Because there are not nearly enough young-adult novels about vampires, let’s have some more:
Letters from the Country
December 27, 2009
December 19, 2009
The Road
Today, at long last, I got to see The Road, the recently released film adaptation of Cormac McCarthy’s great novel
The plot of the book and movie are simple enough to describe in a “high concept” way–a father and son travel through a blighted, post-apocalyptic landscape–but neither the book nor the movie is a cheap trinket of popular entertainment.
December 15, 2009
Um … Say What Now?
Just read this, in which DeMint is quoted as saying this, regarding same-sex marriage:
I think we need to make a constitutional case of it. The federal government and our courts have no business redefining marriage and even at the state level, the courts have no business telling us what marriage means. So we need to fight this, because this is not about equal rights. This is about the government legitimizing and promoting behavior that culturally we have always considered wrong.
A constitutional case in what sense, if the courts have no business deciding? Wha–? How’s that? Say again?
I keep thinking Jim DeMint might be the worst, most insufferable person on earth–and then I remember Joe Lieberman.
Last night I ran across this piece. The gist is that Lieberman is really not all that smart. A lot of people are spending a lot of time trying to figure out why he says what he says and does what he does…
But there’s little evidence that he’s a sharp or clear thinker, and certainly no evidence that he knows or cares about the details of health care reform. At one point during the 2000 recount, the Gore campaign explained to Lieberman why lowering standards for military ballots would be totally unfair and illegal, and Lieberman proceeded to go on television and subvert the campaign’s position. Gore loyalists interpreted this as a sellout, but perhaps the more plausible explanation was that Lieberman — who, after all, badly wanted to be vice-President — just didn’t understand the details of the Gore position well enough to defend it. The guy was taken apart by Dick Cheney in the 2000 veep debate.
Finally! An explanation that makes sense!
I think the same can be said of DeMint. His motives are by no means inscrutable–he wants power within the GOP. Be that as it may, he’s a reciter of talking points, and he’s probably believes what he’s saying, as weird and as inconsistent with reality as it is. He’s just not “a sharp or clear thinker.”
The other day, I told Todd he should run against DeMint. There’s no way Todd would win, but the debates would be a lot of fun.
December 14, 2009
Another Message to Jim DeMint
I read this today, and then I used DeMint’s online contact form to send this:
I gather that you’re currently in the process of trying to become king of the Tea Partiers, and as such you’ve said some things recently that are calculated to attract the attention of fringe right-wing zealots. The senate has gone too far to the left. We should privatize social security. A gay president would be some kind of immoral blight on the nation.
In addition, I’ve seen some items in your Twitter feed that are not only inflammatory but plainly false.
As an aspiring “kingmaker” who spends the greater part of his time jetsetting “across the country recruiting new republicans,” you may not have noticed that things in South Carolina are pretty bad right now. As your constituent, I’d appreciate it if you’d stop stirring the pot and focus on real-world solutions for real-world people.
Of course, even as I write this, I’m only too aware that I’m wasting my time. Your idea of a “real-world solution” is giving Social Security away to Wall Street. In your world, the ideological principle of “a free market” is always and entirely more important than the health and safety of actual human beings.
And as I think we’ve learned over the course of the past year, members of your party care as little for helping people as they do for the truth–i.e., not at all.
(I love how y’all go on and on about liberty and freedom all the time, but then you openly and outspokenly yearn to enact your own narrow view of morality into law. Sometimes I think that the Republican definition of freedom begins and ends with the right to own firearms. But I digress.)
I have a suspicion that if you ever started reading this at all, you won’t have gotten this far. But in any case, I’ll finish by saying that I would really, really like it if I could see your name in the news just once without cringing because you’ve said something ignorant or hateful. You’re an embarrassment to your office and to the state of South Carolina.
Although Lindsey Graham occasionally replies to my messages, I’ve never had any kind of acknowledgment from Senator DeMint on anything I’ve ever sent him. I’m sure he’s far too busy trying to amp up his rightist cred to have any truck with the lefty likes of me.
•
UPDATE:
DeMint said that the Senate Republicans have moved to the left; I wrote that he said they’ve moved to the right.
His assessment is so backassward that I cannot seem to type it. Even in the sentence directly above, I almost typed “moved to the right…moved to the right.” No doubt my confusion stems from the fact that the Republicans in the Senate keep moving to the freakin’ right.
But never mind. I fixed my mistake in this post.
December 10, 2009
Rick Warren and Uganda
Rick Warren has at last spoken out against Uganda’s proposed anti-gay law.
He had to, you see, in order to “correct lies, errors and false reports when others associate my name with a law that I had nothing to do with, completely oppose and vigorously condemn.”
Question. Why would anyone who “completely opposes and vigorously condemns” refuse to say so for so very long? If, when first asked, he had said he “completely opposes and vigorously condemns” the bill, that would have been the end of it.
I noticed a few days ago that Warren tweeted this:
DJoe,I feel no need to tell reporters &bloggers what I’ve done behind the scenes on this.They never admit their misreporting anyway.Pr.15:12
Since he didn’t use the standard Twitter @-mention mechanism, and the only “DJoe” on Twitter has tweeted only once (on August 25, 2008), I have no way of knowing that this refers to. I suspect it has to do with this Uganda thing. Pure speculation.
Just for funsies, I looked up Proverbs 15:12:
A mocker resents correction; he will not consult the wise.
Shame on us ill-tempered correction-resenting mockers. When will we leave the poor wise Rev. Warren in peace?
Side note: Warren’s next tweet after the one quoted above? Pascal’s Wager:
If you guess life ends at death, please consider that Eternity would be a long time to be wrong. I wouldn’t gamble.
Trouble is …
Well, there are a lot of problems with Pascal’s wager, as detailed here. Suffice it to say, once you’ve chosen one belief system over all the others, you’ve placed a bet.
•
UPDATE:
Again, from Warren’s Twitter timeline:
DThanks Bob! It seem our quiet effort helped kill part of the Uganda b so it was worth being misjudged, but our job isnt done yet.
Makes me think my suspicions about the earlier tweet are correct.
I wonder if it would cynical or unkind to point out that Warren’s attempt to take credit for the softening the bill (without seeming to take credit) is further testament to the strength of his connection with the Ugandan haters.
Well, I don’t really care. Consider it pointed out.
An Open Letter to Senator Jim DeMint
Dear Senator DeMint:
Congrats! You’re the quote of the day on Taegan Goddard’s Political Wire:
The problem in the Republican Party is that the leadership has gone to the left.
This is not just any garden-variety quote. This could be the money shot for a teabagger porn flick.
As a proud member of the reality-based community, however, I must ask you the following two-part question. What are you smoking, and where can I get some?
December 9, 2009
More Good News
Those asshats from Uganda who want to kill all the gays? They’re making inroads into Canada.
From AlterNet:
College of Prayer members in Uganda’s parliament have spearheaded the push for the new anti-gay bill and, as a story posted on the main College of Prayer website quotes College of Prayer Canada head Rev. David Chotka,
“I have three-twelve members of the Canadian Parliament who have heard about what God is doing in Uganda and would like to attend the Parliamentary COP in Uganda next year. They are interested in bringing the College of Prayer to the Canadian Parliament.”
The article concludes, “It seems that God continues to expand our spheres of influence. The extraordinary favor of God is resting upon us. All glory to His name!
Yes. All glory to the fag-hating, homo-killing Baby Jesus!
SO Proud
Oh, Senator Graham, you’ve done it again! You’ve made me so proud to be a citizen of South Carolina.
I’ve just been reading your comments on the “black jail” at Bagram:
When our colleagues go over to visit, I would just make a recommendation to committee members if you get a chance go over to the Bagram confinement facility, General McChrystal, y’all have done a great job, that is a, I wish we had jails like that in South Carolina, I mean it really is a very impressive facility, and I want to commend you and your staff and the embassy working together to come up with a new detainee policy I think will help the war effort.
I can see your point, really. Reading this, it just sounds like this is simply the most humane and effective detention facility on earth.
The site, known to detainees as the black jail, consists of individual windowless concrete cells, each illuminated by a single light bulb glowing 24 hours a day. In interviews, former detainees said that their only human contact was at twice-daily interrogation sessions.
“The black jail was the most dangerous and fearful place,” said Hamidullah, a spare-parts dealer in Kandahar who said he was detained there in June. “They don’t let the I.C.R.C. officials or any other civilians see or communicate with the people they keep there. Because I did not know what time it was, I did not know when to pray.”
Sure, sure, some detainees were allegedly abused while being detained in conditions unfit for any facility run by the ASPCA, and in fact would have preferred death:
“That was the hardest time I have ever had in my life,” Rashid said of his interrogation. “It was better to just kill me. But they would not kill me.”
But ohmigod, it’s not like detainees are people or anything, amiright?
You just keep fightin’ the good fight, Senator!
December 8, 2009
Why Uganda Be So Hateful?
Although good things seem to be happening in New Jersey, and in fact overall things “appear to be v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y getting better” for same-sex marriage.
But in Uganda… Oh, dear, in Uganda, there is a very clear indication that in the broadest possible context, we have a long, long way to go.
In short, the Ugandan parliament is considering an “Anti-Homosexuality Bill.” If enacted, the country’s laws concerning homosexuality will become repressive and draconian unto the point of absurdity. A single act of gay sex carries a penalty of life imprisonment. Testing positive for HIV or engaging in a second act of gay sex is punishable by death–as is gay sex with a minor. If you are aware that such acts have occurred, and do not report them, you may face up to three years in prison. The bill prohibits the “promotion of homosexuality” in such a way that all HIV and AIDS prevention activities will cease. Homosexual Ugandans who engage in gay sex abroad “are supposed to be brought back to Uganda and convicted.”
The bill is expected to pass.
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