Rook's Rant

My mother called me just a few moments ago. She had the voice. You know the voice. The one that has a tone suggesting bad news. Yet she was not especially distraught. Anyway, my father was transported to Abbott Northwestern Hospital last night. It seems he was not getting enough oxygen to his heart.

My father has had many surgeries, and many emergency visits to the hospitals. So, I can understand my mother's lack of fear. Oh, I am sure she is worried. But my father has proven to be tough - he has survived worse. He put up with me.

Oh, okay. That is not necessarily worse.

Anyway, guess I will be making a trip to the Twin Cities today. 

Incredible! A reporter actually challenging a liar! It is a thing of beauty.



And even more amazing? It's from a Fox affiliate! He must not be drinking the Kool Aid.

There is quite a bit of discussion on the Obama's Justice Department's appeal of Judge Virginia Phillips's ruling on DADT (did I avoid the massive double negatives that usually occurs with this issue?). I completely understand why the move was done. I would write it again, but let me instead copy and past from one of my comments over at "The Same Rowdy Crowd."

Wish I could agree with you. But one of the responsibilities of the Administration, and the Justice Department, is to uphold the rule of law. We saw what happened to our country when George Bush was in office; much of the damage done was by his failing to uphold laws. Whether or not you agree with a law is immaterial, as President of the United States he does not get to pick and choose which laws to uphold, he is required to uphold them all. His statement that he wants it repealed is not only legitimate, but it is the correct way to go about righting the travesty that is DADT.

The second greatest failure of the Bush Administration was it's failure to uphold the laws of the land. As a result, we have seen our nation's food supply poisoned, witnessed what appears to be one of the greatest systemic frauds (mortgage paperwork? We don't need no stink'n paperwork!) in the history of our country, and have watched as we marched to war, all because of a failure to follow the rule of law.

Bitch all you want about the move to appeal Judge Virginia Phillips's ruling - President Obama is doing his job. Had President George W. Bush also upheld the rule of law, we would never have invaded Iraq.

Just a quick technical note: Upgraded MT for a bug fix. Not that my site appeared buggy, but it was available, and I had time. And it went off without a hitch. Shiny!

Because it is just sooooo damn funny:

This speaks for itself:

So, Michael Steele has come out and blatantly called Obama's economic policy a failure. Never mind that it is the Republican party's purposeful obstruction that has prevented a more meaningful and powerful financial stimulus package from being crafted. Never mind, as the preceding graph shows, it was 6 years of George W. Bush's economic policies that created the mess we are in, and that under Barack Obama we are slowly, very slowly, crawling out from that mess.

Damn, there goes my blogrolls. One of the more irritating developments for blogging over the years is the lack of an intuitive, easily understood mechanism for managing blogrolls. I am an intelligent man, and have taught myself some basic, low level html coding. I can insert other codes into my blog templates, and for the most part can manage the simple stuff in Movable Type.

But when it comes to managing blogrolls, I relied on BlogRolling because it seemed none of the people smarter and more educated about Movable Type were interested in developing a blogrolling widget or plugin. I understand that BlogRolling wanted to make money, but that few of the people actually paid for their service. I kept meaning to, but I was financially strapped, some months not making the rent.

So, here I am, now stuck with losing my blogrolls, with no easy means of saving them (blogrolling never created an export feature so that you could create a text file of the links), and not wishing to spend hours copying and pasting one link at a time, I am stuck with eventually learning to create a means of managing and developing new rolls.

Crap.

See what I mean about being in a basket?

Well, despite this being my day off, I found myself awake at 5:30 AM. So, I have been up and reading through my blogs, made moves in my correspondence chess games through GameKnot, and am enjoying a nice, strong cup of coffee - sans cream and sugar, thank-you-very-much.

As I read my blogs I learned the world is once again going to hell in a hand basket, something that has been going on for about 50 millennia or so and has been happening as long as the modern human race has existed. So, I think I will take a pass on freaking out about the end of the world and enjoy what today has to offer.

So, what is in your basket today? You know, since it is going to hell.

Or, as Atrios is fond of saying (though about the stock market) Wheeeeeeeeeee!

By Kevin G. Hall | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON -- U.S. employers shed more jobs in September than had been expected, according to two closely watched surveys, released Wednesday, that cast a shadow over the government's official September jobs report, which is due Friday.

This is without a doubt the worst economic downturn of my generation.

And no, I am not related to Kevin.

I do not understand. What is it with the Republican conservative movement's inability to work and play well with others? Are they that rigidly locked into a literal, concrete form of thinking that they can not tolerate any deviation from their societal comfort zone? Is their fear of change so overwhelming that they lose all sense of respect and decorum? Are they truly suffering from a belief in their inability to deal with natural change?

In the end, all I see are cowards unable to accept human society as it has always been: an evolving, changing system of concepts, theories, and expectations that are fluid and ephemeral; defying the understanding of the very makers of the systems, leaving them utterly overwhelmed and unable to recognize there is no answer to the question 'Why?"

Yes, it is my birthday today. I would prefer cash to gifts. Unless the gift is the winning lottery numbers.

Oh, wait......

And as to how old? Old enough to know better than to tell you my age.

Via mistermix at Balloon Juice:

Glenn Beck's inability to get more than 700 people in an auditorium that seats 8,000 is just one indicator that he's more of a media phenomenon than a real one. With two million or so viewers, Beck is the second most-watched show on cable news, but that's like being number two in the tallest midget contest. He has less than half the viewership of SpongeBob SquarePants, and the top-rated cable show (the Saints/49ers game), had seven times as many people watching. Compared to broadcast TV, even the 25th-ranked show last week (Undercover Boss) had 6 times the viewership (10 million more people) than Beck's most-watched broadcast.

I wonder if Shakespeare was clairvoyant: it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing.

(NYT) With insurgents increasingly attacking the American fuel supply convoys that lumber across the Khyber Pass into Afghanistan, the military is pushing aggressively to develop, test and deploy renewable energy to decrease its need to transport fossil fuels.

Last week, a Marine company from California arrived in the rugged outback of Helmand Province bearing novel equipment: portable solar panels that fold up into boxes; energy-conserving lights; solar tent shields that provide shade and electricity; solar chargers for computers and communications equipment.

The 150 Marines of Company I, Third Battalion, Fifth Marines, will be the first to take renewable technology into a battle zone, where the new equipment will replace diesel and kerosene-based fuels that would ordinarily generate power to run their encampment.

Even as Congress has struggled unsuccessfully to pass an energy bill and many states have put renewable energy on hold because of the recession, the military this year has pushed rapidly forward. After a decade of waging wars in remote corners of the globe where fuel is not readily available, senior commanders have come to see overdependence[sic] on fossil fuel as a big liability, and renewable technologies -- which have become more reliable and less expensive over the past few years -- as providing a potential answer. These new types of renewable energy now account for only a small percentage of the power used by the armed forces, but military leaders plan to rapidly expand their use over the next decade.

Once the Military embraces alternative energy, so to will the rest of the nation. Many of our modern conveniences come to us by way of military research and development. Or by way of NASA, which is only a thin step away from the military.

The overly large concept of global warming may not entice people to go green, but when you can show simple, understandable, and concrete benefits of alternative energy, it will start to become more acceptable for the general population to move away from fossil fuels.

Hat Tip: Bark Bark Woof Woof

(NYT) What would happen in the many communities now allowing medical marijuana had been a subject of much hand-wringing. But few predicted this: that it would be a boon for local newspapers looking for ways to cope with the effects of the recession and the flight of advertising -- especially classified listings -- to Web sites like Craigslist

But in states like Colorado, California and Montana where use of the drug for health purposes is legal, newspapers -- particularly alternative weeklies -- have rushed to woo marijuana providers. Many of these enterprises are flush with cash and eager to get the word out about their fledgling businesses.

"Medical marijuana has been a revenue blessing over and above what we anticipated," said John Weiss, the founder and publisher of The Independent, a free weekly. "This wasn't in our marketing plan a year ago, and now it is about 10 percent of our paper's revenue."

Marijuana will become legal. Once people start making money in a conventional manner - and advertising is as conventional as it gets - others will want in on the profits.

I have surprised a few people over the years with the statement that marijuana should be legal. They are shocked to hear a substance abuse counselor make that claim. But we spend way too much money fighting a losing battle, just like we did when prohibition was in place.

Nor will legalizing marijuana increase my business. I do not believe the rates of marijuana addiction will go up. One, I do not recall any increase in the rates of alcoholism after prohibition was repealed, so I suspect the same of marijuana. Second; marijuana is pretty well established as a cultural norm - along the lines of under age drinking - in this country.

In any case, and on a personal note, illegal or legal, I will not be using marijuana. I had my fun with it years ago, and paid a hefty price. I have no desire to repeat that process.

Hat Tip: Anne Laurie at Balloon Juice

Like Mustang Bobby over at Bark Bark Woof Woof, I figured Walt Disney would not allow this to remain on YouTube. Yet still it remains. So, I guess I too will post the video. Enjoy.

They spill their hurt. They spill their rage. They talk about rapes. They talk about beatings. They talk about all the loss, all the disappointments, all the pain. And I sit there, showing only empathy. Then I watch a movie, and how one man helps another heal himself, and I cry, like I dare not cry in group.

It is just a damn, movie. But it is a damn good movie. 

And; yes, I have wireless internet.

Yeah, yeah. I know. It has been like forever since last I graced this blog of mine with a post. Well, life has been hectic, what with the final stage of my break-up with The Ex-GirlFriend^TM finally coming to a close. I am now the proud renter of an efficiency apartment outside of Hastings. However, I am not alone. Currently I have two cats in the apartment with me; Quiz and Cinnamon. Of course, they do not get alone at all, which is not a good thing, what with my apartment being no bigger than your average cheap motel room.

Thankfully, that is the only thing my apartment shares with a cheap motel. But more on my living arrangements later. I just wanted to quick spin out a post before finishing breakfast and heading to work. Hopefully, with my life settling into a new phase, I might find it in me to resume a more steady pace of blogging.

Yeah, yeah. I know. You have all heard that before...........

Why make this type of claim? I get the impression he was lead to believe some deal would be struck. If I had to guess, I would say Mr. Preacher Man has found himself over his head and is desperate for a way out of the spotlight. In any case, he really is a jackass.

Wow, another 6 legs done. I really have been lagging on the posts. Because of the amount, stats below the fold.

But not for being a sexist.

Alan Simpson's comment is not in the least bit sexist. But it is derogatory, insulting the majority of American's that have worked hard to support a family.

My father, who is probably one of the hardest working persons I have ever had the privilege know, worked a full-time job at an oil refinery (now Flint Hills Resources, but then simply known as Koch Refinery) while also working an 80 acre farm, mostly by himself. If you have ever known anyone that worked an oil refinery, they often are working 12 to 16 hour days during turn-a-rounds, which could last for weeks. He did this for 4 or 5 years back in the 1970s. All the money he earned was taxed, some of which was paid into Social Security. Meanwhile, my mother, who was taking care of me and my three siblings while dad was either in the fields or at the refinery, was also working part-time as a waitress. Some of her earnings likewise was paid into Social Security. At the end of the 70s, and through the 80s, my parents then ran a restaurant, which in and of itself is almost four full-time jobs. They once again paid into Social Security.

Today, they are enjoying the twilight of their years on the measly benefits that they more than earned. Over the last 30 years, working as a waitress nearly broke my mother's back. My father has had several heart attacks because of the physical demands his work put on his body. And what does Alan Simpson do? He implies they are ne'er-do-wells living off the government's teats.

While many on the right seem content to call Social Security recipients lazy, unproductive members of society, I have the belief that most of them are hard working fathers and mothers who struggled to put food on the table for their family and, having reached the twilight of their years, are simply reaping the benefit of having worked hard and paid Social Security taxes.

You see, not only did I witness my parents work hard, I also witnessed the parents of my friends, the neighbors in my town, and my co-workers struggle to put food on the table and keep a roof over their heads, all the while paying Social Security taxes. So, it is unconscionable for Alan Simpson to claim that over 300 million American's are lazy, unproductive members of society. For that he deserves to be fired.

Man, here is an old flash video that popped into my head today.

It is about time he stepped up and defended the Constitution! Religious freedom means just that. And if the construction permits are all admissible under New York law, then the freedom hating right can just shut the hell up.

Seriously, they do not care about the Constitution, they just care about getting their way, regardless of that pesky concept "the rule of law." But, that has been the way of the freedom hating right since its first taste of power under Reagan; they blather on about being freedom loving, but when it comes time to stand up for those very freedoms, they cower in fear and weakness.

Sadly, the current actions of the freedom hating right are not about any principled stance - they are about being frightened of other ideas, other beliefs. They must suspect their beliefs and ideas are flawed and unable to stand up to scrutiny in the light of day. Otherwise, why tear at their hair and clutch their pearls, screaming inanely about the threats to their way of life. Such weakness. If their way of life was so wonderful, so capable of dealing with the misery and hardships of existence, then they would have no concern about Islam, for it is hardly more powerful then existence.

Their faith is weak, that is why they need to attack other faiths. And it is not that Christianity or Islam, or any other religion is the right way, or wrong way. No. It is simply a matter of how strong your faith is in your beliefs and values, and your ability to live by those beliefs. If they work, then good. If they do not, blaming other belief systems does not change the failure of your own beliefs. Indeed, blaming does nothing more than clearly show failure.

Because the geeks on the Discovery Channel can't have all the fun:

Bill in Portland Maine compiled a very useful list of myths --- and links that bust them. Suitable for bookmarking:

> Tea Party'ers are not more likely to have racist tendencies than other conservatives.
(Except they are.)

> Democrats are scheming to hit 94 percent of small business owners with tax increases.
(Except they aren't.)

> Bloody violence is out of control along the Mexican border, and illegal immigrants are streaming into America at record levels.
(Except it's not and they're not.)

> Obamacare will send Medicare spiraling out of control.
(Except it won't.)

> Marriage is a religious union that's all about procreation.
(Except it isn't.)

> Voters say cutting the deficit is more important than creating jobs.
(Except they don't.)

> Social Security is going broke, it adds to the deficit, and we have to raise the retirement age because people are living longer.
(Except it's not, it doesn't and we don't.)

> The earth is getting cooler.
(Except it's really really not.)

Now, at this point I am suppose to hat tip a blog for giving me this information, but I have seen it at so many of them today it is just not worth it. I will, though, give credit to "They gave us a republic......" because that is the blog I copied and pasted the above from.