He is Worse, and Crazier, than I Thought

DeLay Statement on Terri Schiavo

3/31/2005 12:07:00 PM

To: National Desk

Contact: Dan Allen or Shannon Flaherty, 202-225-4000, both for House Majority Leader Tom DeLay

SUGAR LAND, Texas, March 31 /U.S. Newswire/ -- House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Texas) today released the following statement mourning the passing of Terri Schiavo:

"Mrs. Schiavo's death is a moral poverty and a legal tragedy. This loss happened because our legal system did not protect the people who need protection most, and that will change. The time will come for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior, but not today. Today we grieve, we pray, and we hope to God this fate never befalls another. Our thoughts and prayers are with the Schindlers and with Terri Schiavo's friends in this time of deep sorrow."

http://www.usnewswire.com/

In a last, desperate attempt to divert attention away from his crimes, which if properly investigated and adjudicated will result in loss of office, if not liberty, Tom DeLay is calling for the murder of Michael Schiavo, James Wittamore, George Greer and others.

This is a most profound outrage. And yet . . . .

Somehow, I can’t muster proper indignation against Tom DeLay, even when he publicly solicits the murder of people who don’t agree with him. The man is so mired in filth and madness that all I can feel, no matter what he says or does, is a deep sadness.

It Is Later, and Worse, Than I Thought

Before, when illegal abortion people would talk about overturning Roe v. Wade in order to "throw abortion back to the states where it belongs," I'd get a sick, sinking feeling (especially remembering the vast areas of the country where abortion is already legal but not obtainable by a woman of modest means), but I'd put a brave face on it and say, "Erosion state by state won't be so bad. We'll have time to get the underground railroad up and running, providing clinic space for doctors to work, and transportation for women and girls to safe zones. As the screws are tightened, we will build up a broader and more robust network, ensuring that women will still have access to 21st Century medicine even under 19th Century laws."

But the outrageous "procedures" carried out in Congress, the Florida legislature and Federal courts make it clear that when they talked about "federalism", they were simply lying.

Again.

Damn, I was hoping we weren't going to have to take over the whole country just to get its laws enforced.

What's In Your Mailbox?

Today I have responded to a plea for action from Planned Parenthood, received a charming newsletter from Susie Bright, got word from Donna Barr about a cool new book by Keith Knight and looked at some nifty pictures of the places humans could be going right now if we weren't busy with other things at Universe Today.

I've had worse inboxes.

Music I Like

Finlandia by Jean Sibelius
The Pilgrims' Chorus from Tannhauser by Richard Wagner
We're Not Gonna Take It by Dee Snider
The 59th Street Bridge Song (Feelin' Groovy) by Simon & Garfunkel

and any other piece of music that does exactly what the writer intended it to do, that evokes exactly the mood the musicians are going for.

(Recycled post, from October 28th 2004)

Was Bush Right?

I'd like to believe that the invasion of Iraq really has resulted in an upsurge of democratic (or at least populist) sentiment in Arab countries. That would be a very good thing. Also good would be if the U.S. were perceived as a friend of democratic regimes generally. I have a hard time believing it, though.

It seems to me that Arab (and worldwide) opinion of U.S. foreign policy is much as it always has been:

"The Americans are crazy. There is no accounting for them or predicting what they will do next. They may support a tyrant for twenty years and then suddenly turn on him. They may do the same to an elected government. They may bomb your cities into ruins and then build you up again, or they may suddenly cut you off from trade and keep you cut off for decades. They may forgive or even forget the most appalling atrocities, or they may conceive a grudge against you for nothing at all.

"Their rhetoric rarely matches their deeds. They talk a good game of democracy and human rights, but they may say those things while funding coups, terrorist groups, death squads.

"Take what you can get from them when they are being friendly, but don't expect them to stay friendly. And above all, don't ever try to predict what they will do next."

We Did Laundry Today

We don't have a washer or dryer, not so much because we can't afford them (we could work something out, one way or another, in spite of being short of money so often) as because we're going to have to install new plumbing that can handle the load. So, we go to the laundromat on Kings Boulevard, across from the Fred Meyer's.

Usually, I do the laundry by myself late in the evening, after Kathe is in bed, but today we did it together. It was quite enjoyable. Certainly less lonely.

Welcome Home

Bravo Company came back to Corvallis. Kathe and I stood on Harrison Boulevard to see them go by, in two chartered buses.

It was good to see them come home. Good to see anybody come home safe. The ones who came home unsafe travel individually, of course.

Lots of people had pulled out the poster folded in with the Gazette-Times, reading "BRAVO!" You can't use that gimmick for the poor guys in Charlie Company.

Theresa Marie Schiavo

So much concern about Terri Schindler-Schiavo, who wants so badly to live, but is being maliciously starved to death by her uncaring husband.

But there is no such person as Terri Schindler-Schiavo. She never used that name. It was assigned to her by people who claim to speak on her behalf. She's as fictitious as Jeff Gannon.

There used to be a woman named Theresa Schindler, but she chose to change her name when she got married.

There used to be a person named Theresa Schiavo, but she hasn't existed since 1990. Since then, her body has shown no sign of cognitive function. That's sad, but it's a fact, and camera tricks and wild stories won't change it.

Weighing In, Midmonth

I wasn't going to weigh myself again until April, but after I hurt my back and it didn't get better on its own, I had to get doctored, and that meant having to be weighed.

Still 220 lbs., but at least I'm not still gaining.

And at least the brace I'm wearing for my back cinches my waist tighter, so I look svelter.

"heya check this out"

My friend Grace sent this to me:

Hello everyone. It will be
interesting to see who
responds! I told a guy that I could find
300 people who
believe in gay marriage before he could
find 300 people
who do not believe in gay marriage. If
you believe in the
right to gay marriage, please copy and
paste this onto a
blank e-mail form (leaving off the
headers). or repost it..
Add your name and send it to your
friends and family or
repost it. If you happen to be the 300th
person signing
this, please send it back to, Andrew
Nelson. His e-mail
address is: Rnbowzrok4evr@aol.com
Thanks! 1)Taylor
2) Jeremy 3)DUSTIN OH YEAH BABY 4)
Michael
(equality baby) 5.)jennifer 6.) Jason *love
has no
boundries nor does it discriminate! if
another guy or girl
makes you happy and you wanna be with
them
forever...i say f@$#@% it...why not! its
your life...live
it! FTW* 7)Jessy~ Totally for it. Equality.
8)Brian~Love
is Love. 9) Olivia 10) Christine 11) Jessie
12)Alex
13)matt 14) Sierra 15) Elz 16) Black Lotus
17)Sky
18)Taylor 19) CHELSEA 20. Elyse 21.)
Rowena all for it
totally 22) Ginger 23)Carrie 24) Jenn L
25) Greg C 26)
Charlie K 27) Travis 28) matt 29) Anna
30) spikeydrew
31)Kamran 31) ALICIA 32) Justin "With
liberty, and
justice for ALL" 33. Caitlin H
(HARTEATTACK) 34) Sam
(aS i wAtch you froM behind blue eyes)
35) Micha (love
is love no matter what sex you are) 36)
Kayne (just let
them get married) 37)Joe 38) timmmy
39) Andrea- love
is love!! 40) marissa 41) jon - if they love
each other let
them do what they want 42) ben - sure
why not 43)
amy 44) care 45) Michelle - llike alot of
other ppl said ..
love is love 46) shawn 47) rachel i
support! 48) Ashley,
discrimination is what ruins the world. let
ppl do what u
want 49) Zach 50) jayne 51) alex 52)
Heather 53)
courtney 54) Tiffany - i dont care what
ppl do, if they
wana get married, let them! 55) melinda-
why the
f@#$ not? 56) jess 57) helen 58) Andrew
59) matthew
60) katie 61) Daniel - i totaly suport it,
good luck but
dont u think getting 300 ppl is alot? may
take a while
:P 62) lisa 63) kristina 64) Aurin 65)
brandon 66)
Brittany supports them! 67) nicole 68)
april 69)
jeremy 70)kayla 71) kate 72) Lloyd 73)
Mike! 74)
philip 75) anna 76) robyn 77) Tasha 78)
megan - let
them do what they want! 79) Mat 80) Bob
81) Amanda
82) Sarah 83) Janet 84) Kell 85) Anna
86) Bob 87)
Mark 88) Nathan 89) Jillian 90) Summer
Rae
91)Bridget- OH YEAH F@#% BUSH AND
THOSE
IGNORANT F@%# THAT SUPPORT
HIM! 92) kayla~ i
think you should do what makes you
happyif your gay
and wanna get married soo what it
doesnt change
you...f@%# BUSH he is freakin ignorent.
93)Kat 94)
Bryan 95) Noah 96)Heather Turney 97)
alyssa 98.
Mikael perez 99) Steve 100) Alice Ralph
101) Steve.
102) Cara 103) Nick 104) Kylie 105)
Rexanna 106)
TRENT. 107) Joyce 108) Boris 109)
Sarah. 110) B- Trap
Brian 111) Emily Hadley 112)jenifer 113)
melissa 114)
gaytha 115) jerme (the cynical side of me
says why
should straight couples be the only ones
to suffer the
bonds of marriage. which is funnier cause
i plan on
wedding the unlucky lady right above
me.) 116) anna
117)juliette 118)jon 119 Ron 120) kristine
121) Josh 122)
Chris 123)Chester 124) yvan 125) Colin
126) Casey D.
127) Andrea 128) Heidi Avelina 129)
Chris Kortright ... I
must say that I would rather abolish the
institution of
marriage, but until then let all folks get
married. 128) Halie Johnson
129) Meg "homos rule" Woodruff
130)Sean "three doller bill" McArdle
131)Mariah "tangerine" Dancing
132)Molly Darragh
133) Steve "let everyone be condemned to lifetimes
of unhappiness in monagamy" Seal
134) CJ "Fag Me Up, Gaf Me Down" Szczech
135) Meredith "I support state-sanctioned gayness"
schafer
136) stoopid ass administration. Ken "bush and every capitalist
pig-boss can kiss my skinny white ass" Nowack
137) Steph Annis
138) Phebe Annis
139)Grace "puhder thar pahrdner" Fenton
140) John "getting married worked for me" Burt

The Purple Finger of Fate

My friend Andrea sent me a link to this article, with this message:

> Hi All,
> I liked this article. It made sense to me--unfortunately! Especially the
> line about the 'oil for women program' in the middle. -- Andrea

Personally, I had high hopes for the phrase "oil for women" -- I was ready to volunteer to help rub it in. Then I read the article, which is not funny at all.

Bernadette replied:

As an American, a liberal Democrat, and a citizen vehemently opposed to everything Bush stands for, including our foreign policy and the death toll continuing to pile up in Iraq and other parts of the Middle East, my comment to this article is: so?

Yes, apathy is my pervailing emotion. I feel as if I'd like to say directly to this reporter, "...thanks for getting some more facts published... what else would you like to tell us that we already know?" True, some of these facts I could not recite before, but the whole Iraqi debacle has been a elaborate scam to forward the interests of a relative few. I see my beloved country's government as an empirical power treating the people of the world's nations as pawns in a cruel game that just gives them literally something to do. I mean how much money do you really need? How much control in your lifetime is truly necessary? Who raised you to be so narrow-minded, short-sighted, and selfish?

Right now the biggest threat to the US is not a physical or ideological attack from another far-flung faction or state. The biggest threat is our economic instability, and it is clear that hijacking another country's riches, i.e. oil reserves, will not shore up our growing deficits.

Oh I could go on and on, but I am entirely too weary. My interest in world and political news has absolutely imploded since our election. I have very little faith in American policy-makers overall, and the American public. While world crisis issues loom over American's heads, our congress convenes to see whether or not there's a "problem" with the use of steroids in baseball! That's my tax money funding your little Capitol Hill brew-ha-ha folks!!! Meanwhile this nation can't even figure out basic health care policies like if abortion is OK or not! Hello, the whole Terry Schaivo right-to-die/life is really a precept for that issue.

I have a very dark outlook for America's future in the world. I see our standard of living decreasing and continued alienation by many countries, both economically and in terms of culture. I thought things were pretty horrible leading up to the last presidential election, but apparently conditions need to become much, much worse before any sort of change will occur. I believe it will take decades to extricate ourselves from them Middle East mess, and about the same amount of time with huge amounts of policy and fiscal discipline to regain the economic status that will truly make us a strong and great nation.

So in response to Ms Klein's article, good for you for connecting the dots; something that most people are taught in kindergarten but seem to forget by the time they're voting age. Maybe by yet again writing another piece about how f-'d up US-Iraq policy is people will see how narrow-minded and self-serving our national government truly is. And just maybe there will be a call to change our current regime... just maybe. If I ran across this headline in a newspaper or magazine I'd just skip over it. I could sum up the contents with my own concise headline: "The ________ in the _________ is a Scam to Serve The Intrests of a Powerful Few. This is Not Democracy." Go ahead and fill in the blanks with the word du jour be it Iraq, Iran, Middle East, North Korea; and war, election, economic policy, ect.

The Drought Ends

Hoo boy, look at all that rain. It's sheeting down, so I can barely make it up the ladder to the lookout, and once I'm up here I can't see a thing.

But, as I said, the drought is over. I just hope some of this copious precipitation is coming down as snow in the mountains, otherwise we're still screwed for summer water.

19 March 2003, 2004, 2005 . . . .

MoveOn invites us to search online for nearby locations for vigils to mark the second anniversary of the beginning of the current war.

There will be no difficulty finding it in Corvallis. It'll be where it's been since October of 2001, every single night, without fail.

Title IX, Paragraph 666

Sorry, folks, but I really am just a tad overworked here. Can we just take it as read that I hereby make malicious fun of this guy who says girls will be better Christians if you burn their soccer shoes, and offer to let them scrub floors instead?

Thanks to Mouse Words for letting me know about this, and thanks to Arthur D. Hlavaty for letting me know about Mouse Words.

He's Right About This, Too

From: scott
To: kathe
Date: Tue, 15 Mar 2005 21:15:03 -0500

Kathe -

Scott C. visited JohnKerry.com and thought you would find the following
link of interest:

URL: http://www.johnkerry.com/petition/rollcall_thankyou.html

They also said:
------------------------------------
Kathe,

If you\'ve already seen this, pardon my intrusion...but the JohnKerry.com website is doing a roll call of people against drilling in the Alaska Wildlife Refuge...please sign up at the link below, if you haven\'t already.

Thanks,
Scott

Evolving Ethical Standards

I saw in this morning's paper that The killer of Dian Fossey had been hired by the state of Nebraska (checking online, I see the offer has been withdrawn).

Okay, I give up, I take it all back: there is more than a dime's worth of difference between Democrats and Republicans.

Wheel Keeps On Turning

A notable event in my year has just gone by, as it generally does every year: the sun was shining outside and I was feeling not too bad, and "Feelin' Groovy" came on the radio.

Things can't be as bad as all that. Life still goes on, with that annual event gone by.

(smile)

LiveJournal?

Arthur D. Hlavaty says LiveJournal is more reliable and accessible than Blogger. Does anybody else care to comment?

Double Pun

"Why is it that the bottled thyme is priced by the ounce, while the bulk dried thyme is labelled by the gram, and the fresh thyme is sold by the bunch?"

"Well, Ma'am, disparate thymes call for disparate measures."

Weighing In, March 2005

I weighed 240lbs. in October, 214 in February, and currently am up to 220.

Gotta do something about that, get moving again in the right direction.

The punishing 60-70 hour work schedule I've been following lately isn't helping matters much, though.

Gotta do something about that, too.