Wednesday, June 13, 2007

You're EVIL because you don't watch our crap

Les Moonves has no shame.

The man who brought us:

* Howard Stern, who talked dirty with naked women in the studio, among other outrageous acts . . .


* And then Opie & Anthony, who got fired over encouraging listeners to get it on in places like, ohhhhhhhh, St. Patrick's Cathedral for fame and prizes . . .


* And then Opie & Anthony again after a few years but not firing them from CBS Radio after they chuckled their way -- on their XM show -- through a "guest's" graphic descriptions of how he'd like to rape Condoleezza Rice and Laura Bush . . .

This is the man who's now telling us we're sexist for not watching Katie Couric deliver a dumbed down CBS Evening News. That, my friends, is cojones grande.

From The Financial Times:

“I’m sort of surprised by the vitriol against her. The number of people who don’t want news from a woman was startling,” Mr Moonves said of the audience’s reaction to Ms Couric, who this month brought ratings for the CBS Evening News to a 20-year low.

He reiterated, however, that he was committed to Ms Couric and that he believed her programme would succeed in spite of its last place standing behind rivals ABC and NBC.

Ms Couric’s gender has been a central issue since CBS poached her from NBC’s Today show a year ago and made her the first woman to solo anchor a network newscast, filling the seat of such legends as Walter Cronkite and Dan Rather.

CBS was hoping to draw younger, female viewers to a US television institution whose audience has halved in the past 25 years.

Ms Couric has managed a 2 per cent increase in women age 18 to 49 since her September debut. However, that has been more than offset by an 11 per cent decline among men over 55, who still constitute the bulk of the evening news’ audience.

Mr Moonves has previously chided critics for scrutinising Ms Couric’s wardrobe and personal life. However, his latest remarks, made during a breakfast sponsored by Syracuse’s Newhouse School of Communications, were his most explicit about gender bias.

They come at a time when New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is testing whether Americans are willing to accept a woman in another authority position – as president.

Linda Mason, head of standards at CBS News, last month told the network’s Public Eye blog: “I had no idea that a woman delivering the news would be a handicap,” and that the public seemed to “prefer the news from white guys”.

In the absence of specific research, some analysts took issue with that argument. “People get news from women all the time – on local news, on morning shows. I’m sceptical of his discovery of sexism,” said Andrew Tyndall, whose Tyndall Report monitors newscasts. He and others have criticised the style of Ms Couric’s newscast, which emphasised soft features over hard news – something CBS seemed to acknowledge this year when it replaced the producer.
OL' LES COVERED a lot of ground during his remarks today. Earlier, I blogged on his slimy, self-serving skewering of a straw man when, in the same talk, he went after former CBS anchor Dan Rather for alleged sexism in criticizing the Evening News.

Then we pick up The Financial Times, a British publication, and get a new angle -- that it's not just Rather who's evil and sexist. All of us are . . . or at least almost all of us, considering Couric's woeful ratings.

I'm a sexist, he's a sexist, she's a sexist, we're a sexist, wouldn't you like to be a sexist, too?

If for no other reason that it seems to torture a sleaze like Les Moonves soooooo bad.

Tuesday, June 12, 2007

Workers' rights Gone With the Wind


Your European retirement jaunt: $25,750.

The travel trailer you always wanted: $75,439.

Season tickets to the symphony: $975.

Somebody to feed you and wipe your ass when you're too old and sick to do it yourself: Oh, about five bucks an hour. No overtime, though!


The Washington Post has the story of the Supreme Court's latest decision. (Oh, before you go, Mellie . . . will you have Mammy come in here to fluff my pillow? Tell her to bring me a julep while she's at it.)

The Supreme Court ruled yesterday that workers in the fast-growing home-care industry are not entitled to overtime pay.

The court unanimously agreed that a 1975 Labor Department regulation exempting workers paid by third parties from minimum-wage and maximum-hour rules was a valid exercise of the power given to the agency by Congress.

(snip)

The home-care case was brought by Evelyn Coke, a 73-year-old retiree who worked for more than 20 years as a home-care provider. She sued her employer, Long Island Care at Home, because she was never paid overtime despite her long hours and sometimes overnight care for clients.

She and her lawyers challenged the Labor Department exemption, saying its development at a time when Congress was including more workers under wage and overtime laws could not be what lawmakers intended.

But the Bush administration said Congress clearly had left the decision up to the agency. Otherwise, the administration contended, wage and overtime provisions for companionship services would have been applied in the law.

The court, in an opinion by Justice Stephen G. Breyer, agreed.

"Where an agency rule sets forth important individual rights and duties . . . and where the rule itself is reasonable, then a court ordinarily assumes that Congress intended it to defer to the agency's determination," Breyer wrote.

The decision set aside a ruling by the Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit that had allowed Coke's lawsuit to go forward.

Home-care workers make up one of the marketplace's fastest-growing occupations, the growth fueled by an aging population and a desire to keep more of the aged in their homes rather than in institutions.

Coke's supporters said the decision will make it even more difficult to find workers to take home-care jobs, which often are low-paying and come without benefits.

"If we are to avert a home-care crisis in America, our leaders must invest in living wages and health-care coverage for home-care workers to ensure that we can meet the home-care needs of our growing elderly population," said Gerry Hudson, executive vice president of the Service Employees International Union, which represents about 400,000 of the estimated 1 million home-care workers.

"Unfortunately, today's Supreme Court ruling is a step in the wrong direction," he said.

But home-care agencies had said an adverse ruling would have meant scores of lawsuits seeking retroactive pay and future wages that would have sent the cost of care skyrocketing. New York City, for instance, told the court that its Medicaid payments for such care would rise by as much as $250 million under the appeals court's decision.

William A. Dombi, vice president for law for the National Association for Home Care and Hospice, welcomed the court's ruling in Long Island Care at Home v. Coke, but said he is sympathetic to the workers and the union.

The decision, he said, "doesn't resolve the underlying problem about proper levels of compensation."
OH, I WOULDN'T WORRY about finding people who'll do awful work for slave wages.

There's a great big country full of desperately poor people just to our south, a big undefended border that's not in the way a-tall and plenty of American businessmen ready and willing to exploit the hell out of every single illegal alien who'll take The Jobs Americans Aren't Willing to Do (TM).

And all we aging Boomers have to do is learn to say "I'm hungry" and "Please come clean me; I've soiled myself" en Espanol.



ALSO:
The New York Times has the story here.

Oh, for cryin' out loud!

I am so happy I wasn't drinking coffee just now, 'cause I'd be cleaning off the computer monitor instead of typing this. It would have been Spit Take City.

From The Associated Press:

CBS Corp. Chief Executive Leslie Moonves shot back at former CBS news anchor Dan Rather on Tuesday, saying his characterization of the network "tarting" up its newscast with anchor Katie Couric was "sexist."

Rather, speaking by phone on MSNBC's "Morning Joe" program with Joe Scarborough Monday, said CBS had made the mistake of taking the evening news broadcast and "dumbing it down, tarting it up," and playing up topics such as celebrities over war coverage. The comments subsequently appeared in blogs and in a story published Tuesday in the New York Daily News and the New York Post.

While referring to his successor, Couric, as a "nice person," Rather said "the mistake was to try to bring the 'Today' show ethos to the 'Evening News,' and to dumb it down, tart it up in hopes of attracting a younger audience."

Moonves, asked about the remarks at an appearance in New York sponsored by the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University, called the remarks "sexist" and said he was surprised at the amount of negative coverage Couric was receiving. Couric, the first solo female news anchor, has been struggling in the ratings.

"She's been on the air for nine months," Moonves said. "Let's give her a break."

Couric started strong but has settled into a distant third in the evening news ratings race. Last month her "CBS Evening News" set a record for its least-watched broadcast for at least two decades, then broke it the very next week.

Rather left as "CBS Evening News" anchor in March 2005 and cut ties to the network a year later. He continued to be dogged by controversy surrounding his role in a discredited story about President Bush's Vietnam-era military service.

Moonves said he "absolutely" had confidence in Couric and the direction that CBS's evening was going, saying it was imperative to reach younger audiences. Evening news broadcasts couldn't continue to have audiences that are mainly over 60, Moonves said, otherwise "the evening news will die."

NO, LES, Rather wasn't being "sexist," he was stating the obvious about your hiring of Couric to present the evening news. He was stating the obvious about the "junk culture" values now driving American broadcast "news" (for lack of a better term).

And by the way, Les, this would be sexist. A typical bit by the guys you have doing the morning show on one of your New York FM stations, and syndicated on several other CBS stations.

They're the sexist ones, Les, not Dan Rather. And you like having them around just fine.

Bring out your dead. . . .

Almost two years -- two years! -- after Hurricane Katrina, 100 unclaimed bodies, victims of the flood, lie in plastic-wrapped coffins in a seedy New Orleans warehouse. Thirty have never been identified.

Why is this? Can New Orleans not even bury its dead?

CNN
has a few answers (video is here):

The bodies are in the charge of Dr. Frank Minyard, the city's coroner. Minyard won't let anyone inside the warehouse because he says it would be undignified, but he did show us pictures of the inside. The caskets are wrapped in plastic and sit on a raised platform behind a chain link fence. He says the fence is there as an extra layer of security. Above each casket is a white plaque with a black number, one through 100. Minyard wouldn't give us the pictures to broadcast, but we got our own video from inside the warehouse.

Minyard is trying to raise $1.5 million to build a group of mausoleums for the bodies and a memorial in the swirling shape of a hurricane. But as the second anniversary approaches, it's unlikely those bodies will find a permanent resting place anytime soon. The coroner has raised $250,000 so far, and Charity Hospital has donated an old cemetery for the memorial. But Minyard says they won't be able to break ground until they raise another $150,000.
OH, HOW THE GOOD is derailed in people's quest for the glorious . . . and the glory.

The coroner needs to let those poor drowned souls rest in peace. I think it is possible to build a tasteful mausoleum, or group of small mausoleums, for $250,000. Do it. Then build a tasteful, understated memorial park around that as money becomes available.

AFTER ALL, the Savior of the world was buried in a small cave with a boulder rolled in front of the opening. Fortunately for all of us, He only needed it for a couple of days.

Monday, June 11, 2007

Louisville newspaper forgot to purchase
First Amendment rights to super-regional

From the organization that:

* Denied Auburn University permission to bus its football players to a teammate's funeral in the early '90s (the school did it anyway), and
* Denied Louisiana State permission to fly its basketball team to a teammate's funeral in St. Louis in 1980 (Coach Dale Brown gave them the money to go anyway), and
* Denied permission for Georgia fans to fly a Boise State player's father back from Iraq (where he was training Iraqi police) so he could see his son play against the Bulldogs in Athens, Ga., and
* Has given its full cooperation toward turning every national collegiate championship into a veritable whorehouse of corporate sponsorships and rank commercialism . . .

comes this, as told by the victim, The (Louisville) Courier-Journal.

A Courier-Journal sports reporter had his media credential revoked and was ordered to leave the press box during the NCAA baseball super-regional yesterday because of what the NCAA alleged was a violation of its policies prohibiting live Internet updates from its championship events.

Gene McArtor, a representative of the NCAA baseball committee, approached C-J staffer Brian Bennett at the University of Louisville's Jim Patterson Stadium in the bottom of the fifth inning in the U of L-Oklahoma State game. McArtor told him that blogging from an NCAA championship event "is against NCAA policies. We're revoking the credential and need to ask you to leave the stadium."

Courier-Journal executive editor Bennie L. Ivory challenged the NCAA's action last night and said the newspaper would consider an official response.

"It's clearly a First Amendment issue," Ivory said. "This is part of the evolution of how we present the news to our readers. It's what we did during the Orange Bowl. It's what we did during the NCAA basketball tournament. It's what we do."

U of L circulated a memo on the issue from Jeramy Michiaels, the NCAA's manager of broadcasting, before Friday's first super-regional game. It said blogs are considered a "live representation of the game" and that any blog containing action photos or game reports would be prohibited.

"In essence, no blog entries are permitted between the first pitch and the final out of each game," the memo said.

Bennett had filed Internet reports from U of L's NCAA Tournament games at the Columbia (Mo.) Regional and did so from the first two games of the super-regional.

He was told before yesterday's game by U of L assistant sports information director Sean Moth that he was violating NCAA policy by filing periodic reports for The Courier-Journal's Web site, courier-journal.com.

After consulting with his editors, Bennett filed a report at 4:12 p.m. after the top of the first inning and added 15 more reports before he was asked to leave. U of L won 20-2 to advance to the College World Series in Omaha, Neb.

"It's a real question that we're being deprived of our right to report within the First Amendment from a public facility," said Jon L. Fleischaker, the newspaper's attorney.

"Once a player hits a home run, that's a fact. It's on TV. Everybody sees it. (The NCAA) can't copyright that fact. The blog wasn't a simulcast or a recreation of the game. It was an analysis."

During the middle of yesterday's game, Courier-Journal representatives were told by two members of the U of L athletic staff that if the school did not revoke Bennett's credential it would jeopardize the school's chances of hosting another NCAA baseball event.

"If that's true, that's nothing short of extortion and thuggery," Ivory said. "We will be talking to our attorneys (today) to see where we go from here."
I CERTAINLY HOPE that when the Courier-Journal's lawyers get through with the National Collegiate Athletic Association, its NCAA acronym will have an entirely new meaning.

No Cash At All.

Sunday, June 10, 2007

Did you know . . . I'm an idiot?

GAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

On this week's Big Show, I mention The Ramones "53rd & 3rd" as being from 1999, because I was having a brain fart and that was the date of The Ramones Anthology: Hey Ho Let's Go, from which the track came.

Great. Now I've become just like the over-coiffed, empty-headed, local-TV drones who'll read any blame thing the teleprompter puts in front of them . . . and mispronouncing half of it. Because they're not from here and ain't learned much because they won't be here long.

It's embarrassing, really. Of course, while "53rd & 3rd" was released on the 1999 anthology, it first was released on The Ramones' self-titled first album in 1976.

As I said previously . . . GAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!

Then again, my contemporary exposure to the Ramones in that time period was playing the crud out of the "Blitzkrieg Bop" single on Baton Rouge High's FM station, WBRH, circa early '78.

Woulda played it sooner, 'cept that 'BRH didn't go on the air until September 1977, and I didn't get my FCC license -- you needed one a them to go on the air back then -- until January '78.

And believe me, playing "Blitzkrieg Bop" was dicey enough back then. If we'd had "53rd & 3rd" -- a song about drug dealing -- available to play, we probably would have . . . and then promptly been sent to Siberia by the East Baton Rouge Parish School Board, not noted for being a haven for deep thinkers or cultural mavens.

I mean, this was the bunch who slapped us down for playing the Sex Pistols' "God Save the Queen" in late '77. And that was merely insulting the Queen of England.

Anyway, back to the point: I'm middle-aged and prone to fits of "Old-Timer's Disease" when the brain don't work so good. That's my story, and I'm stickin' to it.

And you can bet I've gone back into iTunes and put the correct original release date on each track from the anthology CD.

Friday, June 08, 2007

Did you know . . . ?

It's another tasty good episode of the Revolution 21 podcast, and it's also time for a game of Did You Know?

Hey! Ho! Let's go!

DID YOU KNOW . . . that Rickie Lee Jones improvised many -- if not all -- the songs on her latest album Sermon on Exposition Boulevard, which is based on her friend Lee Cantelon's book The Words? Cantelon wrote the book as a modern-day paraphrase of the words of Christ in the Gospels, rearranging them by topic.

Originally, Jones was to do readings of passages from the book. But she had an idea. . . .

Jones' idea to do improvised songs based on those passages revolutionized the project, and resulted in a fine album. A fine album. On the Big Show this week, we'll hear "Falling Up," the first single off Sermon.

DID YOU KNOW . . . who the backup vocalist is on Gram Parsons' cover of "Love Hurts"?

Same lady who was his partner in song on all of the legendary Grievous Angel album and for the rest of his career until his untimely death -- the equally legendary Emmylou Harris.

Oh . . . and you might know "Love Hurts" better from Nazareth's cover a year later, in 1975. Originally written by Boudleaux Bryant, it was first cut by the Everly Brothers in 1960. Didn't hit the Top 40 then, though.

The most recent cover? Rod Stewart, last year.

AND, DID YOU KNOW . . . that Rory Gallagher was the Irish rocker who paved the way for the long string of Irish rockers to come? On the show, we hear "Shin Kicker" from Gallagher's 1978 LP Photo-Finish.

Rory Gallagher got his start in the early '60s, I think, then formed the band Taste in 1966. He went on to solo work after Taste broke up in 1970, achieving Guitar God status during his too-short career.

Gallagher died in London on June 14, 1995, at age 47, victim of a staph infection following a liver transplant.

And that's it for Did You Know . . . on The Big Show.

Now go and listen to the podcast, won't 'ya?

If you can't do the time. . . .


Apparently, Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer was as disgusted with "celebrity justice" as the rest of us. He's sent spoiled brat Paris Hilton back to the hoosegow, "medical condition" or no.

And Shakwanda from Compton said "A-MEN!"

Of course, in that fine spoiled brat tradition, the heiress horrible was led from the courtroom Friday weeping and screaming. Yes, screaming.

It's a fine day in America. The Associated Press has all the poop in this early dispatch:

Paris Hilton was escorted from a courtroom screaming and crying on Friday after a judge sent her back to jail to serve out her entire 45-day sentence for a parole violation in a reckless driving case.

“It’s not right!” shouted the weeping Hilton. “Mom!” she called out to her mother in the audience.

Hilton, who was brought to court in handcuffs in a sheriff’s car, came into the courtroom disheveled and weeping. Her hair was askew and she wore a gray fuzzy sweatshirt over slacks. She wore no makeup and she cried throughout the hearing.

Her body also shook constantly as she dabbed at her eyes. Several times she turned to her parents, seated behind her in the courtroom, and mouthed, “I love you.”

Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer was calm but apparently irked by the morning’s developments. He said he had left the courthouse Thursday night having signed an order for Hilton to appear for the hearing.

When he got in his car early Friday, he said, he heard a radio report that he had approved Hilton’s participation in the hearing by telephone, but he had not.

“I at no time condoned the actions of the sheriff and at no time told him I approved the actions,” he said of the decision to release Hilton from jail after three days.

“At no time did I approve the defendant being released from custody to her home on Kings Road,” Sauer said.

Earlier Friday, a weeping Hilton was brought back to court in a police car, apparently handcuffed. She was taken from her home, where she returned yesterday after the sheriff’s department decided she could serve out her sentence in home confinement, with an ankle monitor.

The frenzy began early Thursday when sheriff’s officials released Hilton because of an undisclosed medical condition and sent her home under house arrest. She had been in jail since late Sunday.

Hilton was fitted with an electronic monitoring ankle bracelet and was expected to finish her 45-day sentence for a reckless driving probation violation at her four-bedroom, three-bath home.

The decision by Sheriff Lee Baca to move Hilton chafed prosecutors and Superior Court Judge Michael T. Sauer, who spelled out during sentencing that Hilton was not allowed to serve house detention.

(snip)

California Attorney General Jerry Brown criticized the Sheriff’s Department for letting Hilton out of jail, saying he believed she should serve out her sentence.

“It does hold up the system to ridicule when the powerful and the famous get special treatment,” Brown told The Associated Press before testifying at a congressional hearing in Washington.

“I’m sure there’s a lot of people who’ve seen their family members go to jail and have various ailments, physical and psychological, that didn’t get them released,” he said. “I’d say it’s time for a course correction.”

I REMEMBER WHEN we used to call Jerry Brown "Governor Moonbeam" when he led California in the '70s. But, you know, I always thought he had a deeply sensible streak in there somewhere. And, boy, is he right on this one. There's a couple of course corrections called for here -- for the system, and for the hysterical heiress.

However satisfying it is to see Paris Hilton get hers (courtesy of the Long Arm of the Law, no less) -- and satisfying it is -- we have to hope that this is that pathetic young woman's Divine Wake-Up Call.

Listen, we're all dirty rotten sinners here, and we all have our pathologies and areas where we might even be bat-s*** crazy. The difference between Miss Hilton and your average struggling, stumbling Christian imperfectly trying to cooperate with God's saving grace is that we know we're screwed up.

We care that we're screwed up.

We don't want to be screwed up.

We're not making millions solely because we're screwed up.

And we're willing to take The Cure.

I hope Paris gets to be sick and tired, and then sick and tired of being sick and tired. And I hope she -- one day -- is willing to take The Cure, too.

Thursday, June 07, 2007

But how do you store spare light bulbs?

Ma! I can't turn the light off!

I . . . CAN'T . . . CUT . . . OFF . . . THE . . . LIGHTS!!!!!

From the London Daily Mail:

Scientists have sounded the death knell for the plug and power lead.

In a breakthrough that sounds like something out of Star Trek, they have discovered a way of 'beaming' power across a room into a light bulb, mobile phone or laptop computer without wires or cables.

In the first successful trial of its kind, the team was able to illuminate a 60-watt light bulb 7ft away.

The team from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who call their invention 'WiTricity', believe it could change the way we use electricity and do away with the tangle of cables, plugs and chargers that clutter modern homes.

It could also allow the use of laptops and mobile phones without batteries.

The inspiration came when the lead researcher, Dr Marin Soljacic, was standing in his kitchen at night staring at his mobile phone.

"It was probably the sixth time that month that I was awakened by my cell phone beeping to let me know that I had forgotten to charge it. It occurred to me that it would be so great if the thing took care of its own charging," he said.

To turn this dream into reality, Dr Soljacic needed a way of transmitting power wirelessly.

Scientists have known for nearly two centuries that it is possible to transfer an electrical current from one coil of wire to another without them touching.

The phenomenon, called electromagnetic induction, is used in power transformers and electric motors around the world.

However, the coils in motors and transformers have to be close for power to pass from one to another. Attempting to transfer power over distances is impossible.

The breakthrough came when Dr Soljacic realised there was another way of transferring energy through the air.

Rather than sending power from a transmitter to a receiver as a conventional electromagnetic wave - the same form of radiation as light, radio waves and microwaves - he could use the transmitter to fill a room with a 'non-radiative' electromagnetic field.

Most objects in the room - such as people, desks and carpets - would be unaffected by the electromagnetic field. But any objects designed to resonate with the electromagnetic field would absorb the energy.

It sounds complicated, but the result demonstrated by the American team this month was a dramatic success. Using two coils of copper, the team transmitted power 7ft through the air to a light bulb, which lit up instantly.
OH, OK, you need a receiving coil before the blame scheme will work. But why let something as mundane as facts screw up a good lede and headline, eh?

That there's a Sub-Zero-size job

I thought "Dollar Bill" Jefferson already had frozen his assets. Hmmmmm. . . .

Anyway, The (New Orleans) Times-Picayune clarifies the situation:

A federal judge on Thursday froze the assets of Rep. William Jefferson, D-New Orleans, three days after the congressman was indicted on corruption charges.

U.S. District Judge T.S. Ellis III granted the government's request for a restraining order keeping Jefferson from using nearly $500,000 and about 33 million shares of corporate stock prosecutors say he was paid in bribes.
I WONDER whether the feds are going to have to resort to this to freeze the congressman's financials.

I'm going to throw up now

Paris Hilton gets to go home to here

because she has a "medical condition" -- apparently, she was on the verge of a nervous breakdown -- that precluded her from doing her time here

YEAH, this is exactly the same consideration Shakwanda from Compton would get if she were so "mentally fragile." Give me a friggin' break.

TMZ.com reports:

Psychiatrist Charles Sophy visited Hilton in jail yesterday and the day before. We're told after Sophy's visit yesterday, word was passed to the Sheriff that Hilton's mental state was fragile and she was at risk.

The reason for releasing her had nothing to do with a rash or other physical issues. It was purely in her head.

Last month, on the eve of a trial in which Hilton was accused of slandering socialite Zeta Graph, Dr. Sophy told the judge that Hilton was "emotionally distraught and traumatized" over her jail sentence, which prevented her from participating in a meaningful defense. That trial was put on hold until August.
HEY, SHERIFF! Can I get likkered up, weave around LaLa Land in my Beemer -- or Bentley, or Mercedes, whatever -- get arrested, blow off terms of my probation, then lose my s*** in lockup so I can spend 40 days at Paris Hilton's mansion?

On second thought, solitary is just fine, thankyouverymuch.

Paging M. Voltaire . . . paging M. Voltaire. . . .


OK, it's time for a Voltaire "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it" kind of moment here.

Fred Phelps' band of allegedly "Christian" whackadoodles were in Bellevue -- an Omaha suburb and home of the U.S. Strategic Command -- for one of their tasteless hate fests outside the funeral of a local National Guardsman blown up in Iraq.

Apparently, not only does God hate "fags," the Almighty hates American soldiers, too.

Anyway, the nutball daughter of the nutball pastor finally went Too Far (TM) and got herself arrested Tuesday by having her 10-year-old son stomp on an American flag. Despite recent Supreme Court decisions, that's still illegal in Nebraska.

Probably part of an effort to keep idiot "God Hates Fags" troglodytes from doing something that just might get them killed in Bellevue-By-God-Nebraska -- home of Offutt Air Force Base, thousands of airmen and sailors therein, and thousands more Air Force vets who stayed around when their hitch was up.

The Associated Press fills us in:

Shirley Phelps-Roper, 49, will be charged with flag mutilation, disturbing the peace and contributing to the delinquency of a minor, Sarpy County Attorney Lee Polikov said Wednesday.

Phelps-Roper, a member of the Westboro Baptist Church, acknowledged that she allowed her son Jonah to stand on the flag Tuesday — something she says is protected by the U.S. Constitution.

“It’s utter nonsense,” said Phelps-Roper, a lawyer. “I don’t know what else to tell you other than that we’ll see them in federal court.”

Phelps-Roper is a daughter of Westboro’s founder, the Rev. Fred Phelps. Members have protested at more than 280 military funerals in 43 states since June 2005, she said.

The group says the deaths of U.S. soldiers are God’s punishment for a nation that harbors gays and lesbians. Nebraska and 37 other states have laws restricting how close protesters can get to funerals, inspired at least in part by the Westboro protests.

Tuesday’s funeral in suburban Bellevue was for Nebraska Army National Guard Spc. William “Bill” Bailey, who was killed May 25 when an explosive device struck his vehicle in Iraq.

Phelps-Roper was arrested because she was involved in a potentially volatile situation in the presence of Bailey’s friends, relatives and fellow soldiers, Polikov said. Bellevue has a strong military presence, with Offutt Air Force Base located at the south edge of town.

“To come into that environment and communicate what I would call fighting words — provocative language and acts — you can’t do that,” Polikov said. “You might illicit a violent response. That’s against community peace and community law.”
PERSONALLY, I AM DISAPPOINTED that the mourners didn't beat the crap out of her and the rest of the Nut Brigade. Legally, I hope -- and strongly suspect -- she'll ultimately get the flag law tossed.

But I'm not so sure she won't be doing some time in the Sarpy County Jail on disturbing the peace and contributing to the delinquency. "Fighting words" (or actions) are called that for a reason, and if she hadn't been hauled away by the cops, she may have been fighting for her life.

Ordinarily, if she were convicted on disturbing the peace and was contrite as all get out, she'd probably walk away $100 lighter in the pocketbook, but a free woman. But she was trying to disrupt and desecrate the funeral of a local soldier and volunteer fireman.

And she's a first-class jerk.

And her daddy's a jerk.

And their whole church is full of jerks.

And she's spent two days waving a stomped flag in the face of the county attorney and courts.

After -- Did I mention this? -- trying to disrupt and desecrate the funeral of a local soldier and volunteer fireman.

Yep. She, I hope, will beat the rap on the First Amendment issue. But on the rest, let's just say I hope she has a long and extremely unpleasant sojourn in the Pissed Off Veterans cellblock of the Sarpy clink.

Your government at . . . what, exactly?

Half a trillion dollars on a failed war in Iraq.

Millions upon millions upon millions upon millions upon millions of dollars for congressional "earmarks" on the budget bill.

But half a decade overdue, there's still not a penny for a necessary weather satellite. Unbelievable.

That is, such a thing formerly was unbelievable. When it comes to our government at "work" in these times, hell, I'll believe anything.
Read this from the Baton Rouge (La.) Advocate and wonder how many this administration's incompetence will kill this time:

A hurricane tracking satellite is about to stop working and supporters of a replacement are trying to cobble together the $375 million needed to build and launch another one.

Without a satellite, hurricane forecasting would be 16 percent less accurate 72 hours before a hurricane’s landfall, and 10 percent less accurate within 48 hours, according to Bill Proenza, director of the National Hurricane Center.

The satellite QuikSCAT is five years past its projected lifespan, Forecasters and congressmen say that makes it vulnerable to failure.

Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., and Rep. Charles “Charlie” Melancon, D-Napoleonville, have introduced companion legislation in the Senate and House calling for the federal government to replace the current satellite about to die.

“It’s crucial that our nation’s hurricane system be first class,” Landrieu says in a statement. “With 50 percent of our population living within 50 miles of the coast, residents in these communities — in Louisiana, Florida and across the nation — deserve the best technology available to track impending hurricanes.”

In addition to hurricanes, the satellite detects coastal winds, storm surges and other weather-related events, such as “El Niño.”

“We need more advanced warning of storms and can’t afford to slide backward,” Landrieu said. “This requires a long-term solution.”

NASA launched the QuikSCAT satellite in 1999. The tracker was expected to remain in service until 2002.

The probe was built in just 12 months because the previous satellite was lost in 1997. An instrument on the satellite sends pulses of microwave energy through the atmosphere and measures energy that bounces back from the wind on the ocean’s surface.

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

God uses the 'Dump' button on Giuliani

THE ALMIGHTY don't need no stinkin' eight-second delay. No, He doesn't. Not at all.

And yes, Rudy, you should be worried.

Can New Orleans save America?


What?


Just what I said. Can New Orleans save America?

Or, to be more precise, will America allow New Orleans to survive, so that New Orleans might save America? That just might be the theme of the final post from Dan Baum on The New Yorker's magnificent blog, New Orleans Journal:

But, most of all, I’m lonely. I was in Beaumont, Texas, having vegetarian fajitas at an outpost of the Acapulco Mexican Grill chain, when I noticed a woman at the next table looking at my food. “That looks good,” I heard her whisper to her mother. I kept expecting one of them to lean over and shout, “Hey, babe, what’s that you’re eatin’?,” and for all of us to end up at the same table. But they kept to themselves.

“Do You Know What It Means To Miss New Orleans?” an old song asks; another reminds us, “You don’t know what you got ’til it’s gone.” Since Katrina, I’ve often been asked (though never by someone in New Orleans) why the country should bother rebuilding it. Is it really worth the billions it would take to protect this small, poor, economically inessential city, which is sinking into the delta muck as global warming raises the sea around it? But the question of “whether” has been settled—New Orleans is rebuilding itself, albeit slowly, fitfully, and imperfectly. Now it’s only a matter of how and how long. That is better news than perhaps the rest of America fully understands.

It’s the American way to focus on the future—we are dreamers and schemers, always chasing the horizon. Looking forward has made us great, but it comes at a price. (Mexican immigrants often describe life in the United States as puro reloj, or “nothing but the clock.”) New Orleanians, on the other hand, are excellent at the lost art of living in the moment. Étienne stopped at our house one afternoon to drop off some papers he wanted me to see. No, he said, he couldn’t stay; someone was waiting for him downtown. But we got to talking, and gradually moved to the chairs on the porch. We had a beer. The shadows lengthened as the day cooled, the jasmine across the street smelled sweet, and a few houses away someone was practicing the saxophone. Margaret brought out a dish of almonds. We all had another beer. It was dark by the time Étienne left. And here’s the true miracle of New Orleans: the person waiting for him downtown no doubt had an equally pleasant couple of hours, and Étienne surely paid no social penalty for being late.

When Margaret and I first arrived, in January, I noticed that I kept getting stood up. If I arranged on a Monday to meet people for lunch on the following Thursday, they often wouldn’t show. When I tracked them down later, they’d ask why I hadn’t called that morning. It hadn’t occurred to me to do so; everywhere else in America, people use calendars to manage the future. It took me a while to figure out that in New Orleans the future doesn’t really exist. There is only the present.

Long before the storm, New Orleans’s infrastructure was decrepit; the schools were a shambles; poverty, corruption, and violence were rampant. It was, by most conventional standards, a terrible place. But few who had tasted life there willingly gave it up. Right before Katrina, a Gallup poll found more than half of New Orleanians “extremely satisfied” with their lives, despite the city’s wretched state, a higher percentage than in any other city surveyed. New Orleanians have more time than money, and they like it that way.

The city’s unique appreciation for the present makes life there rich indeed; it’s why people call New Orleans “the Big Easy.” It is not a world view conducive to getting things done, however, which goes a long way toward explaining why New Orleans is having so much trouble recovering from Hurricane Katrina. There are exceptions, but, as a rule, New Orleanians—no matter what color or how wealthy—aren’t great at planning meetings, showing up on time for them, running them in orderly fashion, deciding on a course of action, and then following through. This isn’t simply laziness or fecklessness; it’s a reflection of a commitment to enjoying life instead of merely achieving. You want efficiency and hard work? Go to Minneapolis. Just don’t expect to let the good times roll there.

New Orleans endures as the national repository of the loose-jointed Huck Finn spirit we Americans claim to cherish. While the rest of us pare down our humanity in service to the dollar, New Orleans is a corner of America where efficiency and maximized profit are not the civic religion. As I drive past endless repetitions of Wendy’s, Golden Corral, Ethan Allen furniture, Jiffy Lube, Red Lobster, and the like on my way back to Colorado, I realize that I haven’t spent a dollar anyplace but locally owned business in four months. A long time ago, David Freedman, the general manager of the listener-supported radio station WWOZ, described New Orleans to me as a kind of resistance-army headquarters. “Everyplace else in America, Clear Channel has commodified our music, McDonald’s has commodified our food, and Disney has commodified our fantasies,” he said. “None of that has taken hold in New Orleans.” In the speedy, future-oriented, hyper-productive, and globalized twenty-first century, New Orleans’s refusal to sacrifice the pleasures of the moment amounts to a life style of civil disobedience.

SEE, THE ONLY THING WRONG with New Orleans is Third-World poverty, out-of-control crime and murder, lousy schools and a crumbling economy. Oh, and that Katrina thing.

But there is a joy in living, a sacramental sense of life that remains in that beleaguered culture, in that suffering place. Yeah, that's it. Joy amid the suffering. There is a sense -- imperfectly present, of course, but present more so than in most American locales -- of people as ends in themselves, not means to some almighty commercial end.

If you have that, you're doing all right. And you realize that schools can be fixed, economies grown, crime fought and poverty ameliorated, given the civic will and the nation's resources.

On the other hand, if you lose that sacramental sense of life, the joy one finds in the moment, the realization that your family and your neighbor is what it's all about -- that man does not live by day planner alone -- what do you have?

Even the Beatles knew back in 1964 that "money can't buy me love."

And if you have smarts and more crap than you know what to do with but are a couple quarts low in the "Meaning and Love" department, you start to have a society that mirrors these sad observations -- as reported by Rod Dreher on his Crunchy Con blog -- a Muslim professor's wife made about contemporary American society:

We got to talking, and she said that it astonishes and saddens her and her husband how materially rich but spiritually desolate Americans are -- at least the ones her husband teaches.

"You can't believe how many of them are on antidepressants," she said. She added that they come to her husband desperate for life advice and direction. They're lost, and have been spiritually and emotionally abandoned by their permissive and indulgent parents.

These kids, she said, have everything they could possibly want -- except what they really need.

Monday, June 04, 2007

FCC's F- and S-word jihad total BS, court says

There's such a thing as Doing Right.

But then politicians get involved and end up Going Too Far.

And then the courts get involved, and the baby just might get thrown out with the dirty bath water.
Reporteth The Hollywood Reporter:

The federal appeals court in New York City on Monday tossed out a key FCC ruling that said a slip of tongue gets broadcasters a fine for indecency, telling the commission that it failed to give a good reason for its decision and couldn't likely find a good reason if it had to.

"We find the FCC's new policy sanctioning 'fleeting expletives' is arbitrary and capricious under the Administrative Procedures Act for failing to articulate a reasoned basis for its change in policy," the court wrote in a 2-1 opinion.

While a majority of the judges found little to like about the commission's 2006 decision, it sent the order back to Washington, allowing the panel to get another stab at writing the rules.

But even the court's remand came with a catch as it warned the FCC to ensure that "further proceedings" are "consistent" with the court's decision.

"We are doubtful that by merely proffering a reasoned analysis for its new approach to indecency and profanity, the commission can adequately respond to the constitutional and statutory challenges raised by the networks," Judge Rosemary Pooler wrote.

"Nevertheless, because we can decide this case on this narrow ground, we vacate and remand so that the commission can set forth an analysis. While we fully expect the networks to raise the same arguments they have raised to this court if the commission does nothing more on remand than provide additional explanation for its departure from prior precedent we can go not further than this opinion."

FCC chairman Kevin Martin took the decision hard, saying it is the judges who are wrong, not the commission.

"I find it hard to believe that the New York court would tell American families that 's***' and 'f***' are fine to say on broadcast television during the hours when children are most likely to be in the audience," Martin said in a statement. "The court even says the commission is 'divorced from reality.' It is the New York court, not the commission, that is divorced from reality in concluding that the word 'f***' does not invoke a sexual connotation."
[Martin used the actual s- and f-words. I took them out. -- R21]

In its decision, the commission decided that language used by Cher and Nicole Richie during the 2002 and 2003 Billboard Music Awards aired by the Fox Broadcasting Co. was indecent and profane.

Opponents of the commission's attempts to regulate speech called the decision a victory.

"Score one for the First Amendment," said Media Access Project president and CEO Andrew Jay Schwartzman. "It's a shame that citizens and broadcasters had to seek protection from the courts, but it is very reassuring to know that one branch of the government can rise above demagogy."

MAP attorneys represented the Center for Creative Voices in Media as intervener in the case. CCV's members include many members of the creative community, and its brief to the court stressed the chilling effect of the FCC's action on writers, directors and other artists.

The decision did not go unnoticed in Hollywood as AFTRA, DGA, SAG, the WGA East and WGA West issued a joint statement applauding the decision.

"Actors, directors, writers and broadcast personnel are pleased that the Second Circuit Court of Appeals today rejected the FCC's effort to expand their authority and influence over creative content," the guilds said.

"The fines imposed have had a chilling effect on free expression over the airwaves. If allowed to stand, these fines would have subjected all programming to arbitrary claims of indecency without regard to context or type of programming. We are united in our opposition to this, or any other, FCC decision to overturn long-standing policy in this area, and replace it with arbitrary decision-making standards that tread on free speech."
DOING RIGHT is hammering broadcasters for willful indecency -- including indecent speech -- over the public airwaves. In other words, I don't care if you write 30,000 articles for your local alternative weekly that feature frequent, flagrant and flamboyant use of f***, s***, m*****f*****, c***, d*** and p****.

Or, for that matter, g****** m************ son-of-a-b****ing rat-faced f****** bastard. Just so long as the creative coupling of expletives is directed at all the right people.

But if you walk into my church and intentionally start using that language in front of a bunch of kids, I'm going to whip your ass.

That's the common-sense distinction most Americans would make in this pluralistic society. Unfortunately, in the wake of Janet Jackson's 2004 Super Bowl "wardrobe malfunction," the Federal Communications Commission decided it was all done with any distinc-to-fyin'.

HEWING TO FCC LOGIC, if cracking down on (ahem) simulated intercourse and R&B singers' ta-tas flopping all over the place on network TV is a good thing, and hammering on Bono's inadvertent F-bomb at the 2002 Golden Globes is better, then making all over-the-air broadcasters terrified to even broadcast football games live -- for fear of someone yelling a Bad Word (TM) too close to a microphone -- must be the Bestest Thing Ever.

Welcome to Going Too Far and, thus, messing up a good thing.

And all God's people said . . . Oy veh!

Boomers of a Lesser God


Call to Action, some 30 years ago, had an epiphany. It discovered a god it could understand, a savior who never utters a discouraging word -- like "Pick up your cross and follow me."

The god of Call to Action tells its members women can be Catholic priests. (Theology be damned! What a bore!)

The god of Call to Action isn't big on authority -- be it that of the pope, the bishops, sacred scripture or 2,000 years of Catholic tradition. (The ancients weren't so clever as you, you aging Baby Boomers you!)

The god of Call to Action talks a lot about herself as Sophia, and she encourages the group's female members to make the deity in their own image, rather than the other way around. The god of Call to Action just can't stand it when the ladies get a patriarchal case of the vapors.

The god of Call to Action tells its members sexuality is a personal thing, and that whatever floats their boat when it comes to artificial birth control and abortion is OK by her.

Oh . . . and the god of Call to Action forgot to consult fetuses everywhere before she told CTAers that last thing.

If you ask me, it must be terribly hard to commit oneself to an eminently understandable Less Than Supreme Being. Or, as Flannery O'Connor once wrote to a friend:

Whatever you do anyway, remember that these things are mysteries and that if they were such that we could understand them, they wouldn’t be worth understanding. A God you understood would be less than yourself.
THAT MAY EXPLAIN why Call to Action is a small, feckless and graying group of alleged Catholics. They've been more concerned with their devotion to the Inconsequential Climax than with breeding, and they've embraced an eternal cause that's smaller than even themselves.

Then again, you have to wonder about folks like those of Call to Action Nebraska, who've actually been excommunicated -- for 11 years, now -- by Lincoln Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz but who just won't vacate the premises. After all -- when tortured by membership in an organization which does violence to all your most cherished beliefs and preconceptions, and when every attempt at "reform" has failed miserably -- isn't the rational response to . . . leave?

As in, "You can't fire me! I quit!"

REALLY, there's not really much at all that Call to Action and the Church agree upon. And that includes basic moral theology and, in some members' cases, the makeup of the Holy Trinity.

Martin Luther never had such a beef with the Vatican.

Yet, there they were last week. Excommunicated -- in other words, ex-Catholic -- members of Call to Action Nebraska protested the beleaguered bishop of Lincoln and his failure to sign onto the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' "safe-environment" audit procedures as they tried to convince the world that they're still Catholic because they have proclaimed Bruskewitz and the Vatican (which upheld the ousters) full of bull.

I guess authority is OK when you're the one wielding it all, huh?

Nine popes trying to nail deliver their 95 Theses petition to the Cathedral door chancery, only to be overwhelmed by more than 100 Lincoln faithful who see God as being greater than themselves and think their shepherd is doing OK.

The Lincoln Journal-Star was there to cover Call to Action's Big Surprise:

Nine members of the group Call to Action stood outside the Cathedral of the Risen Christ Friday to call attention to Lincoln Bishop Fabian Bruskewitz’s refusal to participate in an annual sex abuse audit.

But they were upstaged by more than 100 local Catholics who came together on less than an hour’s notice to show support for the bishop.

Call to Action, a group calling for reforms in the Catholic Church, had petitions signed by more than 1,000 people nationwide asking Bruskewitz to comply with the annual study of whether local dioceses are compliant with church rules to prevent and respond to sex abuse.

But in about a day and a half, the group on the other side collected more than 1,400 signatures on a petition praising the bishop and thanking him for his service.

Rachel Pokora, president of Call to Action-Nebraska, had announced a prayer service for Friday afternoon outside the Catholic Chancery, but the group’s leaders decided to switch to a morning press conference after learning of a counter-demonstration planned by the bishop’s supporters.

Still, Mary Quintero, an organizer of the supporter group, was able to get 116 adults and children to pray and sing while the Call to Action people were talking.

Just as Pokora was starting to speak to reporters, the supporters, many dressed in red, walked by singing the hymn “Ave Maria.”

The Call to Action group joined in the singing for a few moments of unexpected togetherness.

Despite the greater numbers on the other side, Pokora said she believes Call to Action represents the majority of Catholics nationwide who want bishops to fully comply with the annual sex abuse study.

“We are the church, and it is important that the voices of the faithful who are concerned about the children of the diocese are heard,” she said.

Bruskewitz has been identified as the only bishop of a Catholic diocese who declined to participate in the audits.

Bruskewitz has said the Lincoln Diocese is in full compliance with all civil and church laws regarding abuse of minors. The audit is not mandatory, and other bishops have upheld his right to opt out.

“There’s no requirement to do something that isn’t a law,” he said Friday. “If it were a law, we would obey it immediately, of course.”


(snip)

The Call to Action members had planned to deliver the petitions to the bishop’s office, but several police officers were on hand to prevent them from crossing onto church property. Krejci said they would deliver them by mail or a delivery service.

“We were told that if we set foot on church property, we would be arrested,” Pokora said.

Friday afternoon, about 100 supporters gathered again outside the Chancery. Many were still signing petitions, including a number of children who added signatures to the document expressing “our fervent support” for Bruskewitz.

The bishop came out and accepted the petitions, saying, “You are all very kind, more than kind.”

“We love our bishop,” Quintero said.

“I can see that,” Bruskewitz responded.

He asked them to pray for Call to Action members, that they return to the true Catholic faith. Bruskewitz considers the group anti-Catholic, although its members say they are faithful to the church’s teachings.

Doug Vandervort, who headed up the supporters’ petition campaign, noted that signatures came from people in Lincoln and several other states and were collected in 31 hours. Call to Action’s 1,000 signatures were collected over several months, he said.

Heh heh heh.

'Dollar' Bill's Cold Cash Club tees: Wear 'em now
before all your fashion choices are day-glo orange

EDITOR'S NOTE: Here's another shot at buying a Revolution 21 classic tee! Read on.

Who needs banks? Do like Louisiana's finest public servants and keep your extra cash on ice!

"Dollar" Bill's Cold Cash Club (listed, Nigerian Stock Exchange) is here to promote the simplicity and joy of keeping your money in your freezer!

Think of it! No bank fees.

* No having to get in the car and drive to an ATM.

* No ATM fees!

* No check fees!

* No service fees!

* NO BANK BUSYBODIES blabbing to the IRS -- or the Justice Department -- about your "frozen" assets!

Well, then! Now you can help us promote the cause of financial freedom by buying one of our "Dollar" Bill's Cold Cash Club tees! Rest assured that your money will be safe with us.

Right between the ribeye steak and the frozen corn.

Will cold cash put 'Dollar' Bill on ice?

A federal grand jury thinks
"Dollar Bill" should spend some time on ice -- just like his money.

U.S. Rep. William Jefferson (D-La.), at long last, has been indicted -- half a year after getting re-elected by his New Orleans-area constituents. The 16 counts covering racketeering, solicitation of bribery, money-laundering, fraud and obstruction of justice come almost two years after raiding federal agents famously found $90,000 in a freezer at his Capitol Hill townhouse.

Cold cash, indeed.

Jail time on all the counts stemming from African business deals Jefferson aimed to broker could add up to 235 years in Uncle Sam's cooler. Two associates already have cut deals, pleaded gulity and been sentenced to eight and seven years in jail, respectively.

The Associated Press has more:

The indictment handed up in federal court in Alexandria., Va., Monday lists 16 alleged violations of federal law with prison terms totaling as much as 235 years. He is charged with racketeering, soliciting bribes, wire fraud, money-laundering, obstruction of justice, conspiracy and violations of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.

Jefferson is accused of soliciting bribes for himself and his family, and also for bribing a Nigerian official.

"The public deserves, and is entitled to expect, that government officials are free from corruption," Assistant Attorney General Alice Fisher said.

Almost two years ago, in August 2005, investigators raided Jefferson's home in Louisiana and found $90,000 in cash stuffed in a box in his freezer.

The 63-year-old Jefferson, whose Louisiana district includes New Orleans, has said little about the case publicly but has maintained his innocence. He was re-elected last year despite the looming investigation.

Jefferson, in Louisiana on Monday, could not immediately be reached for comment. His lawyer was planning an afternoon news conference.

Two of Jefferson's associates have already struck plea bargains with prosecutors and have been sentenced.

Brett Pfeffer, a former congressional aide, admitted soliciting bribes on Jefferson's behalf and was sentenced to eight years in prison.

Another Jefferson associate, Louisville, Ky., telecommunications executive Vernon Jackson, pleaded guilty to paying between $400,000 and $1 million in bribes to Jefferson in exchange for his assistance securing business deals in Nigeria and other African nations. Jackson was sentenced to more than seven years in prison.

Both Pfeffer and Jackson agreed to cooperate in the case against Jefferson in exchange for their pleas.

The impact of the case has stretched across continents and even roiled presidential politics in Nigeria. According to court records, Jefferson told associates he needed cash to pay bribes to the country's vice president, Atiku Abubakar.

Abubakar denied the allegations, which figured prominently in that country's presidential elections in April. He ran for the presidency and finished third.

The indictment does not name Abubakar. But it describes Jefferson's dealings with an unnamed "Nigerian Official A" who was a high-ranking official in Nigeria's executive branch who had a spouse in Potomac, Md. One of Abubakar's wives lived in that Washington suburb.

Court records indicate Jefferson was videotaped taking a $100,000 cash bribe from an FBI informant. Most of that money later turned up in the freezer in Jefferson's home.

Sunday, June 03, 2007

Censor fi

The next time some Bush Administration commisar -- or some Bushie media shill -- uses the phrase "The troops in Iraq are putting their lives on the line for our freedom," blow up your TV.

And mail the smoldering parts to 1600 Pennsylvania Ave., Washington, D.C.

I'm not sure, exactly, what our troops are in Iraq for, but it's not to fight for your freedom or mine. Hell, they can't even secure their own.

BUT THE PROBLEM is neither al Qaida nor any of the Wahoobi suicide jockeys who seek to plunge the world neck deep into the 13th century. No, according to
this Washington Post story, the problem is Uncle Sam:

The national commander of the proud, patriotic, 2.4 million strong Veterans of Foreign Wars (motto: "Honor the dead by helping the living") took one look at the mushrooming dispute between three antiwar Marine reservists and the U.S. Marine Corps, and knew where his sympathies lay: with the protesters.

"What the Marine Corps is trying to do is hush up and punish these individuals who served our country," Gary Kurpius, the national commander, said in a telephone interview. "All they're doing is exercising the same democratic voice we're trying to instill over in Iraq right now."

The Marines have accused the three reservists, all members of Iraq Veterans Against the War, of wearing their uniforms during political protests and making "disrespectful" or "disloyal" statements. All three were honorably discharged from active duty, but now face "other than honorable" discharges from the inactive reserve, which could affect future employment and veterans benefits.

The VFW issued a blistering statement on the controversy yesterday. Headline: "VFW to Corps: Don't Stifle Freedom of Speech."

Kurpius, an Army vet who fought in Vietnam, doesn't even agree with the protesters. "We're pretty much on record supporting the troops, and if you're going to support the troops, you're going to have to support their mission," he said. "I may disagree with the message . . . but I and my organization will always defend their right to say it."

The Marines respond that this is not a free-speech case. Adam Kokesh, 25, one of the protesters, "violated Marine Corps uniform regulations and he was disrespectful to a commissioned officer," said Master Sgt. Ronald Spencer, a spokesman for the Marine Corps Mobilization Command in Kansas City, Mo. "That would be the issue. It has nothing to do with free speech."

Kokesh, who fought in Fallujah and now is a graduate student at George Washington University, was wearing parts of his camouflage uniform in March during a demonstration where 13 veterans roamed Capitol Hill and downtown Washington carrying imaginary weapons to mark the fourth anniversary of the war in Iraq.

When Kokesh was contacted by the major assigned to investigate the case, he responded with an e-mail about his service and opposition to the war, and concluded with a profane suggestion about what the major could go do.

While all three reservists wore parts of their uniforms during demonstrations, at least one of the charges seems to involve speech only: Liam Madden, 22, of Boston, is accused of making disloyal statements in a speech where he accused the Bush administration of "war crimes"; said the conflict is a war "of aggression" and "empire building"; and said Bush "betrayed U.S. military personnel." Madden says he was not in uniform during that February speech in New York.

Spencer, after addressing the uniform issue, said he needed a few hours to research questions about the alleged disloyal statements, then did not return messages to answer those questions. Maj. Stewart Upton, a Pentagon spokesman, referred those questions back to Spencer, saying, "I'm unable to speak to the legal reasoning behind the freedom of speech charges issued by the Marine Corps."
NONE OF THE MARINES are on active duty. They're not even in the regular reserves. They're all in the "Individual Ready Reserve" -- a reserve of last resort, for lack of a better description -- membership in which is involuntary and lasts for eight years after discharge from the armed services.

They're all civilians, in other words.

The Marines are going after civilians because the government doesn't like what those veterans are saying about the war. The Marines are going after civilians because they can . . . or so someone in Washington thinks.

That's not freedom. That's Mussolini's Italy -- or Chavez's Venezuela -- fahr'n fahr'n fahr'n auf der Autobahn looking for the "Hitler's Germany" exit. And if these Marine combat veterans haven't earned the right to say Crazy King George's catastrophic little war is full of beans . . . well, then none of us have the First Amendment right to say the God's honest truth in public.

Either wearing fatigues or butt naked.

If Americans can't goad our elected representatives into putting an end to this plague of Mad Bush Disease -- putting an end to the insanity ASAP -- it's going to get worse. Much worse.

Friday, June 01, 2007

The amazing show of miraculous healing

Gather near your computer. Lay hands on your iPod. Do you feel the miracle energy waves, brothers and sisters?

Do you have a deviated septum? Is your colon being cranky? Has your get up and go done got up and went?

Feel the music energy, children! Lay your hands! Lay your hands! Everything's all better now.

What? Oh, hell, no -- you're not physically healed . . . that requires a hefty copay and thousands of dollars in uncovered medical expenses. But I bet you ARE feelin' a bit better, ain'tcha?

And that, my peeps, is the power of Revolution 21.

THIS TIME on The Big Show, we'll be hearing from Joni Mitchell, Rosie Thomas, Sufjan Stevens and Billy Bragg, amid tons of tasty stuff I've neglected to mention thus far.

No, in honor of the 40th anniversary of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, we WON'T be hearing from The Beatles. But we will be hearing something from The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds . . . the album that influenced Sgt. Pepper's mightily.

So there. Get the miracle show on the podcast player atop this page, or go here.

It's a heckuva show, Brownie. Be there. Aloha.

Cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs in the Chocolate City

I saw this CNN story, and now I'm not sure whether someone needs to up Hizzonor's meds or switch them to something with fewer psychotic side effects. Really.

Anyway. . . .

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin is seriously considering a Louisiana gubernatorial bid, a political intimate of Nagin tells CNN.

According to public records and his campaign treasurer, the two-term Democrat has raised more than a half-million dollars in campaign contributions since he was re-elected in 2006, even though Nagin can't run for mayor again. (New Orleans limits mayors to two terms.)

The mayor's senior staff members say Nagin is often approached on the street and asked if he'll run for governor, but they say he just laughs off the suggestion. At the mayor's State of the City speech Wednesday, many local politicians told CNN they'd heard the rumors.

If Nagin does decide to run for the state's highest office, it could be an uphill battle. A recent Loyola University poll showed Nagin had an approval rating of just 19% in New Orleans.

Good at getting a job vs. good at the job

The indispensible Dan Baum, author of The New Yorker's blog-extraordinaire, New Orleans Journal, gives us an object lesson at something we modern Americans ought to know but don't: You can't judge a book by its cover.

Unfortunately, we're all about The Cover in this day and age.
Read on:

We decided to take the car out to the gleaming Toyota dealership in suburban Metairie. Fit men in matching Toyota golf shirts took down information on a complicated form, technicians in spotless uniforms came from the back to puzzle out the repair, and our customer-care representative produced an estimate that represented our dining-out budget for a month. We decided simply to buy a new door handle and have the work done elsewhere. We approached the parts counter, where a man looked up the handle we needed on a computer, printed out a complicated receipt that we had to take to the cashier, and gave us a bubble-wrapped package covered in bar codes and numbers.

One day not long after that, Margaret came home from running errands in Treme and told me about a group of men she’d seen sitting around a funky garage at the corner of Dumaine and North Prieur Streets. “They waved and smiled at me,” she said. “The place had great murals of Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X painted on the garage doors.” Those being sufficient criteria for choosing a New Orleans body shop, I drove out to the garage in Treme. Several middle-aged African-American men sat on torn vinyl chairs enjoying the morning sunshine, and a short, bald white guy with tattoos all over his neck was running a sanding wheel over the Bondoed fender of a Mustang GT. Tools lay on the crumbly ground; it looked like the range of equipment didn’t go much beyond the sander than a ball-peen hammer, a couple of socket wrenches, and an old bathtub filled with dirty water, for finding tire leaks.

The tattooed man introduced himself in a banjo-string Florida accent as Juicy. He said he could install the handle, hammer out the dents and scratches around it, paint the door, and touch up all the other dings on the car for two hundred and twenty-five dollars. I watched his eyes as he talked, trying to figure out whether he meant to dismantle my car, sell off the parts, deny he’d ever seen it, and threaten me with an ass-whupping if I complained.

As we were talking under the lurid, stylized figures of Martin Luther King, Jr., exclaiming, “I Have a Dream,” and Malcolm X, exhorting me to “Know Thy Self,” a huge man named Lloyd got up from his chair, walked over to us, and, in a low, rumbling voice, offered to detail the car inside and out—shampoo the seats and rugs and everything—for eighty dollars. This Toyota is the first new car I’ve ever owned, and I’ve long harbored bourgeois dreams of having it “detailed.” I wasn’t even completely sure what the word meant, but I knew it was something my software-executive friends in Boulder do to their cars and I liked the idea.

“We are all Christian people here,” another man called to me from his chair. He knew what buttons to push: “We’ll get it done right. Have your work done right here. Right here in this community.”

I told them I’d be back in a week to have the work done. Margaret and I wanted to wait until the last possible minute before moving back to Boulder, because, between the potholes, lunatic drivers, and narrow streets, New Orleans is hard on automobile exteriors. Juicy and I arranged to meet at the garage the following Thursday at 9 A.M. When he wasn’t there by nine-thirty, Lloyd said, “He’ll be along,” but I began to think about that spotless dealership in Metairie. Juicy finally showed up at nine-forty-five and I handed over the keys. “I need it by five,” I said, because I had an appointment to be on a live radio show at six. Then I rode off on my bike and worried all day.
SO, WHERE DO YOU THINK this story is going? What is your first instinct? What is the rational thing to think . . . to do?

Is Baum a genius or a doofus? Read the whole thing and find out.