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Thursday, February 12, 2009
Wednesday, February 11, 2009
Surgeon General's Warning
NORML has sent a petition with some 2300 signatures attacking Kellogg's cereal for dumping Michael Phelps as a paid sponsor. They are calling on people to boycott their products (including favorites like Corn Flakes, Cheez Its, Rice Krispies and Pop Tarts) for demonizing what millions of Americans including presidents and members of Congress have done at least once or twice.
NORML has been working to de-criminalize marijuana for years and may have found the president and the economic circumstances to finally get the necessary support to do it. It got me thinking what the Surgeon General's Warning would look like on a package of legal cannabis. Maybe something like this:
Smoking By Pregnant Women May Result in Fetal Injury, Premature Birth, And Low Birth Weight. Smoking Marijuana May Cause Drowsiness, Paranoia or Bad Taste in Music. Chronic Use of Marijuana Can Contribute To Excessive Procrastination, Decreased Levels of Motivation and a Low Sperm Count. Do Not Operate Heavy Machinery or Enter Credit Card Information Over the Internet For Any Reason While Under the Influence of Cannabis. If Driving While High, Stay in the Right Lane. Marijuana Has Been Known To Induce Feelings of Euphoria And Relaxation.
Am I crazy to think the US may actually legalize pot in the next 8 years? Maybe so, but there are so many benefits I can think of that would support doing it, why can't this be part of the CHANGE we've been promised too? And as for Phelps.. the dude won 8 Golds and he's likely not done. Is he less of a man because of this? No. Is he less of a role model? Not to hackey-sackers and ultimate frisbee players.
Sick of the bailout
FOX analysts are picking it apart like a Thanksgiving turkey.. if they were such fiscal conservatives, how come they were so supportive of W's spending spree? I forgot, it was the Dem led Congress that screwed the economy up.. Oy. At any rate.. for those wishing to take a break from the rigamarole, I recommend taking a look back into the not-so-distant past. A time when music was not pre-packaged, safe and vacant. Here's a glimpse of a great little documentary on a counterculture I knew well:
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Obama Speaks!
Wow. I had nearly forgotten what a president is supposed to really sound like. After years of innuendos, fear tactics and guffaws, I was hypnotized by the straightforward answers the Prez gave in his first real address since taking office. No Hollywood glitz. No sugarcoating. And no broken record montage of bringing someone "to justice" or "fighting the war on terror." Just straight talk from a guy who inherited a double shitburger that this nation still has to digest somehow. A lot of tough questions on the economy, the Middle East and nuclear prliferation. The guy from the Post asked about A-Rod which was irrelevant. The guy from FOX asked a question that had no real basis (on some cryptic, random Biden quote, as if that's in short supply), but was intended to shed a negative light on the evening. Obama smiled through it and pretty much said, "I have no idea what this is about, but I'll try to give you a soundbite." Overall, it was a breath of fresh air to see a leader once again leading the country instead of, well.. you know.
Monday, February 9, 2009
Taliban self-image gets a boost
Those wacky extremists are at it again and this time they are telling Polish geologists everywhere to keep their grubby hands off of rocks that don't belong to them. Some four months ago, Piotr Stanczak was kidnapped in the North West Frontier Province, overrun with Taliban rabblerousers. Since the Poles keep sending troops to fight their brothers in Afghanistan and the Pakistani government simply won't release dozens of their captured comrades, the Taliban decided to send a message by beheading a guy who was hoping never to face the all-too-real dangers that prompted the creation of "hazard pay." The Taliban feels pretty fucking good about it too! What greater joy can one guy feel since they banned.. well everything fun? I sincerely hope they will lift restrictions on bicycle riding soon so they can move a hair closer to being a civilized society (that almost sounded plausible). Of course, http://www.rawa.org/ reminds us that womens' rights might be a few generations away.
Stimulus Package
Tax cuts for the rich. With a side of pork. Hold the funding for education. Oh yeah.. are you hiring?
Sunday, February 8, 2009
Alaskan Moose Hacked My Computer
After a frustrating week of troubleshooting, I think I may have finally gotten my computer back to normal. During my hiatus from posting, I saw about 1200 articles on the whole Ashley Judd/Sarah Palin war of words over the practice of shooting wolves from helicopters to prevent them from killing moose and caribou in Alaska.
As mentioned countless times on this (and other) websites, Sarah Palin is a dumb twat. While debating this point with a couple of Republicans I work with, the argument was made that Palin is being targeted merely because she's a Republican. To be clear, I have no moral opposition to hunting. I wish there was a program that encouraged hunters to donate unused portions of their kill to food banks, but there isn't. Native Americans didn't waste a bit of what they took from Mother Nature, finding a use for everything they killed from the nose to the hoof. Sadly, we are a lazy and wasteful bunch.
The thing that pisses me off about Palin isn't that she labels the group Judd has aligned herself with as an "extreme fringe group" that "distorts the facts." It's that she doesn't know the facts. Shocker, I know.
James Swan is an avid and well-educated outdoorsman who knows a thing or two about wildlife in Alaska. A couple years back, he wrote about the declining numbers of moose in Palin's home state. According to Swan, the declining numbers are not caused by hunting or natural predation, rather they are caused by a shrinking of natural habitat. He called for a plan to create a more suitable habitat for moose to thrive that incorporated the use of contolled burns to maximize the number of adult trees a moose can feed off of and the building of fences for protection along roads and railroad tracks.
Palin asks people to investigate the facts on this before passing judgement. Since she refuses to divulge the name any news source, magazine, book or resource she consults when assessing situations and how to best act, I have no clue if she has read this case study from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game. In it, it DOES highlight that wolves are indeed responsible for the majority of moose that meet unnatural demises. It also breaks down how reproductive rates are intimately tied to the severity of the weather in a given period. Predatory control programs are not new, but this report makes a point that they would prefer to avoid their use if they can. Ultimately, we must await the results of this more recent effort by the ADF & G which has an emphasis on creating a better habitat for the Alaskan moose before we know where things truly stand.
This I do know.. Alaska is home to the largest remaining population of gray wolves. They have been largely eradicated from the lower 48. Moose are nowhere close to becoming extinct, despite a dip in numbers recently. The practice of killing wolves to save the moose is short-sighted and discriminatory. Of course, the whales don't get much help either and they only eat krill.
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Obama's Op-ed
As many of you are by now probably aware, President Obama wrote a pitch in the Washington Post for his economic stimulus plan. Like many, I have great reservations about the entire thing, and think the House Dems are quit possibly acting like its winter 1993, which of course brought us the fall election of 1994. If this fails, I want to say to Pelosi, much like The Dude once said to Walter:
Shit! Nancy , you fuck... you fucked it up! You fucked it up! Her life (our economy) was in our hands, man (woman) !
To which I would love for her to reply:
Nothing is fucked here, Dude. Come on, you're being very un-Dude.
The new jobless numbers are out and they are too depressing for me to type. Something has to be done and it needs to be done now or our economy might bleed to death. Of course you could argue that it needs to die, much like the system did in the Soviet Union, and on paper that makes sense. We probably need a 20 year period of hellishness to punish us for all our economic and glutenous sins of yore. But I don't want to live through that...do you?
I don't know the answer, and how could I? The best minds that know the most about this stuff seemingly don't either. But hey, no sympathy for the Devil, right?
Oh well, whatever, nevermind.
I'll see ye at the soup kitchen. Don't forget your spoon.
I'll see ye at the soup kitchen. Don't forget your spoon.
Bon appetit!
PS- Mr. President, we are looking for writers. If you want to communicate with the American people, see the link on the right. Drop us a line, sir...
Sunday, February 1, 2009
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Economics, Inflation and Simpler Times
Homegrown propaganda from way back beats thinking about CEO bonuses and the stimulus package.. at least for today.
Friday, January 30, 2009
21st Century Pachyderms
Still smarting from across-the-board defeats, the GOP is trying to rebuild itself in radical ways. To start, they elected Michael Steele to become the first black chairman of the RNC (I wonder if he'll get his own "magic negro" song) over a guy who just cancelled his membership to a "whites only" country club. The vote was 91-77. They also launched this website to coordinate a plan of attack to reclaim the power that so quickly slipped away from them. In it they key in on several areas they need to improve upon immediately. The primary focus of this resurgence will be on building a grassroots movement through the internet to rally support for their party:
The challenge is daunting, but if we adopt a strongly anti-Washington message and charge hard against Obama and the Democrats, we will energize our grassroots base.
They are also looking to recruit 5 million online activists to fight against "the Obama agenda." Obama had roughly 3 million people serving a similar role in his campaign and T. Boone Pickens has about 1.4 million people spreading the word on energy issues. Key to their success will be drumming up support from Technology fat cats who would be willing to lend a hand and adopting a new, less fearful view of being pioneers in this unfamiliar territory.
Also crucial to this plan is having at least 40% of their nominees be of the age of 40 or younger:
Undoing the damage to our party's brand among America's youth will take more than new slogans and hip spokespeople. It will mean making young voters the face of the Republican Party, and not just another target group with its own bulleted list of "outreach" talking points. To that end, the next Chairman should commit to a simple goal: working towards a Republican Party where at least 40% of our challenger and open seat candidates for Congress are under 40. Such a party will send a signal to all Americans that the GOP is once again the party of the future.
Say what you will about this strategy.. It reeks of, "If you can't beat 'em join 'em," especially with the election of a relatively young black leader who says it will be a "great honor to spar" with President Obama. It makes perfect sense because having Steele as the mouthpiece of the party negates the race card. While many Dems are still celebrating the new dawn of Obama's presidency, the GOP is getting their shit together. And they have proven to be resourceful, resilient and fucking sneaky.
Check out http://www.rebuildtheparty.com/ for regular updates on their nefarious activities. Their intentions are quite deliberate. They are down, but not out and are not in a big rush to "reach across the aisle" if they are not in charge. Shocker.
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