The next to the last evening of 2008

I won't miss 2008 a bit, no thank you. Not that good things didn't begin to develop, and better, newer ways of being began to manifest. But, for those things to manifest, a great deal of lurching, gut-wrenching, free-falling uncertainty and drama was required and I didn't favor that very much, thank you.

The homework assignment before me is to write out in detail what I want if there were no considerations or obstacles. A good exercise for anyone, especially facing down the barrels of a new year.

I am seeing clearly for the first time just how much drama and obstacle most people put in front of themselves. They're tripping over it (I've been tripping over it) and not even aware that it's there, just going forward expecting that that is how things are supposed to be.

What if we have an opportunity with this Rick Warren controversy?

First let me preface my diary by stating that I'm a Religious Scientist (not a Scientologist, click here for a wikipedia article.) I believe that everything we experience in life is coming from our own belief of the world.

That is a HARD thing to have to balance with something as initially disturbing as Rick Warren's selection to give the invocation at Obama's inauguration.

Unlike those that support HRC and the Log Cabin Republicans, I believe that everyone in the GLBT community deserves full human rights NOW. Unlike many, I believe that the anti-GLBT dialogue from those like Rick Warren contributes to the huge spike in anti-GLBT violence which was beautifully summarized by PICO over on Daily Kos today. How our leaders speak sets the tone by which people act and react.

When I saw Rick Warren was Obama's choice, I felt betrayed. However, these last few days, I've been wrestling with my own tendency to view myself as a victim of circumstances - even those circumstances that are fully within my control.

Victim/not victim. What is the difference? In the abstract, that's not difficult to understand.

In the moment of seeing what is clearly an abandonment, or a turning away after WE helped him get elected it's not as easy.

I agree with the folks who are complaining that in saying that he is for working together in spite of differences and what's gone in the past, Obama is saying that it we (the GLBT community) that has to give up being right and come across the aisle to shake hands and accept Rick Warren.

What if that's what Obama has in mind for us?

The other night, someone commenting on a GLBT themed diary on Daily Kos made the joke that without us, straight people are destined to have bad clothing, hair and drink cheap wine from a box.

Okay, you grinned, you know you did.

Even when we in the GLBT community are feeling most abused and diminished, we know that deep down we're very special people. What if Obama is, knowingly or unknowingly, calling for us to step forward and BE special?

Again, I've been wrestling with my own thinking and personality in the last week, and at that micro level (which is quite macro for me, thanks, but in the scheme of things..) I've been seeing where being right about being victimized has kept me back. Engaged in whipping up big drama has kept me back.

We are righteously whipping up big drama over Rick Warren's selection.

Is that what will best serve us as a people?

One thought - Rick Warren is giving the invocation. Dr. Joseph Lowery is giving the benediction. Rick Warren starts, but Dr. Lowery finishes.

Is that not a metaphor for what is happening here? We're starting the ceremony with self-righteousness, focusing on those that appear different so as to gain advantage, and selfish greed - and we're ending up with inclusion and acceptance and working together regardless of the apparent differences.

Moving from one to the opposite way of handling things. If we move to inclusion and acceptance and working together, we're going to HAVE to include and accept those that have not and do not accept us.

What if we, the GLBT community have this glorious opportunity to LEAD?

The website DailyOm today posted a spot-on comment about exactly this. They couldn't have known that we'd be wrestling with Rick Warren today. It's serendipity, if you believe in that, or it's the word of Spirit right at the moment it's needed, if you believe in that.

I'm going to give you the opening paragraph, but because of copyright and the site's TOS, you'll have to click through to read it all.

I don't know how exactly we're going to lead from this, but how about we start to look for ways to do so that aren't reaching back to the last 28 years and trying to be the powers that be that dictate terms to the other side? How about if we in the GLBT community follow the words of our newly elected leader, which are so poignant and so needed right now, and we accept, love, and work with everyone?

What if GLBT people were viewed as not only the ones with all the style, wit, flair and vibrance, but we also were the ones that gave the world peace and hope?

If we can create what we have already done, marginalized and closeted, we can do this. If we can create lasting community service organizations to help ourselves when the straight community abandoned us in righteous judgment over AIDS, we can do this.

It's a far more empowering mission than figuring out how to gain revenge for betrayal.

December 19, 2008
The Great Transformer
Loving What You Hate

"Hatred can be irrational, and it has a greater impact on the individual who hates than the person or object being hated. Yet overcoming hatred is difficult because hatred reinforces itself and causes greater enmity to come into being. The most powerful tool one can use to combat hatred is love. Deciding to love what you hate, whether this is a person, situation, or a part of yourself, can create a profound change in your feelings and your experience. There is little room for anger, dislike, bitterness, or resentment when you are busy loving what you hate. The practice of loving what you hate can transform and shift your emotions from hatred to love, because there is no room for hatred in a space occupied by love."

Maybe it's time to take a class

If you're like most people, you probably have a smart phone. Blackberry, Treo, something that accesses the internet, has a full keyboard, does it all.

Have you ever marveled at one of these little hand held devices and remembered what it was like fifteen years ago? How much like Star Trek are these little things?

They're going to get a whole lot more complex, and a whole lot faster than you may think. In another four years, what we'll be buying will seem far more like a Star Trek tricorder than what we're using now. You have seen the billboards for "3G wireless networks" - welcome to 4G.

Now, if you go to that linked article about 4G and can read it and understand it, you're probably a physicist or something. I looked at it a few times and boiled it down to this:

* None of the phones we're using now will work at all in about three years
* What we're just now starting to get used to - streaming video on our handheld, slow and clunky internet, navigation on our handhelds - is merely a baby step compared to the 4G devices that we'll see awfully soon
* The only thing that will hold a 4G device back is the screen size. There will be some 4G handheld devices that will have more computing power than the laptop I'm writing this on - and you can use it to stream movies, work at your desk, or in replacement of the stereo system and navigation system in your car through wireless Bluetooth-like technology and full sized monitors/keyboards.
* South Korea has already re-wired their wireless networks to 4G and is rolling out the products - this is not speculation, it is coming more certainly than the inaguration on January 20
* In another five years or so, your new car will have a video screen, and a power/cable plug for your 4G device, which will be the video/audio/satellite radio/navigation system/trip computer/telephone for your vehicle. If you rent a car, you'll have your normal and familiar functionality with you.
* No more laptop cases, no more lugging your eight pound device around. No more desktop computers. Monitors, keyboards and pointers (commonly called a mouse) with a power port will be the work stations of the very near future. This alone will massively reduce electrical consumption.
* You'll never have to miss your favorite TV program ever again!

Well, Lieutenant Uhura, get me Star Fleet on the comm!

What to do with this information? If you're challenged by your Blackberry NOW, take a class about them at HCC or something! The train is whistling to leave the station, and your competitors (who can handle this massive technology shift) will be aboard!

Hey, Conservatives -

The other day, Eric from Vancouver was touting his local MP (that's what the Canuckistanians call their Congresscritters) web page. He linked me to her website, and there occupying all of the up front real estate, was a story that told of the MP's informing the Border Security guys to watch for Americans coming across the border to protest in Vancouver at a Gay Pride event.

Seems in Canada it's a crime to incent hatred or discrimination toward other groups.

The few people in the US that I spoke to about this (outside the City and County of San Francisco, that is) thought that was "stupid."

Turns out there's a completely valid reason for this. From a diarist at Daily Kos:

The Psychological Harm of Anti-Gay Initiatives
by RfrancisR
Sun Nov 30, 2008 at 08:13:16 AM PST

Been feeling angry, fearful, sad, or depressed, lately? I have. I remember the joy I felt on election night, and how that joy came crashing down when I woke up the next morning to the reality of California's Prop 8 having passed. It blew me away. I had been talking to my sister in the weeks leading up to the vote of possibly moving out there with her so that me and my boyfriend of nearly nineteen years could get married. To straight people out there, imagine being with your boyfriend or girlfriend for nineteen years. Who has a boyfriend that long? Imagine never being able to call, by law, your boyfriend or girlfriend your spouse, and imagine that was the case because people who hated you spend millions to tell your neighbors every lie in the book about you.

Dr Gregory Herek, one of the foremost experts on the issue of sexual minorities, has posted a wonderful blog documenting the very real psychological harm of anti-gay ballot initiatives.

* RfrancisR's diary :: ::
*

Evidence has documented so called minority stress, the additional psychological stress that is caused by being an out-group in society. Now, Herek points us to research that proves that vicious anti-gay campaigns ran to help pass anti-gay measures do severe psychological harm to the GLBT community tantamount to PTSD. It's not merely the loss of a legal recognition of a marriage. It is brutal psychological warfare against gays and lesbians.

I can’t do justice to Dr. Russell’s book-length account here, especially her in-depth descriptions of the stories related by research participants. But one of her important findings was that a substantial segment of the sample reported many symptoms that are commonly associated with depression, anxiety disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and they perceived that these symptoms were a direct result of having lived through the months of antigay campaigning.

Through Internet surveys, the researchers used standard mental health measures to assess the current well-being of more than 1500 lesbian, gay, and bisexual adults. For example, respondents were asked whether they had recently experienced various symptoms of depression, such as having difficulty sleeping or concentrating, feeling fearful or hopeless, and not being able to “get going.” They were also asked about the extent to which they were experiencing negative emotions, such as fear, irritability, hostility, and nervousness.

587 participants completed two versions of the questionnaires — one in the spring of 2006 and a second one about 6 months later, shortly after the November elections. Nearly one thousand others completed the post-election questionnaire, but not the pre-election survey.

The researchers sorted participants into two groups — those living in a state with an anti-marriage amendment on the 2006 November ballot and those in other states. Not surprisingly, compared to residents of other states, residents of the amendment-campaign states reported encountering a larger number of antigay messages in the mass media and in day-to-day conversations. Moreover, comparison of the November questionnaires with those administered six months earlier revealed that the number of encounters with negative messages had increased significantly in the amendment states but not in the other states.

When the researchers examined the mental health data, they found that residents of the states where an antigay campaign had just been waged reported higher levels of stress, more negative emotions, and more symptoms of depression than did respondents who lived elsewhere. Comparison of the pre-election and post-election questionnaires revealed that levels of psychological distress had increased significantly among residents of states with a marriage amendment on the ballot, but not among residents of other states.

In sum, the findings of Dr. Rostosky’s group support and extend those of Dr. Russell’s research team. By examining the experiences of sexual minority adults residing in different states, and by comparing scores on mental health measures before and after the statewide antigay campaigns, they provide good evidence that marriage amendment campaigns are harmful to the mental health of lesbians, gay men, and bisexuals.

BeyondHomophobia.com

I remember my civics class lessons on Brown v Board of Education. It was the top psychological research of the day that helped to make the case that segregation was a moral evil. The research, then, proved the psychological harm caused by segregation. Unequivocally, then separate could never be equal. I hope those challenging anti-gay laws, such as Prop 8 can use this new research effectively to help convince the courts of the harm such laws and initiatives do to good people.

For a really good time this December 1st, read the comments.

four years to look forward to

So, I've mostly tolerated the rantings of the "conservatives" that I know - probably has lead to the depression and anxiety that has ripped my life apart. I have tried to engage in rational discussion, third party fact checking, and so on, but the "conservatives" that I know, even the mostly sane ones, are so caught up in the daily download of conservative pornography from the RNC (as has only recently been documented here and on other non-MSM sites.)

HOW could so many different people take umbrage on the SAME day with the SAME idea using the SAME phrases?

Well, because it's all scripted, that's how.

After becoming de-homed back at the end of September, I drove out to San Francisco and stayed with a friend from college for a month. Living in San Francisco was quite an experience in freedom. People on the peninsula just don't judge each other at ALL. One is taken for how one behaves, not how one looks, where one lives and so on.

The late election eve experience for a homosexual in San Francisco was a staggering change. We, no - I - was singled out by the electorate and told EVERYONE IN THIS STATE MATTERS EXCEPT YOU.

An atmosphere I'd been quietly tolerating back in Texas (from the Indian Tejas - friendly. Fat chance.) for twenty-seven years. I could feel in the "air" that we were singled out from the herd. Not accepted. Not allowed. Wrong.

And, I was ANGRY.

Okay, I've been angry since 1980 when Jimmy Carter lost to Ronald Reagan, but NOW I WAS REALLY ANGRY. I came back to Texas (drive friendly!) to get my life back together and get the FRACK out of here.

That's when I came to realize the depth of the racism and elitism here. It's not elitism like what Obama was accused of, or the elitism that is denegrated in the press. Not a lot of arugula here in Houston.

It's the elitism that allows a 33 year old who doesn't have a pot to piss in and can't hold a job for more than three months, has never paid his child support, doesn't pay his taxes and has no education past high school to lord it over the blacks, the Mexicans, the poor, anyone who isn't WHITE. That's the key thing that I think we kossacks and progressives are not fully understanding. Race is the bottom of all of this.

I stopped tolerating race baiting the day after the election.

A lady friend of mine took me to dinner and was snarling about the black churches improperly proselytizing which brought Obama the election.

This was not new. This was a "friend" who, in front of ALL of my friends at a birthday party told me she was still surprised, given how intelligent I am, that I'd be a liberal.

For the last ten years, I'd have pointed out politely that there aren't enough black people in the country to push an election, and there are only a handful of cities where the black population can carry the day in a vote.

This time, I said "this is utterly inappropriate and racist and I won't tolerate it. If you'd like, I'll take you home right now and we can skip the opera."

She didn't like it, but she shut up.

I read every day how we Kossacks and progressives are expecting the Demos to roll over and play dead for the Republicans shouting in their unified meme. I expect it too.

But, if we accept this - as I accepted my friend's overt racism for YEARS, who's at fault? WE have the majority?

Why should we not prosecute war crimes and offenses against our domestic laws?

Why should we not prosecute the illegal politicization of our civil departments and agencies?

Why should we not bring about the IMMEDIATE dissolution of the unregulated trading structures that provided a place for a handful of thousands of hyper-wealthy to trade up our fuel, food and financial prices?

When the Demos start to roll over, why don't we say to them "I won't tolerate this, it's inappropriate. Would you like me to take you home now, or would you like to go to the opera?"

Final note, one of my best friends from high school reconnected with me on Facebook a few months back. He and I hadn't talked in 30 years. He could, if he chose, sit over there behind his computer and look at pictures, and think whatever thoughts bring him pleasure.

I for my own part don't reach out and smack old friends around on Facebook or elsewhere. I do post articles, notes, and such on MY profile that I find interesting. Hey, it's MY Facebook page! He posts all kinds of nasty crap and I don't go over there to his sandbox to see what cat turds he's burying in the sand.

But, when I post something - I get the nearly immediate little red pop-up "***** **** has posted a comment on your item."

Just guess how many times it's flattering or polite? C'mon, just guess.

Okay, fine.

Tonight, I posted a couple of things. One, a thought about how it is people think they can get their laundry clean with crudded up machines. One, a link to Paul Krugman's article about how to get the economy started again. And, one a quote from Kos today on how a party committed to government being incompetent is incapable of running a competent government.

Over there, in his sandbox (if I were truly snarky I'd use the term litter box here, but..) he decides to post "Office of the President Elect" HaHaHa find that in the Constitution."

A.) I'm tired of the dog whistles.
B.) I'm sick of being part of the progressive roll over and play dead movement
C.) I was friends with him THIRTY TWO YEARS ago. Like I need someone giving me crap.

Here's the progression of what came next:

Me: "Uh, you don't get to talk about anything not being in the Constitution, since Richard and George just made up eight years of shyte that wasn't EVER in the constitution. Sit back and take your medicine."

Him: "Others misdeeds are no excuse for your own"

Me: "I didn't create the title that you now object to. And, truly, after all of the shredding of the Constitution, international law, domestic law and just plain common sense that has been supported by .. um .. well, people I know, I just am not listening to any superficial complaining about someone adopting an "uppity" title for their office. Hey, ... guess what? He IS the president elect. And, he has an OFFICE! It's an office where he's conducting the business of being the president elect! There are even structures in place from prior to his being born to PAY FOR IT.

If you have a complaint, at least make it a good one. Repeating today's RNC talking points that were broadcast by Fox and the AM dial isn't information, nor is it discernment.

Oh, and hey - congrats on spreading today's latest slice on the racial dog whistle. Obama's an uppity nigra."

Now, you know he had some comeback, right?

I saw the little red flag and .. I didn't even want to go look. So, I didn't. I started this diary instead.

But, when I went back to Facebook to collect my quotes above, I saw his reply.

Him: "Whoa slap me down with a vengeance"

That's right, sucker.

Paraphrasing Sean Penn from "Milk"

On the Statue of Liberty, it says "Give me your poor, your hungry, your huddled masses yearning to be free." and in the Declaration of Independence, it says "All Men Are Created Equal." You can't rip that out of the Declaration of Independence and you can't take it off the base of the Statue of Liberty. That's what it is to be an American!

I say, ENOUGH. When they dog whistle, they must be called out. People are people. Everyone deserves a chance. No poor person brought our economy to its knees, and no person of color put us into Iraq, nor gave us a military budget equal to the gross national products of 3/4 of the world's nations. No illegal immigrant destroyed the watershed, or polluted the air, or outsourced all of our foundational employment to other, cheaper countries.

If the elected try to play roll over, I say - Let's take 'em straight home. We can find another date to the opera.

A milestone achieved

I don't post much on Daily Kos. I read it relentlessly - "it" being a collection of individual thoughts and posts, opinions with some facts thrown in. I've been a member for a couple of years, first so that I could post comments. I don't do that very often. I've posted only a few times. Had a few comments.

This morning, I read a recommended article from the LA Times about a guy who used to be a writer for the Wall Street Journal, and has been now homeless for three years. He lives in the back of his Toyota pick up. I wrote a post in response to that, and plunked it down.

Daily Kos gets tens of thousands of posts each day - called "Diaries." They are unedited. If someone violates the site's TOS (that's internetic for "Terms of Service) they get deleted and blocked, but people can say pretty much what they want as long as they're not suggesting violence toward someone.

I don't read all of these diaries.

Editors, who are I believe volunteers, review the tens of thousands of diaries, and advance them for everyone to see on the front page. In addition, a handful of regular diarists post straight to the front page all day. Each night, some ten to fifteen diaries are recommended for everyone to read. This feature is called "Open Thread and Diary Rescue." Some of these diaries are just emotional stories, some are well researched tomes, some are ill researched rants.

My diary today was recommended for everyone to read. I'm both honored and embarrassed.

Warm, Dry, Full

Cross posted from Daily Kos

Homelessness takes many, many shapes - and most homeless are not living under a bridge, but are living on a friend's sofa, or in a den or guest room.

Les Gapay writes of having lived from the back of his pickup in today's Pundit wrapup. Even that homelessness is mostly invisible, because he's not out begging for coins and sleeping in a doorway.

Homelessness means that you cannot any longer provide a home for yourself and your family. Being warm and dry and fed doesn't equate to being "homed." Having a home of your own gives you the ability to say how things will go, how clean it will be kept, how it will be managed, when it will be quiet and who will be coming over.

Homeless means that you're dependent on someone else's expectations, upon someone else's schedule and way of doing things. If you can't adjust ALL of your psyche to meet them all the way on their side of the equation, you are about to be homeless without the warm/dry/fed part.

Homeless also carries with it an internal stigma. That you couldn't keep it up - you couldn't carry the day and manage it. That you may never be able to do it again.

Homelessness also means forcible separation from one's "stuff." Mine, for instance, is in two different places, 40 miles apart. Not only do I not have any place for it to go, elements of it have been planing away for months - things that once meant a great deal to me are too difficult to keep moving or are broken or just taken. My surround sound system now lives elsewhere forever. My furniture is scattering quickly as friends mention they've always liked this piece or that piece and could they have it? Buy it?

Never does it bring a fraction of what it would cost to replace. My future home, if there should be one, could now be contained in a one bedroom apartment, maybe even a studio. Even knowing that, there is no sense of accomplishment, only an effort to battle a sense of loss.

The only relief homelessness provides is freedom from the crushing slavery to paying housing, utilities, cleaning products, everything that you once did to make and keep your place as your own. My very high paying consulting career ended weeks after 9/11, but the hand writing was on the wall when the incoming Bush administration simply canceled all of the social/education/community development funds that our division was working with. Since then, I've been trying to find a place for myself, and maintaining a space for myself has been a pitched battle each month. Finally, when Hurricane Ike made its appearance, my entire weakened self-employment network came to an end. Twelve days later, I was living on the good wishes of good friends, and wondering when, if ever, I would be "homed" again.It's so very easy for one to think of someone like me, talented, enormous skills, and think "well, you're choosing to do this." At some metaphysical level, that's probably true.

However, when your day is consumed with trying to keep your household going, or trying to figure out where you can put everything when you cannot keep it going, and then trying to help out the people with whom you're staying by doing their house cleaning and chores - there is little time left for actual work. Bouncing around from friend's sofa to friend's sofa leaves little time for planning and execution of your recovery - you barely get your shaving tackle situated and it's time to move on to the next friendly place for a few days. Everyone in your life wants to hear from you "how did this happen? What are you going to do next?" Hours each day of concern - hours that eat up whatever time you do have to make something for yourself.

Hours of concern that can only be interpreted by you as an expression of dismay and disappointment that you didn't work hard enough or make better decisions. Concern that you just don't want to hear anymore, because none of it is helpful or new.

There are no resources for homeless people, if you have a little income and a car of your own. If I were HIV + or if I were a battered woman, there would be assistance. Our society sees fit to help no one; those who worship Ann's Rant "Atlas Shrugged" have done their best to eliminate any social net that they can adequately vilify through daily talking points.So, no bridge for me. No back seat of my car - yet. I'm luckier than most. But, I'm as homeless as the guy who just asked you for a little change on the sidewalk. I'm glad and thankful that I have what I do still have, though.

But, don't be surprised or call me unpatriotic when I say I'm not too proud of this Country of ours just now. That opinion has been a long time coming, and there is only a glimmer of hope for the future.

Tuesday thoughts

Happy Veterans' Day!! My favorite vets get a special "WAHOO" for their service.

Several things for today that are fun and interesting.

First, holy crap, Batman - GM may be filing for bankruptcy .. talk about having a lump of coal in your stocking. It seems that there are no more debtor in possession loans available, which means that a Chapter 11 reorganization is beyond unlikely. Bloomberg today has an article that suggests things are dire - while JP Morgan says GM is a likely survivor, and rates their debt as a "buy."

Why should you care? Because, GM is a huge contributor to our nation's economy, and the consequences of a GM shut down would be dire. GM directly and indirectly employs more than 300,000 people - exclusive of the retail distribution and repair channels.

In most states, GM accounts for about 15% of sales tax revenues and about 9% of employment.

Just so you know.

What would happen to your state if 15% of the sales tax just vaporized? Or to your city of 9% of the employed were out of work?

This is not to say that I think GM needs to be preserved in its current form. The consequences of auto industry management decisions can be seen, though, in the collapse of Detroit. Detroit was one of the most glorious cities in the country; check out this picture from the New York Times reflecting downtown Detroit in the 1920s versus today via the website Forgotten Detroit. This picture shows nearly the identical spot on Washington Blvd.

Here is a neat discussion of the three scenarios possible for the US auto industry.

This is all analogous to the experience Houston had during the early 1980s when the price of oil collapsed and huge elements of the population were unemployed. It took the Houston area nearly a decade to return to economic health, but recall what's been happening to the price of oil these last eight years. Lots of economic stimulus for the center of the oil production universe.

There will be no such stimulus for former auto towns.

Detroit is much like New Orleans, post-Katrina. What was a thriving business center has now become an empty core that spreads outward - the lack of jobs causes and exacerbates a lack of housing and services that spiral on in an endless negative loop. You can try to build new jobs, but without housing, there will be no employees. You can try to build new housing, but without gas stations, groceries and schools, there will be no occupants. You can try to attract new occupants, but without them, there will be no jobs, no gas stations, no groceries and no schools.

Only massive government spending will begin to reverse the cycle.

Now, let's move on to more amusing things - there are a fair number of people who suggest that the Holocaust was a fantasy - just a public relations tale to promote Zionism. Seems that those folks were wrong - 28 pages of blueprints have been found in a Berlin apartment that pre-date the construction of the Auschwitz death camp, and include details plans for the crematory, gas chambers and body storage. While it's possible that these plans are a fake (as was Hitler's diary,) they seem to be quite genuine. The German archives are studying the documents, and we'll know more soon enough.

What are you doing on Saturday? Care to join the protest for human rights?

Check out jointheimpact.com and see where the nearest rally is being held. In Houston, it's being held at City Hall at noon. Invite your friends. All of them.

Where I've been hanging out, there is a great affection for "The View." The ladies (and I use that term loosely in a few cases) have been talking a great deal about Prop 8 and its pros and cons.

Elisabeth, whose bio suggests is unafraid to express her candid and conservative views, is one of the most ill-informed liars with a public platform who's not committed to the Fox networks. She's Sarah Palin with a better vocabulary, but a less soothing voice.

Elisabeth, get a few facts straight once in a while. Stop making crap up. Please. Just a suggestion. Or don't, because your "candid and conservative views" are without value when you keep inventing "facts" to support your bigoted theories. Makes it easier to swallow when one is clear that you're a lying idiot.

Whoopi is working to inject a fact or six into the discussion of Prop 8, to the great dismay of Elisabeth and Sherri (Sherri - a suggestion for you - take a bible study course. Actually study it. Then, start using it as a foundation again, AFTER you know what it says).

You know what? It's actually better for the non-bible thumping crowd to watch you parrot bigotry supported with non-specific bible citations than to actually have to expend the intellect to discuss a well sourced bible scholar. So, Sherri, you just keep on, gurl.

So, now when I'm watching the "View," I'll just sit in amused self-righteousness that the homobigots and neocons must resort to lies and making crap up to support their unsupportable venom.

One of the best explanations for why it's a wrong-headed idea to vote against rights for humans was given by Keith Olbermann on his "Special Comment" last night. Go have a read, or go to MSNBC.com and watch it.

Observations from the road

As I was careening through West Texas last night, I kept thinking "these headlights are much like running as fast as possible in a thick forest while carrying a penlight."

Then, the traffic cleared up and I flipped on the brights.

I could see next week they were so bright.

Fired up, ready to go!

Election day, 2008

Seventy-seven days from the Inaugural ball(s). I need a new tuxedo - and a decent tuxedo shirt (or two.) I have the shoes. (big grin) Do I EVER have the shoes!



There's an excitement in the air.

It's not just me. People outside the living room window here are excited. Excited that today is the last day of being ruled by grumpy, old, white men whose lives were defined by the threat of Hitler and Communism. Men who believed that their prejudices should prevail over a woman's body, a person's right to love who they wish, who can own property, who can vote, who can aspire to public service, and which shifting moral code should be imposed on the population.

Today is the last day of this country being the playground bully that no one is able to stand up to.

Today is the last day. That's what we're voting for.

From today's Christian Science Monitor:

My wife made me canvass for Obama; here's what I learned
This election is not about major policies. It's about hope.
By Jonathan Curley

from the November 3, 2008 edition

Charlotte, N.C. - There has been a lot of speculation that Barack Obama might win the election due to his better "ground game" and superior campaign organization.

I had the chance to view that organization up close this month when I canvassed for him. I'm not sure I learned much about his chances, but I learned a lot about myself and about this election.

Let me make it clear: I'm pretty conservative. I grew up in the suburbs. I voted for George H.W. Bush twice, and his son once. I was disappointed when Bill Clinton won, and disappointed he couldn't run again.

I encouraged my son to join the military. I was proud of him in Afghanistan, and happy when he came home, and angry when he was recalled because of the invasion of Iraq. I'm white, 55, I live in the South and I'm definitely going to get a bigger tax bill if Obama wins.

I am the dreaded swing voter.

So you can imagine my surprise when my wife suggested we spend a Saturday morning canvassing for Obama. I have never canvassed for any candidate. But I did, of course, what most middle-aged married men do: what I was told.

At the Obama headquarters, we stood in a group to receive our instructions. I wasn't the oldest, but close, and the youngest was maybe in high school. I watched a campaign organizer match up a young black man who looked to be college age with a white guy about my age to canvas together. It should not have been a big thing, but the beauty of the image did not escape me.

Instead of walking the tree-lined streets near our home, my wife and I were instructed to canvass a housing project. A middle-aged white couple with clipboards could not look more out of place in this predominantly black neighborhood.

We knocked on doors and voices from behind carefully locked doors shouted, "Who is it?"

"We're from the Obama campaign," we'd answer. And just like that doors opened and folks with wide smiles came out on the porch to talk.

Grandmothers kept one hand on their grandchildren and made sure they had all the information they needed for their son or daughter to vote for the first time.

Young people came to the door rubbing sleep from their eyes to find out where they could vote early, to make sure their vote got counted.

We knocked on every door we could find and checked off every name on our list. We did our job, but Obama may not have been the one who got the most out of the day's work.

I learned in just those three hours that this election is not about what we think of as the "big things."

It's not about taxes. I'm pretty sure mine are going to go up no matter who is elected.

It's not about foreign policy. I think we'll figure out a way to get out of Iraq and Afghanistan no matter which party controls the White House, mostly because the people who live there don't want us there anymore.

I don't see either of the candidates as having all the answers.

I've learned that this election is about the heart of America. It's about the young people who are losing hope and the old people who have been forgotten. It's about those who have worked all their lives and never fully realized the promise of America, but see that promise for their grandchildren in Barack Obama. The poor see a chance, when they often have few. I saw hope in the eyes and faces in those doorways.

My wife and I went out last weekend to knock on more doors. But this time, not because it was her idea. I don't know what it's going to do for the Obama campaign, but it's doing a lot for me.

Jonathan Curley is a banker. He voted for George H.W. Bush twice and George W. Bush once.

Grumpiness

And, no, I'm not talking about John McCain. Enough of that.

Several things -

When people are speaking on a wireless phone (cell or at home) and the call quality is poor, they consistently say "you broke up" or "you're breaking up."

Um, are you sure? If I heard you just fine and you couldn't hear me, who was it exactly that was "breaking up?" The way the common statement is phrased is a matter of blame; saying "our call broke up" or "our call quality is poor, and I couldn't hear you" is actually more accurate and without finding fault.

Next thing -

Why is it that people who haven't ever had a pot to piss in, or whose economic lives have been roiled and forever changed to the worse from the last eight years are so convinced that Obama is going to destroy their futures?

Is it perhaps .. race? Bigotry?

I think so.

Either that, or they're people who believe that McDonald's has a "healthy" menu.

Rainy rainy days

The first of November. It's raining steadily, overcast and fragrant here. I slept until nearly eleven this morning.

We "did" Halloween; my friend with whom I'm staying went as Supergirl - he looked great, and his friend was dressed as Marie Antoinette with this ENORMOUS Marge Simpson wig - he was over 7' tall in the 5" heels, the wig and everything. I wore my traditional red fairy costume. When I went to put it on, I didn't have to struggle to get into it - the tights and leotard just wooshed right on, and the costume hung on my like a flour sack. Last few years, I could hardly get the tights up to my hips. Last few years, I couldn't zip the leotard. It was very cool to have that kind of validation that I'd lost weight.

We went first down to the Castro, and wandered around a bit - into the Walgreens to get Marie a new set of press-on nails (they were completely out) - we kept getting stopped every few feet to have our pictures taken by tourists and people who weren't in costume. Several times, there were so many cameras going off that I felt a bit like David Beckham coming into LAX. We went into a bar, but it was so crowded in there that it was uncomfortable (my wings kept getting into people's way, and they'd just shove the wings aside) so we went to a private party in the Castro for a while, then up to Haight Ashbury to the big party of the evening.

Parking was a nightmare in the Haight; we ended up parking blocks and blocks away (and still getting a ticket) but the party was awesome. The costumes very impressive and creative, and the food was glorious! I kept getting chatted up by people who LOVED my fairy costume (which I'll have to have taken in next year, I think - it just was so .. baggy!) The hosts have no back yard to speak of, so the smokers and people who wanted some air spilled out onto the sidewalk, where we got to interact with the folks walking down the hill to the straight bars. Some of their costumes were very cute; the straight girls' favorite this year was Sarah Palin. One girl was dressed quite passably as Glinda the good witch of the North, and did a perfect spin and then sat down with her dress perfectly laid out around her.

By midnight, we were all tired, so we came home. I left my costume in the trunk of the car, so today when the rain dies down a bit, I must go put it all back together.

be proud!

Why is it

I'm just amazed that people who have a different viewpoint (um, pretty much the wide-eyed, Ayn Rand, conservative "taxes are bad, regulation is bad, government is inept" crowd) have to levy judgment that one's intellect is flawed rather than just acknowledging that there are different ways to look at the world.

I've been called unintelligent by a person I consider a close friend at one of my birthday parties because I don't subscribe to supply side economics (or, trickle down economics which even G.H.W. Bush didn't believe in) or welfare mothers in Cadillacs. Today, I was inherently called stupid by the sister of another friend for engaging in a conversation on facebook about Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged."

When someone advances these concepts, I must admit that I question why they're looking at the world that way. In the case of my insult hurling birthday party friend, she's still focused on how she always felt she had to work for things in her life and her sister got all the breaks without deserving it. It colors all of her opinions about people whose lives don't work but get assistance from the government or parental figures. Her belief in welfare mothers in Cadillacs stems from her anger with her father and her sister and from no empirical data or anecdote.

I don't know today why my friend's sister felt it was necessary to tell me I wasn't smart enough to understand "Atlas Shrugged." I understood it just fine; I just don't agree that it's a valid economic and societal blueprint. In fact, given that our society and government have been operated from this blueprint for the last eight plus years (I'd say more like 28 years) and it's a spectacular failure would put the bullet in the argument, but it seems to be ramping up again even as its spawn melts down.

So, what is it about persons of more conservative political and social views (wasn't it nice of me not to call them little Hitlers, fascists, bigots, haters, fear mongers, oppressive and superior white bastards or any number of other labels I could have used?) find people who disagree to be intellectually flawed?

How is it that these same people will ask my flawed intellect for instruction on how to deal with tax issues, or to recall historical facts, or to provide relationship advice, or to provide a shoulder to cry on? If my intellect was that flawed, then why should it follow that ANY of my mental qualities were reliable?

Fun but TRUE!

watch it. share it. watch it again.

Atlas shrugged, and the world should have

I managed to skate through college without strolling into the Waldo Library until the last week of my senior year. Thus, I managed to complete a very fine public school education and a mediocre (by my own making) college education without having come into contact with Ayn Rand's monumental "Atlas Shrugged." In fact, I successfully completed college without having heard of it. I read a great deal of other, weighty tomes. "The Brothers Karamazov," for instance.

A few years ago, a fellow I had met was raving on about how "Atlas Shrugged" was the most important book he'd ever read. How it was such a signal truth about society. Okay, so I was influenced by how how I thought the guy was, so I picked up a copy of the book and read it. All 1400+ pages of it. I read it right through to the end, and thought as I closed the back cover "What a piece of self-indulgent crap."

Many young men read this work, and figure that they point of Ayn's Rant is the government and economic structure of the United States. It's not. Ayn was a child of the Eastern Block (for those of you who remember,) and her work was a rant about centralized economic planning and monolithic bureaucracies of the Soviet Union.

A great number of people don't do their homework on this point. Including Allen Greenspan, who, as it turns out, was ministering to our nation's economic condition using the premises of Ayn's Rant - all regulation is bad, and true, unfettered capitalism will always self-correct.

Somehow that hasn't worked out so well for us. And, the unfettered capitalists have run to the protection of the State, while those oppressed workers become further downtrodden and further disenfranchised.

It's funny, but as I remember the book and the story, the wealthy (who toiled not, neither did they sow) were living off the largesse of the State.

That being the case, isn't it then true that Ayn's Rant, when applied to the real world, has brought about the very condition that Ayn ranted against?

Bush's achievements

Boris Johnson, the lavishly Tory Mayor of London ...

However well-intentioned it was, the catastrophic and unpopular intervention in Iraq has served in some parts of the world to discredit the very idea of western democracy.

The recent collapse of the banking system, and the humiliating resort to semi-socialist solutions, has done a great deal to discredit - in some people's eyes - the idea of free-market capitalism.

Democracy and capitalism are the two great pillars of the American idea.

To have rocked one of those pillars may be regarded as a misfortune.

To have damaged the reputation of both, at home and abroad, is a pretty stunning achievement for an American president.

Snared from Andrew Sullivan's post on the Atlantic Monthly website

Don't count your chickens...

Just remember, at this point in the 1980 election, Ronald Reagan was down by eight points in the polls. In the end, Jimmy Carter only carried six states including his own, and lost the popular vote by nearly 10 points.

Get out the vote!

Jackie the dog 1995 - 2008

The story of Jackie the dog starts back in 1982, when I had only been in Houston a few months. There was a dog wandering the neighborhood, a beautiful gold colored German Shepherd. We gave him a little nosh, and he started hanging around. My room mate, Brad, took to calling him "Pferd," German for "Horse," since he was pretty large. He always responded to that name, which seemed odd at the time.

We took him to the vet clinic in the neighborhood, and learned that he had belonged to someone that had moved away, and abandoned him. His name was "Fred," which explained his reaction to being called "Pferd."

Fred was an awesome, heroic, patient dog who lived until 1992. I had always thought it would be great to get a female silver point Shepherd and call her "Ethel," but holy smokes! Have you seen what the cost of a purebred dog is? Just before he passed, I was given the gift of another dog, a little black chow mix puppy that I named "Barney." Fred and Barney. Get it?

Barney lived up to his name, and was .. well, you can read in the archives about Barney.

Barney had been with me about three years when my friends Kurtis and David called one evening. They lived just up the street from me, and a friend of theirs had rescued a chow chow female that she couldn't keep. They thought about taking her in, but she didn't socialize with their female chow mix dog, and they thought of me.

I hopped into the car, drove the few blocks to their house and there, sitting off by herself, was a stunningly beautiful cinnamon pure bred chowchow. She was gorgeous.

She had been abandoned around the time she was fully grown, and had lived on the streets of Montrose for at least a year before this woman had caught her, taken her to the vet, had her fixed and "fixed," and groomed.

I've often questioned whether one can fall in love at first sight, and with people, I still wonder about that. I can tell you, though, that it is possible to fall in love at first sight, because it happened to me right there.

The woman who had rescued her called her "Annie" (little orphan annie) but I called her Jackie after Jacqueline Onassis. I figured she had had a rough life, but was regal, dignified and very, very beautiful, so naming her after the former First Lady was apropos.

Jackie came home to live with me right then. She and Barney got along just fine, although it was pretty clear that it was she who was in charge.

At first, she was so skittish about allowing someone to "control" her - she wouldn't let me put her leash on her. She so wanted to go outside with me and Barney, but she just couldn't bring herself that last few inches to let me clip the leash onto her collar. I thought making her stay behind while Barney and I went out on the leash would persuade her, but after several days, she would let me get just an eyelash from her collar and then she'd dart away.

My room mate, Billy (who's deserving of a chapter or two of his own) surprised me when I was out with Barney by coming around the other side of the block with Jackie on the leash. I asked him how the HECK he had gotten her to let him clip the leash on her, and he just looked at me like I was an alien. "Why, raw meat, you ninny."

I kept Jackie on the leash that evening, standing in the kitchen between Billy and me while we had company over. I stood on the lead to her collar so she couldn't go anywhere, and fed her scraps and petted her. She was never again relucant to let me handle her again.

Jackie was very grateful to be indoors, fed, loved and safe. Unlike Barney, who was a locust for any attention or calories, Jackie was patient, accomodating and adapting. One evening, I put in the movie "It's My Party," which I was then emotionally unprepared for. The movie made me reflect upon the dozens of friends that I'd lost to AIDS, and as the film reached its climax, I was sobbing. Jackie climbed into my lap and began licking my face. Barney, being the shit that he was, crawled into my lap as well, but he wanted the attention Jackie was getting - he wouldn't have cared if I was bleeding to death as long as he got all the food and attention.

When we moved into the apartment on Bagby, Jackie would frequently get on the bed at night and sleep near me. If I awoke during the night, I could feel the almost feather-light change in pressure as she jumped off of the bed.

Because of Barney's behavior, I started penning the two of them into the kitchen when I'd go away or sleep at night. Barney was always a piddler, who'd walk and squirt. Jackie would squat and do her business all at once, and I assumed I could differentiate between the two of them if there was an accident at home. Boy, was I wrong about that.

After a short transition period after I started restraining them in the kitchen, I'd arise nearly every morning and find a big puddle of urine in the kitchen. It was not the typical Barney walking squirt, so I assumed it was Jackie doing the dirty work. I took to "caging" her by tethering her to the laundry room door, limiting her movement to just a small area.

That worked for a short time, and then I'd arise and find Jackie, tethered to the door, standing in a lake of urine, soaking wet.

These were not good mornings for me. For her, either.

One morning, I awoke and heard the inimitable sound of urine splashing on a tile floor coming from the kitchen. Silently, I lept from my bed and dashed to the kitchen. I looked around the corner to where Jackie was tethered, and .. Barney had insinuated himself BETWEEN her and the laundry room door, and was urinating BEHIND her.

Our assumption that dogs and other creatures don't have the power to be calculating or make plans is flawed.

Jackie's life got much better after that.

In February 2007, Barney had a stroke. He was thirteen years old, and had gotten quite frail. After spending nearly ten years with him, Jackie wasn't in the least bit distressed by her constant companion lying there incapacitated. She seemed almost to communicate "ignore the black one, now it's MY turn!"

She was indeed pampered after Barney's passing. I only regret that her pampering and being attended to had to wait until Barney passed along; she had gotten old enough that we could only incrementally improve her life, not create a new one.

Jackie was a trooper in all respects - in April last, when we went with Robert and his two dogs to the ranch in Colorado, she only complained when the other dogs would plow into her in their unbridled enthusiasm in the back seat. She checked things out, and then napped for a week in the sun.

It's nearly impossible to see the physical decline in a creature you're with every day in close quarters. Jackie was having trouble going up and down stairs a year ago. She had trouble negotiating the rocks in Colorado, and she was having difficulty with the hills here in San Francisco.

Over the last two weeks, she had lost interest in eating, and was vomiting every day. Although she was clearly uncomfortable, her personality didn't change a bit. She was aloof except when she wanted attention, she was enthusiastic about going outside, and she hated getting wet.

We went back to the self-serve dog wash yesterday, and she wasn't too pleased about getting wet - again - but, she soldiered through. She couldn't walk up the steep hills, and I had to carry her.

Today, I took her to David's vet. For the first time, she couldn't get herself into the car and I had to lift her in. She sat, expectantly, on the floorboard, and nosed around with her normal detached enthusiasm in the new place. Even though visits to the vet usually cause her distress, she was peaceful and affectionate.

Initially, they couldn't find evidence of anything that would clearly explain her condition. She had arthritis far more severely than I had believed; her lower back and shoulders must have caused her great discomfort. Her stomach was distended, and they at first thought that they could treat her with a curative for her stomach lining and an appetite enhancer. The other vet did an ultrasound of her abdomen, and they found the large tumor in her stomach.

Chow chows have stomach cancer more than 20 times more often than other breeds, and when they become symptomatic, it's too late to do anything about it. Her blood values were all quite normal, so she wasn't feeling the effects of her illness, other than the stomach discomfort. There was only one decision to make, and they brought her out to say good-bye.

Jackie wasn't too much interested in being loved on right then, she was ready to move on to the next thing. She kept heading for the door, and the next place there was to go.

I've had a dog since Fred came wandering around in 1982. All three of my dogs were unwanted in their lives, discarded and thrown aside. Jackie was the most special of the three. She spent her whole life with me being grateful that I had taken her in.

Perhaps it's a sign that I'm now done with that part of my life that today was her day to exit this plane. She was the last real link to who I've always known myself to be. The rest is just dross - structures and detritus that needs to be cleared away, dealt with and disposed of.

I'm grateful to have had the time with her. I'll miss hearing her clacking around on the floor, miss her soft snore as she sleeps the day away, the happy look on her face when she gingerly chews her food, her reluctance to get her feet wet, and her nudging me with her snout, looking to get validation and love.

Godspeed, gentle soul.

And another one bites the dust

So, while in Bellingham, I finally got to tour the Boeing Museum of Flight and walk through a BAC Concorde (G-BOAG) - I had always wanted to fly on one, but that was rather out of reach. Interestingly, it was very small and not very plush inside. Apparently, the experience was in the service and the speed.

This week, the QE2 makes its final transatlantic crossing - then it makes a Mediterranean cruise before being gutted out, towed to Dubai and converted (as in physically revised) into a floating hotel and casino. Always wanted to cross on the QE2.

And, this morning, I found this picture on Airliners.net (yes, there's a porn site for airline geeks such as I am) It's a picture of a DC-3 at Berlin Tempelhof airport. I've always wanted to fly into Tempelhof, that's the Berlin airport that was built for the 1938 Berlin Olympics. it's one of only two manmade structures in the world that's large enough to be seen from outer space (the other being the great wall of China). The airplanes pull in and park inside the structure (as you can see in the picture). It's the airport into which all the flights went for the Berlin airlift.

The airport is closing forever on 31 Oct. Tempelhof is now considered unsafe for airport operations; the city is grown up all around it, and the runways are too short. Berlin is rebuilding one of its three airports into a totally new facility and they're closing the other two, Tempelhof being the first to go.

In short order, Tempelhof's runways will be dug up, and that land redeveloped. The terminal building itself will be modified for some other use, and that it was once the world's first modern international airport will be available only through photographs and the memories of those who flew there.

If I did manage to go, would it be as my visit to Concorde was? Anti-climactic? I don't know. It is just an airport. The reward and attachment I used to have to elements of the past has faded into nothingness.

For instance, twenty years ago, I paid good money for a piece of coal from the Titanic wreck site, and an autographed photo of she who is now the last Titanic survivor, Melvinia Dean. Ms. Dean has reached an age where she requires ongoing care, and she is selling the last of her Titanic related memorabilia, including the child's sized wicker suitcase given her by the New York charities to carry her belongings once she arrived with her mother and family in New York on the Carpathia.

A few years ago, before the Green Imperial, I'd have been rabid for that suitcase. I'd have displayed it carefully with other momentos of a life that wasn't my own, and dusted it periodically; showing it to visitors and relating the story of what it was and how I came to possess it.

Now, I have no interest in it. Judy said to me yesterday that she would love to have the ability to buy that wicker suitcase for me, but that's a me that doesn't exist anymore.

Just as I reach this point in my life, I find that the market for such "treasures" has collapsed along with people's home equity lines of credit. So, I'll be hanging onto my "collection," perhaps in boxes, until a rosier day when they can be disposed of favorably.

So, it's much less my dream of flying into Tempelhof and seeing the 1930s terminal that has bitten the dust. It's my interest in seeking out fulfillment from these things outside myself that mean nothing in a life that's focused on now.

Be proud of your roots! Or something.

Sunny, mild and temperate AGAIN

How does one deal with this?

This morning, talking with Jan the Fabulous, I was again reminded that one needs to have a goal or a "want" that is bigger than the thoughts and worries that plague each of us every day. I looked back through my little notebook that I keep the wants and dreams in, and there they were - and still valid. Apparently, either they aren't "big" enough or they keep sliding back into obscurity.

Someone has put up a "McCain/Palin" poster in an office window a block away. It may be the only one in the city.

Jackie (the dog) is not eating, and may be really rattled with the huge change in environment and routine. I'm going to go over to the Dog Palace today (probably taking her with me) and see if they have anything that piques her interest. I've tried some psychology with her (lifted from the movie "To Live and Die in Beverly Hills,") and that generated a modicum of interest on her part, but no consumption.

Last night, I spent my Friday night doing a bunch of geekazoid research to disprove something in a Wikipedia article about Potrero Hill - this involved looking into the chronology and build locations of US Navy Battleships going back to the 1880s. WHOO! It was kind of fun, which tells you just what it is that trips my trigger.

Been contemplating what comes next for the last few days. I have some more work to do, but first, I have to do some actual WORK. I've done some cleaning around here today, but now it's time to crack the work product open.

all this and very funny, too!

Ask yourself .. why?

Prop 8 ads - great stuff!

Reactions:

(Swiped directly from Pam's House Blend)


ABC News: Sen. Obama also gets specific right away -- looking right to the camera with his bailout package for the middle class. And if you're looking for the first candidate to draw a distinction tonight, it's Obama, not McCain. LINK


Washington Post (Chris Cillizza): Obama is ON message. A question about campaign finance and nasty campaigning becomes an economic answer. LINK


TIME: "Jobs." And the dial lines go WHANGO! Obama should work "jobs" into every answer, including any about Bill Ayers. LINK

CNN (Bill Schneider): Obama's answers during this first line of questioning appear crisp and clear, while McCain's sound disconnected and rambling. LINK


ABC News: …McCain is still saying he'd balance the budget within four years? This is silliness, and I think McCain knows it. I look forward to his campaign explaining how, exactly, he'll do this while extending the Bush tax cuts and funding bailouts. LINK


Washington Post Fact Check (Michael Dobbs):Joe the Plumber - John McCain raised the story of "Joe the Plumber" who ran into Barack Obama at a political rally in Toledo, Ohio, earlier this week. He depicted the plumber as an average American who will end up paying more taxes under the Obama plan. In fact, the plumber told Obama that he had plans to buy a company that would make more than $250,000 a year. Obama has conceded that his proposal to phase out the Bush tax cuts for high-income groups will lead to higher taxes for people making more than $250,000 a year. Obama told the plumber that he would face an increase in his marginal tax rate from 36 to 39 per cent, but Americans earning less than $250,000 a year would stand to gain under his proposal. LINK


NBC News (Mark Murray): McCain was wrong, however, when he said that 100% of his ads weren't negative. According to a recent study by the University of Wisconsin Advertising Project, 100% of McCain's ads have been negative. LINK


Washington Post Fact Check (Michael Dobbs): McCain exaggerated the closeness of the relationship between Obama and former Weather Underground founder Bill Ayers in claiming that his rival had "launched his political career" in Ayers' living room. It is true that Obama attended a coffee meeting at Ayers' home after he announced his intention to run for the state senate in September 2005. But according to Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times, who has tracked Obama's political career closely, the Ayers' event was only one of a series of coffees in the Hyde Park community where he lived. The kickoff for Obama's Senate run came at a meeting in the Hyde Park Ramada Inn on Sept. 19, 1995. LINK


TIME: McCain is flat-out lying about Obama's health care plan. It is not government-run health care, and looks nothing like the Canadian system. LINK


Washington Post Fact Check (Glenn Kessler): John McCain made two assertions on corporate taxes, one that small businesses pay 50 percent of the taxes and the other that U.S. corporations are among the highest taxed in the world. Both are wrong. LINK


Washington Post Fact Check (Alec MacGillis): McCain said that ACORN, the large anti-poverty and affordable housing organization, is perpetrating one of the greatest voter frauds in the history of the country. This is greatly overstating the allegations that have been brought against the group in recent weeks. LINK
Washington Post (Chris Cillizza): The Fix- Again, lots of different attacks from McCain...hard for the average viewer to know what to take from debate. LINK

Amusements and information some will find helpful

This is a cute, cute quip about Sarah Palin as president - move your mouse around the page and click on anything that the cursor will open.

Here is a calculator for how Obama's proposed tax plan would work for you specifically.

Have to get over to "work" now.

Has the danger passed?

So, something has been done and on a broad scale. This article sums up what has happened and what is likely better than anything I could write.

Working at the dog wash, yeah

Just down the hill a bit is an adorable, well stocked dog and cat store - they don't sell dogs and cats, they sell to dog and cat owners. In the back, they have a double tub self-grooming area, which is so easy to use and CHEAP! Only $15, and they supply the water, the shampoo, big yellow rubber aprons, grooming tools, towels, and a blow dryer, which we didn't try. I didn't try the nail clippers, either. Only so much could be endured at once.

Jackie was remarkably more calm in this environment than she was in the bathtub. Having the spray nozzle on a flexible hose was also a big plus.

Why don't we have these in Texas?

Fleet week

Sunny and 61 degrees. Windy. Clear skies. Wow.

Jackie keeps walking to the front window and looking out wistfully. There's no balcony there, so her interest is unrewarded. She still hasn't been eating, but David's fraidy-cats have been enjoying her food lying in a dish on the kitchen floor.

We're going to run to the Container Store today, and to the office, so I can retrieve my teakettle.

a few things you won't read in your local paper..

Paul Krugman's columns today, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/10/opinion/10krugman.html?_r=1&oref=slogin and below; also, Salon's revelation that international grain shipments have come to a standstill http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2008/10/10/real_economy_paralysis/index.html?source=rss&aim=/tech/htww


Faustian bargains
I’ve lately become a reader of Across the Curve, the blog of the bond trader John Jansen. It’s jargon-heavy — sometimes even I have to look up the terms he uses — but in a time of disordered markets (does anyone actually manage to borrow at Libor these days) it’s really helpful to have reports from a “tone and feel of the markets” guy who can tell you what the numbers can’t.

And his opening comment this morning is a shocker. After describing some of the weird action in Treasuries, he says:

Is this the beginning of the end for the dollar and the Treasury market? Is this the first sign of the bursting of the bubble in Treasury securities? That market, in a sense, represents the ultimate bubble as it exists at the whim and caprice of foreign investors, who have as participants in a Faustian bargain, financed our war(s) and our lifestyle so generously over the last decade. Maybe even that bizarre construct is crashing about us as we speak.

Maybe I should be drinking something a bit more … calming .. than coffee right now.

City by the Bay

After a consultation with Kay Bailey's office, I decided that trying to enter Canada before next year was a bust, so I spoke to David (my best friend from college,) and asked him if he had any work he needed done at his company.

Interestingly, I'd been wanting to help him in his business for months and months, but couldn't really do anything when I was in Houston and not there to see what I was working on. Working remotely can be really challenging when you're just starting out, unless it's a simple matter. He invited me to come down for a month, and I got here last night after driving two days through beautiful Oregon and Washington landscapes. I drove past signs for Mount Hood, Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Shasta and wanted to stop, but felt impelled to keep going.

Coming through Redding, I missed the 505 bypass that would have had me go around Sacramento. There was a huge grass fire just south of Redding, and I was paying so much attention to it that I missed the 505. I ended up driving through downtown Sacramento (twice) because I was looking for said 505.

Came down through Oakland and Contra Costa county and then across the Bay Bridge, through seriously heavy 5:30 p.m. traffic. It was about 70 degrees, and sunny. Arrived at David's business, and he helped me unload the car (the stuff that didn't need to come to his house,) and then we came back to his place which has a floor to ceiling view of the financial district. Jackie is enlivened by the new environment, and David's three cats are hiding out.

He took me to an amazing Chinese restaurant two blocks up the hill/street, and we chatted a while. I have filled his media room with bags of clothing, and have to work on organizing all of that today. Jackie also needs a bath, which she's about to get.

Vancouver bound and gagged

I began to think I had the only red car in the reddest of all of the states.

I don't mean dark red, or maroon, or claret, or merlot - I mean "push me down and do me" red. Blood red. Screaming for attention red. Red like my car, my phone (that matches the paint on my car, thank you very much. Like the bags things are packed in that ride in the car. Like Jackie the dog.)

I drove straight up US 287 from Ennis (south of Dallas) through Waxahachie, Wichita Falls (failing to stop in Anarene for lunch), Amarillo, Dumas, and then through endless, nameless towns in the Oklahoma panhandle, and through southeastern Colorado until I connected with the interstate system near Denver.

From there, I took I-25 to Cheyenne, then west on I-80 through all of Wyoming, into Utah, skipped Salt Lake City, clipped the edge of Ogden, and headed for the Oregon border.

Oregon started off very high, and almost as curvy as Utah. Oregon is amazing and beautiful. It was in eastern Oregon that I saw the first red car on the road since leaving Texas.

As I was trying to negotiate sharp curves and transiting from 6% uphill grades to 6% downhill grades in the rain, I had someone in a bright red Pontiac G6 chase up my bumper moments after developing the thought "I haven't seen a red car in three days."

They were at least polite - no tailgating, and they moved along quickly.

Only a few minutes later, a young woman in a bright red Chevy Cobalt came running up behind me. I was passing a truck, something that one does a lot of in the mountains, and had the cruise control set for the state speed limit of 65.

Apparently, I was causing her some difficulty, because she ran right up behind my rear bumper such that I couldn't see her headlights. Once I finished passing the truck, I moved into the right lane. She gunned her little motor and went past me.

Her car was equipped with a "fart pipe". That's one of those large diameter exhaust pipes that one usually sees on more ethnically connected and older Japanese cars, which makes a loud noise akin to a very long fart.

I still haven't seen very many red cars.

I've seen some amazing things, though. An early 80's Plymouth Reliant that still runs. A Datsun (By Nissan) B210 (second generation) that isn't completely rusted out. A Chevy Celebrity wagon that still runs.

Lots of older cars in use here in the Pacific Northwest.

Some notes:

* Wyoming has some of the best pavement I've ever driven on. Oklahoma, hands down, the worst.

* Construction zones on Interstate freeways should be much better marked than they are.

* Wyoming saves money on signage and uses it on freeways - meaning, their signs SUCK, and there aren't enough of them.

* Oregon has the best speed limit signs. HUGE, with ENORMOUS letters "65". No uncertainty.

* Utah didn't post a speed limit sign for nearly seven miles into the state.

* Texas excels in small towns with lower speed limits without any prior warning.

* Oklahoma is the gold medal standard in such speed traps. Fortunately, they have no people living in the panhandle, therefore no police officers to nab anyone.

* Colorado's rustic visual imagery seems engineered and a facade. Wyoming's is because that's how they live.

* Oregon smells great

* Mountain roads, twisty curves, steady rain, falling temperatures nearing freezing, heavy traffic, summer performance tires, at night on roads you've never driven is a great recipe for paying close attention through adrenaline.

* Canada customs officers are mostly movie-star handsome.

* US customs officers look like country sheriff charactures, with consistent personalities

* Motel 6 quality is widely varied from property to property. The towels are all the same, as is the decor.

* A dog, laying on the floor of the car for three days, produces an astonishing amount of particulate trash and a noisome odor.

* How did I live so long without XM radio? The sheer reliability and clarity of non-stop signal for the stations which you wish to listen to is a blessing.

I haven't really seen all that much of Washington state. Seattle (which I passed through at night and in the rain) looks awesome. Washington roads are beautifully built, well signed, clear, and much like riding a wooden roller coaster.

Sunday morning funnies

Corporate welfare and taxpayer bribes

Read this

This is another example of why it is wrong-headed to give tax dollars to private enterprise. San Antonio, which never got the jobs that were promised, is out the $1M, and the State is out the $15M. These are direct payments, not just tax waivers.

In Minnesota, Northwest is bailing out of their huge facilities that the State helped pay for to "keep jobs in Minnesota." Now, those jobs are gone forever.

In each of these cases, the defense is that the private enterprise needs the flexibility to make competitive choices.

Fine, do it with your own money. Stop taking money out of my pocket.

The executives at WaMu were taking out more money each year in salary, bonus and other compensation than this amount that our cash-strapped state and nearly destitute San Antonio put in. Why didn't the State tell WaMu "hey, I've got a great idea - cut your executive's pay package for ONE YEAR and you'll have the capital that you need."

Why are we doing this? Are we collectively insane?

Decisions like this aren't even taxpayer bribes to corporate enterprise - this is welfare.

How much money was spent on AFDC and WIC in Texas as compared to this huge gift to a company that didn't keep its contract for the money? Why cannot the State and San Antonio demand repayment of the money from Chase as a condition of the takeover?

Because they're blocked from doing so. Because this is WELFARE - this is transferring money raised from people struggling to get by shopping and working at Wal-Mart to multi-multi-millionaires.

Questions on the anniversary of 9/11

Lifted directly from "Bill in Portland, Maine," on DailyKos

hu Sep 11, 2008 at 04:12:53 AM PDT

From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE...

Questions

When he was warned in the August 6, 2001 PDB, "Bin Laden Determined to Strike In US", why did the president do nothing except tell the guy who delivered it to him, "All right, you've covered your ass, now"?
Why did Rudy Giuliani put the anti-terrorism command center in the World Trade Center against the advice of experts who knew better?
Why did the president sit in that Florida classroom for several minutes after being told "America is under attack"?
Why were members of the bin Laden family allowed to fly out of the country when all planes were grounded?
Could there be any greater examples of heroism than the passengers who fought back on Flight 93, the rescue teams at the Pentagon, or the NYPD and NYFD responders who ran into the towers without hesitation?
Father Mychal Judge: Saint...or Supersaint?
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Why did firefighters have faulty radios instead of dependable ones, Mr. Giuliani?
Was it really necessary for the president to tell us to go shopping?
Why were rescue workers at Ground Zero told by the EPA director that the air was safe to breathe when it wasn't?
When rescue workers got horribly sick from breathing contaminated air, why were so many given perfunctory treatment and then left to fend for themselves?
Why did Rudy Giuliani say he "was at the site as often, if not more, than most of the workers," when he only visited the site for 29 hours over a span of 41 visits?
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When Glenn Beck---one of the most respected figures in the Republican party---said, "When I see a 9/11 victim family on television, or whatever, I'm just like, 'Oh shut up!' I'm so sick of them because they're always complaining," why wasn't he banished into obscurity?
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When the president stressed the importance of safeguarding our ports and vital infrastructure, why did he take so long actually safeguarding them? Are they much safer today?
When the president called for greater security at airports, why was there such a lopsided focus on passengers and very little on cargo until recently?
When we found out that most of the hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, why did the president continue holding hands with their leaders?
Why were habeas corpus rights suspended years after the attacks of 9/11, when the country wasn't in a state of rebellion or invasion?
When Congress found out the president had broken the law before 9/11 by snooping on American citizens without warrants, why did they patch up the law to make his---and the phone companies'---illegal activities retroactively legal?
The president nominated Bernard Kerik to be the head of Homeland Security...and he wasn't joking???
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When Ann Coulter---one of the most respected figures in the Republican party---said, "These broads are millionaires, lionized on TV and in articles about them, reveling in their status as celebrities and stalked by grief-arazzis. I've never seen people enjoying their husbands' deaths so much," why wasn't she banished into obscurity?
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When Bush had bin Laden in his sights at Tora Bora, why didn’t he take the shot?
Why were we told repeatedly that Saddam Hussein was partly responsible for the attacks when he had nothing to do with them?
When we needed more troops to vanquish the Taliban in Afghanistan, why did we invade Iraq?
If we're winning the "War on terror," why hasn't the color-coded terror alert level changed from Yellow to Green or Blue in 2,382 days?
How unspeakably crude was it for the Republican party to exploit the 9/11 attacks in a promotional video during their convention in St. Paul?
Why hasn't the president caught Osama bin Laden?
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When Jerry Falwell---one of the most respected figures in the Republican party---got on TV and said, "I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People For the American Way, all of them who have tried to secularize America. I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen'," why wasn't he defrocked and sent to work in soup kitchens for the rest of his life?
-
Why is there still a giant hole in the ground in Lower Manhattan?
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Are terrorists pricks, or what?
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Are politicians who use fear to scare citizens into submission pricks, or what?
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Will the shock ever wear off?

Too bad it's not really satire

Bitter - party of one hundred million...

So, the Wall Street Journal today had an article...

It seems that the red hot new Pontiac model - the G8 - has had but 1915 buyers in August. That's fewer than one sold per franchised dealer.

The article goes on to discuss how a huge swath of GM's models sell next to nothing. The entire Buick lineup sells fewer cars in the US now than does Mitsubishi, if you don't take fleet sales into account.

Very few of these cars are profitable at these low volumes.

The Chevrolet Malibu, which was a car that used to sell more than a million units a year through the 1980s, struggles to reach the numbers achieved by the Impala, a TRIM of a model that used to sell more than a million units a year. The Impala, which sells about 30,000 units a month for Chevrolet, is artificially pumped by its heavy rental and corporate fleet purchases.

So, what went wrong? There are still a few die-hard American iron buyers in my circle; me, Larry, Jeffrey and Steven, Kent .. but that's IT. Substantially anyone else I know first considers the Japanese brands, the Germans or Hyundai. American brands are dead last.

If I reflect back on when I was first experiencing adulthood, GM had just downsized the full sized and "A" bodies - Malibu, Grand Prix, Regal, Monte Carlo, Cutlass. The fall of 1979 was filled with gorgeous examples of these cars, and the most amazing of them was the 1979 Regal. I remember a black one, with a turbocharged 3.8L V6, gleaming chrome, t-tops, full console, and gorgeous gold velour seats.

How about this? My Firefox spell checker doesn't recognize the word "velour."

I saw this car at the local Buick dealer - they occupied the entire corner pad of the second largest mall in town - their lot had at least 150 brand new cars. The Regal was magnificent; it looked every bit as classy as the Riviera that was decked out nearly the same way, but there was no way I could afford a Riviera. The Regal, though. Maybe not the Turbocharged, maybe not the t-tops .. but I could see myself in something that looked that good.

Back then, in a world without the Internet, without text messaging and without endless, mindless video distractions, my best friend and I haunted the car lots at night, after we'd left all our normal friends off at home to hit the hay.

We'd walk the unsecured lots looking at rows of Eldorados, touching the exquisite knurled stainless roller knob that controlled the then very new "interval" wipers on a Riviera, marveling that Lincoln could get a metallic green finish to leather that matched the exterior paint and the opera vinyl roof. We'd go out in misty, fall weather - the new models always came out around my birthday the first weekend in October.

Now, you can hardly get me worked up about going to an auto show.

I know that David was lost to American brands after his '79 Regal Turbo ate its piston heads, his '88 Dakota and his '88 Aerostar also were terminal cases. He went Japanese and hasn't looked back in twenty years. He's a car nut, as I have always been. He's recently been interested in the new Malibu, which is a looker. I keep looking at it and thinking 'wow, that is a GREAT looking car'.

Back when you could stick a screwdriver between interior panels of a Regal, standards were different. We didn't expect a car to do 0-60 in 7 seconds. We expected it to look great. We expected so much less, but expected far more of how it looked.

I guess my point of that we could look at a car like that Regal, which was loaded like a Riviera. It looked JUST as good as did that Riviera. We could buy one that gave us the feeling of the richer, smarter looking car, and by cutting back on equipment, we could convince ourselves that we were driving the nicest wheels.

In the spring of 1980, I was about to graduate from college, and there was still the occasional patch of snow that had been a big pile from street plows. The cherry blossoms were out, and I was still wearing a heavy jacket and gloves. It was sunny, and everything smelled wet and fertile. I drove by DeNooyer Chevrolet, and up on a stand was a black 1979 Camaro Berlinetta.

Now, n this time, I could look at a '79 Camaro, and see that it was a hack job on a Nova chassis, had a trunk the size of an Altoids box, and had a 305 V8 that made a whopping 110 horsepower. Back then, the Camaro was something. Chevy sold hundreds of thousands of Camaros every year.

This one was something ELSE. Black, with bright red stripes that accented the wheel wells, the window reveal moldings, the rocker panels, the trunk lid edge. Alloy wheels in a honeycomb pattern, with white walls (okay, it was a different time. Remember that the spell checker doesn't remember "velour".)

Red vinyl interior, it had most of the optional equipment that one would now consider obligatory on the lowest Hyundai minicompact. It had a rear defroster. A stereo AM/FM radio with two rear and one front speaker. Hand crank windows and manual locks.

Dual exhausts. Well, dual exhaust TIPS. It was a single exhaust from the 305 back to the muffler, and then it split into two pipes that came out the back.

It stood there, on the metal stand, shoulders above the other cars on the lot. They had had this beast for months; the recession of 1979 was severe. Pink cherry blossoms framed the car. I instantly fell in love.

I've been hit by love at first sight only a few times in my life. Seeing that Camaro there. The evening I was introduced to Jackie (my chow chow) was another.

My dad and I had bought several cars from a guy - I wish I could remember his name; I can see his face in my mind. I went inside and talked to him. He let me take the car out for a drive; he just let me have the car.

I was wearing soft, black leather gloves that day. It started to mist. I drove the car all the way out to Mattawan, and rang the bell at Kevin's house. The car sat, burbling and idling in their wet driveway, the slight rain beading up on the mirror black paint. Kevin thought it was gorgeous.

On the way back, I stopped at the office where Mary Ann worked. She thought it was beautiful as well, but she asked if I thought I could pay for it.

I'd been paying on my 1978 Monte Carlo for 22 months; I had put 55,000 miles on that car. Two sets of brakes. I didn't care a whit for what it cost, only whether the monthly payment was affordable to me. I drove the car back to DeNooyer - it was the first time that I had ever been allowed to test drive a car without a salesman in the car or an adult, other than just around the block.

I don't even remember negotiating.

I didn't know he called my dad and got him to co-sign for me.

I sold my Monte to my friend Deb, and bought the Camaro. I felt so SEXY driving that car; dignified but sporty; elegant and athletic.

Back then, Camaro came in four trim levels - there was the base model, which looked kind of like a granny's Malibu, with zippy sheet metal, there was the Rally Sport, which had comb over two tone paints and stripes, and was a poor man's Z28, there was the pavement ripping (if you can call 150 horsepower "ripping") Z28 and the Berlinetta, which that year replaced the LT model of earlier years.

Each one of these trim levels was targeted toward a different customer.

The Berlinetta and the Z28 were the only two that had upgraded interior trim and fabric. The Berlinetta was "classy" and the Z28 was the bar bully.

I was that car. That car was me.

The next spring, I put a Clarion biamplified stereo into the car - 6x9 rear deck speakers, and separate tweeter/mids in the doors. It rocked. When I got to Houston, I upgraded to a Sony system, and that REALLY rocked.

One afternoon, my law school friend Tracey and I were driving up Voss Road, and stopped next to a car load of high school kids, who were blaring their music.

Clearly, they didn't understand the concepts of auto sound fidelity. Tracey barely glanced in my direction and said "Hit it." I cranked that knob on the Sony receiver, and there was a thermonuclear blast of Michael Jackson's "Off the Wall" album that ripped through those kid's choice of music like a chainsaw through balsa.

I drove that car everywhere in Houston, working as a singing telegram messenger. In that mail slot of a trunk, I not only carried four costumes, paper hats, party horns, balloons, and blank telegrams, but also tools and other necessities. I used to work with this awesome male stripper, Mark, who one day was about to choke with glee because I had run out of gas. He was cawing "I can't WAIT to tell everyone that the GREAT Douglas has run out of gas." His facial expression collapsed when I opened the trunk and pulled out my gas can and said "take me to the gas station."

I had every confidence in the world, driving that car.

The last winter I lived in Michigan, I never resented that car when I had to chip the ice and snow off of the windshield, and when I had to start it and let it warm up for fifteen minutes before I could drive it off. In the blistering summers of Houston, I never resented that the car was a furnace when I opened the door.

Even after driving it for four years, I still felt like a sophisticate pulling up in front of a very tony nightclub. Valets still treated it with respect.

I put 119,000 miles on that car. When I graduated law school, I had read a review of the brand new Thunderbird TurboCoupe - the first paragraph said that the car made the reviewer want to sing "Jose Cuervo, you are a friend of mine..."

I decided I had to have one. I traded the Berlinetta in at Chuck Miller Ford, and when they gave me my trade in bid, I was stupified that it was so high. We wrote everything up, and they came in to me with the paperwork including the odometer certification. They had thought the car had 19,000 miles.

I gave that Berlinetta away to buy a car that didn't drive as well, didn't have the horsepower, and didn't sound as sexy.

Since the Berlinetta, I've had seven cars, all American iron. Three Pontiacs, three Fords, and, the car I never thought I could have, a Riviera. Of all of those, only the Riviera was what I could call a "good" car. The 1990 Grand Am SE HO Quad 4 (that was what it was called, really) was a good car until I got about 90,00 miles on it, then it just started to fall apart.

The Riviera was bullet-proof and gorgeous, right up until 98,000 miles. I couldn't keep the rear suspension working, and the driver seat frame kept breaking. One December morning, Bram backed into it, and that was all it took for me to drive it to CarMax and buy a 2005 Bonneville GXP, my first V8 powered car since the Berlinetta.

The GXP has been an outstanding car, as far as being a car goes. It's not perfect, but it looks like sex, it goes like stink, and the exhaust sounds delicious. Strange how the monthly payments aren't anything like my $178/month on the Berlinetta, though. Of course, I was only taking home about $130 a week in 1979.

I am very happy with the GXP, but it doesn't make me .. um.. the way that Dorothy Boyd did for Jerry McGuire. The way that the Berlinetta did.

The W12 silver Phaeton four seat that I drove two years ago would have completed me in the way the Berlinetta did. It's funny that there was so much derision about the Phaeton when I was so hooked on them.

What have I lost, that none of the designs today bring me to a place where it changes my confidence and elevates my mood each and every day? What has the industry lost? It's not me; yes, in three weeks, I'll be a half century old; in my lifetime, I've seen a lot of refinements, but they filtered out the excitement.

"We Build Excitement." Pontiac, in the 1970s.

I think that the Phaeton W12 would have inspired me back in 1979; impossible as that would have been to happen. A young man who stayed up until 3 am to look at Mark V, Riviera, Grand Prix, Cordoba would have found the detail exquisite and the performance thrilling.

And the exhaust note the most compelling of any.

I assert that it isn't me who's changed. I can still be moved to a higher level of existence by the creation of automobile engineers and designers.

I just don't know what it is that is now gone. Everyone used to have it, and millions of cars were sold because of it. Now, they're all toaster ovens, and we're mostly concerned about which one uses the least power and is the easiest to clean up.