Bush tells residents of New Orleans: Learn to swim

Drawing heavily from his knowledge of submerged civilizations, President Bush today informed the residents of the New Orleans Sea that they would need to "learn how to swim." Standing on the bow of a supertanker, Bush yelled down through his bullhorn that, like Kevin Costner in that "really wet Waterworld," New Orleans Sea dwellers would be expected to grow gills and breathe underwater. Bush immediately curtailed the use of federal funds to use stem cells to create underwater-breathing people.

"Self-determination is what makes this country great," Bush orated from on high. "I understand your pain and your loss, which is why the fight against terror must continue," the President exclaimed, in a rambling four-hour speech that covered topics as diverse as the Iraq war, space exploration, and the new giant-sized M&Ms. Bush promised to give each family who lost a relative in the flood one giant M&M, "just like in that funny commercial, you know, where the guy throws the big M&M up in the air and it hits him in the head and he falls down - that's funny." A spokesman for the Mars Candy Company, which makes M&Ms, quickly issued a press release indicating that, in fact, the M&M featured in the commercial was exagerated, and in fact the company does not make M&Ms that large. The price of M&Ms surged upward later as reports of troop movements near that M&M factory were confirmed by the Pentagon.

Bush cut short his six-month vacation to his ranch in Crawford, Texas, where he had been mercilessly harrased by "that woman whose boy up and got hisself kilt," as Bush described her. Bush noted he did not understand why the woman was so mad at him. "I say, if he chose to wear a kilt, which we all know is what those gay French boys wear now days, then the problem is with a mother who didn't raise her boy right," said Bush.

At a rally outside the new Walmart Marina, a Bush spokesman said from her dingy that rumors of dry land were just that - rumors. She was subsequently killed after announcing the President's plan to come by the marina later to distribute bottles of water.

Hard times for terrorists

Just when I was starting to feel like I could be concerned about the homeless problem in this county, I learn that the smelly beggars are actually al Qaeda posers scoping out their next target. Now, generally, I'm not one to take serious most of the Dept. of Homeland Security "warnings," namely because I have never bothered to learn the color-to-threat conversion table (much like I never learned metric conversion - on the other hand, neither did NASA).

In any event, I can get behind this one. At last, I have an excuse to not give the homeless my spare change (which I don't do already, but I have to lie about why - "Sorry, I don't have any change," or sometimes just "sorry."). Now, whenever a shivering, dirty, hungry old woman asks me for change, I can respond in a strong, confident voice, "United We Stand!" before pushing her under an onrushing MAX car and chortling, in the words of Chief Wiggum, "Where's your messiah now, Flanders?"

Alternatively, maybe we can deport them to Venezuela, where, apparently, Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez is inviting Islamic Terrorists to spend their next terror training session in his lovely South American paradise. (Okay, there is no direct evidence of this, but come on - Pat Robertson has a direct line to God, PLUS his own TV show! I can' t argue with credentials like that).

Maybe the next time a homeless al Qaeda terrorist asks me for a quarter, I'll just point to the sky and screech, like Donald Sutherland at the end of the 1978 remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PC NCAA FUBAR

Prince Charles apparently considers political correctness as a form of intellecual communism (a term I thought I had invented - silly me). If the Prince is right (and who am I to argue with the Crown), then the new PC Politburo is the National Collegiate Athletic Association's (NCAA's) Executive Committee.

That committee recently approved a report by the Minority Opportunities and Interests Committee (MOIC) and the Executive Committee Subcommittee on Gender and Diversity Issues that criticizes colleges and universities who use Native American nicknames and/or mascots. (You can read the full report here).

The report identifies schools with such mascots, and puts them into three categories - those who, upon inquiry from the NCAA, dumped there nicknames/logos, those who allege a close relationship with Native Americans, and those who said "go to hell." (Let's hear it for the Fighting Sioux of the University of North Dakota!!).

The report approves of the use of the name "Braves" by the University of North Carolina-Pembroke because it 21% of its 5,027 students are Native American and 24% are African-American, and because it has Native Americans on its board of trustees. This is like saying it's okay for African-Americans to use the word "nigger" because they're black. (Bill Cosby - quite rightly - thinks otherwise).

Everybody else, however, must be punished. The report notes that:

"the staff received several written responses from numerous Native American
organizations, tribes, interest groups, and individuals stating their opposition
to the use of Native American culture in their athletics programs.
Although several of these institutions have reached out to Native Americans in
their local communities, several Native Americans in and outside of those
communities are opposed to the use of Native American culture in intercollegiate
athletics. "

However, NCAA President Myles Brand acknowledges that, at least insofar as Florida State University (Seminoles) is concerned, the Seminole Indian Tribe of Florida supports FSU's use of the nickname and imagery. In an August 11, 2005 press release, Brand says:

"To be fair, some American Indian tribes have expressed their approval of the
manner in which their names and imagery are used by specific institutions.
Florida State University is a well-documented case in point, and that will
likely be the basis for any appeal. The Executive Committee must take such
claims seriously."

Well, if the FSU case is "well-documented," why is there no mention of it in the report? (FSU, for its part, intends to sue). It seems that the report's authors were selective in their analysis in an attempt to justify their conclusions. In short, they cheated. I'm pretty sure the NCAA does not condone cheating.

The report recommended that schools with "hostile or abusive racial/ethnic/national origin macots, nicknames or imagery" be prohibited from hosting NCAA national championship events, or displaying their macots, nicnames or imagery at NCAA national championship events.

The report suggested schools follow the examples of the Universities of Wisconsin and Iowa, who do not schedule non-conference games with other schools who use such macots, etc., and to remove such references from NCAA member publications.

(As an aside, this is, admittedly, less dumb than some univeristy's ban on the Trojan guy from USC brandishing his sword while galloping around the stadium on Charger because of the school's no-tolerance policy for weapons - or so I recall).

Here's the sticky part (aside from the non-sensical, biased, intellectually dishonest analysis contained in the report) - what constitutes "hostile or abusive"? The report does not provide a definition. Hotile or abuse to whom? What about Notre Dame? "The Fighting Irish" and their little drunken, brawling leprechaun mascot? Here is my short list of other possible offensive nicknames and their schools (who are also not on the list) and who they might offend:

Appalachain State Mountaineers (rural, mountain folk);
Arizona State Sun Devils (religious folk);
Central Arkansas Sugar Bears (women; men's teams are called Bears);
Earlham Hustlin' Quakers (Quakers and anti-gambling oatmeal lovers);
DePaul Blue Demons (religious folk and demons who are blue);
Furman University Paladins (French surrender monkeys);
Hawaii Rainbow Warriors (Gays, Hawaiians);
Hawaii-Hilo Vulcans (Vulcans, e.g. Mr. Spock);
Hofstra Flying Dutchmen (Dutch and drug addicts);
Idaho Vandals (criminals, law enforcement types);
Illinois College Blue Boys (boys?);
Iona Gaels (Scottish);
Jamestown Jimmies (anybody named Jim)

Etc, etc. This could take all day.

In any event, for all the hullaballoo, these changes don't affect the one sport where such mascots, icons, etc. take center stage - college football. You see, the NCAA doesn't sponsor a college football championship. The bowl games are independentl entities, and the FNC (fictional national champion) is now "decided" by the BCS bowl series, which is also independent of the NCAA.

Here's an additional interesting tidbit - and proof positive that the NCAA was looking at a pre-determined outcome here: As I noted above, NCAA President Myles Brand pointed out that Florida State University has a "well documented" situtation wherein the Florida Seminole Indian Tribe supports FSU's use of the nickname "Seminoles." As I also noted, this is not in the NCAA's report - rather, Brand suggests that FSU must now appeal - in effect saying, you can appeal based on information we ignored, and we will take you serious. Oh really. The Florida Seminole Indian Tribe approved the use of Seminoles back in June, months before the NCAA draft policy (dated in July). Why wasn't it taken seriously the first time around?

I feel compelled to make this point because of its Orwellian aspect - namely the blatent disregard for the truth in order to achieve a "politically correct" result. (See, e.g., NARAL's discontinued ad campaign against John Roberts). In any event, college football season kicks off here shortly. I, personally, now hope to see my beloved Oregon Duck sporting war paint and wearing a headdress. (Hey, does anybody remember the "Tommy-hawks" from the mid-90's, where when Oregon kicker Tommy Thompson took the field, people would hold yellow foam hatchets (sold by the UO) and make a chopping motion? Don't recall any protests then. Darn).

I survived the "Pledge" - you will too.

Seems another crackpot tried to sue a school district to stop them from starting the school day with a recitiation of the "Pledge of Allegiance." He lost.

When I attended school, we started with the Pledge. It included the words "under God." Yet, somehow, I turned out okay (i.e., I have yet to "thump" a Bible). Honestly, I never gave it any thought. I certainly never thought I was being somehow indoctrinated or preached to.

Here's an idea - if you don't like the Pledge's reference to God, you have the freedom to explain to your kids why they shouldn't take that line to heart. Better yet, maybe explain to them why it's there and examine the tension between the Establishment Clause and government's pervasive references to God.

In the marketplace of ideas, suppresion of ideas, any ideas, regardless of their perceived offensive nature, is another form of intellectual communism. Basically, only stupid people try to stifle expression with which they disagree, because to challenge or question or counter that expression with more thoughtful counter-expression is, well, just too much work. And as Homer Simpson says - "If something is too hard to do, then it's not worth doing."

"Intelligent Design" Adopted by Kansas

While so much of the county is focused on "islamo-fascisim," there is very little attention being paid to an equal or greater threat to this county - namely "christo-fascism."

Today, the christo-fascists in Kansas struck a blow against education when, by a 6-4 margin, the Kansas Board of (Un)Education approved the teaching of "intelligent design" in Kansas classrooms. The most recent draft of those standards, dated July 12, 2005, claims to not adopt "intelligent design," but that appears to be, well, not exactly true.

Personally, I think there's something to intelligent design in the sense that the development of intelligent life (or perhaps life at all?) took such an unlikely random series of events that something must have dabbled in the great genetic pool. However, that discussion belongs in a scientific philosophy class - not a science class. There is a difference between science and philosophy.

That said, I seriously doubt the Kansas Board really thinks aliens may have influenced the course of evolution on this planet.

Everyone Hates Roberts - So I Like Him!

John Roberts, Bush's nominee to the U.S. Supreme Court, seems to be pissing off everybody. Good for him. Seems some conservative group, the Public Advocate of the United States (never heard of them) are mad that Roberts did pro bono work on behalf of gays opposing a Colorado law that would have legislated discrimination.

When I first read the story of Roberts' involvement with that case, the White House immediately spun it as "well, he didn't know what he was doing - it was one of a jillion pro bono cases," or something like that. Well, I'm a lawyer, and I am relatively certain that 1) I would not forget who I had worked for (in a case of that magnitude), and 2) I would never work for free on purpose without knowing why and for whom. Thus, Roberts knew what he was doing. Good for him.

On the other side, the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) has launched a completely dishonest ad campaign against Roberts. There, they accuse him of defending abortion clinic bombers. What crap. For the whole story, click here . (BTW, I highly recommend the Factcheck.org website for unbiased fact checking of claims by both political "sides.").

Finally, Sen. Arlen Spector (R-PA) is whining that the Supreme Court disrepects Congress when it limits Congress' power to enact legislation pursuant to the Commerce Clause (Article I, Sec. 8). In case you don't know this, Congress has very limited power. Among those few powers is the regulation of interstate commerce. Congress has figured out that if it simply says an issue is a matter of interstate commerce, then it can pass whatever law it wants. In recent years, the Supreme Court has restricted that power, ruling that a number of notable laws were not reasonably within the scope of the Commerce Clause.

Now, Specter calls this "judicial activism." Funny but I bet this is more akin to Associate Justice Antonin Scalia's "originalist" construction approach. Namely, the Court is enforcing the actual terms of the Constitution by restricting Congress' attempts to expand beyond what the founders intended when they drafted the Commerce Clause.

In case Sen. Spector has forgot, this is what's referred to as the "checks" part of "checks and balances." The Court is supposed to act as a check on Congressional (and Executive) power. That's it's fundamental purpose. In any event, Roberts apparently participated in a decision that struck down a law protecting some endangered species in California, noting that the animal (I forget now what it was) lived its entire life in California, and thus could not impact interstate commerce.

This is gonna get good, I'm sure of it. :D

Another Reason Budweiser Sucks.

This story kills me. Seems Anheuser-Busch, who makes that watered down psudeo-beer called Budweiser, donated $5,000 to the South Carolina state Republican Party. Now, that alone is funny. For although we can be sure that the S.C. Republican party panders to Budweiser-swilling rednecks in order to "get out the vote," I have a hard time envisioning their leadership really caring about beer (or psudeo-beer, as the case may be).

So, in any event, apparently the good folk at Budweiser wrote the check, then presumably helped themselves to gallons of their product, afterwhich they mailed the check to the South Carolina state Democratic Party, which promptly deposited the check.

How nobody noticed the check was made out to the GOP and not the Dems is itself confusing. Presumably the Dems figured, as Dems are want to do, that any hand-out is a good hand-out; and so what if it was for the GOP, those bastards hog all the cash anyhow.

Eventually the drunks at Budweiser sobered up, realized that "drink responsibly" relates to more than drinking and driving, and notified the GOP of their error. The GOP threatened to sue the Dems. The Dems relented, and refunded the money to the beer meisters.

Quote of the day comes from this story. When explaining why the Dems sent the check to the hung-over lushes in St. Louis instead of the lush-lovers in Columbia, the Dems said:

"Nobody should expect us to write a check to the Republican Party."

I would have paid to see the ads the GOP would have run after that!!

Does Bush have no shame?

Okay, look, if you're gonna lie, the secret is to lie about things that are not otherwise provable (or at least not easily so). For example, I can lie about my golf score, and unless you were there, you'd never know the difference.

Bush is, simply, the least subtle (or least intelligent) liar I've encountered in a forever long time.

In his August 6 radio address, the President said:

"The increased revenues and our spending restraint have led to good progress in
reducing the federal deficit."

Oh really?

Seems Bush is actually spending money like a woman scorned. Check out this site graphing the national debt - you'll gag (unless you're an old-school Dem, in which case you might be able to cancel your Viagra prescription).

Review - Dan Simmons' "Olympos"

Just finished reading Olympos, the second half of the massive Illium-Olympos epic tome by Dan Simmons.

For starters, if you haven't read Illium within, say, a couple months, don't bother with Olympos. I was about a quarter to a third of the way through the book before I remembered who was who and what was going on.

Although I enjoyed Olympos, if you don't have at least a passing familiarity with The Illiad, The Aenid, The Odyssey , the Tempest, and Robert Browning's Caliban Upon Setebos, Or Natural Theology in the Island, well, at least read the Cliff Notes versions first.

I won't recount the story - I don't have all week. But the Trojan War aspect of the story serves no purpose here (or such minimal purpose that it could be relegated to 10 pages needed to get Achilles to Olympos and move on).

The story was too long - the ending to short. It reminded me of any countless episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation where the writers got to the 45th minute and then said "Oops, we better wrap this up. Find a use for tachyons." Who is Moira, Propero, Sycorax? What happened to Setebos? What happened to Zeus? Why'd the post-humans choose to act like Greek Gods?

Just too many questions. There's fodder here for short stories set within the Illium-Olympos universe - the rise and change of the post-humans, the evacuation of the Jews, the rubicon, etc. Frankly, I find those backstories more likely to hold my interest.

So, if you enjoyed Illium, read Olympos. If you have no idea what I'm talking about - go read Hyperion. Even my wife, no huge sci-fi fan, loved that book/series.

I intended to start this a long time ago, but forgot - much like my attempt to conquer the world. Stuff just kept getting in the way.

Anyhow, my good friend "Harold" started a blog, and thus I am remotivated.

If you read this, you must really be hard up for opinions - so I'll try not to disappoint. Unlike my friend, I am not a Flaming Liberal. However, I am also not a Neo-Con Fascist Conservative (although I am, alas, the last of a dying breed - the Real Republican - the kind whose philosophy predates the GOP's hijacking at the hands of Religious Extremists (although this kid seems to have figured it out).

Thus, don't be surprised to read opinions that are, at least on the surface, inconsistent or incongruent.

Good luck with this.