Hi everybody!

There's been so much action over the last few days that I don't know where to begin and I don't know if I'll remember it all. Fortunately for me, no one reads this. The other day I got to thinking: what's the real difference between writing a blog that no one reads and walking down the street talking to myself? I was distressed that I couldn't come up with anything, so I called myself a whore and ran away.

Amazingly, I'm actually progressing on my latest effort to fool the publishing world into giving me money for the blithering drivel that I manage to smear all over the page (or screen, I guess, I haven't "written" anything in ten years).

Hey, my good friend Sarah Palin is running for Vice President! Did you guys see her speech the other night? She was so awesome! She was so good that I nearly died from hypertension listening to it and started throwing things at my television in complete glee. And I also love how she let her grandfather speak last night. Even though he seems a little confused and disoriented, that's probably just dementia.

Also, my good friend Sara Benincasa and her good friend Diana Saez are doing some deliciously hysterical Palin spoofing. You should all get out on YouTube and watch them. Start here and watch all six of them.

OK, all done for now.

Labels: John McCain, politics, Sarah Palin, writing

Just a quick note to make sure that you're following my good friend Dennis DiClaudio on the Indecision 2008 blog. The guy is brilliant and I hate his guts.

Also: Holy Hillary! I almost stood up in my living room like five times, and if you know me at all, that's really saying something.

Labels: Dennis DiClaudio, Indecision 2008, politics

Senator John McCain, about Dan Quayle, at the 1988 Republican National Convention:

"I can't believe a guy that handsome wouldn't have some impact."

I don't even know what to say.

Labels: John McCain, politics, quotes

If you're looking for someone smarter than you, look no further than Nate Silver. He's the mastermind behind the PECOTA system that projects baseball player/team performance, which is the only reason that I'm even close to making money in my fantasy league.

Now, he's turned his attention to the presidential race and put together a nifty little site called FiveThirtyEight.com, which projects electoral votes along party lines. I've seen site's like this before, but I trust Nate's math a whole lot more than I trust exit polls.

[Thanks, Rob]

Labels: fantasy baseball, politics, smart people

Dear god, there's so much to catch up on.

- I saw Hair at Shakespeare in the Park on Sunday night. I know what you're thinking: When did Shakespeare write an anti-establishment, anti-Vietnam musical? The answer: around 1967. I could spend some time here, railing all over the Baby Boomers (again) and discuss how those greedy, selfish fucks basically pissed away the last chance this country had at true change, because their parents stopped paying for their pot and they needed to get jobs to support themselves, so they just sold out to the highest bidder, got fat and became the people they swore they never would when they were in charge. But I won't do that.

Instead, I'll just tell you that the production is outstanding, even if it does come off a little dated. And if you're inclined, wake up early, get your ass on line, and get some tickets for this bad boy. You won't be sorry.

- They finally shut down Scrabulous. That'll make people buy the board game. Thanks for ruining Christmas, Milton Bradley.

- In a horrific turn of events, the external hard drive that contained 90% of my music was completely erased. Now I'm in the unenviable position of having to rebuild the entire collection from scratch. To be fair, I'm not entirely free of blame in this situation, I am looking forward to getting reacquainted with Frampton Comes Alive and Jerry Vale's Greatest Hits by re-stealing them.

- In case you forgot, I've got a book on the shelves. You should consider purchasing this book. I believe that you would enjoy it very much. If you don't like the book, I'll personally come to your home and tell you the story about the time I asked Sally Field if I would write her biography.

- I wanted to say something about the election: since I already know who I'm going to vote for, is it possible for me to vote now and then stop paying attention? I consider myself a news guy. I watch the cable news channels. I read the Times. I just can't take anymore of this. People actually said, out loud, that it's a bad thing that people outside of the U.S. (in addition to 54% of the U.S. electorate, as polled by Quinnipiac University) like Barack Obama. This is the attack? People abroad like him, so we shouldn't vote for him? Someone's going to have to clean my brains off of the wall, because my head just exploded.

** Update: It should be noted that I don't *actually* hate my parents. They're lovely people who raised me very nicely. I just have an unfocused hatred of their whole selfish generation.**

Labels: books, Hair, iTunes, music, politics, Scrabulous, Shakespeare, Underrated

Just passing along a l'il something here.

Planned Parenthood put out a little video about John McCain's view on things like women's reproductive rights and sex education. Call me old-fashioned (or "new-fashioned" to Grandpa McCain), but to me, women should be able to control their own hoo-hahs. And someone that actually utters the words "I don't agree with Roe v. Wade. I think it should be overturned" just flat out doesn't get it on a lot of levels. Again, just me.

[Tip of the hat to Sara B.]

Labels: hoo-hahs, John McCain, politics

Bush or McCain? It's not as easy as you think.

Labels: John McCain, politics

Things Younger Than John McCain

Labels: John McCain, politics

So they want to repeal the gas tax?

It just seems insane to me. We've already cut taxes at wartime. We're already putting a tax rebate out there that isn't even going to do what they think it's going to do. Now, we're looking to repeal the gas tax for a summer, taking even more money out of the coffers. What's in the Treasury Department vault right now, deposit bottles? Moths? Connie Chung's career?

And separate from the obviously horrible idea of taking money out of the pockets of the government while we've got a recession going on, why on Earth are we incentivizing driving and using gasoline? If the rising price of oil should be teaching us anything, it's that we need to find other ways to power our cars, get to work and make money for the people that sell the oil. And frankly, our skies and water could use a pollution break.

And then I read that Hillary Clinton wants the oil companies to pay for the gas tax for the summer, instead of repealing it altogether? First, good luck getting our President "Big Business" Bush to sign that bill. Secondly, the oil companies are turning $4B quarterly profits. You think they give a rat's ass how much gas costs? The first thing they'll do is turn around and pass their cost on the consumers.

It's just shocking sometimes how shortsighted our politicians can be. It's nice of them to want to try to put a little more money in my pocket. I appreciate it. Really. But why don't you guys take a minute and think just a little bit abstractly for a minute? Take my 25 cents a gallon and invest it in find actual alternative biofuels that don't require fossil fuels to produce. It's an investment that every person in the world should be willing to make.

Labels: Hillary Clinton, my high horse, politics

It was a campaign commercial for Hillary Clinton, and it was running through quotes that are descriptive of her ability to be president. This was the last one that came up:

"Mrs. Clinton is qualified ... to be president"

I missed where that quote came from, because I was laughing so hard. It's not that I don't think she's qualified to be president. She's probably qualified. I wouldn't vote for her, but then again, I don't love her politics and I'm not a big fan of her method.

More than anything though, that's just a pretty strategically placed ellipsis. What words appeared between "qualified" and "to" that had to be removed? A couple of guesses:

"is qualified to bring in a talking bear to be president"

"is qualified, albeit totally unsexy, to be preseident"

"is qualified to eat her weight in Crisco, but not to be president

Labels: Hillary Clinton, politics

Excellent article by Loretta Hidalgo Whitesides in Wired about Mike Huckabee and his artful dodging of any real answer when people ask him about creationism:

Huckabee took Republican center stage after the Iowa caucuses, but his clever sidesteps of scientific questions are a warning sign. "Do you believe in evolution?" The short answer? No, he doesn't. People are charmed by him, asking why anyone should care since "[I'm] not planning on writing the curriculum for an eighth-grade science book," and "if anybody wants to believe they're the descendants of a primate, they're welcome to do it."

Whitesides goes on to say that he's missing the point pretty badly. There are big decisions to be made that, as president, he's going to have to make on real world issues, like who to fund and how much for scientific and medical research and appointing judges to make decisions in case about creationism is schools.

I agree. And the bottom line is that all of his beliefs and guiding principles inform those decisions. A person who believes unironically that the Earth is 6,000 years old isn't, in my opinion, working from the right decision making perspective. And that should inform my (but also everyone's) decision on who to vote for.

Labels: Mike Huckabee, politics

Interesting story about the Huckabee family, courtesy of Snopes.com.

The stuff about his son David is disgusting, but the details on it are pretty shady. I have no idea what actually happened. However, the stuff at the end of the passage (regarding his dismissal of Arkansas Chief of Police) is something that is worth considering when you vote.

Labels: Mike Huckabee, politics

... and they're somewhat surprising (at least to me). From the New York Times:

Senator Barack Obama of Illinois, a first-term Democratic senator trying to become the nation's first African-American president, rolled to victory in the Iowa caucuses on Thursday night ... The victory by Mr. Obama, 46, amounted to a startling setback for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, 60, of New York, who just months ago presented herself as the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination.

--snip--

On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas who was barely a blip on the national scene just two months ago, defeated Mitt Romney, a former Massachusetts governor, delivering a serious setback to Mr. Romney's high-spending campaign and putting pressure on Mr. Romney to win in New Hampshire next Tuesday.

Obama's been running a pretty close second to Hillary in most of the polls that came out prior to last night. The most interesting part here, given that Dodd, Richardson and Biden were barely a blip, was that Obama won an overwhelming amount of undecided voters, rather than scooping up the dismissed less-than-15-perceter votes. This is a pretty strong result for him.

I don't even know what to say about Huckabee. The guy is likable and, even though he's a minister, he's not a Bible-thumping assface. I wouldn't vote for him, because he's completely opposed to everything I support (or at least don't care enough about to be opposed to) socially, like abortion, gay marriage, etc. However, I can totally see why he'd be a viable option for any Republican voter. Romney comes off so disingenuous to me. It's very hard to get a read on him. He's supposedly a devout Mormon, which to me is the same as being a Scientologist.

The best result of the night? 6 percent for Giuliani, the twice-divorced "family values" candidate, who's so crooked that you have to count your fingers when you shake his hand. His record in New York City as mayor was horrible from a civil liberties perspective, and he was mostly hated here right up until 9/11. I'd rather pull my fingernails out with pliers than vote for Giuliani. Sounds like Iowa feels the same way.

Labels: politics

Although the general election is a still a staggering 11 months away, determining each party's candidates begins tonight with the Iowa caucuses.

CNN.com has a very simple primer about how the caucuses work here, and it kind of makes me want to move to Iowa. I think one of the reasons people don't vote is that they don't feel like the process means anything. It's so disconnected. You're not really invested in the process. You go into the booth, pull the lever and that's it.

In Iowa, there's actually some action. You stand with your candidate. If he/she doesn't get enough votes, you throw your support somewhere else. Your vote counts. Not just once, but twice or three times or more.

It probably works in Iowa because the population is manageable enough, but it would be nice if all states could make their population be this engaged about something that's really fucking important.

Labels: politics

Today is the 44th anniversary of the shooting of President Kennedy in Dallas, TX. Whether you believe in any of the conspiracy theories (or whether you even care aside), it was one of those pivotal moments that this country seems to experience every 15-20 years. And this one was captured on (grainy, nearly unwatchable) 8mm film.

I found this article online compelling and thought it worth sharing.

Labels: politics

In a lighter moment, Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich confirmed an account in actress Shirley MacLaine's book that he saw a UFO while at her home in Washington state.

"More people in this country have seen UFOs than I think approve of George Bush's presidency," he said.

[Quote courtesy: CNN.com]

On a heavier note, it makes me sad that the Democrats come off looking like a bunch of bickering idiots.

Labels: politics

Great Op-Ed in today's Times from resident strident Liberal Paul Krugman, about the right's total inability to give Al Gore some well-deserved credit and lay off of him for a bit. It's all very reminiscent (and this is me editorializing now) of the Blowjob Witch Hunt of 1998.

Krugman also made an appearance on Real Time With Bill Maher this weekend, sitting next to MSNBC's resident former bow-tie aficionado Tucker Carlson. I really enjoy watching Tucker Carlson in a forum where he isn't the host. I don't agree with a ton of what he says, but he's always challenging his fellow panelists and the host of whatever show he's on, and that makes for interesting TV at the very least. Carlson takes a lot of heat for being a little bit of a twit, and that might be true to an extent, but I think being moved off of CNN's Crossfire and out of the "Conservative" label that the show kind of forced him into has done wonders for him.

Speaking of Conservative/Liberal stuff, if you're looking to get Nancy Pelosi a gift for any reason, think about getting her a small bit of common sense. Whether you agree with the war or not, Turkey is a key ally in helping us keep our servicemen and women safe over there. To piss them off for what amounts to pandering to the Armenian lobby just doesn't seem worth it and, more importantly, could cost you some seats on Election Day 2008, including the most important one of them all.

Labels: politics

I can't believe that there have already been four presidential debates when the election is 15 months away, but the CNN/You Tube debates last night were surprisingly entertaining. Looks like Slate agrees.

Hilary scares me a little. She's the most presidential looking of the whole bunch, but she's so polished that she comes off like RoboPres. You know what though? I think she might be exactly what this country needs: someone who's measured, controlled and thoughtful. We've had eight years of a thin-lipped C-student, acting on impulse, like he was picking up the lastest copy of the Weekly World News while buying his groceries.

Obama, eh. I'm luke warm on him. I don't think he's quite there yet. I loved his passion 3 years ago at the convention, but I'm not really seeing it as much through this campaign (albeit, we're over a year away from the election).

But I've got to say, policy-wise, I still love Joe Biden, and I'll probably go down swinging and vote for him in the New York primary next year, if he makes it that far.

Labels: politics