TOP TEN QUESTIONS YOU WON'T GET AT ANY UPCOMING PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE

10. "So, Congressman Kucinich, what goes best with a porterhouse steak, red wine or white?"

9. "Mr. President, which do you think will be easier to find: those socks that always seem to turn up missing after the laundry is done or those Iraqi weapons of mass destruction?"

8. "Rev. Sharpton--you are low on money. You have no shot on Super Tuesday. Your campaign has failed to capture the imagination of African-American voters. When are you running for President of Haiti?"

7. "Mr. President, if you were a tree - would you cut yourself down?"

6. "Mr. President, if you and Kenneth Lay were prison inmates together, which one of you do you think would be a 'top' or a 'bottom'? And should it be legal to marry him?"

5. "Senator Edwards, you have run a very positive campaign so far. If you could kill one Yankee with your bare hands--other than Senator Kerry--who would it be?"

4. "Mr. President, are you aware that every time the Vice President opens his mouth your lips seem to move?"

3. "Senator Kerry is there any truth to the rumor that in your basement you have a picture of you which is aging faster than you are and in your attic you have a voodoo doll of Howard Dean that's stuck full of hatpins?"

2. "Congressman Kucinich, who do you like to win America's Top Model?"

And the #1 least likely debate question in coming months:

"Mr. President, which will be easier for you to find, the 2.9 million jobs lost during your administration or those Iraqi weapons of mass destruction?"

INSERT CLEVER APHORISM HERE

IDIOT CELEBRITY QUOTE OF THE WEEK (non-Bush Administration division)

"Martin Luther King Jr. suffered from infidelity, so did John F. Kennedy. You're more likely to find great leadership coming from a man who likes to have sex with a lot of women than one who's monogamous."
--Ethan Hawke to reporters, perhaps trying to explain rumors of infidelity to estranged wife Uma Thurman.

IDIOT CELEBRITY QUOTE OF THE WEEK (Bush Administration division)
"The NEA (National Educational Association) is a terrorist organization."
--Bush's Secretary of Education Rod Paige, referring to the lobbying tactics of the nation's largest teacher's union.

Just like I thought--to this administration, everyone who doesn't agree with them is a terrorist.

(This blog will be updated later tonight).

NOBODY TOLD US THERE'D BE DAYS LIKE THESE

BUFFALO SHIT

There are so many topics on my mind tonight, so many truths to explore, it makes my head spin. So forgive me if I forsake style for substance, because I've got to hit all the high (low?) points:

As a native Coloradoan, even though I never attended the University of Colorado, I am embarassed and appalled by what's been going on on that campus although unfortunately, I cannot say I am shocked. Six women have now made allogations of sexual misconduct, including incidents of rape by CU football players, head coach Gary Barnett has been placed on "leave" (legal speak for, "he's got one foot in the grave and the paper trail is about to knock him in for good") and a lawsuit charging CU with being in violation of Title IX (for using inappropriate sexual behavior to lure recruits among other things) is underway.

Most galling is Barnett's assertion in an interview that former CU placekicker Kate Hnida (the first woman to play for a Division I football team in 1999 and 2000) was "lousy" and "not respected by her teammates", leading to the suggestion that somehow she deserved to get raped by a fellow player. Barnett did not actually say this, but what does Hnida's abilities as a kicker have to do with her rape complaint in the first place? Typically, the victim is blamed, the perpetrator goes unpunished, the coach gets to keep his job.

There's no easy solution for all of this, but I've got a start--do away with the current system of big time college athletics. Pay the players. Don't offer them scholarhips. Sign them to a two-year contract with the university and give them the option to matriculate there if they so desire, but don't even try to make the "student-athlete" attend class, don't house them on campus and, this is my main point, don't recruit them using sex and binge drinking, let universities whore themselves--I'm sorry, sell themselves--the way professional sports organizations do, on the merits of what that program, that system, that coach can do for the player's NFL or NBA careers, for their future earnings. Take away the edge to be gained from dirty deals and sleaze tactics. Let the only real student-athletes continue to be the tennis players, fencers, wrestlers and gymnasts. Divorce the big money sports from the business of higher education and recognize the athletes for the mercenaries they are.

Of course, none of this will actually happen. Barnett will get fired eventually (why the delay, I'm not exactly sure). But if you don't think this happens at Texas, at Washington, at Michigan, etc., think again. Testosterone + privilege + money + competition = rapes & assaults + coverups. That's an equation no one should have to learn about in college.

(ADDENDUM: Dave R. of Denver had some interesting comments in response to this. Thanks Dave! I'll excerpt the meat of his argument - hopefully he won't mind.

"What we are really "discovering" through this ordeal are two central truths that most people already knew, if they were honest about it:

1) college athletes are recruited based on their athletic ability alone -- not their character, not their intellect, not their selflessness, not their academic aspirations, not their personal decency, not their determination to make a positive contribution to the world. When recruiting a student / ATHLETE, almost all universities completely overlook the character factor in favor of athletic ability; therefore, most people recognize that the college athletes we watch, cheer, and even idolize are quite often spoiled, selfish people with a large sense of entitlement. It's part of why I've stopped watching most Division I college athletics: no matter who wins the game, it's just a bunch of mostly bad people beating another bunch of mostly bad people -- who really cares much about that? Let's face it: many college athletes are just not very good -- and in some cases dangerous -- people.

2) the high school and college athletic "systems" allow and even encourage athletes to behave selfishly and irresponsibly. Athletes are constantly showered with praise and adoration, regardless of their character or humanity. As someone inside the CU athletic department told me this week, "Football players and basketball players are treated like royalty." And as royalty, they are continually pardonned for their selfishness, their viciousness, their meanness, their aggression, their rudeness, their thoughtlessness -- as long as they continue to participate in athletics. Maybe it's economics, maybe it's the lack of true heroism in our society, but good athletes are rewarded and admired in spite of -- or maybe even because of -- their arrogant, aggressive, and destructive behavior. The system recruits and then builds people with some very dangerous values." --Dave R.

Whatever happened to the days when team sports was thought to build character? Maybe the problem is money...maybe it's something else. And isn't it interesting that you don't see problems of this scale in women's athletics?

ROE VS. ?

A Federal appeals court in New Orleans has agreed to hear the former "Jane Roe" argue against the Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion in 1972. The Wade side of the "Roe v. Wade" case was the district attorney from Dallas. In an interesting reversal, the "Wade" side or the Dallas D.A., would now be arguing the side that favors safe, legalized abortion--only they do not have plans to send anyone from that office to the hearing. Their legal position is something along the lines of, "then abortion was illegal in Texas, but now it is not. Therefore we have nothing to argue in the hearing, other than to engage in a political debate." Personally, I think you need both sides in a debate. At least, that's what I learned in junior high! Someone has to make the case for choice in this hearing, even if it is a hearing that may have no real legal merit. In the current climate, where the Bush administration and the Christian Taliban are working every day to take away a woman's right to choose, we can't afford to have any argument on the subject that goes unchallenged. Every little thing could be another stone hurled at the glass house of freedom. And eventually, the house will crack and come crashing down, if people let it.

By the way, Roe, who's real name I forget but I'm sure someone will enlighten me, argues that "30 years of evidence of the psychological harm abortions do to women" should lead the Court to reconsider their ruling. It's hard to argue that abortions don't cause psychological harm to women...but much harder to argue that going through with an unwanted pregnancy or getting a back-alley, coat hanger abortion or being stigmatized as an unwed mother unable to take care of her child isn't much more psychologically damaging and even worse, psychologically damaging to the child as well. Always better to have two psychologically damaged souls for the price of one. I guess that's what you call wholesale damage.

RICHARD GROPER NEEDS YOUR VOTE

On the lighter side (you didn't think there would be one, did you?), in California a Democrat named Richard Groper is running for the State Assembly. Dick Groper. Seriously. First Schwarzeneggar and now this. Imagine if Groper gets elected--that will be at least two gropers in the State House. Or maybe they'll just rename the Capitol, Hooters.

Or maybe Wieners.

W.M.D. M.I.A.

It wouldn't be this blog if I didn't keep you updated on the $1 million sweepstake search for weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and I'm thrilled to report that--we still haven't found them. Better luck next time.


I'd like to thank Yahoo! News, Sports Illustrated's Rick Reilly and the Associated Press for contributing information to this essay. And thanks to John Lennon for suggesting the title. Please Yoko, don't sue...

Love In The Time of Howard Dean, a Reflection

LOVE IN THE TIME OF HOWARD DEAN

I'm going to write a short story with that title one day, but I haven't worked it all out yet. All I know is that as much as I've supported Dean, given him money, lashed at the media for building him up too much and tearing him down too gleefully, it's safe to say that the Dean campaign is done. We can safely speak of it in the past tense. The Democratic machine can breathe easy--they have their guy. The Republicans can focus their awesome war chest on two very flawed, but also ultimately more predictable candidates in John Kerry and John Edwards. Dennis Kucinich and Al Sharpton will be around to provide local color and livelier debates.

But in a way Dean won anyway. He got Kerry and Edwards and even Clark (where have you gone, Wesley Clark? The Clinton machine turns it's lonely eyes to you. Woo hoo hoo) to co-opt his talking points and get tough with Bush. Every time Kerry exhorts people to log on to "johnkerry.com", I'm reminded of the $40 million Dean raised over the Internet, from regular folks like us who were turned on by his anti-war message, his pledge to try and supply universal health care and his legitimate outsider, let's shake up the machine credentials.

As a fan of political theater, I hope Dean sticks around until the convention. His lack of polish is always interesting and somebody has to keep Kerry on his toes, since Edwards is too nice and someone has to prepare the guy for the hatchet job Karl Rove has in store. Dean probably won't last until California. He's out of money, he's going through campaign strategists faster than Adam Sandler goes through toilet humor, his crowds have dwindled and the media, having had it's way with him, has written him off. But it's been a fun year, hasn't it? Thanks for the enthusiasm and the vision Howard Dean. Keep up the fight.

(ADDENDUM: Since I wrote this originally, Dean has officially ended his campaign for the presidency but has pledged to continue to raise money for the Democrats and fight to keep his issues a part of the Democratic platform. He will not, at this time, endorse any candidate. Here's a hint: if he did, it wouldn't be Kerry.)

THE SEARCH GOES ON

Day __ of the $1 million WMD sweepstakes has come and gone and there's still no weapons of mass destruction. Last week's death toll of U.S. servicepeople, Iraqi officials and civillians: 110 and counting. Casualties: many more. Cost of the war: more than we can pay for. End in sight? Can you say, Vietnam?

HWJRTPOC? (please see below)

HOW WOULD JESUS REVIEW "THE PASSION OF CHRIST"?

Jesus Christ here with a review of Mel Gibson's new movie about my final hours, The Passion of Christ.

Let me first off say that Mel has always been a good actor, a committed Catholic and a first-rate director. I very much enjoyed Braveheart, particularly the scene near the end when William Wallace had been captured by the English and the camera looked down on Mel as he was carried off on a board towards his fate, his arms outstretched, his feet bound. It reminded me of my crucifixion and I know that's just what Mel intended--I appreciated the props! It's important to find the qualities people have attributed to me to the people who are doing God's work in the present day world.

Anyway, back to the movie: people down on Earth are getting after Mel about all the graphic violence in the movie and I must say, I didn't have a problem with it. I really was whipped and scourged by the Romans, that's how they treated their prisoners. The crown of thorns upon my head brought back especially painful memories and there is really no humane way to pound a six-inch iron nail through somebody's palm and no realistic way to show somebody being dragged over cobblestone streets with a 70-pound cross on their back that doesn't involve blood and gore. It was 1,971 years ago after all, brutal times, brutal times, and I think to portray what happened to me accurately, you cannot shrink from all the horrible details.

The second thing that has garnered a lot of criticism for this movie is the sense that it seems to place the majority of the blame for what happened to me on the Jews. Now here's where I have a quibble with what Mel has done. He seems to take great pains to show Pontius Pilate as a conflicted Roman prefect who gets goaded into crucifying me by an angry and politically motivated Caiaphus [a Jewish religious authority]. That's just not the Pilate I knew. The Pilate I knew had dreams of someday rising to be the Emperor of all of Rome, but knew that he lacked the bloodlines and he was continually frustrated by that. Pilate was ambitious, ruthless and extremely intolerant of what he called "barbarian faiths", including Judaism, Zoroastrianism and many of the so-called pagan practices still common at that time. And he cheated at cards!

Pilate had a hearing when I was arrested by the Pharisees. I knew that God wanted me to sacrifice myself as a martyr for the sins of all mankind...I had made peace with it (my nerves at least partially calmed, I might add, by some of the "herbs" available in the garden of Gethsemane). When Pilate asked me to explain my crimes and answer for my sins, I knew he wouldn't understand my mission and that I had committed no real crimes. My popularity among the Judeans had become a threat to his authority, to his dreams of leaving Judea and returning to a position of more power in the capital and there was no way that I was going to get a fair trial or be released, so why waste precious time on pointless arguments? Anyway, in the silence, the chief priests, who were jealous of me, did have Barabbas released instead of me, but even if someone had stood up for my release, Pilate would never have done it, so to suggest that other Jews could have saved me and that an entire religious sect is somehow responsible for my death, well, that's simply not true and it has troubled me for almost 2,000 years. I feel like Mel could have presented these scenes with a little more subtlety and complexity, but then perhaps that was more than I should have expected from the director of Braveheart.

Overall though, The Passion of Myself is a very powerful movie, especially if you don't want to think too deeply about the history of that time and you just want to experience anew, in a most vivid fashion a potrayal of mankind as our most vicious, venal and conflicted selves. But I feel I must close my review by warning all who may go to see it or who have read about it not to judge their fellow man. That role is God and God's alone, because She (I don't know WHO started all that Holy Father stuff!) created all the heaven and all the earth and all human beings are equal in Her eyes. Even George W. Bush! Now that's a diety!

Jews, Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Mormons, agnostics, atheists, all the same, all red-blooded primates, all equally culpabale for what happened to me and all equally innocent. Remember that when you watch The Passion and my sincerest thanks for keeping my memory and words alive for all these years, even if sometimes you don't get all the particulars right. To all of you, Peace be with you.

Jesus also recommends: Heavenly Creatures, The Last Temptation of Christ, The Matrix trilogy (although not the last one so much) and Jackass: The Movie.

Happy Valentine's Day, Part 1

IF KEN CAN'T COMMIT, THEN DON'T HOLD YOUR BREATH FOR THE REST OF US...

I was devastated, devastated I tell you to read the press release that Ken and Barbie were separating after 41 years. Or is it 42 years? Through Malibu Barbie and Ken, Doctor Ken and Nurse Barbie (and, in later years, Dr. Barbie and, well, Ken) through all their various permutations, it was always Barbie and Ken, Ken and Barbie. And now...some Australian bloke? Barbie and Ken need to "find themselves"? Ken just needs to find a wedding chapel, that's all! What is the world coming to? This, along with George Bush Jr. being in the White House, is surely one of the signs of the apocalypse.

OH, JESUS

Since I certainly take suggestions on what to write about, I will devote some time to discussing an article someone gave me about the new Mel Gibson film, The Last Temptation of--er, I mean, The Passion of Christ. You can bet I have some thoughts on it, but my contacts are killing me and I really need to get to bed, so these are more like drive-by thoughts as opposed to well-thought out, structurally sound essays. (Do I hear laughter?) I promise by the weekend I'll lay out my thoughts and fears about this movie.

NO WMD'S, NO MILLION DOLLARS

Just to update, for the 299th consecutive day, no one has found weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, although this intrepid essayist is looking into rumors that there may actually be weapons of mass destruction at a missle silo within 150 miles of the president's ranch in Texas. No money will be rewarded if this turns out to be true, although UN inspectors are invited to come in and investigate if the madman Bush may be plotting to use these weapons against the peace loving people of the Third World, or liberal activists in Berkeley.

DEPROGRAMMING NOTES

Be sure to use znet, truthout.org, the Guardian (London), the Washington Post, New York Times, Village Voice and the New Yorker, just to name a few to get the straight shit on what's really going on in the world of war, politics and corruption.

Until this weekend, adios!

THE CALCULUS OF VIOLENCE

If brevity is the soul of wit, then let me be a dullard...

THE CALCULUS OF VIOLENCE

After viewing the brilliant Errol Morris documentary The Fog of War earlier this evening, I'm inspired to set down a few thoughts about the incalculable equations of war, imperialism and violence.

How many deaths in Iraq? If you read the news reports, the totals stand (I apologize for rounding off, the numbers aren't in front of me) at 570 U.S. soldiers dead, a couple of thousand more wounded, untold thousands of Iraqis killed, many thousands more maimed and wounded. But then factor in the "collateral casualties" or the victims of circumstances related to the war but not directly tied to it. All the soldiers who attempted or have committed suicide (a number reported by the New York Times to be now in the dozens). A horrifying escalation in rapes and attempted rapes by American GI's on both fellow soldiers and Iraqis.

But this war is filled with "fuzzy math". The $87 billion additional dollars we will spend on the Iraq occupation--June handover or not--has to come from somewhere. Will it come from the money cut from veteran's benefits that would help the soldiers who come home from the conflict, but will now help them a little bit less? Will it come from educational programs that now have a little bit less money to try and teach schoolchildren about history, geography, politics and civics, lessons that could help us understand the world better, question our leaders more and perhaps prevent future conflicts? Where will the money not come from? It will not come out of the bloated defense budget, which grows every year under Bush and the Republicans, nor will it affect the amount of money given to Halliburton, our colonial, capitalist proxy in Iraq and the previous employer, and prime beneficiary of Vice President Dick Cheney.

I actually don't think Iraq will become another Vietnam. This summer, Bush will trumpet the "orderly handover of authority in Iraq to civilian authorities." Casualities will decline. The horrors of war and it's aftermath will recede from the front pages. People will get caught up in the conventions and the campaigns. Bush and his machine will spend over $100 million to convince the American people he should be reelected and that this war has done great good in the world. Many will be tricked into believing this, setting the stage for more unilateral invasions, more terrorism against the U.S. and U.S. interests, more searches for weapons of mass destruction, more dead American soldiers, more Middle Eastern instability, an incalculable morass of more, more, more and less, less, less.

100 million

87 billion

570

Thousands

Just numbers? It's calculus that doesn't add up and math that just doesn't make sense.

QUOTE OF THE DAY:
"If you come home in a box
Green pants
Green drawers
Green socks
Typical American kid
I think not"
--from the rap song, "Typical American", by The Goats, c. 1993

IT TAKES A NATION OF 25 MILLION (AND DROPPING) TO HOLD US BACK

Week 2 and still no takers on the $1 million sweepstakes to locate the WMD's in Iraq. Hell, it could be a billion dollars and dinner with all of the models in the Sports Illustrated swimsuit edition and I feel pretty confident that no one would ever have to pay up.

One rule though: Donald Rumsfeld doesn't get to play.

THE CASE AGAINST BUSH, AND OTHER OBVIOUS THINGS

Bush W. Bush here...

This is my first posting on dissent channel, so I'll cut right to the point, because as they like to say in Wisconsin, "the cheese is binding."

There's an email going around that makes the case for why Resident Bush must be voted out office this year in much clearer terms than I'm probably about to. But just so we don't miss some of the highlights, let's look at Bush's stellar three years in office so that we may better understand why those who don't support his administration seem to hate it so much:

--This administration has taken one of the largest surpluses in our nation's history and turned it into the largest deficit. In just three years. And these are supposedly Republicans. You know, the people that liked to say they were for smaller government and spending tax dollars more wisely for the benefit of the American people? Who would have thought that we'd be pining for those supposedly "big spending Democrats" to restore sanity to our Federal budget.

--We have lost over 500 troops in battle in Iraq, a nation that has not yet secured it's true independence, where the search for weapons of mass destruction (the alleged reason for the war in the first place) are nowhere to be found. And there are more terrorists in Iraq now, then when we invaded.

--The USA PATRIOT act, which both parties should take a lot of responsibility for, is the greatest impingement of civil liberties this nation has enacted since World War II. (You may recall that racial discrimination in the pre Civil Rights-era South was a "state's rights" issue. The Federal Government may have been turning a blind eye to civil rights abuses while literally and figuratively whistling Dixie, but the Federal government of that era did not actively put in to place legislation that allowed it's citizens to be spied on, investigated without cause or potentially jailed without the right of an attorney under the pretext of "terrorism" or anything else.)

--The President has pledged to send people to Mars (even though millions of Americans have lost their jobs) and to protect the "sanctity" of marriage by promoting either a Federal law or a constitutional amendment to outlaw gay marriages.

--This administration has overseen the largest increase in military spending in 20 years, while slashing veteran's benefits.

--Despite the PATRIOT Act, the creation of the Homeland Security department and ongoing large scale military operations in Afghanistan and Iraq, Osama bin Laden remains at large, many of his al-Qaeda operatives who the government was well aware of were allowed to return to Saudi Arabia without questioning and the war in Iraq goes on, large scale fighting replaced by Mogadishu-style street, guerilla fighting. Saddam Hussein is captured, yet we are on the hook in Iraq for hundreds of billions of dollars over the next several years.

Of course, on the positive side for Bush, he is seen as more "moral" by a majority of voters than his predecessor, although that just goes to show that lying and selling out taxpayer money to your cronies is much more acceptable to a lot of people than cheating on your wife with an intern in the Oval Office. Bush had better keep his breasts covered in the coming nine months, or whatever popularity he has left will almost surely shrivel up overnight.