“You must be the change you’d like to see in the world.” – Mahatma Gandhi
via Firda
Category: politics
Breaking my own rule, Reid
Breaking my own rule, Reid over @ PhotoDude wrote a lengthy post that pretty much sums up my thoughts. Well done, indeed.
I would hope that everyone who can goes to their place of worship today. If that’s Starbucks, a Synagogue, a Mosque or Chucky Cheese, it doesn’t matter. Me? I’ll be listening to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints memorial broadcast at noon EST. You’re welcome to come along. It will be uplifting and universal.
In LawverNews, the speech therapist showed up as I was leaving for work this morning. Maybe now we’ll know why Max isn’t talking… I’m sure he has a lot to say.
Nostradamus is still the #1
Nostradamus is still the #1 query. It’s more than doubled the query after it. If you add all the synonyms, it probably has more queries than the rest of the top 10 combined. It boggles the mind.
It’s in the darkest times
To that end, I’m going to try not to say anything more about the current situation. I hope and pray that survivors will be found in both the Pentagon and Trade Centers. I hope and pray that whoever did this is brought to justice and survives to stand trial.
Now is not the time for chest-thumping and vows of revenge. It is time for calm heads and still hands to make sure that rescues are undertaken safely and speedily; that investigations are conducted correctly and effectively; and that everyone try to heal, recover and put things back together as much as possible.
What impressed me most yesterday were the reactions of people. To me, the most impressive public figure yesterday was Mayor Giuliani. In the face of thousands of casualties and horrific damage, he looked steeled, calm and business-like. It was an amazing thing to watch every time they showed him. It was a striking contrast to some of the other inflamed rhetoric shown.
Ok, that’s it. It may be quiet here for a couple days. Good luck and take it easy.
Trade Secrets
This may get me fired, but I don’t care. Do you know what the #1 query on AOL Search is so far today? It’s Nostradamus in a landslide. It’s not Red Cross or World Trade Center. It’s Nostradamus. I constantly find reasons to lose faith in humanity.
There is one comforting fact though, porn queries are still way up there. I guess the libido doesn’t stop for tragedy.
Undone
I am undone. I’ve felt tears well up several times today, yet none come. I am angry. I am sad. I am tired. I want to do something. My brain won’t shut off, and I keep trying to shut it up. I hope I can go to work tomorrow, because I can’t take another day of watching CNN and watching the video anymore.
I looked at my son today, his beautiful face. He’s not even two. He ran around today like nothing was wrong. He babbled and played and was a little pill while the rest of the world was falling apart around my little family. We will continue. The world will slowly return to normal. The pain for the observers, the survivors and the families of the victims will fade over time. Maybe a lot of time. It’ll be OK…. I hope.
It Becomes
Unless you live in a cave, or don’t have a radio in your car, you know that there have now been four apparent terrorist attacks on American soil. I’m listening to KCRW streaming through my headphones, delivering the carnage straight to my ears. Everyone here at AOL is running up to the newsroom to watch it. I can’t. I don’t need to see it to know it’s happening, and I’m sure we’ll see enough as this things becomes clearer, body counts come out and the source of the pain is ferreted out.
I have no idea who is responsible, and I’m trying to keep an open mind. After the Oklahoma City bombing, everyone assumed it was an Muslim extremist. It turned out to be a small group of angry white men who felt their government had let them down.
Now, all the airports in the country have been shut down. They’re evacuating federal buildings, but it worries me that now the roads will be clogged and if anything else happens, emergency personnel and equipment won’t be able to reach the problem areas.
Ok, that’s enough… I have nothing else to say. I want to run home, grab my little family and hide.
This Modern World is brilliant
This Modern World is brilliant today. Bill Clinton was the source of a comedy boom. Bush is single-handedly killing satire, because he is one! The man scares the living crap out of me.
This is the stupidest thing
This is the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. When do comedians have to apologize for their jokes? I think it’s perfectly reasonable to read in a comic strip that Georgie has the lowest IQ of any previous president. That’s funny. It’s scary that it might be true, and he’s not doing anything I can see to make that joke not funny. Why apologize?
I’ve decided that when I retire, I’m going to run for Congress. It may not be a serious bid, but I’m going to do it. I may start small and run for city council or the school board, but I’m running. I hear more and more every day about how corrupted everything’s become by the two-party system, and it just bothers me. My latest point of ire? Redistricting. We don’t pay a lot of attention to it because it happens once a decade, but here’s how it works:
- The census is taken and numbers counted. In the 10 years since the last census people have moved around, and populations shift. This means it’s time to move voting districts and reallocate representatives.
- State legislatures have the responsibility for redistricting, and if you think the national legislature is bad, get a load of your state houses. They’re snake pits of people not bright enough to make it to the national level. They’re the ones who decide how to draw up the lines.
- Whichever party is in power in the house at the time of redistricting gets to draw up the lines. As long as they don’t get too crazy, they can draw them up however they want, giving them advantages over the other party whereever possible.
- There have been several public cases of abuse, mostly in the South and California. If you get caught goofing with the lines too much, it’s called gerrymandering, which is my new favorite word.
Doesn’t that piss you off? Couldn’t the lines be drawn by computer simulation? I’m no genius, but I think I could write that in Tcl over a weekend. I’m tired of everything in government being a vast winged (left or right, take your pick) conspiracy. The work of government should be apolitical for the most part. Legislation I completely understand as being a point of much contention, but the daily work of government and even the courts has become rife with political machinations. It makes me want to become a conspiracy theorist, but I just don’t drink that much coffee…
Vast right-wing conspiracy, redux (from
Vast right-wing conspiracy, redux (from Salon). This is my favorite part about Politics. Everyone gets self-righteous when they’re on the chopping block. The Dems are all pissed off at the Republicans for trying to bring them down now that they’re on top in the Senate. The Republicans are barking about confirmation of appointees being delayed when there were people appointed by Clinton in his FIRST term who were never confirmed. And the funniest part is that the public buys it. They keep crying and whining and expect us to forget about all the other stuff, even RECENT stuff like the impeachment. Unfortunately, not enough people pay attention, and well, it works. Their blustering gets a soundbite, and well, that’s what people remember.
Oh how I long for a dictatorship. One voice is so much easier to listen to than a hundred blowhards and party wonks in their wondrous spin machines. (before anyone e-mails me, I’m just kidding)