“Clearly in a playful mood, Bush took the band leader's baton and conducted a few bars. Then he sneaked behind a female flutist and poked her on the shoulder, giving her a start.”
An Angry Old Broad’s got more at Alternate Brain.
Something tells me that by the time this thing is over, those 7 minutes in a Florida classroom are going to remembered as the time when Bush was really on top of his game.
Bush has lost his freaking mind
iPod confessions: Your song of shame
There have been a number of song and artist questions posted on this blog over time, but I don't think this one has been raised. Apologies if it's already been covered. It's kind of a multi-part question.
One: Is there a song tucked away on your iPod or similar music player to which you'd be fatally ashamed to own up? A tune that you secretly love despite your best efforts? A melody reviled by the world at large, sneered at by the cognoscenti, but one toward which you harbor a hidden fondness? A song that would provoke the dark sarcasm of a Nelson Muntz?
Ha-ha! Your musical taste is questionable!Two: Do you have the courage, the confidence, the assurance of self to share the name of that song with your fellow Shakers and the unforgiving wider world? (This question need only be answered in your heart of hearts.)
Three: What is that song?
I suppose as I've posed the question, it's only fair that I provide the name of my own song of shame.
Urgh.
Well.
"Magic." Yeah, that "Magic." And I'm not (terribly) ashamed!
What's that? Okay, wisenheimer, let's hear yours!
Escalation
Israel destroyed the home and office of Hezbollah's leader Friday and tightened its seal on Lebanon, blasting its air and road links to the outside world to punish the guerrilla group — and with it, the country — for the capture of two Israeli soldiers.
Hezbollah's Sheik Hassan Nasrallah and his family were safe after the Israeli missiles demolished the two buildings in Beirut's crowded southern neighborhoods, the militant group said.
"You wanted an open war and we are ready for an open war," Nasrallah said, addressing Israelis in an audiotape played on Hezbollah's Al-Manar television. The speech apparently was prerecorded and did not refer to the missile attack.
…Warplanes again smashed runways at Beirut's airport with hours of airstrikes, trying to render it unusable, and destroyed mountain bridges on the main highway to Syria. Warships blockaded Lebanon's ports for a second day.
Smoke drifted over the capital after strikes exploded fuel tanks at one of Beirut's two main power stations, gradually escalating the damage to Lebanon's key infrastructure. Apartment buildings were shattered by strikes in south Beirut.
In response, Lebanese guerrillas fired a barrage of at least 50 Katyusha rockets throughout the day, hitting more than a dozen communities across northern Israel.
The death toll in three days of fighting rose to 73 killed in Lebanon — almost all civilians, including five killed in strikes Friday — and 12 in Israel, including four killed in rocket attacks.
Pepperoni and World Salvation
Someone call the Samurai Pizza Cats.
This was a cartoon series from the 90s that Mr. Furious and I thought was about the most hilarious thing ever. I still have a bunch of episodes on tape, even though I don’t have a VCR. Ha.
Crap
“Supporters of banning gay marriage won two major court rulings Friday, with a federal appeals court reinstating Nebraska's voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage and the Tennessee Supreme Court ruling that voters should have a say on the issue.”
The Nebraska case went before the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals who ruled that the state amendment, which limits state-recognized marriage to heteros, is “rationally related to legitimate state interests and therefore [does] not violate the Constitution of the United States."
I still have yet to hear a satisfactory argument about what precisely the state interest is in denying equality to the LGBT community, no less how imposing that claimed interest doesn’t violate the Constitution. There were (and are) plenty of states who have an interest in denying the right to vote to people of color. I’m sure come creative retrofucks could construct a viable argument that some states would have an economic interest in denying women the right to work. State interest, when it comes to extending full equality to an oppressed population, shouldn’t trump that population’s members’ individual Constitutional rights—and if a state is going to do so, then they ought to have a better reason, supported by quantifiable data, than “It’s in our interest because we think boys kissing is icky…and, uh, it undermines the family! Yeah, that’s the ticket!”
Right On
Watching Owen Wilson on The Daily Show yesterday, I was overcome by the usual swooniness. I don’t really fancy him for his appearance; not that he’s a bad-looking chap, but I don’t usually go in for blonds. There’s just something about his personality that I dig.
Last night, I was suddenly struck by something else, though. I really like the way he talks. It’s so uncannily familiar, I thought. That mix of sort of slurred mellow stoner and Valley Girl, all delivered in a flat nasal monotone, with even the most declarative statements rising as questions. My conscience informed me, Yeesh, you bloody narcissist. That’s exactly how you talk.
Was that right? I turned to Mr. Shakes. “Do you think Owen Wilson and I talk alike?”
“Tootally!” was the dreaded reply.
So, okay, I talk like Owen Wilson. And Luke Wilson, too, who sounds just like his brother. Mannion thinks I sound like Janeane Garofalo. And Mr. Furious has always told me I sound like Janice from Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem. I do. I sound like all of them, and they all sound like me.
Right on, my drolly drawling brothers and sisters.
Bush Steps In
Not what Lebanon hoped for; better than I expected (which isn’t saying much):
President Bush told Lebanon's leader on Friday that he would urge Israel to limit civilian casualties as it steps up attacks on its neighbor, a promise that fell short of Beirut's calls for a cease-fire.Meanwhile, Steve Clemons reports a rumor “from a well-placed source” that Rice approached Israel about taking it down a notch and was told to get stuffed.
…Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said Bush was certain to discuss the Israeli-Lebanon situation with the Russian leader and the other G-8 nations: Germany, Britain France, Italy, Japan and Canada.
Matt’s got a good collection of thoughts on the goings-on, too.
More War
I’ve been fretfully and frustratedly wondering if the questions I have, as I increasingly see the words “Iran” and “Syria” being thrown into the reporting on what’s going on in the Middle East, are tinfoil-hat worthy, or if they’re legitimate questions. Either way, I’m not the only one who has them.
Yglesias gets at it perfectly:I'd also like to know how Ken Baer knows that "both attacks [on Israel] were green-lighted by Iran." Similarly, TNR's editorial boldly proclaims that "The Hamas action in Gaza appears to have been ordered by Khaled Meshal, the Hamas leader who resides in Damascus--which is to say, it is also a piece of Syrian intrigue." But why does the fact that an attack "appears to have been ordered by" a guy who lives in Damascus demonstrate that the attack itself was "a piece of Syrian intrigue?" Surely the one thing doesn't follow from the other.
I would, too. Color me cynical, but I wasn’t a fan of fixing the intelligence around the policy the first time around, and I certainly don’t want to go down that road again. I’m not saying that’s definitely the case here, but I want some clearer explanations, and I don’t believe that’s too much for which to ask.
The same editorial also argues that Syria was behind the Hezbollah attack because "Nor can anything of significance take place in Lebanon without the sanction of Damascus."
This is mighty fuzzy stuff and it's popping up all over the place. But I'm not seeing the evidence for it.
…It all looks to me like a story we've seen before. If you've been paying attention, a lot of people have been agitating for the United States to commence more active efforts to overthrow the Syrian and Iranian governments for some time now. Then some stuff happened and -- miraculously and without real evidence -- that stuff's occurence is suddenly the reason we need to implement the very same policy that was being pushed for previously. I'd like to see some proof.
Meanwhile, the US and pretty much everyone else disagree on the tone of Israel’s response, if not their right to respond:Russia and France condemned Israel's strikes in Lebanon on Thursday as a dangerous escalation of the Middle East conflict but the United States said Israel had the right to defend itself…
French Foreign Minister Philippe Douste-Blazy also described Israel's bombardment of Beirut’s international airport "a disproportionate act of war", and British Prime Minister Tony Blair “called on all sides in the Middle East crisis to exercise restraint, act proportionately and get back to the negotiating table as soon as possible.”
Bush and Merkel made clear at a joint news conference they felt Israel's actions in seeking kidnapped soldiers and responding to Hizbollah rocket attacks were justified.
But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov denounced both Israel's attack on Lebanon and its operations against the Palestinian territories.
"This is a disproportionate response to what has happened and if both sides are going to drive each other into a tight corner then I think that all this will develop in a very dramatic and tragic way," he told reporters on a flight from Paris to Moscow, Interfax news agency reported.
The US, meanwhile, vetoed a UN resolution that sought to condemn Israel for a "disproportionate use of force.” We were the only one of the 15 Security Council nations to vote against the resolution. (Britain, Denmark, Peru, and Slovakia abstained.)
And Israel bombarded Beirut again today, “blasting the airport for a second day, shattering bridges, igniting fuel storage tanks and cutting the main highway to Syria,” after Israel’s military chief of staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz said that “‘nothing is safe’ in Lebanon and that Beirut itself, especially Hezbollah offices and strongholds in southern Beirut, would be a target.”
Look, I’m in complete agreement that Israel has the right to defend itself, but I’m also inclined to agree that the level of their response was disproportionate and served primarily to escalate the situation unnecessarily. The primary responsibility lies with Hezbollah, who clearly want to provoke Israel. I want to make it clear that that is my opinion, as well as that Israel had a right to respond. That said, I’m in agreement with Jill, who notes:The best solution here, obviously, would be for Hezbollah to release the Israeli soldiers. That doesn’t look like it’s going to happen without Israeli action.
Can the US not support Israel’s right to defend itself while simultaneously condemning the scope of the defense? Not everything really is fair in love and war.
But attacking the entire country of Lebanon, shutting down one of the biggest cities in the Middle East, and causing all kinds of damage (humans and infrastructure) along the way? The actions that Israel has taken have been entirely disproportionate and excessively violent. And while it’s easy to argue that “Hezbollah started it” — and in this narrow case, they did — nothing is ever that simple in Middle Eastern politics, is it?
Israel has cut Lebanon off from the rest of the world. There is no way to get in or out of the country. It has warned all citizens of Beirut to leave. And this isn’t a small town or insular locale we’re talking about here — it’s a major city, with busy ports and a thriving tourist industry. It can be easy for Americans to orientalize cities in the Middle East, and stereotype the people there as desert-dwellers. But Beirut isn’t small beans. It’s the approximate equivalent of, say, San Francisco in the United States. Imagine that city having its airport and seaport blocked, and its major highway to LA destroyed. What do you do? Where do you go?
Our Congress Sucks
Congress has just chopped a week off what already is a notoriously skimpy work calendar so that lawmakers will have extra campaign time at home this fall. The Capitol will recess at the end of September, leaving a world of unfinished business. You’ll be relieved to know, however, that among the House items already seen to was a pay increase — 2 percent over the current base salary of $168,500.Yeah, I remember.
Our government is a fucking joke at this point. We’ve got a president who wantonly breaks the law, a Vice President who shoots a dude in the face with no consequences and compares himself to Darth Vader, an administration staff whose primary function appears to be smearing political opponents and get raises while under investigation, a cabinet that is rife with incompetent crackpots who find international and domestic law “quaint” and crack jokes at pissed off soldiers, a Justice Department who thinks the president is always right, federal agencies run by incompetent cronies, and a Congress that is utterly useless.
We are not being governed.
Question of the Day
Mr. Curious and I love to play a game called "How much would someone have to pay you to...?" Usually it's really just an excuse to try to gross each other out until we're collapsing with laughter, but I'll refrain from employing that technique, although this question is a bit "dirty."
How much would someone have to pay you to go for three months without washing, brushing your teeth, or using deodorant without explaining to anyone why you were doing it?
Considering I don't have a job at the moment, I'd be embarrassingly cheap.
How fucking nuts is our Congress?
Just yesterday, I had a crazy quote from the crackpot Westmoreland, and now today, there’s this:
"We could also electrify this wire with the kind of current that would not kill somebody, but it would be a discouragement for them to be fooling around with it. We do that with livestock all the time." — Rep. Steve King (R-IA), quoted by The Hill, equating the containment of immigrants to that of livestock.Honestly, someone could dedicate an entire blog to the steady stream of ludicrous twaddle that emits from the mouths of Congressmembers.
ARGH
Mr. Yuk
This campaign started in 1974, the year I was born. I remember that my mom had a big roll of Mr. Yuk stickers that were supposed to go on detergent bottles and things, but she never used them. (And, miraculously, even absent the lifesaving powers of Mr. Yuk, neither my sister nor I never drank them.) When I was about 12 or so, I asked my mom if I could have the stickers, to which she consented with the sort of perplexed "wev" look of a mother who can't even believe her kid is inquiring about something so random. In short order, all the things I loathed were graced with Mr. Yuk stickers: my science book (because of the teacher, not the subject), my folder for confirmation class, every entry in my journal about a neighbor I couldn't stand, and the yearbook photos of two nasty lads who bullied the disabled kids.
Transgendered Scientist on Institutional Bias
One of the topics I most enjoy discussing with transgendered people is sexism, because they have such a unique perspective on the subject. So it was with interest I read about Dr. Ben Barras’ article for Nature. Dr. Barras began transitioning in 1997 at age 42, after spending most of his academic career as a woman.
“I've lived in the shoes of a woman and I've lived in the shoes of a man. It's caused me to reflect on the barriers women face.''There’s more at the link, and a great summary of the sub-only Nature piece here, which includes this rather amazing snippet regarding what Barres calls “the main difference he has noticed since changing sex”: "People who do not know I am transgendered treat me with much more respect," he says. "I can even complete a whole sentence without being interrupted by a man."
…”I feel like I have a responsibility to speak out,'' he said. “Anyone who has changed sex has done probably the hardest thing they can do. It's freeing, in a way, because it makes me more fearless about other things.''
In his article, Barres offers several personal anecdotes from both sides of the gender divide to prove his own hypothesis that prejudice plays a much bigger role than genes in preventing women from reaching their potential on university campuses and in government laboratories.
The one that rankles him most dates from his undergraduate days at MIT, where as a young woman in a class dominated by men he was the only student to solve a complicated math problem. The professor responded that a boyfriend must have done the work for her, according to Barres.
