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Tuesday, December 23, 2003

Absence

Hey, y'all. Sorry I haven't been around for a bit. I have been and still am on vacation. Right now I'm logging on through someone else's wireless network from my in-laws' house and I've been taking a break from just about everything. I will be back to my old tricks after the 25th, so I hope all of everyone has a great time with relatives, a happy merry NODWISH, and I'll see you yet before 2003 fades away with my year end wrap up of...well, the end of the year.

BEST WISHES!!!

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Thursday, December 11, 2003

BUSHCO VS.NATURE

Ladies and Gentleman! It is time for the main event!

In the blood red corner, is the favorite. Although he's never won a fair fight, he acts like a champion and has beaten down all challengers with harsh rhetoric and the iron fist of opression wrapped up in the flag and crowned with the devil's smirk. Managed by a consortium of special interests who love green only when it's on a bill, the challenger! George "The Planet Smasher" Bushco!

And in the green corner. The longtime champion. Weak from years of neglect and powerful forces aligned against her. Even her fans in the Green Party abandoning her to prove a specious point. Still alive even though she's been kicked nearly to death like a fat black man in Cleveland. Struggling to the center of the ring, we give you Nature!

Bushco strikes before the first bell, pulling out of the Kyoto Treaty. Nature stumbles! How will she keep fighting against the onslaught of greenhouse gasses? Bushco continues the attack looswning the restrictions on manufacturing and mining. Nature is devestated and takes a knee. The referee gives her a standing eight count. He's called the doctor over. The doctor still sees trees and animals and says she's not dead yet. The referree wink at Bushco and says "Bring it on!"

Bushco doesn't waste a moment charging in and attemping to explore the Arctic Reserve. But wait! Nature's defenders jump in and halt this attack for the time being. Bushco is fuming mad! How will his special interests respond to this unheard of denial? Bushco one-twos with the Clear Skies assault and Nature is against the ropes. Bushco stops for a moment to chat with his cronies at ringside. From the unhealthy cloud of pollution eminating from their smokestacks, they sure look pleased with their boy. All that money they've bet on him seems sure to pay off. Sure the odds are against Nature, but sometimes you have to take the favorite and, boy, have these guys bought themselves a winner.

Hold on a second! Bushco has pulled out a secret weapon! He's started himself a war on the side. Everyone's stopped watching the fight and they're all looking over at Iraq! Meanwhile Bushco's pals have jumped into the ring and they're hoding Nature down while Bushco is kicking her! Nobody's paying attention. Even the Green Party is thinking of making their stupid point again. Bushco's murdering Nature. Wait! The Senate is standing up to Bushco...but it's against a judge. Oh! Bushco fakes them out again. And now it seems that Bushco's blaming Nature for fire. Everyone's applauding as Bushco turns his focus on the trees in the forests. He's signing legislation for their ultimate destruction. And he's grinning, folks. Oh yes, he's smirking away because his friends know that Nature is one step closer to her doom.

But this fight ain't over yet. Nature hasn't stayed on top this long without a few tricks up her sleeve. Unfortunately, she doesn't worry too much about who she has to destroy to save herself. We know that if Bushco keeps kicking her, she's gonna lash back hard at all of us. But Bushco can't see the warning signs and doesn't recognize the fire in her eyes which are not swollen shut yet...

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Tuesday, December 09, 2003

WHAT'S THE POINT

My vote for this week's showcase is LC member Clonecone and his excellent essay. Go over and check it out and, while you're there, slap a freeper upside the head.

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Monday, December 08, 2003

THE GREAT WALL


Excellent piece by Keith over at The Invisible Library. As a fan of R.A. Wilson, I'm sure he understands the importance of 23!

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Sunday, December 07, 2003

PEST

I don't know how many of you are familiar with hockey, but there is a type of player that is best described as a pest. For the L.A. Kings, Sean Avery is this type of player. His job is not to score goals but to keep the other team's best scorer from scoring or otherwise impacting the game. Avery is pretty good at his job.

I've been considering whether or not this job concept could be transferred to politics. Could we elect a congressperson, for instance, who's only job is to be a pest to, let's say, Tom Delay. Now I know what you're thinking. Ol' Tom's a bug killer from way back and he know's how to smash a bug or two. Well, Raid may work well and good on small insects, but to kill a human, well, that's murder and while we're sure Ol' Tom's killed a man or two in his time (allegations only, no hard evidence...just conjecture based on lack of a soul...people without souls are more likely to be murderers...), I don't believe he could get rid of his congressional pest so easily. See, what this person needs to do is simply attach themselves to Delay. Anytime he makes a speech or statement, they are right there, in his press, to rebut him. Every press release of his is immediately followed by one of theirs. Nancy Pelosi could find a prominant Democrat in a "safe" district to do this. Someone the press will pay attention to and come to relay on for a juicy mean spirited, but truthful, rebuttal to Delay's insane need to destroy our country. Make him a little crazy by always being there when he turns around. This person needs to become an expert on Delay and know what will ultimately make him snap. It can only be one person so that Delay can focus all of his venom on that one person and, meanwhile, a more level headed Dem can tsk-tsk to reporters that Tom is going a little off the deep end with his attacks (because there will be attacks) on our pest. But our pest won't care because if Tom is going crazy and, ultimately, loses the ability to score points, then the pest has done his or her job. Almost better if a woman took the job because then Ol' Tom can look like an evil mysogynist (which we're sure he is...no real evidence...just suspicions...just a feeling that the man is evil and hates women...)

If people get their just rewards, Ol' Tom will get taken out by a pest...and if it works on him, why not try it on some of his pals...)

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Saturday, December 06, 2003

LOGO
Now that people actually come by The MX23FB, I decided to embiggen my logo and kill the blogger title bar. I've been thinking about a redesign, though...what do y'all think?

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Friday, December 05, 2003

WELL, THERE IT IS

Rum and Monkey : Satire, personality tests and web toys: "
Which Historical Lunatic Are You?
From the fecund loins of Rum and Monkey."

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BUSH SCARED OF DEAN

Now we know that Bush is scared of Dean. Check our this Bushco Scare Ad which is basically warning NH and Iowa voters not to vote for Dean because: (A) He'll raise all kinds of taxes (no proof of these claims, of course Dean has said he simply wants to repeal Bushco's disasterous tax cuts)
(B) Dean is too much like three Democratic presidential losers.

You know who ran ads like these? Gray Davis. Against Dick Riordan. It's one of the main reasons Repugs were so angry at him. They disliked that he stuck his dollars into their primary. But Gray knew that Riordan would beat him, so he eliminated him from the race. That's what Bushco is trying to do to Dean. But Dean's not going to sit back and take it. This is going to get very dirty, folks.

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BIG IDEAS, LITTLE MINDS

So Rove would like his sock puppet to push an agenda that includes travelling to the Moon. As much as I applaud the idea of going to the moon, I just don't believe that Bushco really cares that much about space. They care about looking like they care about it. But I know and you know that they know that we know that they don't care about anything that doesn't make their friends a buck...of course, the moon could be profitable to their corporate cronies, so we'll just have to wait and see.

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Thursday, December 04, 2003

NODWISH

Being a Southern Californian Jew with multiple step-parents who have not been Jewish, I have always had to reconcile that on December 25, I would be a part of some kind of Christmas celebration. Not that I really mind it. I mean, Chanukah is a lovely holiday that celebrates a very interesting chapter in Jewish military history topped off by a minor miracle involving oil that lasted longer than expected. I mean, really, God parted the Red Sea and threw frogs at Egyptians for the ancient Hebrews and yet we give gifts because a lamp stayed lit. Eight nights of gifts sounds really great until you become an adult and have to try to stretch these things out. So Christmas at our house has been really interesting because it always begins with lox and cream cheese on a nice toasty bagel (although Xmas dinner has become popular as of late...my rich cheap parents providing a nice cut of meat instead of the lox breakfast...I prefer the lox...my in-laws are always good for lox, though and I;m seeing them in a couple of weeks, so I'll let my parents off the hook this year). And my father, sadist that he is, always throws his ten or so Xmas CDs into his large changer and pipes songs about chestnuts and ringy bells throughout his cavernous beach house (nothing like Xmas in Malibu...I'm dreaming of a...sandy Xmas, just like the one in Tel Aviv). So anyhow, I could never wrap my head around the whole Xmas thing, being a Jew, and finally came up with the perfect way to celebrate an annual gift giving holiday by removing the religion from the swapping. I call it NODWISH, or the NOn-Denominational WInter Solstice Holiday. You can swap it out for Xmas in any of the songs, it has a nice pagan, but not pagan feel to it and nobody in Malibu is likely to be offended, what with Shirley McLaine a few houses down. You can have a NODWISH tree, sing NODWISH jingles and even have a white NODWISH, should you be so inclined. It is the perfect holiday compromise for the Judeo-Christian family that hasn't seen the inside of a temple or church since the last bar mitzvah or wedding which was most likely in some outdoor venue.

So have a Happy Merry NODWISH everyone! (and the guy in the red suit? You can call him Mr. Nick or Uncle Claus...)

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IF YOU HAVEN'T SEEN IT YET

Be sure to check out Pandagon's "Twenty Most Annoying Conservatives of 2003". Spot on with one exception...Devil Ann is always number one on the evil hit parade.

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"NOT OPTIMISTIC"

Terry McAuliffe, in his letter(via Talking Points Memo) to AG Ashcroft, says that he is "not optimistic that [Ashcroft] will pursue" the Smith Bribery Affair. That's understating. What he should have said was that he knew full well that Ashcroft wouldn't spare a moment from tracking down head shops to look into repug malfeasance. Then he should have booked time on every news show, maybe chained himself to the front steps of the Capital Building, in order to call attention the the fact that Ashcroft is doing nothing to punish people who do far more serious things than sell arty pot smoking paraphenalia. The Democrats have to do far more than send self-defeating letters to the AG. After reading this, I assume the donkey's name is apparently Eyor.

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THE PAPER

Should you really have nothing better to do and wish to read my academic product, I have posted both parts of my paper, Witnessing Rebellion. While I find it very interesting stuff, I am a student of Comparative Literature and, thus, am somewhat biased. If you should read it, tell me what you think!

(Update: The results are in and the paper earned a 98%! Better than I hoped for but what my wife expected)

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Wednesday, December 03, 2003

DONE

I've been struggling all day with a 1500 word essay comparing the chorus in Jean Anouilh's Antigone to Deckard in Blade Runner in relative terms of Sophocles' Antigone and Aeschylus' Prometheus Bound. Hopefull my wife will give it the thumbs up (she teaches community college composition as well as studying for a masters in Rhetoric and Comp...she's handy when I write these things...of course now I have to edit her much longer paper, but the price one pays...) Anyhow, I kind of like the paper and my prof loves me so...anyway, aside from a few finals next week, I can relax now and focus on blogging! (what's really important, right? No? You mean my novel about a small town in Vermont is more important? You may be right...I can blog, too, though :) )

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LIBERAL COALITION ON THE TTLB SHOWCASE

Paws up for our friend in sunny South Florida...

The Truth Laid Bear New Blog Showcase Vote: Bark Bark Woof Woof: More On Moore, Who Is No More

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Monday, December 01, 2003

MORE REPUBLICAN INTEGRITY

As documented in this Slate article, some "unknown" repug tried to bribe one of his unwilling kindred into voting for the medicare bill. This is against the law. Even Novak reported on this as a malfeasance and, yet, there is nothing from the party that impeached Clinton for lying about a blow job. These people are wretched, wretched faux-pious thugs who have no morals to speak of. The sad thing is, most everyone in Washington is complicit in this destruction of the morality of our government. Repugs because they do it shamelessly and then claim some weird high ground by somehow finding a way to blame the Democrats. The Democrats are almost worse because they take it on a daily basis and do not use their ability to speak to the nation and expose this crapulence for what it is. Every last person wandering the halls of the Capital who watches it all and allows this business as usual to take place deserves a spot in the ninth circle of hell devoted to treasonous bastards who act against their brothers and sisters. WE are the people the government is supposed to protect but they continually work to simply protect themselves and their cronies on both sides of the aisle and the rare exception who gets punished is held up as something getting done but nothing changes. NOTHING! Where's the outrage from Pelosi? Where's the fight in Daschle? Just calm defeated words that maybe next year we might get back the White House or maybe gain a vote or two. But nothing to drive the rats out. We need a goddamned Pied Piper to make them frog hop into the Potomac. But hell, in this country we don't even give a damn enough to help a lady off the ground while she's being trampled by others who, like her, want a cheap DVD player for Xmas. I know there are people out there who give a damn. I know there's even conservative folk out there who give a damn. But the people who care are far outnumbered by the Walmart throng who don't look down enough to see their feet...to see the people beneath their feet...and who can't look up to see the feet heading their way.

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YELLOW DOGGEREL DEMOCRAT

Check him out Yet another blog dog...woof!


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X23 CAT PORN

I had to pull the cat pics for the moment until I can get the file size down. My roundabout way of posting pictures (through StudioX23 where you can see a picture of Lasky, one of the fattest cats in the world) doesn't seem to want to work with gifs at the moment...

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MORALITY

You need to go read Stradiotto's latest.

What? Still here? Go there now! Read!

(and if you need to comment, do it here cause Strad doesn't have comments...get some comments, Strad!)

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PRIMARIES

I know my complaint here is the same as many who do not reside in New Hampshire or Iowa. Now while I have nothing against those two states (other than that New Hampshire seemed to me to be an overpopulated, somewhat dreary version of Vermont), I cannot, for the lifeof me, figure out why they seem to get to play kingmaker while more populated and (in electoral terms) more important states such as my own home, California, seem to get shafted in the whole process. You would think that the large states would get the opportunity to separate the wheat from the chaff, but the logical is reversed. I'm not saying that the people of the smaller states do not deserve a voice in things. I'm just saying their voices should not be heard so loudly that they drown out much larger voices in the republic. It just doesn't seem...democratic. I know others have complained about this, but I have my own little forum here and now its my turn. (end whine here)

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PROPHESTIC

As Jack Black in the film Bob Roberts (1992) calls the title character, I would call Tim Robbins for this sometimes brilliant film. I've had it on my shelf for awhile and some ultra-liberal friends came over this weekend and demanded that we watch it. There were times when one of them seemed to forget it was a film. If you've never seen it, you should. If you haven't seen it recently, go back and watch it again. It's scary accurate.

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