At a press conference this morning, Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) compared lack of enforcement of trade agreements by the U.S. to "coming to a wife swapping party and being the only one who brought your wife."
On an unrelated note, Lifesaver Pastels Jellybeans are the most vile thing ever. Ever.
The Washington Post is running a three part series on Red and Blue America. The first article lays out the basic argument that America is becoming increasingly politically segregated. The second is a slice of life in Red America in Sugar Land, Texas, Tom Delay's home district. It's about a man who drinks Bud Light at Hooters, grills cheeseburgers on his gas grill, and goes to church every Sunday. He be a nice guy, but my immediate reaction is that he's a moron who is out of touch with the realities of this country.
The increasing vitriol is evident in this article and my reaction to it, as well as the protest yesterday. Explanations for this growing scism vary, and will be the basis for a lot of political science classes in the next 50 years (provided that the republicans don't destroy higher ed).
One of the fundamental arguments is that we choose to live among the like minded, which has further entrenched our own beliefs, whatever they may be. The anger directed both generally at the President, and specifically at the anti-choice protestors (and at us by them), demonstrates a declining willingness to compromise and find those issues on which there is agreement.
Tomorrow's piece will be about Nancy Pelosi's home district in San Francisco. I’m sure I’ll be full of warm fuzzies and want to move there.
What a long weekend. Oy. The party rocked, the March was pimp-ass, and to top it off, i just got back from Reston, VA after seeing MJPR. I'll have pictures from the March at some point, and a longer comment too, but since I have to go to work tomorrow, I'm going to bed.
But before I do, I thought I'd quote the White House statement on the March:
The President believes we should work to build a culture of life in America and regardless of where one stands on the issue of abortion, we can all work together to reduce the number of abortions through promotion of abstinence-education programs, support for parental-notification laws and continued support for banning partial-birth abortion.
Fucker.
I had been planning to make chocolate for my super-awesome Party for Choice. But the heat and the humidity of recent days have made that plan untenable. She's a fickle mistress, chocolate. Oh well, the quesadillas and pizzas and gyoza should do the job. That and the beer.
If you are in Washington on Saturday night, you should come to this party. It's going to rock. And not just because of the aforementioned food and beer. The food and beer will be largely responsible for the rockingness, though.
Directions from the Metro are here.
Yesterday I was reviewing the newest Washington Post-ABC News Poll. There is lots of bad news for Kerry, though it remains far too soon to consider this data valuable. I wandered around the office noting my favorite piece of data from the poll, the response to this question:
"Overall do you think George W. Bush has done more to unite the country, or has done more to divide the country?"
50% say unite, 48% say divide. Good stuff. Unfortunately, Andrew Sullivan has beaten me to the blog. Bastard.
Listening to Morning Edition before work today, I heard a story on the growing popularity of prenatal ultrasound portraits. The FDA has issued a warning that the use of ultrasounds for non-medical use is both inappropriate and potentially harmful to fetal development.
Parents (and the one they had on the show sounded like the kind of idiots who would pay for this crap) are taking these "portraits" of their unborn children, I suppose for the scrapbook. One proprietor of such an establishment, when asked about the potential health risks to the fetus responded, "it's still safer than an abortion."
To translate, "I waste medical technology, and my behavior is indefensible, so I have to blather some right-wing crap on an unrelated topic."
Kind of like when the President brings up gay marriage when we're interested in the location of those WMD.
So Jim Cantalupo, the CEO of McDonald's, died of a heart attack today. I don't mean to make light of this man's death, but this is kind of like rain on your wedding day, don’t you think?
In a related story, Mayor McCheese lowered all McDonald land flags to half-mast, and the Hamburglar agreed to take a hiatus from his thieving ways. When asked what Cantalupo meant to him, the Hamburglar, between sobs, replied simply "robble."
Last night, I was flipping around while watching the Timberwolves game, and came across an awesome show: Animal Face-Off. They make biomechanical versions of animals and have them fight. Last night was Walrus vs. Polar Bear.
I initially thought the walrus would have no shot. Sure, it has badass tusks, but they are a goofy looking animal. But the walrus is about twice as heavy as the polar bear. I missed the conclusion (because I was held rapt by a far more momentous battle: Nugget vs. Timberwolf), but will have to catch it in rerun.
Brilliant show concept. The season finale is a must-see: Collosal Squid (how cool does that sound?) vs. Sperm Whale. Make your own inappropriate jokes.
Arriving home, I sought to partake in the great American tradition of a cold beer after work. I might have even tried to catch a baseball game. As I reached into the fridge and grabbed hold of some Belgian concoction, the bottle exploded in my hands.
Beer everywhere.
Making matters worse (than just not having any beer), the beer was was a 25.7 oz bottle, distributing its beer-y goodness all over the fridge. And it cut my hand to boot. Dammit.
I was reading a Salon(which has declined recently) article on John Kerry: The Video Game, when I came across a turn of phrase that brilliantly captures what I hope will be Bush's downfall in this election:
As Iraq teeters once more on the brink, his [Kerry's] opposite offers little more than the leadership of smirks.
I would have thought Maureen Dowd or perhaps E.J. Dionne would have come up with something this good, but I guess not.
Second, (as cited in Howard Kurtz's Media Notes), Michael Tomasky (The American Prospect's Executive Editor) writes in his weekly online column:
We saw the usual mental confusion and frighteningly long pauses as his mind scoured its grim landscape for an appropriate word.
In reading both of these pieces, specific images of the President stumbling for words, or smirking smugly immediately spring to mind. That's good writing.
Oh, and finally Sen. Kerry provides his vision for leadership in Iraq in a decent piece in today's Post.
Off to go watch Ashcroft testify. I hope it isn't too hot.
My server has been down most of last week, which prevented some postings. It's working (though who knows for how long) now, so I'll probably be backblogging later this week.
Oh, and kudos to the Gophers' Women's Basketball team. Their impressive run in the tournament (and Lindsay Whalen's career) came to an end, but it was a lot of fun to watch. Though I probably wouldn't have refered to the run as either a "karmic joyride" or "jubilant jaunt" as the Strib did in the first two paragraphs. Nonetheless, I enjoyed it greatly. And this from someone who has in the past referred to women's basketball as insipid.
I spent much of this weekend in the kitchen. Because I'm on jury duty, I'll have more opportunties ot cook next week too, which is good since it's passover. On Saturday I spent about 5 hours making a vegetable stock from scratch. It takes quite a while, and I'm not convinced that the finished product is worth the effort, but there is something soothing about the processs. It is a bit challenging, in part because of the temporal investment. After spending three hours, I really didn't want to fuck it up.
I used the finished product to make a sauce for stuffed turkey cutlets. Served with mashed potatoes and green beans...tasty. Next week: lots of kosher meals. Matzo ball soup...yum.
I've been thinking in the list form recently. The two lists I've come up with are:
Random observations from jury duty
chabel.net sleeps all day
