Oh, the Terror!

Update: Swine flu has been confirmed within 3 miles of our house. We remain unconcerned. And tired of the media feeding frenzy.

It's the Swine Flu!! And it's right here in southeast Virginia! The terror is palpable:

Virginia officials say they have turned up two confirmed cases of swine flu.

On Thursday night, Gov. Timothy M. Kaine confirmed that two cases of the potentially deadly virus have been found in the state. He said an “adult male in the eastern part of Virginia and an adult female in the central part of Virginia,” who had traveled to Mexico, contracted the illness. [...]

Both individuals had mild illnesses and are recovering well, according to a news release from the Virginia Department of Health. Neither required hospitalization.

OH. MY. GOD. Mild illness and speedy recovery. However will we survive this killer pandemic?

The New York Times has an article regarding Dick Cheney’s ongoing defense of the Bush administration. I find this theory fascinating:

It is the kind of scene that Americans have come to expect from their elder statesmen: a quiet, unassuming return to private life after giving up power. Except, that is, for the quiet and unassuming part.

In the three months since leaving office, Mr. Cheney has upended the old Washington script for former presidents and vice presidents, using a series of interviews — the first just two weeks after leaving office — to kick off one last campaign, not for elective office, but on behalf of his own legacy.

Americans have come to expect a “quiet, unassuming return to private life after giving up power”?? Maybe they expect such a thing of Republicans, but certainly not of Democrats. Say what you will about them, but Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, and Al Gore upended the Times so-called “script” long before Dick Cheney did.

Dispatch from the Party of Tolerance

Yesterday, Laurel made a post on her blog showing Alison at the Virginia Beach Tea Party. No further commentary, just a couple pictures of our seven month old. Less than 24 hours later, a tolerant, generous, loving liberal, who neither of us have ever heard of before and is, to the best of our knowledge, a complete stranger, had left this comment:

Paranoid. Racist. Wildly ignorant. What we saw on display at these Teabagging parties is exactly what ails the Republican party as it attempts to remake its sorry image. It is a political party that is wholly dependent on a slice of voters who don't have a clue about civics, history, or whether they look like raving Christianist jackasses in public.

We already saw that with the mobs attending the McCain/Palin rallies who were eager to share their bigoted, deranged views with anyone carrying a video camera. They are now enshrined on YouTube for Edition 2 of the State of the GOP Base.

Listening to these folks go on and on about taking the country back was absolutely hilarious. Taking the country back? Are you kidding me? Where were you people four years ago when the rest of us were trying to stop George W. Bush from raising taxes on working families to pay for a war we didn't need to be in? Where was the outrage then? Spare me.

Wow, that's a lot of insults in such a short essay. Let's count the love:

Racist

Ignorant (and wildly so)

Paranoid

Clueless

Raving

Christianist (whatever that is)

Jackass

Bigoted

Deranged

Can't you feel the love? Imagine the joy of spending any time with a person bitter, angry, and pompous enough to leave so much bile on a stranger's blog. On a post about a baby. Over politics. Never mind trying to discuss any of her "ideas," because she never offers any. All we know is that she doesn't like Republicans, and thinks that is all she need communicate. What she may actually know about "civics" and "history" we will never know or be able to discuss, for she offers nothing beyond calling us ignorant on the matter.

For anybody interested, this woman's enlightened and important musings can be found here.

We went to the Virginia Beach Tea Party today. Police estimated the attendance at around 700, which is pretty good considering the cold, drizzly weather. Alison even had a special onesy to wear.

Dispatch From the Religion of Peace, Continued

From Russia comes this report, proving that nobody is safe from the RoP:

An Azeri immigrant in Russia's northern city of Saint Petersburg has been charged with hiring hit men to kill his 21-year-old daughter for wearing a mini-skirt, police said today.

The man's arrest follows the detention last week of two other citizens of Azerbaijan, a majority Muslim state in the Caucasus, who confessed to murdering the girl, a university medical student.

“They admitted to being paid 100,000 rubles ($4140) by the girl's father. They said he wanted to punish his daughter for flouting national traditions and wearing a mini-skirt,” a police source told said today.

It’s always amazing to me just how many RoP transgressions are punishable by death.

You know, lots of people are telling us global warming is real, and we all must shiver all winter, swelter all summer, and drive electric rollerskates. You know, if we don't do as we're told, WE'RE ALL GOING TO DIE! (Well, maybe not.) If these same people really believed their own words, don't you think they would be serious about modifying their own behavior? People like Al Gore and Barack Obama? After all, it's a matter of global survival!

When you're the President of the United States, only the best pizza will do - even if that means flying a chef 860 miles.

Chris Sommers, 33, jetted into Washington from St Louis, Missouri, on Thursday with a suitcase of dough, cheese and pans to to prepare food for the Obamas and their staff.

If Barack Obama is entitled to fly a pizza chef almost 900 miles to satisfy his pepperoni jones, maybe it should be okay for me, or you, or the rest of us citizens to drive our SUVs 6 or 7 miles to enjoy our own pie, don'tcha think?

Good question from Gaghdad Bob,:

(I)t's a real mystery why Jews continue to vote Democrat, when the only widespread source of organized anti-Semitism is on the left, whereas the ranks of the right are filled with people such as myself who regard Israel as so self-evidently morally, politically, intellectually, spiritually, and comedically superior to its barbarous and humorless neighbors, that we would not abandon her under any circumstances. It is one of the few sources of light in this dark world.

I really need to spend more time on that blog. He's good.