If that's normal, I don't want it!

I had a roomate in college that displayed a singularly annoying habit. Everything that was new to her was new to everybody else. Thus- her daily discoveries about different cultures, politics, government and all the other things she either wasn't exposed to, or didn't spend time to think about in the small town in which she went to high school, were all carefully explained in excruciating detail to me each evening as if I had come out of the same insular world and had no idea what the hell she was talking about.

For some reason this roomate has come to mind while reading a sampling of recent columns by conservative writers. Their columns brought flashbacks of sitting on that cheap apartment couch listening to my roomate prattle on about the separation of powers or the importance of family in latin-American culture. Conservatives are the last people that should be lecturing us about the state of Iraq.

David Brooks puts his imagination to work (always a sure sign that he's about to run off the rails) and presents us a picture of a dystopian middle east future that results from the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.

The essence of all this disorder was that the Arab nation-states lost control. Subnational groups — like Hezbollah and the Mahdi Army — and supranational groups — like loosely connected terror networks, the new Sunni and Shiite Leagues and the satellite television networks — went from strength to strength while central national governments toppled and fell. The collapse of national governments led to a power vacuum that the more authentic and deeply rooted social groups sought to fill.

This war had several stages. The first was the disintegration of Iraq. No national institutions could survive the onslaught: There was no impartial justice, no effective law enforcement, no political organization that put loyalty to nation above loyalty to sect or tribe. Absent a government of laws, government by death squads emerged. Militias — with their own hospitals, schools and indoctrination systems — sought to impose order through assassination and revenge.

Put aside for the moment that Brook's middle east nightmare could easily come about regardless of whether or not our troops remain in Iraq the fundamental question remains- "David, where the hell were you during the debate leading up to the Iraq war?" The issue of the power vacuum that could arise with the overthrow of Sadaam and the collapse of Iraq and the rest of the middle east into chaos was a primary argument advocated by those against the war. Just because you dismissed that argument out of hand because it was made by damn, dirty hippies doesn't mean it's any less correct.

At least the infamous Jonah Goldberg actually makes an effort to offer a solution to this ensuing chaos. In his Los Angeles Times column entitled Iraq needs a Pinochet he argues that Iraq needs a strongman, a benign dictator, to bring all the disparate warring factions in the country into line. He compares and contrasts two models as examples- Pinochet and Fidel Castro- declaring Pinochet the hands down better example of a dictator. I guess he cracked fewer skulls. Or threw them out of helicopters.

Goldberg does close with one of the most unintentionally amusing paragraphs I've read in some time:

But these days, there's a newfound love for precisely this sort of realpolitik. Consider Jonathan Chait, who recently floated a Swiftian proposal that we put Saddam Hussein back in power in Iraq because, given his track record of maintaining stability and recognizing how terrible things could get in Iraq, Hussein might actually represent the least-bad option. Even discounting his sarcasm, this was morally myopic. But it seems to me, if you can contemplate reinstalling a Hussein, you'd count yourself lucky to have a Pinochet.

Realpolitik? The neocon clowns like Goldberg wouldn't know realpolitik if, to paraphrase the Black Adder, it sat on their face and wiggled singing "realpolitik is here to stay!"

So let's do the math. Two of the leading neocon deep-thinkers have independently concluded that an Iraqi dictator would be the best option to unify Iraq and thus keep the middle east from descending into violent chaos. I guess hindsight really is 20/20.

I feel like the parent who cautioned a small child against touching the stove because he might be burned, only to watch him touch the stove and burn his hand only to spend the rest of the day listening to that child explain how dangerous stove's are.

Or like I'm back in college.

In my loneliness I decided that if I could not inspire love, which is my deepest hope, I would instead cause fear.

A tear shed at the passing of Peter Boyle. With very few actual lines he absolutely stole "Young Frankenstein." He parlayed a scary look and a gruff personality into a lifetime schtick but was supposedly one of the nicest guys in show business.

He inspired a lot more love than fear. RIP, sir.

I'm not bad, I'm just drawn that way.

This tempest over the movie Happy Feet immediately brings to mind something Mrs. Wormer quipped a few years ago when she heard of televangalist Jerry Fallwell's campaign against a "homosexual" Bert and Ernie: "They're puppets."

(Mrs. Wormer is the queen of icy observations. Several years ago while in a theater watching E.T., the gentleman sitting behind her waited until the end of the movie when the alien magically made Elliot and his bike fly to spout in disbelief "Oh, Cmon!" Mrs. Wormer turned around and said "But you bought it up 'til now.")

It goes without saying that conservatives are not often, as the Tick would say, on a first name basis with lucidity. They couldn't call themselves conservatives if they weren't accustomed to looking reality squarely in the face and telling it to bugger off. Those that've displayed the mental gymnastics necessary to convince themselves Saddam was behind 9/11 or that abstinence only programs actually decrease teen sexual activity or that human activity doesn't contribute significantly towards global warming aren't really a big leap away from assuming cartoon penguins represent the evils of liberalism.

I will admit to a grudging respect for those conservatives that've taken the "if you can't beat 'em, join 'em" approach to cartoons. The Veggie Tales are cloyingly annoying yet they wear their Christianity loudly and proudly. It does beg the question as to whether it's creators recognize the irony of a cartoon about Christians in which Christians are represented by vegetables. What's the deal- were cattle, zombies or lemmings already taken?

But what I'd really like would be for conservatives to stop the cowardly hiding and the alternative entertainment sources and engage us directly. Don't believe in global warming? Fine, then engage a study that can be published in scientific journals for peer review rather than broadcast through right-wing media. Think a movie about dancing penguins is a little too heavy on the liberal message? Fund your own major animated film about animals that eat their young, kill everything that's weaker and rule through fear. Why not Atlas Shrugs with bears?

I must stop this whole thing! Why, for fifty-three years I've put up with it now. I must stop Christmas from coming... but how?

Since we have become the frontline soldiers in the War on Christmas (WOC) we might as well discuss tactics. The spotlight that dastardly Bill O' Reilly has cast on us these past few years has forced us to go underground and use guerilla tactics. Here are some strategies I cribbed from other secular warriors and some I came up with on my own-

Operation Wishes Aren't Horses - Kidnap a mall Santa, steal his costume and take his place. As kids give you their Christmas wishes tell them they're thinking to small and that Santa's going to bring them a pony. The dissapointed kids on Christmas morning will swear off Christmas forever.

Operation Frosty's Randy - Move the carrot noses on neighborhood snowmen down a couple of feet.

Operation Santa's Last Ride - Put together a fake Santa-tracking website mimicking NORAD's Christmas eve offering. Early in the evening make a grim announcement that Santa was accidentally shot down by Air National Guard just before reaching North America.

Operation Reveal the Double Entendre - Tell children what the song "Santa Baby" is really about. They'll be so grossed out they won't enjoy the holiday.

Operation Lamer Gamer - Build a state-of-the-art gaming system, make sure it's the "must have" item of the season, then only manufacture enough that only a few people are able to secure one for their kids.

Operation MistlePOWNED - Hang mistletoe around the office then file tons of harassment complaints.

Operation X-Mas Nativity - Rearrange the figures at the town nativity scene so they're now involved in lewd behavior. Replace the baby Jesus with a disco ball.

Good luck soldiers!

General Wormer

No, you don't look like you're up to something, but whenever you look like you're not up to ANYTHING, you're up to something.

Via Atrios I see Gordo's jumping the Iraq war ship.

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- In an emotional speech on the Senate floor Thursday night, Sen Gordon Smith, a moderate Republican from Oregon who has been a supporter of the war in Iraq, said the U.S. military's "tactics have failed" and he "cannot support that anymore."

Smith said he is at, "the end of my rope when it comes to supporting a policy that has our soldiers patrolling the same streets in the same way, being blown up the same bombs, day after day."

That is absurd," he said. "It may even be criminal."

There are few things in life that are as predictably regular as Gordon Smith's "I'm really a moderate" act he puts on every cycle he's up for re-election. Change of heart? Hardly. It's just time for a conservative politician who voted for Bush's tax cuts, the Iraq war and to convict President Clinton after his impeachment, to start pretending he represents the mainstream views held by his constituents.

Gordo: it ain't gonna work this time. Come 08 it's back to pea-farming for you, bud.

And when Santa squeezes his fat white ass down that chimney tonight, he's gonna find the jolliest bunch of assholes this side of the nuthouse.

As if we needed another reason not to shop at Wal-Mart they've also joined the fray in Bill O'Reilly's "war on Christmas" nonsense.

“We, quite frankly, have learned a lesson from last year” and all of the threats of protest and bad publicity that arose from shunning “Merry Christmas” in the stores, Wal-Mart spokeswoman Linda Blakley told USA Today. “We’re not afraid to use the term ‘Merry Christmas.’ We’ll use it early, and we’ll use it often,” she said.

Apparently that "lesson" was that when the Right Wing throws themselves on the ground, kicking and screaming because you won't buy them a "real, live unicorn" that the thing to do is to give them what they want. Of course like most spoiled children all that'll do will be to enable them the next time they want something they can't have.

While I'm on the subject of Wal-Mart shame on the Salvation Army for allowing their charity to be featured so prominently in Wal Mart's holiday advertising. They're reputation as THE Christmas charity doesn't deserve to be sullied by association with the nation's leading corporate deadbeat.

Humbug!

On the anniversary of the attack on Pearl Harbor my thoughts go out to a sailor who, as a favor to a buddy who wanted a sea billet, switched billets with the guy to the naval base at San Diego from the battleship Tennessee just a month before the Japanese attack. His buddy survived but called him afterwards to jokingly accuse him of "knowing something."

He got over to Pearl anyway later in the month. He was an Electrician's Mate so they sent him into the capsized battleships first to wade through the garbage, oil and bodies of his fellow sailors and string lights so that salvage could begin. This was certainly his most vivid memory of the war and something that choked him up on the retelling even sixty odd years after the attack.

He may not of won the Medal of Honor but gramps was still a hero.



(If you're trying to figure out how the Christmas Carol quote works with the attack on Pearl Harbor - it doesn't. It's just something the sailor I'm talking about used to like to say this time of year.)

There's a big difference between mostly dead and all dead. Mostly dead is slightly alive.

Who would've thought that something as simple as word tense can make all the difference in the world? Yesterday Robert M Gates the heir apparent to Rummy's empty seat told the Senate Armed Services Committee "is not winning the war in Iraq." This just so happens to dovetail nicely into the sensible centrist McCain/ Lieberman position of doing whatever it takes to "win," usually manifest in the form of sending in more troops. "Not winning" is the perfect expression politically because it not only implies that there's still a chance to "win*" but also plays neatly to the American sense of rooting for the underdog.

In the afternoon and after Gates took some hits from critics on the right in that "not winning" could be interpreted as "losing" he amended his comments to say what he meant is that we are "neither winning or losing" in Iraq. Way to muddle things further, Bobby.

It occurs to me that Gates' characterization of the war is so confusingly nebulous and our options so murky is that he simply is using the wrong tense of "to lose" when describing the situation. Myself and somewhere upwards of 60% of Americans recognize the war in Iraq is already "lost" in the sense the U.S. can achieve military goals that will bring political stability. The U.S. army is the finest fighting force in the world but it was built to fight conventional, not guerilla wars.

Still- I have to give Gates and others credit for demonstrating signs that they're beginning to understand what's going on by entertaining the idea of losing in Iraq. It's just that they're about two years behind everybody else when it comes to deciding what needs to be done.

You sit around here and you spin your little webs and you think the whole world revolves around you and your money.

The last second flood of Measure 37 claims has sent the state into a bit of a panic but has at least provided a bit of grim amusement in watching the Oregonian expressing shock, SHOCK, that corporations might take advantage of a ballot initiative they largely funded the passage of. Not the sharpest tools in the shed over there at the Lazy O.

More sympathetic are the small rural communities which strongly supported Measure 37 that are now running smack dab into the law of unintended consequences. The media has focused on coastal communities near to large tracts of corporate owned timber that may face development under Measure 37 claims but that's not the end of the story. For example:

Sandy received its first claim from Lila C. Leathers, who says her downtown property is hurt by a ban on gas stations and drive-through restaurants.

In other words: a truck stop.

The Sandy downtown is really a small, oval shaped island that splits Highway 26 East and West on both sides. Traffic on the highway is slowed to 25 mph in town and, during the winter ski months when the traffic is particularly heavy, it can be a real bear getting through town.

Leather's property is on the West end of that island bordering Highway 26 on both sides. The truck stop she's been fighting to build would no doubt add considerable traffic problems to the surrounding area as tractor trailers merged back onto the highway. That's why the notoriously development-friendly city have wisely spiked her efforts up to this point. A truck stop would not be beneficial for the local community nor the seasonal travelers that depend on the highway to get up the mountain. Sandy, which bills itself as the "Gateway to Mt. Hood," would become more gate than gateway.

The Governor and legislative leaders are discussing some "tweaking" of Measure 37 during the next session. Most likely something will come together that caps the larger, corporate claims while expediting the smaller individual claims. I would hope the Leathers deal falls into the former category because the benefit to Sandy, and to all all Oregonians that enjoy their winter sports, is negligible to say the least.

Kid's suck.

Do you have a child you particulary despise for whatever reason? Is their a toddler at whom the sound of his voice just makes you want to claw off your own ears? Well here's the perfect Christmas present for the little spawn of satan:

From the authors of "Help! Mom! There are liberals under my bed" comes another children's book which can serve as the equivalent of a literary lobotomy on any wee ones on your hate list.

If you want to ensure a certain child doesn't develop the cognitive skills to complete college, much less kindergarden, get them this book.