to this charming scene, sort of...

Samantha and Tabitha were actually seated on the ottoman in front of this sofa, along with a pile of papers. I Photoshopped them onto the sofa itself, mostly for fun. No, they aren't giant cats; I guess I should have shrunk them a little more. The transplant was not entirely successful; I have negligible skills in Photoshop (and apparently no sense of scale). But the kitties didn't object to being moved, and the scene was just too cute not to share.

Steve
   PermaLink     

The Coronation -- DOGGEREL!

I hardly need to explain to regular readers how disgusted I am at tomorrow's scheduled event. If the man was duly elected, it proves every old saw about how tyrants throughout history have played on people's fears to gain their support in their own subjugation. And if he wasn't duly elected... well, don't get me started on that topic.

In hopes that a bit of humor will help ease the pain, I offer you a close-up view of...

Bush's Inaugural Balls

I. The Price Who are these disporters? Dub's wealthy supporters, Who donate whenever he calls; Whoever is paying, Be certain they're playing At Bush's inaugural balls. A GOP woman Who thought she was someone, But spent all her bucks at the malls, Got no invitation To this celebration: You pay for a look at Dub's balls. She wasn't delighted Not being invited; Not one of the wealthier dolls... To be on the roster, You know it would cost her An arm and a leg for those balls. The hawkers of wars And the corporate whores And the people from K Street's great halls? Their gazes are sunny: They know that their money Will easily cover Dub's balls. II. The People Dub's wife, the first lady, Is rather afraid he, As off of the wagon he falls, Will land with a thunk On his head while he's drunk, But more likely he'll land on the balls. Her daughters, whom Laura Will witness with horra, No little immaculate dolls, Miz Barbara and Jenna See Daddy's a winna At Bush's inaugural balls. And Ms. Condoleezza? Dub thought he could pleezza By giving her State. But she crawls On hands and on knees, To her "husband": "Dub, please! I just want your inaugural balls." Oh, then there is Rummy, Pretentiously scummy, Increasingly covered with scalls, Says (utterly smarmy), "You go with the army You have, to the president's balls." The pride of the ball is Alberto Gonzales, Whose blatant deceptiveness galls; Though from your front porch, you're Aware of his torture, He'll see Dub's inaugural balls. III. The Nightmare You find Dub appealing? Our nation he's stealing; The thought of his thieving appalls. And stolen elections Give Dubya erections Above his inaugural balls. His "final solutions," His swift executions That aren't confined to The Walls; One thing is quite plain: That he likes causing pain... But you know there's no pain in his balls. Those battered and wizened Poor wretches imprisoned Forever, Guantanamo's thralls, Know Dubya's excuses For heinous abuses Will haunt his inaugural balls. IV. Conclusion So that is my doggerel For the inauggerel; Hope it did not make you sick... The balls surely must sting, But what's most disgusting Is Bush's inaugural Dick.

Steve Bates

Steve
   PermaLink     

 
Selected Links To Recent Posts

 
Click any permalink below to go to the original article on a previous page. Click a comment link below to add a comment to the original article. Your comment will be noticed, by the YDD at least: HaloScan has a page allowing me to view recent comments, no matter which post they refer to.

Tulia Reviewed

Steve
   PermaLink     

King Of The World

Steve
   PermaLink     

Pollution... Again

Steve
   PermaLink     

Not Social? No Security

Steve
   PermaLink     

The I Stands For Incompetent

Steve
   PermaLink     

Huygens Lands On Titan

Steve
   PermaLink     

The Loud Little Handful

Steve
   PermaLink