Life Imitates Art

When I bought my motorcycle last February, I realized I needed to get some new T-shirts to wear while riding. Can't ride around on a Harley wearing "Virginia Wine Festival" shirts, dontcha know. So, amongst others I bought the following shirt just for fun:



Clever and funny, huh? I always thought so. You can imagine my delight, then, when I found this snapshot:



That, my friends, is one-stop shopping.

Well, at least the Democrats are consistent.

Monica Lewinsky's servicing of President Clinton? Not sex.

A man turning his son upside down and inserting his son's wing-wang in his mouth? well, that's not a sex act either.Virginia Senatorial candidate Jim Webb:

"It's not a sexual act," Webb told Plotkin regarding the "Lost Soldiers" excerpt. "I actually saw this happen in a slum in Bangkok when I was there as a journalist."

Oh, I see. Because Mr. Webb witnessed this perversion in Thailand, it's not a sexual act. It's simply a journalistic observation.

Until now, I have been neutral on the Allen-Webb race. But I won't accept oral-genital contact between a man and his son. And I won't allow a Senatoral candidate to shrug it off based on cultural differences. "This is what happens in Thailand" is not an excuse.

Come election day, I will hold my nose and vote for George Allen. Not because of what Jim Webb saw or wrote, but because of his inability to condemn it.

From John Ray comes this delicious link. It seems today's liberals are simply self-contradictory:

Most agree that liberals are the opposite of conservatives, but in many respects, liberals are the opposite of themselves.

This was recently demonstrated, once again, at Columbia University when left-wing students demonstrated their "tolerance" and respect for "free speech" when they stormed the stage and shut down a speech by Minuteman founder Jim Gilchrist.

Defenders of those that disrupted the speech claimed, "The Minutemen are not a legitimate voice in the debate on immigration." Say what? Who gets to decide which voices are "legitimate" in a policy debate? Apparently the liberals that disagree with position of the Minutemen believe they get to decide. So much for free speech.

Liberals love diversity. The more "different" people they can put together the better. Well, as long as those "different" people are all alike - espousing a liberal ideology. Conservatives need not apply to such diverse groups - there isn't any need to be that diverse.

It's true. There isn't a more intolerant group than the self-described tolerant left.

Not just for Klingons anymore...

Next time Wesley Snipes needs to hide from the IRS, he won't have to hide out by shooting a movie in Africa. He can use all those upaid tax dollars to buy his very own cloaking device.

Just like the Klingons use for cloaking their Bird of Prey warships, you can now have your very own cloaking device if these scientists can commercialize their proof of concept.

No news if a Harley will come equipped with the technology.

Phoenix Widow Weekend

I spent all morning playing telephone tag with a low-level government apparatchik up in Richmond. It was so frustrating I decided to take it out on a lunchtime run. Got totally "in the zone." Uphill felt like level ground, level ground felt like downhill, downhill felt like coasting on a bicycle. I ended up going 9 miles in 65 minutes; I could have kept going, but had to go back to the desk. How was your lunch today?

Where Would You Like to Live?

This is a very interesting picture. That's the Korean peninsula at night. Above, the communist North. Below, the free market South. As Donald Rumseld points out, these are the same people, with the same history, and the same natural resources. Yet the South Koreans live a modern, comfortable existence, while the North Koreans live, with the exception of their "Dear Leader," no better than a medieval existence.

How there can be people in this world that continue to advocate socialism and communism over capitalism in the face of this stark reality is entirely beyond me.

I checked out for the day

Suzy died December 30th. January was like a fog, I barely remember it. Then my mother died in February, and that was a blur, too. By April, I was pretty depressed, and had lots of days where I couldn’t get out of bed. Not doing well at all. Towards the end of June, I came to realize the depression could be temporarily overcome if I got out and did something.

So, boy did I do stuff. For over three months, I packed something into every spare minute. A bago here, a bago there, trip to NY, baseball games, an air show, motorcycle rides, running, charity events, work socials, cookouts, geocaching, retail therapy, long phone calls, target practice, visits from friends, visits to friends. All of it sandwiched around an ongoing series of stressful deadlines at work, and all designed to keep me out ahead of the depression and pain. And for the most part, it worked pretty darn well.

Today, though, I ran out of gas. I was simply too tired to face work. Exhausted is probably a better description than tired. So I called in sick and did absolutey nothing all day. I take that back. I did one thing. I sat quietly and read. And I felt pretty good about it all, and fairly relaxed. Maybe the depression isn’t as close behind me as I thought. Maybe I can slow down a little bit and take things at a more gentle pace. After my trip to Phoenix in a couple weeks, I guess.

Let's. Get. Serious.

I mean it. I am tired of diversions. It's time to throw down and handle serious issues. Forget Mark Foley. Screw the Republicans, fuck the Democrats. I am tired of all their candy-ass "issues."

It's time to engage. It's time to join the debate. It's time to decide: Who's better? The Go Gos or The Bangles

The Republican Controlled Glass House

Capitol Hill and the country was obsessed this week with the Mark Foley page boy scandal.

Like this author and this one I'm fascinated by the double standard. But I'm fascinated for a slightly different reason.

I find it curious the Democrats are saying that the Republicans failed to protect the pages.

I agree that the Republicans failed to protect the pages, and they tote themselves as the "party of moral values", so this is doubly bad.

However the Democrats failed to protect the pages back during the Gerry Studds scandal, who received standing ovations during his censuring before the house.

Not only are the Democrats basically admitting they failed in the same way, the Democrats have never shown any remorse for applauding Gerry Studds, man who didn't just try to seduce the pages with missives, but actually got at least one of them drunk in order to get him in bed. That seduction strategy is often called "date rape" in court nowadays especially when it is between a workplace superior and subordinate.

Now that a similar events creeps out of the closet across the aisle, it's a huge, perhaps criminal, failure according to the Dems.

The Donkeys are playing both sides of the fence. They can right now and they have probably just succeeded in securing both houses in November with this October surprise. But I wonder if they will regret it.

There's an old saying that people who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones, and I think a Mount Rushmore sized boulder just crashed through the Capitol Rotunda.

Time will tell, but I personally think both parties are about to have a massive eruption of outing of both straight and gay congressmen and women having extra-marital affairs with the teenagers and young adults of Washington, D.C.

As they say, power corrupts absolutely...

Zell Miller:

For it has been said so truthfully that it is the soldier, not the reporter, who has given us the freedom of the press. It is the soldier, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech. It is the soldier, not the agitator, who has given us the freedom to protest. It is the soldier who salutes the flag, serves beneath the flag, whose coffin is draped by the flag, who gives that protester the freedom to abuse and burn that flag.

Today's New York Times website features seven letters purporting to put the Mark Foley scandal in perspective. If brains were dynamite, these people couldn't blow their noses. The amazing thing is that each either makes a point so obvious it is stupefying, or is completely incomprehensible. Among the former, here are some purely pedestrian observations:

We must remember that pedophiles are not necessarily gay, nor are all alcoholics gay. They can be straight, too.
Well, duh-huh? Do ya think?

Also, it is important to remember that being gay and being in the government should be no different from being straight in the government.
Wait a minute, I thought being gay was a lifestyle, a culture, an identity. Wouldn't being gay in government be different than being straight by definition?

Mark Foley, a congressman, had a certain amount of power, and many of the pages were responding to that power.
One wonders if the author of that priceless analysis noticed any power differential between the President and 20-something girl a few years ago. I imagine not.

The real good stuff, though, is evident when the author believes he or she has made some inciteful analysis, but the prose is so twisted and florid that the idea behind it becomes completely obscured:

If so, then Mr. Brooks is asking for the ostensible rectitude of propaganda.
Oh-Kay! I am sure that will come as a surprise to Mr. Brooks.

Do we expect the same reactions to “The Sopranos” and real-life criminality, or to “Where the Wild Things Are” and real childhood horrors?
Brilliant! Just brilliant analysis I tell you. And I don't even want to talk about how much "A Wrinkle in Time" scared me in elementary school.

The risk is that deception becomes normalized, artifice takes the place of reality, and the ability to discern legitimacy is compromised.
Ya know, I have always said that exact same thing. That risk is fucking huge. I started to normalize deception several years ago, but managed to catch myself before compromising my legitimacy discerning skills. Close call for me, but now I am so careful to keep my artifice away from my reality.

Economy Soars, Democrats Whine

What must it be like to live a life in which you must make good things into bad things? Ask Nancy Pelosi:

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Friday criticized Republicans for being optimistic about the Labor Department's September jobs report showing an increase in jobs, a jump in average hourly income and a decrease in unemployment.

More jobs, higher incomes, low unemployment, and Nancy Pelosi is critical? Unfortunately, the Democrats, in blaming the Republicans in general and George Bush in particular for everything that goes wrong in America have positioned themselves so that they cannot acknowledge when anything, anything, goes right.

"President Bush and Republicans continue to claim that the economy is on the right track," Pelosi said in a news release. "This once again demonstrates how out of touch Republicans are, because the U.S. economy is not delivering for middle-class families."

What an awful, ugly platform upon which to stand.

I didn't write this, but I found it poignant.

The first time I kissed another I was happy and yet I cried
The first time I held another I was overcome with joy and yet I cried
When I began to realize I might be able to let someone new in I was filled with hope and yet again I cried.
When I realized I could go on and live again I was surprised, and it was another time I cried.
The tears are not of regret, they are of finality.
The tears are not of what is, but of what was lost.
The tears are not of fear of the future, they are of memories of the past.
The tears do not take me backwards rather forward in this journey I never asked to take.
The tears are like a shower they help to cleanse the pain.
The tears are not to make me remember they are here so I never forget.
It is the memories of what I had that make me who I am.
It is the pain I have felt that changed me and I think even make me a better man
So when I take another new step I hope a new tear falls
Just so I remember how I got to where and who I am

Another Newly Minted Widow?

I am so damaged, this is how I perceive the world, 24-7. Yesterday, I was riding my motorcycle along Shore Drive in Virginia Beach, and an ambulance passed me going the other direction in full emergency mode. A couple miles ahead, I passed this scene:

The second fatal wreck of the day occurred Sunday afternoon, when a car hit a motorcycle on Shore Drive.

The motorcycle rider, identified as Jerald Patrick Jones, 43, of the 5600 block of Aragon Drive, died while being taken to Sentara Virginia Beach General Hospital, Ball said.

My first reaction to this news? I feel so sorry for that man's widow, because she has just been thrown into the maw of a hell she had no idea existed!