Blogger's Latest Feature: Blog Lots at Once

Today Blogger released its newest feature, BLO - Blog Lots at Once. The new feature requires that you post all of your blogging for the month at one time. Not only does this save time, but it floods news aggregators making you the HOT blogger you've always dreamed of being.

When asked what she thinks of the BLO feature, blogger Jeneane Sessum said the new functionality was sorely needed. "The way I see it, you might as well post all of your writing for the whole year once you get into Blogger, BECAUSE IT'S SO FUCKING SLOW LATELY THAT YOU HAVE TO WRITE EVERYTHING YOU CAN THINK OF OR JUST PLAIN FORGET IT. FORGET YOU EVER KNEW HOW TO WRITE. FORGET BLOGGING. FORGET YOUR FLEEETING THOUGHTS. EITHER USE THE BLO FEATURE OR GIVE THE FUCK UP!"

Then she slammed her laptop closed.

Yikes.

You just call out my name, you shithead...

Ken Camp has a great post about what makes a real friend... For your reading pleasure, I present it to you:

1. When you are sad - I will help you get drunk and plot revenge against the sorry bastard who made you sad.

2. When you are blue - I will try to dislodge whatever is choking you.

3. When you smile - I will know you finally got laid.

4. When you are scared - I will rag on you about it every chance I get.

5. When you are worried - I will tell you horrible stories about how much worse it could be and to quit whining.

6. When you are confused - I will use little words.

7. When you are sick - Stay the hell away from me until you are well again. I don't want whatever you have.

8. When you fall - I will point and laugh at your clumsy ass.

This is my oath...I pledge it till the end. Why? You may ask. Because you are my friend.

Send this to 10 of your closest friends, then get depressed because you can only think of two and one of them isn't speaking to you right now anyway.

Remember: A good friend will help you move. A really good friend will help you move a body. Let me know if I ever need to bring a shovel.

;-)

Onward Chris and Soldiers...

So HE's been blogging over here, as Chief Blogging Officer, which means I believe that he is CBO for Highbeam. Well COOL! If it weren't for technorati and spammers, I wouldn't know anything at all.

But I do know about highbeam thanks to C-BO, and I can say that it has saved my ass looking up some arcane items this past week that I'd like to write about as soon as I figure out how to use the blog this item button.

I have an email into the CBO about it. I hear you don't even have to go through his receptionist if you call his office. He answers the phone himself--right from his home office couch.

Technology. It's so cool.

Blogger's Slow Again...

And it's pissing me off.

Take Christianity Back from the Right

To reclaim language, to take back its meaning from those who would distort it, is to reclaim power. Reclaim Christianity now.

I am a Christian, too
It's time to take religion back from the haters, killers and temple money-changers
BY JOHN F. SUGG

There's a bit of schoolin' that God-fearing folks in Cobb County and the rest of the nation should pay heed to as they cheer the creationist team in a federal lawsuit heard last week.

The legal spat, over a warning plastered in Cobb schools' biology texts that evolution is merely a "theory" and not a "fact," has the world press in a tizzy now that evangelicals are perceived as political 900-pound gorillas (probably not a great metaphor when talking about evolution).

Thank God (so to speak) for Cobb County, always good for when scribes need a bit of bizarre to substitute for news.

Still, there is a "gol darn, I didn't know that!" lesson hidden in the Cobb evolution brouhaha, one that should be important to every Christian. It's a gem from the earlier "monkey" trial, the 1925 drama that starred teacher John Scopes, who challenged Tennessee's anti-evolution statute. The advocate for the religious side was William Jennings Bryan, one of the great men of principle in American history.

But, oh, heavens, Bryan was a died-in-the-wool liberal. He generally was described as a "populist," but in the parlance of the late 19th century, that meant liberal. Bryan volunteered in the Spanish-American War; that experience turned him into a fervent pacifist bitterly opposed to the nascent American imperialism. As Woodrow Wilson's secretary of state, he jawboned the 30 leading world powers to agree to a one-year cooling-off period before going to war -- no pre-emptive slaughter for Bryan.

Dubbed "the Great Commoner," he castigated the capitalists as enemies of common folk. Among his most ardent allies in a 1896 presidential bid was American socialist leader Eugene V. Debs.

In short, Bryan was a man who would have earned the scorn of Karl Rove, Rush Limbaugh and Trent Lott. If he was reincarnated and ran today for a U.S. Senate seat in Georgia, Saxby Chambliss would air commercials putting Bryan's mug alongside Saddam's and Osama's -- just as he did to Max Cleland.

But hold on a minute. Bryan also was a fundamentalist Christian. At the Scopes trial, he thundered, "I believe everything in the Bible should be accepted as it is given there." He was born again, he was an evangelical.

The nation, especially the South, bestowed great reverence on Bryan, who died a few months after the Scopes trial. Country and western balladeer Andrew Jenkins, a Georgia boy, sang these words in tribute: "Oh, who will go and end this fight, oh, who will be the man?/To face the learned and mighty foe, and for the Bible stand?"

Let's wind forward 79 years. Bob Jones III is president of the racist Bob Jones University in Greenville, a favorite haunt of George Bush. Jones, a storm trooper of the religious reich-wing vanguard that claims ownership of Bush, sternly admonished the president after the election, "You owe the liberals nothing. They despise you because they despise your Christ." Ah, I get it. Bush & Co. own Christ.

The letter also underscores the message hammered home so successfully by the GOP during the recent campaign: Liberals despise Christ.That's a lie.

The example of William Jennings Bryan -- and millions of others -- makes clear that ultra-conservatives don't have an exclusive claim on Christ. It's time for Christians to start giving witness to that fact.

I've warmed you up with a little literary napalm. But what I'm going to write next isn't easy. It's the sort of thing journalists aren't comfortable acknowledging. Here it goes ...

I testify that I am a Christian. I have been ever since I came forward at a Billy Graham revival when I was 8 years old. I later fell from grace and had a lot of dark years I'll have to account for on Judgment Day. My life did not turn around until, 14 years ago, I got down on my knees and prayed. That's something I do every day now. I prefer small churches to the show palaces; Christ said to pray in private. I've felt called to be a minister, but figure I'd get to do less preaching than with this gig.

I don't pay heed to the false prophets such as Pat Robertson and Tim LaHaye of the Left Behind books because Christ said to beware of charlatans claiming to know when He is coming again.

The "rapture" isn't in the Bible, so it's not in my theology. I find it hard to conceive of Jesus returning to save a few smug Pharisees such as Jerry Falwell while brutally slaying billions of my brothers and sisters. The heaven I believe in has ample room for all men and women of all faiths who seek God and try to live good lives.

In the Book of Matthew, Jesus said, "Not everyone who saith 'Lord, Lord,' shall enter the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father ... ." He told us his Father's will was to be meek; to be peacemakers; to take care of the weak, the poor, the afflicted; to sheathe the sword.

I believe there is truth in every word of the Bible, but as Bryan said during the Scopes trial, "Some of the Bible is given illustratively." I also believe there is truth in other faiths' scriptures, and I study them, too.

All Americans are invested in the debate over "values." It's time for Christians to take back our religion from people who have commandeered it simply to squeeze political advantage.

I believe the Ten Commandments have more impact if they are carved on our hearts than if they are hung in government buildings. I believe our leaders have broken one of those commandments by bearing false witness in concocting lies out of whole cloth that led us into war. I believe that "elective" war is another word for murder, and war to grab other peoples' oil is coveting and theft -- more broken commandments.

More...

Thanks to Craig for the pointer.

Watching...

Happened upon Elton while clicking through newly-installed cable TV. Living the high life over here.

Burn Down the Mission -- currently playing. Tune in. You already missed Take Me to the Pilot. Hurry!



Some people say they are Elton John fans. I'll show you my original liner notes from Captain Fantastic.

Remembering Diva Today

I remember writing this last year when Diva was almost 13. She was so darn cute.

I keep hearing her today. "Diva, quit that bark.... oh."

Thanks for all of your kind words. We're really okay today. I cleaned up the dining room, washed out her dishes, vacuumed the downstairs, watched the vacuum take away her stray hairs a clump at a time, swollowed the lump in my throat, smiled, knowing her hair will never all be gone. She was just too fuzzy.

This is the first animal we've had who died at home of old age. Something nice about it. She curled up on her favorite spot and took a long nap. I said to Tom, she got it right.

Bando is lost though. He's nearly 4 now and has never spent a day without his surrogate mother. We got him at the pound when he was 8 weeks old. We figured Diva could teach him some things. She was patient with him. He's not the smartest biscuit in the box, but he loved his Diva.

Bando howled last night. He stands at the gate and yips like a puppy. After the holiday, I told Jenna, we'll get him cleaned up. Let him spend some more time inside. I got him a chew toy today to keep him busy. He was happy to see that we hadn't disappeared too.

Bando was the one who showed George where she was. He stayed by her side while George checked her out. He watched over her until we took her away.

Bando grew up yesterday.

I feel worse for him.

Oh, Diva.

George always tells people I stole her. He says, "She saw that puppy in someone's yard that day and she just took her. She stole that dog. Some little boy is still crying, 'mommy, my puppy's gone!'"

It wasn't like that. Two blocks from the Rochester public market, where quite a few dogs roam free looking for scraps from the open air market, I saw the most adorable fuzzy tiny puppy out in the rain, drenched, the cold Rochester spring rain pounding the sidewalk, this poor little dog in obvious intestinal distress.

I got out of my car, picked her up, oh dear, oh my, she was so sweet, so I naturally walked the neighborhood, up and down both sides of the street, "Hello? Is this anyone's puppy?" I came upon one man who lived on the street, but he said he'd never seen the puppy.

Crap.

I tried to leave her on the sidewalk and go on my way. I got back in my car. We didn't need a puppy.

But she stayed so close to my car that I couldn't see her and didn't dare pull away from the curb for fear of running her over.

Oh hell.

Now what?

I got out and took her.

I took that sweet puppy right away from that lonely street and directly to our vet, who said she was just 7 or 8 weeks old, and from her paws and state of health, she'd most likely been living outside on the streets. He said that I'd done a good deed. Of course, he knew me. What else was he going to say?

For all his blustering about my criminal intent, George fell in love with her when he came back from Boston and saw her face, this little black-and-brown-fuzzball-shepherd-mix-good-old-fashioned-big-hearted mutt.

We named her Diva. She was a sweet and dainty doll.

Diva has seen us through so many changes; she watched me go through my late 20s, 30s, and early 40s. That's a long road to travel together.

Two weeks ago we took Diva to the vet to get her skin, hearing and general health checked. The vet assured us that given her age, she was hanging in there pretty well. We got some medicine for her skin problems--Diva, the queen of hot spots. He advised us to let her keep on going, since she was happy and not in any serious pain. We were prepared to say goodbye that day. But we took his advice and brought her home. She did well on the medicine and her skin cleared up.

Last night Diva didn't come in for dinner. This wasn't so unusual for her the last few months. More than once I had to hunt her down outside. I'd walk up to her, see her curled up on an old dog bed we have out back. I'd suck in my breath, thinking, "Oh no, she's dead." And I'd say, "Diva? DIVA?" Her head would pop up and she'd look at me over her shoulder as if to say, "Oh you! Is it time to eat already?"

She'd gone mostly deaf, and it usually took me slapping the house or going down the back steps to get her attention to come on up the deck for supper.

This morning George went out to get her. Her dinner from last night was still waiting. I heard him put on his boots and go out the door to find her.

He found her under our bedroom window.

She was curled up under the big overhang--her favorite cool and dry place in the yard.

This time when he called her name, she didn't look up over her shoulder. She didn't raise her ears or wag her tail.

Her soft nose was tucked into her paws, her eyes closed, just as she napped nearly every day for just shy of 14 years.

From what we can tell, she took her last breath sometime early this morning.

Sweet Diva.

Our good good girl.

I'm sorry I wasn't with you last night, or there to pat your head this morning.

But I am glad that I stole you when you were a pup. And I'm honored to have had you by my side for all of these years.

goodbye, girl.

Keeping Time

5 person company looking for a tool to enter time into daily that will add time up by project/person, etc. in order to ease invoice creation.

Any ideas? Leave links and I'll share findings.

more to come...working like crazy here...

Also, atlanta area writers--and I mean good folks with tight skills in PR/Marketing writing especially in tech--send me links to your samples if you want to be considered for some upcoming writing project opportunities.

No time to 'splain. more news anon. Ask Stu what anon means.

Write Your Own Caption

(They need to stop giving us so much material.)



"Mmmmm, I love it when you talk redneck to me, Bubba."

Disclaim This

I am very near to dubbing the following, from IT Kitchen, the best blogline of 2004:

Possible monetary disclaimer:

I made 23,000US dollars last year, of which 2000.00 was from weblogging; the other 21,000 came from selling myself on the street corner at 5.00 a blowjob. I regret this, though; I feel so cheap for taking money for weblogging.

We are here and not in traditional media because we are biased. Most of us were drawn here by the unique opportunity to explore voice/writing/opinion/conversation.

As a reader of this weblog, please understand the following: Right here is the place where I say what I want, about whom I want and what I want, and on the occasion that someone decides to sponsor one of my writings, projects or brilliant ideas with cold hard cash, I have not only the right but the inherent responsibility to jump up and down in my own living room telling Jenna that it's present time.

(Read Gonzo Marketing, kay?)

David Weinberger has a nearly 600-word disclaimer/disclosure, the short take of which is, if you trust him as one of his readers, then you don't need to worry unless he tells you to.

For my part, I'll take any money I damn well please from anyone I damn well please. I'll decline any money I damn well please, but that's not likely to happen any time soon. Those who decide to give me money have no control over me, which, they would know if they had been reading me for any length of time, making the entire exercise of disclosure irrelevant.

Read Gonzo Marketing, kay? Because if someone trys to exert that control in a micromarket that is informed by whipsers, yelps, rants, and conversations, it doesn't work. Black eye to them. Bully for us.

To Chris, it's time to put the whole book online.

To Shelley, it fucking figures.

Write Your Own Caption

Oh so many come to mind...



"You mean I gotta talk into the motherfucking microphone that goes into the box on that cracker's back?"

Settling the Score

Boing Boing found just the right Chistmas Present for that special someone who's hard to buy for.

It's the University of Iowa's Jumbotron, starting bid just $10K.



I hope the lucky bidder puts it to good use.

The International Association of Dissociation

What?

I'm sorry; my mind was someplace else.

why so inconsistent, jeneane?

Been working on a new business venture. Going into business with a long-time marketing/PR associate to provide writing services in line with what I've been talking about on this blog since time was old, but starting more physical than virtual.

It will grow into something very, very cool. I know it will. Time. Energy. Focus. Gotta get better at all three. More soon, anon.

Ask tom what anon means.

Neither of us is certain.

He thinks it may be related to hey nonny nonny.

I think he may be right.

Glad Tidings,
jeneane

Write Your Own Caption

"Sure he's a wetback, but he's my wetback."

Woops.

And a little something for the Missus.

Okay, since I didn't get my Tiffany's gift from all you slackards for my 3 year blogiversary, I bought myself a little something special.

I feel your pain.

Sometimes enough really is enough.

Is this my Blogger?

Smokin' with speed tonight, blogger boys.

You promised it would get faster, and it looks like you've delivered.

If Blogger keeps up its hippity-hop speed like this, I might actually start writing again.

[[that is not an invitation to tweak it backwards.]]

Oh No, Did I Miss It?

Listen, something tells me bloggercon already happened, and I completely missed my opportunity to make fun of it this year! OH SHIT! I've let my readers down. I've let myself down. I've let all of our friends across the pond who wonder what the fuck we're doing over here down.

It seems my classmate Frank was there, as evidenced by his photos on flickr.

I'm sorry, Frank, I had to tag this one as potentially offensive.

I never new you were into this kind of thing.

shudder.

Talk Radio & Clear Channel vs Reality

Thank goodness for the blogosphere--the antidote to mindless talk radio--especially to the self-righteous conservatives who call in from my neck of the woods.

This morning, I was driving home from carpool while listening to the morning radio host on 640AM. He was polling listeners about today's court date for Cobb County's evolution disclaimer (and the constitutionality thereof) for school textbooks. The disclaimer inspiring debate reads as follows:



I live in Cobb County. I think the courts and the schools could be doing more meaningful things. But that's not really the point. What stunned me was the nutjobs who showed up in force on on the radio to defend the disclaimer. That they wish to defend the disclaimer doesn't bother me. Heck, the disclaimer itself doesn't even bother me. It's the symantics of righteousness and hatred I heard that made me sick.

One caller from a neighboring county said this: "On election day, the citizens of this country DECLARED that the United States is a Christian country. I'm so sick of these liberals and their attitudes, I think it's time we start putting liberals in prison."

HELLO, CHRIST CALLING?

The radio host feigned dismay--"Well, that's a bit Draconian I think," and yet, the screener knew excactly what this caller was going to say. Bet on it. It's not just another isolated incident.

Which brings me to zealots.

Which brings me to wondering, what does a zealot stop at in his quest to advance his noble cause?

Which brings me to mounting evidence that they did it again, referenced by Tom.

Dick Morris, the infamous political consultant to the first Clinton campaign who became a Republican consultant and Fox News regular, wrote an article for The Hill, the publication read by every political junkie in Washington, DC, in which he made a couple of brilliant points.

"Exit Polls are almost never wrong," Morris wrote. "They eliminate the two major potential fallacies in survey research by correctly separating actual voters from those who pretend they will cast ballots but never do and by substituting actual observation for guesswork in judging the relative turnout of different parts of the state."

He added: "So, according to ABC-TVs exit polls, for example, Kerry was slated to carry Florida, Ohio, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, and Iowa, all of which Bush carried. The only swing state the network had going to Bush was West Virginia, which the president won by 10 points."

Yet a few hours after the exit polls were showing a clear Kerry sweep, as the computerized vote numbers began to come in from the various states the election was called for Bush.

How could this happen?

On the CNBC TV show "Topic A With Tina Brown," several months ago, Howard Dean had filled in for Tina Brown as guest host. His guest was Bev Harris, the Seattle grandmother who started www.blackboxvoting.org from her living room. Bev pointed out that regardless of how votes were tabulated (other than hand counts, only done in odd places like small towns in Vermont), the real "counting" is done by computers. Be they Diebold Opti-Scan machines, which read paper ballots filled in by pencil or ink in the voter's hand, or the scanners that read punch cards, or the machines that simply record a touch of the screen, in all cases the final tally is sent to a "central tabulator" machine.

That central tabulator computer is a Windows-based PC.

"In a voting system," Harris explained to Dean on national television, "you have all the different voting machines at all the different polling places, sometimes, as in a county like mine, there's a thousand polling places in a single county. All those machines feed into the one machine so it can add up all the votes. So, of course, if you were going to do something you shouldn't to a voting machine, would it be more convenient to do it to each of the 4000 machines, or just come in here and deal with all of them at once?"

Dean nodded in rhetorical agreement, and Harris continued. "What surprises people is that the central tabulator is just a PC, like what you and I use. It's just a regular computer."

"So," Dean said, "anybody who can hack into a PC can hack into a central tabulator?"

Harris nodded affirmation, and pointed out how Diebold uses a program called GEMS, which fills the screen of the PC and effectively turns it into the central tabulator system. "This is the official program that the County Supervisor sees," she said, pointing to a PC that was sitting between them loaded with Diebold's software.

allied is 3 years old today.

That's 59 in blogyears. Happy to me.

Time for an emotional fractal party.

Hey class of 2001, children of RageBoy--Happy anniversary to all of yous too.

Caffine chips and puffs

I've been so tired the last couple of days that suddenly, around 11 a.m., in the middle of working, I basically pass out. Today I didn't even get under the covers. I just put my head down, slapped on the alarm, and snoozed off to dreamland.

It's time to move my office again. I've been working on the king-size bed over the last month. I relocated from the living room couch in early October. I do this every so often for a change of scene. It's a lot easier than getting a new job, especially since this job is the best one I've ever had because I have no boss. Except me. And I'm a pushover.

George tells me that when you reheat day old coffee, especially in the microwave, it has less caffine in it. I get expensive coffee, so I rarely waste it. Which means that every other day I'm reheating day-old coffee, and I'm wondering if what he says is true. That would explain my dumb-headed sleepiness every couple of days.

During my siesta, I dreamed that I smoked. November 4 was my 4 month anniversary. How weird. This dream wasn't your typical "oops, i smoked" dream. It was luxurious and enjoyable, and if I didn't know better, I'd think somehow I really did smoke. It felt, tasted and looked so real, so familiar. I even remembered that I wasn't supposed to be doing it, but not with a jolt--with more like an oh yeah. I remember quitting. This sure tastes nice.

At dinner tonight I chipped my bottom tooth. Not the old chipped tooth, but a new one. I did it by being over excited about the eggplant parmesian from Whole Foods. Half way through I bit down on the fork with such gusto that I jammed the prong right down into my lower tooth. What's up with that? Suddenly I've got Arnold jaw? BAM! One chew, and chaos ensued.

Jenna followed me up to the bathroom convinced that she saw me lose my entire bottom tooth right before her eyes. "OH YAH, OH YAH MOM, YOUR TOOTH IS G-O-N-E!" She mistook a piece of chicken breast for my tooth, thankfully, although she still steals glances at my mouth every hour or so to make sure my teeth are all there. "I really thought I saw your tooth gone, mom. That was so freaky!"

Anyway, it's not a big chip, and it wasn't a big nap, and I don't have dental insurance, and it wasn't a real cigarette, but all of these events added up in their smallness to lend some excitement to what has been a state of numbness these post-election days.

I'm grateful for that.

Diebold, Rangers and Pioneers, and "The Fox Guarding the Henhouse"

This Diebold/Ohio scandal is not new. We should have been all over O'Dell last year.

Published on Thursday, August 28, 2003 by the Cleveland Plain Dealer
Voting Machine Controversy
by Julie Carr Smyth

COLUMBUS - The head of a company vying to sell voting machines in Ohio told Republicans in a recent fund-raising letter that he is "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year."

The Aug. 14 letter from Walden O'Dell, chief executive of Diebold Inc. - who has become active in the re-election effort of President Bush - prompted Democrats this week to question the propriety of allowing O'Dell's company to calculate votes in the 2004 presidential election.

O'Dell attended a strategy pow-wow with wealthy Bush benefactors - known as Rangers and Pioneers - at the president's Crawford, Texas, ranch earlier this month. The next week, he penned invitations to a $1,000-a-plate fund-raiser to benefit the Ohio Republican Party's federal campaign fund - partially benefiting Bush - at his mansion in the Columbus suburb of Upper Arlington.

The letter went out the day before Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, also a Republican, was set to qualify Diebold as one of three firms eligible to sell upgraded electronic voting machines to Ohio counties in time for the 2004 election.

Blackwell's announcement is still in limbo because of a court challenge over the fairness of the selection process by a disqualified bidder, Sequoia Voting Systems.

In his invitation letter, O'Dell asked guests to consider donating or raising up to $10,000 each for the federal account that the state GOP will use to help Bush and other federal candidates - money that legislative Democratic leaders charged could come back to benefit Blackwell.

They urged Blackwell to remove Diebold from the field of voting-machine companies eligible to sell to Ohio counties.

This is the second such request in as many months. State Sen. Jeff Jacobson, a Dayton-area Republican, asked Blackwell in July to disqualify Diebold after security concerns arose over its equipment.

"Ordinary Ohioans may infer that Blackwell's office is looking past Diebold's security issues because its CEO is seeking $10,000 donations for Blackwell's party - donations that could be made with statewide elected officials right there in the same room," said Senate Democratic Leader Greg DiDonato.

Diebold spokeswoman Michelle Griggy said O'Dell - who was unavailable to comment personally - has held fund-raisers in his home for many causes, including the Columbus Zoo, Op era Columbus, Catholic Social Services and Ohio State University.

Ohio GOP spokesman Jason Mauk said the party approached O'Dell about hosting the event at his home, the historic Cotswold Manor, and not the other way around. Mauk said that under federal campaign finance rules, the party cannot use any money from its federal account for state- level candidates.

"To think that Diebold is somehow tainted because they have a couple folks on their board who support the president is just unfair," Mauk said.

Griggy said in an e-mail statement that Diebold could not comment on the political contributions of individual company employees.

Blackwell said Diebold is not the only company with political connections - noting that lobbyists for voting-machine makers read like a who's who of Columbus' powerful and politically connected.

"Let me put it to you this way: If there was one person uniquely involved in the political process, that might be troubling," he said. "But there's no one that hasn't used every legitimate avenue and bit of leverage that they could legally use to get their product looked at. Believe me, if there is a political lever to be pulled, all of them have pulled it."

Blackwell said he stands by the process used for selecting voting machine vendors as fair, thorough and impartial.

As of yesterday, however, that determination lay with Ohio Court of Claims Judge Fred Shoemaker.

He heard closing arguments yesterday over whether Sequoia was unfairly eliminated by Blackwell midway through the final phase of negotiations.

Shoemaker extended a temporary restraining order in the case for 14 days, but said he hopes to issue his opinion sooner than that.

© 2003 The Plain Dealer

[[More on Rangers and Pioneers]]

A Wave of New Voices--GOOD!

As I surf through blogspot blogs tonight, I come upon several new blogs started in the last few days around this critical election. Not all are US blogs, but all I've seen have started writing based on the fear and disbelief around an America run by far right zealots. This is one, for example. Welcome to blogging. And good writing.

The best thing that could happen is that more and more intelligent voices emerge and grow strong between now and 2008. That they inform, move, resonate. And the new wave of the rule of Bush may inspire just that.

Completed Human

"Lusilim," -- the ancient Sumerian (Iraqi) cuneiform meaning "completed human."

From Thomas Truman

And for you dumbfounded folks overseas...

You think you're confounded? Not sure what to make of your American blog friends? Wondering if it's really true that we're lamebrained numskulls? Deciding whether you can tolerate hanging out with people who've been good friends because they are obviously "not your kind of people"?

Yah, well, imagine being you and living here. That's what it's like for the rest of us.

good day.

In this time of turmoil for half the nation...

Let us remember: Stavros' folks' place is still for sale.



We get the top bunk!

Walkin' in a Wiki Wonderland.

Oh my gosh. I just made my first contribution to a WIKI. I added Phil's blog to the list of CEO blogs on the New PR WIKI. I was ever so tempted to delete Alan Meckler's blog. That blog is such a bad example of a CEO weblog. But I didn't delete him. That wouldn't have been right.

Hold on girl.

WIKI. I've been reluctant, worried that I'd slip into collaboration nirvana never to reappear. I thought'd be hard. But it wasn't.

mmmmm. it was sweet.

I feel compassionate all over.

Naming Is Power

David had a great post about reclaiming and/or reframing language that has been adopted and frequently skewed by The Oposition. I added mine:

COMPASSION: The symantics of Compassionate Conservatism must be demystified and destroyed. I had a soccer-mom explain to me on the phone last week that she was voting for Bush because she considers herself a Compassionate Conservative--a term she thought she had just invented until I let her know that Bush and Pubes before him have been using the term -- along with many other phrases that make the simple minded feel important -- for years.

Publicans, please understand that I don't want your compassion; I don't need your compassion. To show me such, in your eyes, gives you power over me. So save it. Keep your pitty, your tolerance, and your motherfucking compassion. I'll do just fine without it.

HE CAN RUN BUT HE CAN'T HIDE: It was very easy for "W." toss this phrase about in the final four weeks of the election. He got a hard on simply from being able to remember it. He used it and saw that it jazzed up his base of elitests and idiots quite nicely on the final leg of the campaign trail. Well, I am claiming it now. Mr. Bush, you can run but you can't hide. Unlike your friend Bin Laden, who, it seems, can both run AND hide, thanks to you.

PRAYER: I talked with a woman checking me out at Walgreens this morning. I see her there frequently--she works lots of hours. When she asked how I was doing, I said tired and pissed about the election. She said, "You're tellin me." And we began talking. What do we do now. Can you believe it. There were no color lines between us. We talked about the war and her boys. And when I took my bag she reminded me--what we do now is pray. THAT'S RIGHT, WE PRAY TOO. Publicans, you do not have a monopoly on prayer or God. You do not have a monopoly on Christ. You do not have a monopoly on salvation or forgiveness.

Those are the three I'd like to add right now.

Thank you

.

I'd also like to add GET OVER IT to my list. Get Over It is the most frequently employed post-election mantra on the part of the publicans. "Get Over It" was also their rhetorical weapon of choice after W. stole the 2000 election. I am reframing it to mean Get Over Yourselves, and directing it at the hypocritical members of the right like Rush It's-Vicodin-Time Limbaugh, and Bill I-Like-Your-Tits O'Reilly, and Alan Cheney-Raised-an-Abomination-But-Vote-For-Him-Anyway Keyes. All of you and all of yours, get over your pseudo-moralistic selves before I do it for you.

One of the bright lights during camaign season just got bad news.

Elizabeth Edwards has breast cancer.

Like that family hasn't been through enough.

Well crap.

Sudan Government Prayed for a Bush Victory

The conflict, which has left at least 70,000 people dead, has created what UN officials say is the worst humanitarian crisis in the world.

How does he sleep at night?

...The ruling elite in Khartoum prefers a Republicans in the White House because it is seen as not as harsh as the Democrats.

Guess they haven't seen him with his flight suit on.

Joyce v Jung

Dickensian or what?

Lost Memo 2

I had this bad dream last night...

Turns out it was real.

Who's in the zoo? Us or him?

Like a little coke snorting monkey.

Just About Right, All About George.

No, it's not 404. Well, then again, maybe we all are. Read carefully.

sick.

I don't know this country's mind any more, let alone its heart.

"They elected a polite David Duke in Louisiana, and someone who doesn't believe gay people should teach school in South Carolina, and a creep in Oklahoma, and somebody who's fairly obviously drifting into the fog in Kentucky. The pretty clearly indictable DeLay tactics in Texas worked like a charm. These are all victories won on grounds on which we cannot compete. When gay marriage trumps dead soldiers in Iraq, how do you run a race without dissolving into fantasy?"

mad.

Fuck You, Bush. You Fucktard.



For the rest of us... some things to read.

Eliminate TV.

Live online where you will find communities of smart people.

David does language. Weinberger/AKMA in 2008.

democrat.com on the fascist motherfuckers in power.

The Rich, Dumb, and Faithful Re-elect Bush: "As Senator John F. Kerry prepared his concession speech Wednesday morning, it became clear that the rich got in bed with the dumb and the faithful to deliver power over every branch of the United States government to a corrupt Republican Party that will do anything, including steal votes and lie, to gain and hold political power."

InterimTom: "Part of the mystery of strongly divided elections is understanding how anyone can vote for the other guy. Part of the reality check USians will face is, how realistic is the rhetoric of healing and union that new-waveian solutions spout with such facility?"

Not. And thank God.

Resist the Borg.

And for every blog pundit online calling for cooperation and civil discourse, an end to disagreements, and a need for pledges among bloggers and citizens to unite us, I say:

BLOW ME!!!!!!

You want a mandate of unbiased blather, go get your journalism degree and write for print, kay?

And while you're at it, take your bastions of morality with you--Bill Adulterer O'Reilly and Rush Drug-Addict Limbaugh. Save a seat at media training camp for George DUI Bush. They could all use a refresher course.

Unite this, you sack of hypocrites.

sad.

Mr. Bush, you are not my president.

I can't wait...