In the immortal words of Jean Paul Sartre, 'Au revoir, gopher'.

I left the democratic party today and registered in the Oregon Progessive Party.  I encourage anyone in the state to also join the OPP.  They need to get only about 600 more members by August to maintain their minor party status to appear on ballots.

It probably isn't a surprise to anyone that my frustration with Obama and the democrats have reached this level but what REALLY pushed me over the top is the plethora of douchebags telling the liberals in the democratic party to sit down, shut up and quit our bitching.

After 8 years of having to listen to that crap while the republicans were in charge when we rightly complained about everything from the loss of civil liberties to the economy to the war in Iraq I have ZERO patience to hear that same bullshit coming from my "friends."

Progressives/ liberals have been right time after time and yet we're still expected to sit quietly at the back of the bus.  Not gonna happen anymore.

The only thing I'm looking forward to these next few years in terms of politics will be listening to these democratic moderates wail as the republicans they claim we should be working with to forge some sort of grand compromise for the country fabricate a reason to impeach president Obama and move on same.

Namaste.

Dean

Hey everybody, we're all gonna get laid.

So much going on today!

Reporting from London -- If history records a sudden surge in carbon emissions on Wednesday, it may be due to the collective exhalation of relief and joy by the hundreds of millions -- perhaps billions -- of people around the globe who watched, waited and prayed for Barack Obama to be elected president of the United States.

Gordo goes down in flames. It's about time. There've been a number of letters to the editor of the local paper from Eastern Oregon whining that, if the state elects two Democratic Senators they won't be represented. To this I simply say "STFU and sit down." 1) If Gordon Smith had been a real Republican moderate in the mold of Bob Packwood or Tom McCall he would've been Senator for life and 2) In Texas over 2 million people voted for challenger Rick Noriega in his unsuccessful bid to defeat John Cornyn. Those 2 million people have no representation in the U.S. Senate by this weird logic.

As far as I'm concerned the far right has had more than enough representation in the nation's capital these last twenty years.

"Jurassic Park" author Michael Crichton is dead. I've enjoyed a lot of his earlier work but his recent cranky pseudo-scientific scepticism towards the concept of human activity contributing to global warming has caused me to question his greatness as a sci-fi writer.

Not to toot my own horn too much but in a fake article from the future I wrote back on October 10th I had this: A state-by-state breakdown of those returns gave the President-elect more than 345 electoral votes, a commanding victory in the Electoral College, which requires 270 for election. His victory included states such as North Carolina and Virginia given to choosing Republican candidates in the last several Presidential elections.

I should buy a lottery ticket.

Ubermilf and randal graves have posts that riff off of "Caddyshack" and "Animal House" respectively. I've seen that latter film a couple of times...

These four photos say everything about the election.

OK, you can owe me.

Headlines that work better without the colon, this time from CNN- McCain: Spending is out of Control.

I'm just a harmless squirrel, not a plastic explosive or anything.

Good news. We can take small amounts of liquids on planes again. No word yet on "the gopher's friends" made out of plastic explosives.

Oh, don't sell youself short, Judge...

"I know President Bush. I wouldn’t say he’s a friend of mine. and trust me, I am no President Bush." - Joe Lieberman

This isn't Russia. Is this Russia? This isn't Russia.

"Bush Admin. Spying On Tens Of Millions Of Americans...

The government is secretly collecting records of ordinary Americans' phone calls in an effort to build a database of every call made within the country, it was reported Thursday.

AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth telephone companies began turning over records of tens of millions of their customers' phone calls to the National Security Agency program shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, said USA Today, citing anonymous sources it said had direct knowledge of the arrangement."

They are spying on US. Try as I might I can't think of ANY way patterns to domestic calls might suggest ties to terrorism.

I am furious at this invasion of our privacy. This is not a Police State and I'll be damned if I'm going to let them make us into a nation of Winston Smiths.

I'm no slouch myself.

Kevin Drum quotes Cliff May's deep thoughts about Saddam and the war:

It's easy to say that if we had left Saddam alone, nothing bad would have happened. But how is that different from what was said for years about Osama bin Laden?

Kevin points out that might be a good argument had somebody actually been saying that we should leave Bin Laden alone.

But I'm more concerned with May's statement itself. It bears a little too much resemblance in structure and cadence to Judge Smails famous speech dedicating his boat in "Caddyshack:"

It's easy to grin, when your ship comes in... and you've got the stock market beat. But the man worthwhile, Is the man who can smile... when his shorts are too tight in the seat.

Is Cliff May really Ted Knight?

Freeze, Gopher!

The world remains atwitter over the Veep's friendly fire incident, ominous silence and then belated mea culpa on FOX(*) Over at Digby's spot Tristero http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/ pondered Bob Herbert's call today for Cheney to step down/ pass his evil legacy to another. Tristero points out that neither scenario: Cheney staying or Cheney stepping aside to be replaced would be good for the country.

Now I see that Peggy Noonan joined the chorus of Cheney-must-goers. Wow. Just... wow. Once you've lost the support of a conservative leg-humper like Noonan you really have sunk to unbelievable depths. I still think the average Winger wouldn't blink twice had Cheney been caught dining on a live baby. It's the fact that Cheney shot a rich, white lawyer that gets to them. This is somebody they can identify with. This is one of THEM.

Ultimately, all the calls for Cheney to down seem silly. Cheney won't leave his job for the same reason he got his job in the first place: he picked himself. He is Vice President because, in his best judgement, he is the most qualified man for the job of Vice President. So as long as Dick Cheney has confidence in the job Dick Cheney is doing then Dick Cheney will be Vice President. Simple as that.

(* I refuse to use the liberal convention of referring to "Fox" news as "Faux" news only because it stopped being clever after about the one zillioneth time it was used.)