An Attempt at Humor

Boxey: Can I ride in your ship sir?
Apollo: Fighter planes are no places for little boys.

Watching the original Battlestar Galactaca. I enjoyed it a lot as a kid, but I was a kid and so my standards weren't that high. I am really enjoying the new series on the Sci Fi Channel. It's really about as good as any thing on television. Anyway this little exchange takes place just after Cylon's have wiped out pretty much everything, and Lorne Green/Commander Adama and Apollo have landed on earth to visit Adama's old home and get photo albums. A crowd of survivors gathers around (armed with futuristic torches and pitchforks), seeking confirmation that the world has ended. Commander Adama confirms that, yes, the world has ended. Suddenly bolting out of the crowd runs little space-kid Boxey who has this heart-warming exchange.

Yeah one advantage the new version has over the older one is no annoying space kid.

In a more serious vein, the Wall Street Journal has a story with this title and sub-title.

Why German Nudists
Are Wearing Frowns
As Others Disrobe

Baring It All in Public Is
Nothing Special Anymore;
Joining Camps is Passe

My first thought was slow news day. And then I thought, hey, isn't there some kind of hurricane bearing down on Texas? Isn't that, you know, news?

Round the Horn. An Irwin J. McIckleson Production

Rejoice! I'm back. This is Irwin J. McIckleson. I couldn't be here last week due to a court day. One of my workers stole three spoons and a fork from the company dining hall, and so I turned him into the police. Big mistake. I should have just flogged him and sent him back to work. Instead I had to attend a boring trial in which the Lawyer from the other side, one of those two fisted style lawyers from New York, suggested that I might be a cruel man. It was terrible.

I am having my pinkertons investigate that lawyer. We'll soon see if he has any dirt in his background.

Anyway I'm back this week to provide a report on the other members of the Liberal Coalition.

First up is Natalie Davis' All Facts & Opinion, in which Miss Davis writes about the recent hurricane, and offers up much that strikes me as wisdom. For one thing she critiques the desire to snipe back and forth for political gain. She also critiques the tendency of some of the presses to demonize the victims.

Bloggg reports that moi is back. Moi being the person who writes the blog apparently.

corrente has the news that some of the leaders of the Bush Administration believe that the most important thing one can do in a time of war is cut taxes. I would have thought defeating the enemy might take precedence, but I understand mores have changed significantly since I was alive.

Dodecahedron writes about the strain of maintaining a blog on regular basis. It is very stressful; it has apparently driven Bryant completely mad; which is why I am handling the Round the Horn duties despite being completely fictional. I suspect Bryant will eventually see an alienist and get cured and I will disappear. But, so far, so good.

Musing's musings has a report on experiment he did with a computo-mo-tronic translaterphonic system. Apparently it is not working completely as advertised.

Liberty Street has some thoughts on a recent plutocrat's comments (gentleman by the name of Rich Lowery) on the rebuilding of New Orleans. Apparently Mr. Lowery wants to blame the difficult lives of those who live in New Orleans on themselves and on government programs.

Perhaps it's because I'm getting old and soft, but I tire of the soft hypocrisy of men like Lowery. The reason people are in poverty is because people like you and me want them to be in poverty. A wealthy happy populace would be much more difficult to control or intimidate. We want poverty, Lowery, and if you are not the sort of person willing to admit it, I am.

Science and Politics has a section on the phenomenon of blogging. I must admit I find it puzzling myself; it's a little like those pamphleters that hand out pamphlets in McIcklsonville at times. I usually have them flogged if I catch them; nothing good ever came of reading. But with a blog it seems like it would be a lot harder for the plutocrats of the future to find the bloggers.

Anyway that's it for another week. Hope you have a productive weekend.

Waiting for Leadership

Another difference between Liberals and Conservatives is that Conservatives are willing to critique their leaders when they make mistakes. I don't see liberals doing that as much.

Take the latest article by Matt Towery. He has some very direct words for the President and other Republicans.

A day of reckoning is coming for Republicans and conservatives, and it is approaching rapidly.

Thanks to a series of natural disasters, unspeakable acts of terrorism and the responses to them, this country is headed beyond a mere budget crisis. We're drifting toward to a five-alarm financial fiasco.

Of course the liberals have a solution to this problem - raise taxes! The more money the government has and the less money you have, the better off we will all be. Fortunately Towery is a bit smarter than that; his solution involves cutting government programs, pork, and foreign aid.

Cutting government programs is hard and many of the voters won't like it. But it is the right thing to do. Now is the time to see whether or leaders are, in fact, leaders.

Why I Am So Hard on Liberals

Screw 'em, that's why.

Well there's more than that.

Liberals plans for America would leave it weaker. They would leave it weaker military, economically, and spiritually. Liberals may have good intentions - some, like Cherry, I am willing to concede are acting out of the goodness of their hearts. That doesn't change the fact that if their programs are followed the end result will be bad for America.

Many of them know this deep in their hearts - that's why they get so defensive. But they are obstinate prideful jerks who are willing to put personal feelings and ambitions over what is good for the country.

Others are just clueless dolts. Useful idiots, as the terminology goes.

But I don't care if a liberal is Mother Theresa; I will still heap my abuse on him or her and do whatever it takes to ensure that the liberal opinion is held in derision and mockery. I'll call liberals traitors. I'll call them idiots. I'll call them whatever works, because that's how high the stakes are.

Liberal ideas are political cyanide for the United States, and I love my country too much to allow them to fester or grow. The ideal situation would be an America in which liberal ideas are not expressed. Not through any sort of free-speech crackdown, but just because they are held in such low esteem that anybody speaking them would be laughed at or worse.

But until then, expect me to continue to be hard on Liberals!

A Theory

Robert Reich has a theory. In his latest article, Robert Reich suggests that the political discipline of the Bush White House hampers it's ability to effectively govern. Staff members won't provide the President negative information because such negative information could leak out and hurt the President.

Politics first, competence last: That's the Bush administration all over. Karl Rove, Bush's brain and deputy chief of staff, is in charge of the political juggernaut that's substituted for effective governance. Presumably, he's now at work on a plan to burnish the image of Republicans as managers of the public's business so they don't the hell beaten out of them in the mid-terms a year from now. But the harder Rove works at spinning what this White House has accomplished, the more likely it is that Americans will see that what it's accomplished is basically spin.

Interesting.

I have a theory too. My theory is that Democrats have already tried and convicted President Bush long before the information about Katrina has really come out. They aren't interested in looking at the mass of evidence, but simply in condemning President Bush for political points.

The key difference between my theory and Reich's theory is that there is evidence to support my theory.

Can we Rebuild New Orleans?

Good morning all!!! : )

The answer to the above question is a surprising no, according to Walter Williams. In his reading of the Constitution, he doesn't find anything that allows federal spending to help rebuild New Orleans. Rather he presents example after example of Presidents who denied requests for help.

Mr. Williams does make it clear he's not attacking President Bush for wanting to use federal funds to help New Orleans.

Don't get me wrong about this. I'm not being too critical of President Bush or any other politician. There's such a broad ignorance or contempt for constitutional principles among the American people that any politician who bore truth faith and allegiance to the Constitution would commit political suicide.

I don't know about this; but it strikes me that if everybody, Democrat and Republican alike, believes that the Constitution permits this help, and you believe it doesn't, Mr. Williams, well I guess I'll have to go with the majority. ; )

Spiritual Warrior

Hi everybody! : - )

The people over at Think Progress do good work generally. That's why it is disturbing to see them making light of Governor Jeb Bush's spiritual side. Apparently Governor Bush made the following comments before a group of lawmakers and politicians.

Chang is a mystical warrior. Chang is somebody who believes in conservative principles, believes in entrepreneurial capitalism, believes in moral values that underpin a free society.

I rely on Chang with great regularity in my public life. He has been by my side and sometimes I let him down. But Chang, this mystical warrior, has never let me down.

If you read the whole article, it's clear that Governor Bush was using Chang as a metaphor for the need to compromise and accomplish rather than let partisan bickering. And if President Bush chooses to personalize this spirit as Chang, who are too mock his spirituality? Rather we should be accepting of beliefs that seem a little strange to us. Or at least that is what I think. : )

Solution? Who Needs a Solution?

If you want to have a little fun with your favorite bleeding-heart liberal, I have a suggestion. Get them on the subject of President Bush and Hurricaine Katrina. Then simply and directly ask them what they think President Bush should have done. Watch as their mouth hangs open for a moment before they mumble some sort of excuse.

You see liberals are a lot like children asking "Mommy, why can't candy be free?" They don't understand how complex and difficult responding to a disaster on the level of Katrina can be. And when they are presented with a question that forces them to face that complexity, they, in a childlike way, retreat into a PATHETIC silence, upset that you have upset their little apple cart.

It's a lot easier to produces snarky questions about why the President was continuing with his social engagements than it is to actually say what the President should have been doing. And Liberals do so love the easy path, the gentle slope.

Surplus Politics

Let me say that although I disagree with Cheery on many points, her actions the last couple of days have shown her to be a patriot who is willing to put her country ahead of politics. This is not a time to be accusing one another or pointing fingers; but a time to come together behind our Commander in Chief. Sadly many Democrats, including Democratic Leaders, lack Cheery's patriotism.

Take John Kerry, for example. Thank goodness this UNPATRIOTIC JERK didn't become President. He clearly doesn't care for his country at all. If he did he would be looking for ways to help rather than taking mean-spirited snips at the President.

Katrina stripped away any image of competence and exposed to all the true heart and nature of this administration. The truth is that for four and a half years, real life choices have been replaced by ideological agenda, substance replaced by spin, governance second place always to politics. Yes, they can run a good campaign -- I can attest to that -- but America needs more than a campaign. If 12 year-old Boy Scouts can be prepared, Americans have a right to expect the same from their 59 year-old President of the United States.

Maybe, just maybe, Kerry, the problems facing the President of the United States are just a bit more complicated than the problems facing your average boy scout? You ever consider that? Obviously not. Once again, thank goodness you didn't become President.

The truth is that Democrats don't want to see the reconstruction in New Orleans go well. The suffering there means nothing more to them than a chance to take CHEAP SHOTS at the President. I know that this seems fantastic. A couple of years ago I might have found such commentary over the top myself. But that is where we are. Hatred of President Bush has so corrupted the Democratic Party that they really have nothing to offer America.

Geov Parrish, one of those liberal columnists who like to pontificate on how dumb conservatives are, writes in his latest article about how President Bush's failure to preserve a fictional surplus has hurt recovery efforts in New Orleans.

This president, you'll recall, inherited a budget surplus from the previous administration -- a cushion that could have been used to soften the budgetary blow of exactly this sort of monetary emergency. He made his bed, by recklessly wasting that surplus on bloated government spending, reckless tax cuts for his wealthy pals, and an even more reckless war in Iraq.

First of all the Bush tax cuts are the engine that is driving our economy. Our economy is going gang-busters contrary to what those nay-sayers would tell you. Secondly, it is never reckless to protect the American people from it's enemies. Rather it would have been reckless to sit back and let Saddam Hussein develop nuclear weapons and then hand them over to al-Qaida.

Anyway, like I say, I wish that Democrats could follow Cheery's advice and become more moderate in their tone and more willing to work with Republicans and Conservatives.

Fair Criticism

Good morning all!!! : )

In the disaster of Katrina, many of us are beset upon by desires to blame someone for this failure. This is natural. We all want to see justice done. But we shouldn't let our desires run away with us. We should launch fair criticisms against President Bush and other officials; but we shouldn't launch unfair criticisms.

For example, some have criticized President Bush for staying on vacation for a day or so after Katrina hit. Is this really fair? The destructive power of the levee's breaking was not apparent immediately, and President Bush had no way of knowing how unprepared the Democratic Mayor and governor would turn out to be. Certainly it would have been better if he had engaged; but it's not fair to blame him for not realizing he needed to engage.

Others have criticized President Bush for failing to fund needed repairs on the levees. This criticism doesn't show much of an understanding of the budget process, I'm afraid. The Congress sets the budget, not the President. More to the point, this is an example of hindsight being 20/20. If asked two months ago, how many of us might have diverted money away from the levees to what seemed like more necessary projects?

Other's have criticized President Bush for his "flip" attitude while dealing with this storm. How sad. We all have coping mechanisms to deal with troubling difficulties. President Bush used humor to cope with the tragedy of New Orleans. His jokes weren't funny, but they might not have been meant to be. They were therapy, not humor.

Others might criticize President Bush for placing Michael Brown in charge of FEMA given his lack of experience. This, in retrospect, may have been a mistake. But we don't know what President Bush saw in Brown. President Bush believed in him; Mr. Brown let him down. Is that President Bush's fault or Mr. Brown's?

On the other hand, I think Republicans have a point when they suggest that Mayor Nagin should have done more to get people out of New Orleans. He is responsible for his city; why wasn't more done to get the people of New Orleans to safety?

Why didn't Governor Blanco accept President Bush's request to assume federal control over the National Guard?

Those, I think are valid criticisms.

I just think we Democrats need to be careful in our accusations against President Bush that such accusations are reasonable and sensible. I know we can do this, and if we show the American people we can be trusted to be reasonable and sensible, they will trust us enough to return us to power! : )

Monday Mail Bag

Yeah I didn't get that Hamlet part I wanted. I went pretty well around the bend for a little while. I'd like to thank all the people at Make Me a Commentator!!! for tactfully not mentioning my troubles but it wasn't really necessary. I'm a mess. I mean I had like one big part and it was a long time ago.

That's what life is like you see. You never know when your moment in the sun is. Back when I was battling Captain Starfaller, well I hated it. Losing every week. I mean it was fun in the middle of the episodes sometimes; but at the end that jerk Starfaller would come bursting in and he'd punch me right in the carapace. He always made a big deal of hitting me in my "weak spot."

Hey Brainiac! Here's a clue, Humans are nothing but weak spots. But the jerks who ran the show always put clear rubber bands (some synthetic crap) on my pincers so I couldn't get them around him.

Anyway back to my main point - you never know when your bright moments are happening. You could be sitting in the best part of your whole life right now. It might be all downhill from here. Isn't that upbeat?

For more upbeat news here's some comments people left. First from Pen-Elayne on the Web who is a fellow member of the Liberal Coalition, under this post by Cheery.

Thank you for the lovely plug, Cheery!

Pen-Elayne seems like a really together person, and you should go check out her blog.

Maybe I should start a coalition of has-been children's actors who don't get to play Polonius.

That might be too narrow a focus.

Anyway our second comment comes from Jinx, in response to a post from the suspended Bryant about Cindy Sheehan.

Cindy who?

To answer your question, Jinx, Cindy Sheehan.

Thank you for playing.

Jinx runs a blog called Shock and Blog. Looks like crap to me, but some of you might find it interesting.

Yes Cheery I do need to use the word crap. I'm in a bad mood.

Anyway there was some sort of brouhaha with a guy named Spoomonger, but I'm not going to get into it because it's boring as hell. Apparently this guy Spoomonger thinks patriots are nicer to President Bush, an opinion shared by Cheery. I don't know what to say to that. Spoomonger's writing is hard to read. He favors long run on sentences that sound smart but are really confusing and not smart. Oh well.

Finally another nice comment by Random Goblin, in which he took Grumbly Muffin to task for comments she had made. His comment is long, but it reads in part.

Democrats see the government (because of democracy) as an extension from the American people. Democracy and policy are internal, as people choose their leadership from among them, and the leadership regulates the entire body.

In the Republican view, the government and the people canbe at odds and it can still be a natural state of affairs.

I will say this confusion is why I favor Lobstrocacy, where Lobsters basically run everything and humans do what they are told or risk being crushed by might pincers. Random Goblin also has a blog - not a bad one either.

Anyway that's it for another week. Have a nice week all. Hopefully I'll be able to hold it together until next week, but I'm not making any promises.

On Respecting Our President

Hello all!

Sad news I'm afraid. :( The Monster is in Senegal this week, so I am acting head of Make Me a Commentator!!! It's a very heavy responsibility and I try to act in a light manner. In reviewing Bryant's recent articles, however, and one that he just submitted I felt I had to disagree with him.

President Bush is our President and he deserves a certain amount of respect. I'm not a fan of President Bush's, but I'm an American first and a Democrat second. Bryant's commentaries, in the pursuit of scoring political points, regularly crossed this line in regard to President Bush.

The situation on the ground is chaotic; we all know this. So to hold President Bush personally responsible for the lives lost and the mistakes made is to show him a lack of respect. Part of respect involves giving the President the room he needs to operate and not nick-picking every little thing he does wrong, or, even worse, making up accusations on spotty evidence.

I'm sure that a reasoned and sensible review of the Bush Administration's performance will reveal some errors; but now is not the time to make it.

Needless to say Bryant does not agree with this standard, so I have been forced to give him a two day suspension. He will be back on Thursday. : (

We'll miss Bryant but we hope he returns with a more respectful attitude towards our President.

Thank Goodness the Adults are In Charge

Joe Klein has written an article for Time this week. It's a recit of the Bush Administration's failures in persuing the Iraq war as well as the difficulties they face and would not be remarkable save for the lucid writing style of Mr. Klein.

At any rate, for those of you who want to believe the Bush Adminsitration, being Republican, will automatically wage war more effectively than the hated Democrats, you might want to skip it. Frankly, it's filled with passages like this.

It is no secret that General Tommy Franks didn't want to hang around Iraq very long. As Franks led the U.S. assault on Baghdad in April 2003, his goal--and that of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld--was to get to the capital as quickly as possible with a minimal number of troops. Franks succeeded brilliantly at that task. But military-intelligence officers contend that he did not seem interested in what would come next. "He never once asked us for a briefing about what happened once we got to Baghdad," says a former Army intelligence officer attached to the invasion force. "He said, 'It's not my job.' We figured all he wanted to do was get in, get out and write his book." (Franks, through a spokesman, declined to comment for this article.)

The rush to Baghdad, critics say, laid the groundwork for trouble to come. In one prewar briefing, for example, Lieut. General David McKiernan--who commanded the land component of the coalition forces--asked Franks what should be done if his troops found Iraqi arms caches on the way to Baghdad. "Just put a lock on 'em and go, Dave," Franks replied, according to a former U.S. Central Command (Centcom) officer. Of course, you couldn't simply put a lock on ammunition dumps that stretched for several square miles--dumps that would soon be stripped and provide a steady source of weaponry for the insurgency.

Something to think about. Still it's lucky we don't have Kerry in there; he might have really messed things up.

Seeking Justice is un-American.

Seeking the Truth is un-American.

Standing up for people who are suffering is un-American.

Trying to make this Country better is un-American.

or, to put it another way, Whining is un-American. That's the title of a column at Townhall by Jennifer Roback Morse. Whining is un-American. I haven't read the article yet; frankly I'm not sure I want to. Just reading the title makes me want to put my fist through the window of my car. Well, that and the fact that it's covered in dead bugs.

OK I read it - basically it's crap. Childish crap.

When I heard Mayor Nagin whining, I thought to myself, this sounds positively French. Maybe this lame attitude is part of the French heritage of Louisiana and New Orleans and all that. And then I’m chiding myself for tasteless ethnic stereotyping.

I just have one thing to say to that crap.

Cheery here. We're sorry but the remainder of Bryant's commentary has been deleted; once again he has lapsed into fairly salty language, and we want this website to be safe for children.

New Format, new Quote

Hi Everybody!!!

New Format and new Quote. This weeks quote comes to us from ol' Space Lobster who promises he we do a Monday Mail Bag tomorrow.

Hope you are all having a nice weekend.