The seismic shifts in our society have rendered right vs. left thinking as archaic as a flat earth map. It's time for those in the media using it to navigate this revolutionary era to catch up with the public -- and the new realities.

From Arianna’s keyboard to Rupert Murdoch’s ears, though I doubt that’s going to happen.

When are we going to realize that complex societies cannot be reduced to simply two extreme ideologies? Maybe that sells on drive time radio shows (and obviously it does, for now), but it’s not how people live their lives. The majority of people have a contradictory, complex set of beliefs and ideas that rarely fit into a 30-second sound bite.

Of late, on errand days, I’ve been listening to right wing radio. I’m done with that. It’s so idiotic in how the hosts control the argument so completely to package an outrageous viewpoint to enrage their audiences. I realized I was completely done when I heard one of them (Hannity or Ingram, can’t recall) criticizing Obama because he didn’t take ketchup on his burger. Seriously? Really? This is worthy of conversation?

He was called an elitist and once again, I ask, what is wrong with that? What is wrong with enjoying the finer things in life when you can? The finer things don’t always mean more expensive. Anyone who has had spectacular Southern greens can attest to that. But to like wine, better condiments, tastier natural foods, and actual literature and art is to be a more evolved human being. That doesn’t mean you have to live in New York or Paris, it just means that Wonder Bread sucks.

And you know what else sucks? A man getting assassinated for performing a legal service and a bunch of people not caring because of their ideology. What else sucks is a group of people who said absolutely nothing against the economic policies of the last eight years and offering absolutely nothing realistic about fixing it now that they’re out of power. What else sucks is that the profits of McDonalds and Wal Mart are up because of this recession and its effect on the rise of the organic food movement that was finally getting traction.

What doesn’t suck is that despite the recession, something like Pet Airways is launching. Call us crazy cat ladies, I don’t care, but it just isn’t cool to not treat your pets well anymore. I am absolutely elated that despite hard economic times, something like this can launch.  It also doesn’t suck that our own Emperor Palpatine is advocating for gay marriage. I also firmly believe that everything that has happened with same sex marriage in the last ten years has been to angle it to the Supreme Court to be struck down as separate but equal is unconstituational.

Which begs the question, why is it so horrible when the Supreme Court does its job? Its job is to be an independent body ruling on the constitutionality of legislations. The Supreme Court is designed to be independent of the will of the people. Because the will of the people isn’t always constitutional, even when it’s popular. Separate but equal was highly popular in its day, but it wasn’t constitutional. Wanting to legislate how two adults have sex may have been the will of the people in Texas, but that doesn’t make it constitutional.

That doesn’t mean I like Sotomoyer. I don’t, for two reasons. One is that she ruled against a family member in an appeal. Bitch ;-). The other is that I don’t want another Catholic on the bench. There are too many. But she’ll get confirmed and maybe she should. That’s the prerogative of the president as long as the Senate doesn’t find something to block confirmation. God  knows after Scalia my bar for opposing justices is pretty damn low.

All in all, I believe in pragmatism not ideology when it comes to governing. I as an individual can afford to have an ideology. But I’m not trying to govern 50 states and 300 million people. Someone in that position—particularly with the economy tanking all around us and two wars to fight and quite potentially who knows what else coming with Iran, North Korea, and Israel/Palestine—cannot afford to be tied to a pure ideology no matter how much money can be made trying to sell one.

This recent Ayn Rand obsession amonst the teabagging conservatives is really getting my goat. Have they ever actually read her works? All of them, not just Atlas Shrugged? Do they really understand her philosophy and how badly they are cherry picking it to meet their goals of the moment? I am sorry to say I do not respect the conservative movement at all right now. Maybe if they stay consistent and actually build a real movement, I might. But the hypocrisy of staying silent while billions are wasted over the last eight years and only creating a hullabaloo when it’s a Democrat doing it makes them ridiculous, not serious. And what makes them even less serious is this sudden interest in an author of a philosophy they don’t even embrace whole heartedly and don’t even really understand.

Dagny Taggert didn’t sit idly by while bubbles formed and popped and call it capitalism. She screamed and fought while stupid non-capitalist decisions were being made. Francisco destroyed his fortune rather than allow it to be used for anything that violated his principles. John Galt didn’t check out after the bubble popped, he foresaw it coming and got out so he wouldn’t be any part of it. Where were all the Ayn Rand enthusiasts when the oh-so-obvious bubble was forming? A bubble that no real adherent of Ayn Rand would have had anything to do with and in fact would have been screaming from the rooftops wasn’t real industry, real capitalism, or in any way shape or form objectivism. But they didn’t. As long as the going was good, they stayed silent. Trading worthless pieces of paper is not capitalism and Dagny, Hank, Francisco, and John wouldn’t have stood for it for two seconds. So anyone who stayed silent for the last eight years can take themselves off to Galt’s Gulch as soon as they find that oh-so-not-a-capitalist Francisco to finance it for them.

A true Ayn Rand aficionado would have stood up for rights of privacy and habeas corpus and would have been wholeheartedly opposed to invading a country that never attacked us. “Let them fail” would have been their credo and they wouldn’t have cared a whit for the human rights of the oppressed Iraqis. Afghanistan in an objectivist viewpoint would have been annihilated.

If it’s not obvious, I’ve actually read quite a bit of Ayn Rand. Not just her badly written fiction, but her very well thought out treatises of non-fiction. And one thing is perfectly clear when you read all of her work. There is no cherry picking. Her philosophy is one that you adhere to totally or not at all. And I don’t think your “conservative” base really understands what embracing Ayn Rand really means. Here’s a primer:

·         Atheist. Completely. And not just free-to-be-you-and-me atheism. Complete hatred and utter contempt for religion of any kind. No favorites, no lesser of two evils. All religion is evil in objectivism.

·         Complete and total libertarian attitude on all social issues: Drugs, sex, abortion, homosexuality, pornography, etc. are all A-OK.

·         No government intervention in anything but what is absolutely necessary to physically defend the country. That means no Iraq, no private consulting firms to outsource defense to (you know, those same ones who have lost billions of our tax dollars that only we liberals seemed to be upset about); no real reverence for veterans (she so conveniently omits them from her writings); no bridges, roads, disaster recovery, nothing. Tell me how much you hate government on your morning commute. Tell me how much you ate government when you have to call 911 to protect your personal property. You don’t, nor should you. Because it is quintessentially American to cherry pick our philosophies.

In regards to the tea parties, I hear a lot about the Founding Fathers. But no group has been more cherry picked then these men. Regardless of our ideology, we take from them what we want and conveniently ignore what is inconvenient to our ideology. As a nation, we pick and choose holistically: we already decide that their decisions on slavery, voting rights, women, and property are outdated and unconstitutional. We’ve passed several amendments deciding that the Founding Fathers were wrong. But some ideologues conveniently forget that when citing them. Isn’t it time we started deciding for ourselves and acknowledging that the Founding Fathers might be good to cite in part, but not revered? How much cherry picking is OK or not OK?

The unspoken truth about American ideology is this: We are ideologues until our emotions come into play. Once those pesky heart strings are plucked, anything—anything at all—can be rationalized. I don’t care which side of the ideological divide you purport to be on. For example:

·         Your upset about the 9/11 terrorist attacks so all of a sudden you’re in favor of nation building.

·         You believe drugs are OK until it causes a friend of yours to die or worse kill others. Then it’s a nationwide drug treatment program.

·         States rights rule supreme until a state decides to legalize gay marriage (Vermont); then a federal statute is required.

·         Individual rights reign until Terry Shiavo dies.

·         Laissez faire in everything outside the bedroom, but dictatorial tyranny inside.

·         Individual rights in everything inside the bedroom, but collective rights in everything outside it.

No matter which side you’re on, the majority of Americans decide issues emotionally not rationally. Philosophies demand rational thought, not emotional.

I can’t decide for you what you want. I can only point out that emotional decisions are not philosophical by their very definition. I can only ask, beg, plead, that before you start cherry picking philosophers, you know that you are doing so and own up to it. Do not claim Ayn Rand when you refuse the full force of her philosophy. Do not claim economic libertarianism and eschew the necessary social aspects of it at that same time. Do not claim collective good of the all and demand individual rights for all. Most importantly, do not believe that America is divided between left and right. There is no such thing. We are all a confusing chaos of conflicting ideas and beliefs that we can only defend about 50% of. The rest are emotion and feelings that we don’t spend much time analyzing. Very few of us spend any time reconciling these beliefs, only using our lizard brains to decide which is right and wrong without any rational thought going into it.

Can we be done with hard line adherence sometime soon? Can we truly embrace both a Virtue of Selfishness and a sustainable society and figure out how it all works? Can we all determine at some point that we all need a philosophy and that philosophy doesn’t have to adhere to a published standard, only a rational one? Can we please stop opposing for the sake of opposing and stop ignoring the fact that we cherry pick every day from those we both revere and despise?

Can we, in short, create an American philosophy?

One thing I don’t want the media doing, any of the media, is yapping about whether or not the president’s speech, news conference, whatever is or is not entertaining enough. It’s a press conference to convey information and take questions about policy, not a variety show (and Cramer, for the record, The Daily Show isn’t a variety show either). The economy is a big, boring, complex, and scary thing and I don’t need to be entertained when I’m hearing what the guy is doing to fix it. Isn’t that what got CNBC in Stewart’s cross hairs to begin with? Focusing more on entertaining than informing their audience? I need information so I can go to the White House web site and ask my own questions that address my concerns.

I had a very good argument with a conservative friend of mine the other weekend and the one thing we could agree on totally was that it was time for the American people to sit up and pay attention. Now she and I definitely have different ideas about what conclusions should be drawn by this newfound attention, but in all, I think most people can agree is that the majority hasn’t been paying attention to the overall economy for a long time. As long as the Dow kept going up and people had their latest bling, no one cared how the country overall was getting their. That our supposed wealth was based on unsustainable bubbles, speculation, and financial trading, not on actual durable goods and services. I’m no economist, but I do recall when I was buying a house six years ago how hard everyone tried to get us to do exotic crazy mortgages even when we were demanding a 30 year fixed. That I even had to argue with anyone about the sensibility of doing a 20% down 30-year fixed mortgage made me sit up and take notice of what was going on. And if I could sit back on my arrogant laurels and be justifiably proud that I didn’t play in that mess and be confident that rest of the country crashing down around me wasn’t going to affect me, I would. But I can’t. Because despite making all the sensible decisions, I still will have a hard time getting credit, finding a job, selling my home (if I wished to), or paying for a medical catastrophe if my fiancé were to (gods forbid) lose his job.

See, the way capitalism is supposed to work is that only those who fail pay the price. All those new devotees to Ayn Rand that I’m hearing about should read her very carefully. In her idealized capitalistic good vs. evil world, no one pays the price without conscience choice and the good guys get to fly off to Galt’s Gulch and let all the bad and weak people (even those ideologically loyal to Dagny herself) to a world destroyed. Well, if I could book a ticket to Galt’s Gulch maybe I would. Even if the whole idea is undermined by the fact that every last one of them in some way was subsidized by Franisco D’Ancona’s fortune.

I’ve been studying Ayn Rand since I first picked up her books in 1986. I’ve read every book she’s ever written and while I love them the way I love a fairy tale, I don’t turn a blind eye to what she conveniently ignores. But now I hear conservatives all over (including a conservative guest on Bill Maher) touting gleefully that Ayn Rand is “flying off the shelves” and is the biggest seller on Amazon. When I hear those same people argue to continue her entire philosophy throughout all aspects of culture, maybe I’ll take them seriously. But I doubt they’ve read The Virtue of Selfishness and have only highlighted those sentences in Atlas Shrugged they can roll out at cocktail parties and in blog comments. If anyone tries to quote Ayn Rand to me, they’d better get the reference of this post’s title first (without Googling).

Actually, now that I think about it, it’s been a few years since I pulled her off the shelves. Maybe I’ll reread one, just so I can keep up at cocktail parties.

I have absolutely no problem with Obama taking his licks over his very un-P.C. joke about the Special Olympics on the Jay Leno show the other night. It was thoughtless and crass and it’s absolutely something my side would have eviscerated George W. Bush over. Any Obama supporter or liberal who is defending or minimizing the joke is a bloody hypocrite. For punishment, find a blackboard, whiteboard, or loose leaf sheet of paper and write 150 times “Obama’s joke was insensitive and stupid and he needs to watch his mouth and I’m being a hypocrite by defending him.”

On a somewhat related note, I got an anonymous comment on my last blog post. It was in reference to this phrase: “Make this Joe the Plumber ‘tard GO AWAY!!!!” and the comment, titled ‘tard, was: “It would be great if this word or its full form (retard) could be dropped from the vernacular … Thanks for thinking about this.”

What precisely is wrong with the word retarded? I would understand if the commenter had objected to my slang use of ‘tard in not referring to someone who is by definition retarded, but I saw another argument against the word retarded in a different post. Where the poster specifically meant to use the term in reference to a mentally/developmentally disabled individual. But of all the words that have fallen to the PC police (and in many cases thank gods for the PC police), why is retarded one of them when it is used in a dictionary sense (from Merriam-Webster: slow or limited in intellectual or emotional development or academic progress). So my use of it was improper and insensitive, but this person wants to not use the word at all and that I don’t understand.

That doesn’t mean Obama wasn’t insensitive by his joke. Bad bad Obama! It’s just a semantic argument that’s always kind of bothered me. Though I certainly think that Joe the Plumber announcing to the conservative glitterati that they make him horny will certainly retard his upward mobility in the movement. Oh and apparently I also misspelled turgidity. I’m leaving the misspelling in there, along with my un-P.C. use of the word ‘tard because that’s what I wrote and I’ll take my licks.

My conservative friends, I have a favor to ask of you. No, it’s not a favor, I’ll pay for it somehow. I’ll write a nasty critical something or other about Obama. I will vote for a Republican in the next Congressional election. I will listen to Rush Limbaugh or Sean Hannity for a week without puking. I will do some or all of these things plus many more if you can do one thing in return for me.

Make this Joe the Plumber ‘tard GO AWAY!!!!

"God, all this love and everything in the room -- I'm horny," declared Joe.

Please, please please! I had a hard time taking it initially. It’s really unfair to keep foisting him on us. Yes, we make you endure Michael Moore and Keith Olbermann, but at least they don’t announce their turgiditity to continue their 15 minutes of fame. This is way too much and has been from the day he entered the scene. Bad enough you all have to cow tow to Rush Limbaugh, but I can’t believe you are keeping this guy in the tent.

At this point I’m reduced to shameful bribery. What do I have to do to convince you all to take this guy behind the woodshed and pants him!

I shudder to think how that would make him react. Just get rid of him, I beg of you.

Sincerely,

Me

For my excommunication that is. Because any church that would do this isn’t one I want to be counted as part of. As far as I know, because I was baptized Catholic and am therefore counted when the Church says there are X million Catholics in America. So how do I go about getting excommunicated? I don’t want to be counted as part of this flock in any way.

The story:

A senior Vatican cleric on Saturday defended the excommunication of the mother and doctors of a 9-year-old girl who had an abortion in Brazil after being raped … He also excommunicated the doctors, who carried out the operation for fear that the 80-pound girl would not survive a full-term pregnancy.

And from here:

“He did not excommunicate the step-father, saying the crime he is alleged to have committed, although deplorable, was not as bad as ending a fetus's life.”

Seriously? Really? Are these people for real? Oh, I get it. If you excommunicate child rape where are you going to find more priests? I realize that’s nasty and there are supposedly wonderful priests out there and all that. But when this kind of thing goes down, what am I supposed to think of the church I heartily abandoned over 20 years ago?

I think I’m relieved and validated that I left it. And this isn’t some edge case, the Vatican backs it. Welcome an anti-Semitic Holocaust denier back into the fold, but god forbid a child be spared abject horror and a potentially life threatening pregnancy in favor of a fetus. Which frankly proves what I’ve always thought about the church. The life of a woman (and now obviously a child) is worth nothing. We are just baby machines no matter how young or old. And child rapists are more welcome in their kingdom of heaven than a woman caring for her child.

This is exactly an illustrative example of why we who are so derided cling to a certain degree of moral relativism. Since we cannot empirically know God’s law (or even that there is a God) how can there be no subjectivity? Certainly the Catholic Church for years showed such subjective judgment regarding their own. But far be it from showing it to a mother caring for her child, or the child herself. Who is this subjectivity reserved for? The so-called princes of the Church and no one else.

Moral relativism is also why I support  overturning the federal ban on funding embryonic stem cell research. This guy claims it’s a distraction and is going to lead to embryo harvesting. There are many ways to prevent that, but in the end, I don’t think there should be anything illegal about me choosing to create an embryo of my own body to harvest stem cells to save or better my life. I can’t say that I would or wouldn’t do that, but in the end, it’s again about my body, my family, my decision.

Moral relativism gets sneered at and derided by those who claim it means an anything goes attitude. It doesn’t. It means questions of morality should be decided within human societal and cultural contexts and there isn’t a one size fits all policy for every moral decision. It does not mean a degraded morality, it means we are rational humans who can assess a situation within a context and make informed decisions about it. The people who think that any “moral” freedom will automatically lead to deprivation are cynics or fearful. Either they are cynics about humanity in general, or they are fearful of what they themselves don’t like and therefore don’t want others to do.

But within the light of the above story, I will take moral relativism any day of the week. Including Sundays.

Update to previous post is that my sabbatical is not yet coming to a screeching halt. Deal fell through. Not going to go into the boring details because they really don’t matter in the long run. There are a million myriad reasons an factors that go into any decision about anything. Whether you are consciously aware of or able to influence or even know all those factors is irrelevant. They are there. You influence and control what is within your sphere of impact, past that, there’s not a damn thing you can do.

Now I’m in the midst of taking the GRE course I signed up for last year. My first class left me equal parts terrified (I couldn’t even remember 2πr!) and confident that it’s ¼ what you know and ¾ knowing how to beat the test. Which pisses me off in that there’s this monopolistic company with its sycophantic colleges and test preparation companies colluding to create a test that doesn’t in any meaningful way predict whether you will be a good graduate student or not. But as I told one of the other class members, I’m giving myself a few days to be pissed off at that before getting over it in time for the next class.

In other ramblings:

·         For all those people ranting about honey bee money and the like in the stimulus package and other things that keep you up at night, please note these things are not in the actual stimulus bill, they are what the states are going to use the stimulus money for. Be mad at your governors and state legislators and get your facts straight.

·         Rush Limbaugh has been and always will be a big fat idiot. Right now he’s the natural leader of the Republican Party even if that does mean I have to see his fat face on magazine covers.

·         There is such a thing as being too true to the original. After watching The Watchmen (which I did enjoy) I have a new appreciation for the Oscar category Best Adapted Screenplay. This screenplay (no offense to original author Alan Moore) could have used a bit more adaptation.

·         And speaking of comics, no female superhero should wear her hair that long while suited up. It’s only a weapon to be used against you. I don’t care about the high heels, those can be used as weapons, but all that hair flying around and no one’s grabbing it to pull her off balance?

·         I’m actually looking forward to my math class on Wednesday. I’d like to remember what I actually used to be kind of good at before four years of craptastic math teachers drummed the understanding out of me. My last good math teacher was in my junior year of high school.

·         I have forgotten how much I really like F. Scott Fitzgerald. Because of the movie, his Jazz Age short stories are back in vogue (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and Other Jazz Age Stories) and highly enjoyable. Didn’t see the movie, but might depending on how I like the short story.

Fingers crossed on a new job lead I found Friday. This time I won’t jinx it until it’s signed, sealed, delivered and I actually start!

My sabbatical is coming to a screeching halt and I’m coming full circle. 9 ½ years ago I was dying to go from contractor to full time at my company and now I’m returning to that company—after 9 years of salaried employment—as a contractor. It’s been a fabulous 8 ½ months off. I did some of the things I wanted to, didn’t get around to some of the things I did, but overall got a good mental rest and restart.

Why am I returning to work? Technically speaking, I don’t have to. But to not work would require certain sacrifices I’m not ready to make. I don’t care how inane or vain those reasons sound, they still exist. Despite cutting back significantly in spending and being OK with that, there are things I’m not quite ready to give up unless I have to. Such as:

·         I hate yard work. To be able to hire someone to do what I hate is the ultimate luxury and a reason—at least right now—to return to work.

·         Despite its many wonders (and more of that to come), Costco cannot supply a good body wash to save its life. I want my Kiehl’s body wash and I will not do without!

·         Over five hundred channels and there’s nothing to watch? There’s always Law & Order and there’s always a rerun of Big Love. I will not give up my massive cable or Tivo.

·         Organic food. Yes, today I spent $3.99 today for a yellow bell pepper vs. $1.49 for a conventionally grown one. But I’d rather not poison myself with god knows what when I don’t have to. I may choose to poison myself with cigarettes, but food should never be poison and I’m bound and determined to support the organic food movement regardless. Again, more on Costco later as I love rewarding them by buying whatever new organic product they stock.

·         In Vino Veritas: Not that I ever gave up wine, but I’d like the occasional splurge on a bottle over $10, something I’ve denied myself these past eight months. There are great bargains for under $10 and I intend to continue to patronize those, but there are amazing wines out there for more that I want to treat myself with now and again.

·         Not caring about the dry cleaning bill! There’s no point in dry cleaning when you aren’t working to justify wearing those types of clothes. But when fashion is something that makes your mornings creative, having to care about how much it costs to clean vs. the value of wearing said item becomes annoying. I want to wear what I want!

But in addition to gaining these little luxuries back when I return to work, I’ll have to give up some things as well:

·         Privacy: For eight months I’ve seen who I want, when I want and have been able to spend as much time alone as I want. In going back not only do I have to interact with many people on a daily basis, I have to carpool. Yes, I realize I’m a liberal and I’m supposed to embrace such green living, but I hate carpooling. I adore the privacy of my car and my NPR or CD and singing badly at the top of my lungs. Because of the location of the office and new parking costs, we all have to carpool which puts restrictions I’m not used to on my time and privacy. Plus the new office has open space rather than offices. I’m OK with that, but will take adjustment given I’ve spent eight months spending the majority of my time alone. Time to finally invest in an iPod I guess.

·         Freedom to spend my days as I like. Regardless of what anyone thinks I’ve done or not done well during my time off, it was still all MY time. Now my time during the work day belongs to someone else (though they are paying me well for that). I don’t see a problem in transitioning to that, but it is a loss of something I’ve enjoyed quite a lot.

·         Managing my household: I don’t care how Desperate Housewives it sounds, or how much you might want to make fun of me for it, I’ve enjoyed being a “housewife.” I’ve enjoyed having the chores get done and not pile up into mountainous problems; I’ve enjoyed cooking every night; I’ve enjoyed doing little household projects like painting a wall or installing new switch plates or putting in a new kitchen floor. I like channeling my inner Bree (except for the aforementioned yard work). There simply won’t be time—despite how well I’ve set up the systems—to do it all as well as I did while not working.

·         Make up free: I love make up, I really do. But it’s been wonderful to go days, even weeks, without any on my face because there simply was no reason to. I’ve grown used to a face without makeup. You might say then why start putting it on just because you’re returning to work? Don’t you work in an uber casual environment anyway? You would be right, but it still isn’t going to happen. I go to work, I wear makeup. It’s just my way.

·         Spending hours in a day delving into a single issue in the world (economic, political, social, etc.). Not just reading one story, but reading ten or twenty to figure out exactly what happened and what it really  means. That takes a lot of time and the average person’s inability to do so is a detriment to society.

Don’t judge my sabbatical on the above (or do, I don’t care). I’ve had plenty of deeper philosophical insights than the relative merits of body wash or dry cleaning. But those are going to take time to internalize and articulate and in many ways, I need to return to the structure of a working world in order to do so. At least for a time. In the meantime, I relish not feeling guilty about buying skin care products and I relish that I don’t really care so much about shopping anymore.

More to come …

If you watch this, it will stick in your head for hours, even weeks to come. You have been warned.

I’m sick of the term “pork.” It has no definition and its use in political discourse is the last bastion of the unintelligent mind. One man’s pork is another man’s energy grid. One woman’s pork is another woman’s pro-life propaganda. It’s an all encompassing term to deride what you don’t like ideologically. It means nothing real or relative.

“Pork barrel spending” is not the same thing as earmarks. An earmark is a more tightly defined concept whereby Congress overwrites the executive branch authority on allocating funds without ever having to identify who authored it:

Earmarking differs from the broader appropriations process, defined in the Constitution, in which Congress grants a yearly lump sum of money to a Federal agency. These monies are allocated by the agency according to its legal authority and internal budgeting process. With an earmark, Congress has given itself the ability to direct a specified amount of money from an agency's budget to be spent on a particular project, without the Members of the Congress having to identify themselves or the project.

The stimulus package is neither perfect nor laden with pork. And it’s here. And it’s here to stay. And yes there will be problems arising from the execution of it and yes there will be sterling successes. But the current debate about it reminds me of the intellectual capabilities of ideological teenagers who know absolutely nothing about what they argue about yet they do it so passionately.

I get that conservatives hate it on ideological grounds. You’ve been heard, it didn’t work. No, that doesn’t mean you should just shut up, but you are not contributing to the current situation. Pitch in and ensure that the money your state gets (and don’t you love the Republicans who wouldn’t vote for the bill clamoring for the money) is spent wisely, according to your constituents values and wishes. Do something constructive, please, because constantly referring to the laissez-faire capitalism that got us into the current situation is as annoying as living near the constant noise of an airport.

I’m currently reading a compilation of an advice columnist and I’m thinking I really should be an advice columnist. This isn’t hard, at least not based on the letters that get sent in. Does anyone actually know someone who sent a letter to an advice columnist? I’ve never heard of such a person and wonder if they’re like Oompa Loompas? Anyway, I love giving advice and have some for the people who have decided that they HATE President Obama. Not just disagree, but hate hate hate. My advice is based on experience so I know what I’m talking about. I HATED George W. Bush so I have direct experience in hating a president.

Check out. Tune out. Find a hobby other than what’s going on at the national level. Seriously, it’s the only way you’re going to get through the next four, possibly eight years. Hating everything you see and hear the nation’s president doing is exhausting. You should check back in around election times, but otherwise, you’re going to be perpetually miserable. Stop reading your bubble blogs, tune out of FOX, take up knitting. Watch back episodes of Lost to remember to confuse you. Focus locally rather than nationally. Unless you are in a position to actually impact what’s going on at the national stage, you are only setting yourself up for pain if you spend four years railing about Obama. I know. I’ve been there with Bush. I had to check out.

I-told-you-so’s are hollow. They don’t make you feel better. Being prescient makes you feel worse, not better. So if you’re right, and everything Obama does is a spectacular failure, you won’t feel better. I don’t feel better that I knew the execution of the Iraq war would be a disaster; that the deregulation of the financial industry and the subprime mortgage debacle would blow up; that ridiculous credit debt would crash us all. Knowing all that years ago and being right doesn’t feel better. In many ways, it feels worse because it makes you believe that the nation is stupid and who the hell wants to live in a stupid nation? So if, in your rush of hatred, you are banking on being “right” and relishing the prospect of saying I Told You So, it won’t live up to your expectations. It might drive up Rush’s ratings, but it do anything for your blood pressure. Just some friendly advice from someone who’s been there.

Conservatives are all up in arms over what they perceive as the return of the “nanny state” because of the stimulus package. They fear near permanent status of many of the spending programs in the ARRA. Whether they are right or wrong remains to be seen.

A lot remains to be seen over the coming years. Severe economic downturns produce sea changes in mentalities and I am fascinated (both from a positive and a negative viewpoint) to watch and participate it.

On the negative front, I’m worried that the drop in fast food prices will force lower income people to make horrible dietary choices because organics are too expensive. Fundamentally changing our agricultural business model to enable better food might not rise to the top of the priority list and in a generation we’ll have even worse problems with yet another round of kids being raised on the poison that inhabits the average American diet. I also worry that many states (as well as the federal government) will raise the “vice” taxes to increase revenue. I actually don’t have a personal problem with increased taxes on cigarettes and alcohol (and I consume both), but tying critical projects to consumption of substances that states are also trying to decrease will be problematic.

But on a positive note, I’m already starting to see some of my pet issues get looked at in the name of pragmatic budgeting. Five states are considering repealing the death penalty due to its cost.  I am ideologically opposed to the death penalty, but if budget cutting that gets it off the books, I’ll take what I can get. Connecticut is looking to repeal its Sunday ban on alcohol sales to increase tax revenues. This puritanical holdover should go the way of the dodo as it always seemed to encourage drunk driving since the dawn of the Sunday football game. And Washington is considering privatizing liquor stores so as not to have to take the cost on the state budget. Why a state would want to run a liquor store rather than just set the regulations has always been confusing to me.

How far behind can the legalization—or at least decriminalization—of marijuana be? The cost of prosecuting pot simply doesn’t seem to be pragmatic in these times. For the record, I don’t really enjoy pot and wouldn’t even if it was legalized. I just think it’s a ridiculous substance to prohibit to adults. The only reason I can see to keep it illegal is that it’s not currently possible to test whether someone (a driver, an airline pilot, a doctor) is impaired at this moment in time, the way you can with alcohol. But once that can be established, what is the remaining argument against legalization? I’ll be very surprised if we don’t start seeing this debated seriously as a cost-cutting/revenue-raising issue.

Of course all of these types of issues will give rise to a huge outcry from the social conservatives that bad economic times shouldn’t degrade our “moral fiber.” And the responsibility of constraining the social conservatives will fall to the fiscal conservatives who claim that Republicans aren’t really representative of conservatives. Because all of these small examples are as illustrative of a “nanny state” as are the programs liberals pushed for in the stimulus package. If conservatives want to seriously take back their party, they need to be consistent on all aspects of the limited government they claim to want so much.

I don’t believe that Republicans should just file in lockstep behind Obama and the Congressional Democrats. I believe that all representatives should vote according to the convictions they stated to their constituents that got them elected. If they and those they represent fundamentally disagree with the stimulus package, they should not support it and state why. After 9/11 there was this attitude that everyone had to rally around President Bush and give him what he wanted (except it was couched in terms of need, not want) because that’s what needed to happen. I don’t advocate that—then or now—because we know what happened. We need to rely upon Congress to rally around what their constituencies want. And in districts and states that went Obama for President and Republican for Congress, Republicans in Congress particularly need to weigh how much their constituents want Obama’s agenda vs. their own.

But I don’t understand Republicans—such as McCain and Baehner—who voted for the previous bailouts (by far so much worse than anything being proposed in this stimulus) but then nitpick this one. What are they saying? Blank checks to banks good, investment in infrastructure bad? I simply don’t get it. Well, actually I do. It was political expediency at a time of crisis and this is exactly why I don’t trust McCain and the like. You cannot claim to be a small government supporter than write a blank check for Treasury to disperse willy nilly.

There are those conservatives who just want the government spending to stop, hang the consequences. There’s a certain Darwinist aspect to that view that I can appreciate. I’m even reasonably sure that we share the same beliefs on the end state. I just disagree with how to get there. I’m a progressive liberal who believes that government can and should do what it can to level the playing field in this country so that we can reach that desired end state where everyone has the same opportunity and succeeds or fails on their own merits. That state simply doesn’t exist yet.  

I don’t believe in the tyranny of the majority or the minority, but this isn’t either. This election made it very clear which direction the majority of the country wants to go. As long as that stays within the confine of the Constitution, then that’s the direction we’re going per the will of the people. Obama has been consistent throughout his campaign and while willing to compromise here and there, is going to ensure that the spirit of what he promises is what’s going to go out there. The tax cut only strategy failed. We need cuts, investments, and regulation.

If Republicans really want to rebuild their party they should take a cue from the Democrats’ problems. The Democrats, starting in ’94, were all over the map. Picking one day to strongly stand by their convictions and oppose the Republicans and taking another day to cave to political expediency. The American people don’t reward that and didn’t for many years. Republicans whose constituents voted for Obama need to take that into account. And Republicans whose constituents did not vote for Obama and who are opposed to bailouts and stimulus packages of any kind should feel free to take that position. They’ll lose this battle, but they’ll be the better politician for it.

Just spare me the Republicans who deregulated the financial sector, bailed it out, and are now whining about the stimulus package.

Yet another one of my crackpot conspiracy theories has to do with President Obama’s stated commitment to transparency.

The short version (via the New York Times) is this:

Mr. Obama directed federal agencies to err on the side of transparency, not the Bush-era default of secrecy and delay, in releasing records to the public. He also undid the executive order signed by President George Bush that lets past presidents and vice presidents sit indefinitely on potentially embarrassing records that belong in the public domain.

But since it’s now so easy to get the exact version, I’ll extract that here, from WhiteHouse.gov:

The Freedom of Information Act should be administered with a clear presumption: In the face of doubt, openness prevails. The Government should not keep information confidential merely because public officials might be embarrassed by disclosure, because errors and failures might be revealed, or because of speculative or abstract fears. Nondisclosure should never be based on an effort to protect the personal interests of Government officials at the expense of those they are supposed to serve. In responding to requests under the FOIA, executive branch agencies (agencies) should act promptly and in a spirit of cooperation, recognizing that such agencies are servants of the public.

All agencies should adopt a presumption in favor of disclosure, in order to renew their commitment to the principles embodied in FOIA, and to usher in a new era of open Government.  The presumption of disclosure should be applied to all decisions involving FOIA.

The presumption of disclosure also means that agencies should take affirmative steps to make information public. They should not wait for specific requests from the public. All agencies should use modern technology to inform citizens about what is known and done by their Government. Disclosure should be timely.

My theory is simple: Obama will prosecute the Bush Administration (minus Bush himself*) if and only if the public forces him to. I read his message as: if you ask for it , you’ll get more than you could have in 8 years, and if you can put it together into a case that forces him to act, he will. He won’t waste time going after the past unless the public demands it and he’s just given the public the means to do so.

Obama believes in an informed and active citizenry. Therefore informed citizenry will need to determine whether the criminality of the Bush Administration should be investigated. I love this theory. I want the Bush Administration held accountable for what it’s done, but I don’t want Obama and his staff and cabinet wasting his time looking backward with all that needs to be done so quickly. So if the evidence is there, it’s up to the American people to find it, put it together, and make a case. After all, the majority of the American people kept those people in office four years ago, the American people should have to do a little work to prosecute them. Unfortunately, the people who will most likely be doing the investigating won’t be the people who voted for them back then, but then that’s life when you’re a liberal. Always having to clean up the conservatives’ messes ;-). We’re used to it.

*It is my understanding that a President cannot be charged or prosecuted for acts while in office unless he is first impeached and tried by the Senate to remove him from office. With regards to the Vice President, I don’t believe a clear cut protection exists, but I also believe that the current Supreme Court is so afraid of any type of constitutional crisis (this is based on the 2000 election decision and the court is more right-leaning since then) that they would not allow a prosecution of Dick Cheney to move forward. However, given that the Supreme Court cleared the way for civil cases to move forward against sitting presidents (the sexual harassment charge leveled against Bill Clinton), I do expect a flurry of annoying and potentially financially devastating cases to be brought against both Bush and Cheney.

"How you can spend hundreds of millions of dollars on contraceptives; how does that stimulate the economy?" House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said after the Obama meeting.

The above is in reference to an item in the current iteration of the economic stimulus plan meant to slow the spread of STD’s and provide contraceptives. That Boehner doesn’t understand how that helps the economy is mind boggling. Actually, I’m sure he does understand it; he just doesn’t want to acknowledge it because that means he’d have to acknowledge that people have sex just for fun and not for the duty of procreation.

Helping people have fewer children and helping them avoid unnecessary health problems definitely helps the economy. Right now, the fewer children people have the less money they need and the more they can invest in the children they do have thereby making the next generation a better one. But social conservatives seem to refuse to see the link between having or not having children and the future of the economy. The more children people have during troubled times, the less can be invested in them. The less we can spend on education, the worse off the next generation should be. Of course, given our society, no one can or should be forced to reduce the number of children they have. But by making family planning support available, individuals can make better, more informed, choices that will benefit the economy. Why is it so horrible to say that? Why is there any outrage at all over a very simple way to improve the future of the economy? I have to think that the only reason there is any controversy over contraceptives at all is because to use contraceptives means someone is have S-E-X which is apparently some huge scary thing to social conservatives (who I have to assume to perform the act but freak out if they have to know whether anyone else is).

In an attempt to balance out my love for Media Matters for America, I started reading News Busters as well. However, the two sites can barely be compared. The time and analysis simply isn’t invested in News Busters, and a lot of their exposition of so-called bias is completely made up. For example, regarding the economic stimulus package (which isn’t even finalized), they are outraged over the amount being spent on roads and bridges, claiming that the infrastructure spending was overpromised. That would be true, if infrastructure only meant roads and bridges. From this Jeff Poor guy:

In reality, little of the $850 billion American Recovery & Reinvestment Act of 2009 proposed by congressional Democrats will actually be spent on actual road and bridge projects - the sort of things most people think of when they hear infrastructure spending, according to the office of Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala.

Both Poor and the office of Sen. Sessions are being deliberately disingenuous, and exposing it in their own statements. If “most people” think only of roads when they think of infrastructure that only means that “most people” are ignorant. What President Obama has been saying throughout his campaign is that the infrastructure initiatives that he’s been proposing include roads, bridges, electrical grids, expanding Internet access and upgrading the network systems throughout the country as well as improving rural communities, etc. Now I’m admittedly too lazy to go through the very detailed spreadsheet that the nice folks at Read the Stimulus created to break down the current iteration of the package, but even a quick glance shows how the folks at News Busters are trying to bias their readers against it. What a crystal clear example of skewing the data to fit a conclusion you’ve already drawn despite the evidence to the contrary (kind of like the intel used to justify invading Iraq). ReadtheStimulus.com is created by Kithbridge, a media solutions company whose founder is an obviously biased conservative (got to Kithbridge.com, click About, and read about the Founder). But if the information in the spreadsheet is correct and kept up to date as the bill progresses, it’s incredibly useful. From what I can see of the construction of the site, ReadtheStimulus.com isn’t trying to push any agenda other than organizing information for the citizenry, which is wonderful. It’s the folks like News Busters who take this information and—by counting on the short attention span of their audience—attempts to skew it in a way to advance their agenda.

I’m prepared for the fact that some people are just going to balk at whatever the President and the Democratically controlled Congress does, no matter what. Issues like rolling back the international gag rule on abortion are going to blind them to anything else. I can even sympathize. I used to be that way on certain issues before I realized that bad decisions will have bad results and good decisions will have good results and to be blinded by ideology or party affiliation will not make a bad decision have a good outcome. Don’t believe I can be that pragmatic? See my take on overturning abortion. Everything, big or small, icky or glorious, has an economic impact.

And that includes headlines. News outlets of all kinds have a pretty good sense of what headlines will get their readers/listeners/watchers to sit, read, click, buy. There’s this outrage from the ultra-conservatives that certain “news” doesn’t get covered. For example, the IMF reimbursements to Geithner. Of course it was covered. I read about it in the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, and MSNBC. What it wasn’t was front page screaming headlines. That he had tax problems, yes, but not the details. Why? Because it’s not interesting to the average person. Which means it won’t generate a click, garner $.50, or get you glued to your television screens while you wait through the advertisements to get the story. It’s economics, not bias. The news is there for those who are interested, but the headlines and top news is there to get you hooked. Why conservatives, who are all about the free market, expect the media to go bankrupt screaming headlines about something the majority of their customers aren’t interested in is beyond me.

On a sad and scary note, apparently the fast food chains are in their equivalent of an airfare war. Supposedly Subway dropped their prices and so did Burger King, McDonald’s, and other major fast food chains. This is bad bad bad. With the price of decent food rising and organic skyrocketing, actual food will be priced out of the lower socioeconomic classes forcing them into horrible fast food on a regular basis. This is not good for the future of the organics industry and nor is it good for the next generation. Yet another reason not to have more children than you can invest in. Note I said that you can invest in, not just whether you can afford them. Food, clothing, shelter, and medicine can be paid for and you’re still not investing in your kid(s). Education, time spent parenting, offering enriching experiences, and the right kind of food, these are investing. If you can’t afford on a regular basis to provide all of this to your kids, then sign up now for the contraceptive economic stimulus package. Please.  

I spent a few days at my friend’s cabin on an island just northwest of the city. I always love going up there, even in the middle of winter. Completely wired for internet, but my cell phone won’t work. Rustic and functional. She just got a compost toilet which is a veritable luxury when compared to the pit toilet that used to be the only option. And wasn’t something I was particularly looking forward to having to use in 36 degree weather.

We talked a lot about the economy. But in a way that I’m not particularly worried about. Yes, it is going to be tough and really tough for those who already had it rough before layoffs, cutbacks, and credit crises. But overall, I have believed since the crisis crested in September ’08 that this recession is going to be good for the country. My friend lives very frugally, but well and in some cases—depending how you look at it—luxuriously (on a beautiful island overlooking your own beach? Who cares about hot water!) I’ve said this before I’m sure, I’m not a minimalist. No one who has ever seen my shoe collection could believe that. But that’s when things are good. Not working and paring down what I want versus what I need (and good body wash falls into the what-I-need category still). Being cost conscious is a new interesting trend. What I sincerely hope is that people will not just go for the cheapest, but start prioritizing quality and worthiness. I’m looking to go back into travel tech, which is something I think is invaluable to life. Travel brings experiences, exposure, interests. I hope that even though it’s terribly tough to make ends meet for the next 18 or so months, folks won’t forsake experiences entirely.

While I was there I finally saw the Zeitgeist movie. Like most conspiracy theory/docudramas, it raises some interesting thoughts, but completely blows it in others; jumping to conclusions without adequate backing, not sourcing information correctly, etc. It’s very easy to spot no matter what the goal is. Still, the first section on religion was fairly spot on. And Building 7 is very weird. As for FDR provoking Japan into Pearl Harbor to launch us into WWII … duh. Pretty much nothing I haven’t heard from my fiancé’s conspiracy theorist father, particularly about the international banking cabal.

I simply love conspiracy theories. I really do. I have one that the reason for the piss poor response to Hurricane Katrina was that the government was trying to see if they could impose martial law, as a test to determine how easy or difficult it would be after a disaster. Given how 9/11 was handled, I was shocked that they didn’t try to declare it in New York. Maybe they just didn’t think of it in time. But my whack job theory is that they intended to try in New Orleans but failed because of the sheer amount of press coverage and national attention. As for international banking/financier cabals, I totally believe in that. I just don’t always believe they’re in the wrong. As long as there are people who want to be sheep, there will be people who feel the need to herd them. I’m a big Kennedy assassination conspiracy theorist and am starting to have questions about some aspects of 9/11.

But the people who produce the conspiracy theories always screw it up by including something so easily caught out that the entire point of what they’re trying to do falls apart. One false fact can unravel the best of arguments. Just ask Dan Rather.

Happy anniversary! Obama reverses the international gag rule regarding abortions. Not surprising of course, but nice to see happen so quickly. You know, I could have much more productive fiscal conversations with conservatives if they would drop all the dictatorial social issues. I’m sure they would say the same thing about me, but what I’ve always said about the left vs. right social issues: my side takes nothing away from them; theirs takes something away from me. Therefore, my side should win. And with this economic crisis, I’m hoping people consider restricting individual rights is lower on the priority than preventing their own foreclosure. But to be honest, what Obama said back during the primaries is true. When times are tough, people do get insular and cling to what is familiar.

It sure was nice to get a shout out in the inauguration speech:

“We know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus, and non-believers.”

It’s the first time that we non-believers (atheists, agnostics, or whatever it is we’re called) have been so publicly called out as being a part of the country. And after the rabid Christianity of the last eight years (which I don’t expect to end, but at least it’s out of the White House) it was a pleasure to be included.

I loved that Michelle Obama stayed away from the traditional red or blue outfit. Rather than being symbolic of the flag, those colors have become more representative of the divisiveness of the two parties. The Obamas could not have won without the red states and cross-over voters. Avoiding the standard colors was a nod toward that, I think. A small one, but her fashion choices are scrutinized. And a white dress for the balls uses up the often neglected remaining flag color.

It was an excellent speech. It doesn’t soar, but then given the current situations, it would be hubris to be so lofty. And the truth is, without citizen involvement, things aren’t going to get better. This says it best for me:

There are those who wanted more poetry, more loft in the speech. They wanted to hear the eloquence of the race speech Obama gave during the campaign. Or the call to tomorrow given from the mile-high perch of the nominating convention in the Rockies.

But this was a day, in a year, when all poetry will have a more urgent edge. Loft will not suffice.

But it’s really today and tomorrow that matter, not the actual inauguration day. Today he starts work. Oh wait, no, he actually did start yesterday with this memo from my uber-crush Rahm Emanuel:

"...no proposed or final regulation should be sent to the Office of Federal Register for publication unless and until it has been reviewed and approved by a department or agency head appointed or designated by the President after noon on January 20, 2009, or in the case of the Department of Defense, the Secretary of Defense."

I’m not sure which of Bush’s last minute gutting of the environment or my uterus haven’t made it into the Federal Register yet, but it’s a start.

I know I should be outraged over this; I just can’t bring myself to be so. It’s so funny. It’s like watching little mice run around and over each other, squeaking and squawking. I assume they’re speaking some little mice language, but it makes no sense and is just cute and funny. Or it’s like watching a hamster furiously running on its wheel like it’s actually going to get somewhere. You can’t help but marvel at the little bugger’s drive, but also at its innate stupidity.

Who am I comparing to cute but mindless rodents? These people:

Change They Can Litigate: The fringe movement to keep Barack Obama from becoming president.

Why the stories about Obama's birth certificate will never die: Barack Obama was, without question, born in the U.S., and he is eligible to be president, but experts on conspiracy theories say that won't ever matter to those who believe otherwise.

I was around in 2000, and I understand the zeal when you have a President-elect who shouldn’t be. But even we, who had something of a case, got over it. But watching these people scurry about in total delusion provides entertainment I thought I’d lost when Sarah Palin went back to Alaska (though her bills keep coming in!)

Thanks little people. In the post-election glow, I needed something to continue to make me laugh.

Cross-posted to Pandora’s Politics.

Seriously folks, begging for my money via private jet? You’re so doing it wrong. And yet, these wealthy people that supposedly generate the jobs so god forbid their taxes should not be raised want to use my money to cut jobs so they can still fly in private jets.

I realize I’m being simplistic here, but don’t these people have PR people? To say, hey, this might look bad given the mood lawmakers and the public are in? The definition of socialism as bandied about during the campaign was completely off base. But the situation the financial industries and the auto companies are putting us in practically demands socialism (government ownership of industry for those who thought the progressive income tax enshrined in our constitution was socialism; NB it’s not).

Symbolism and illustration are important to the American people. Flying in a private jet to the hearings where you beg for money is illustrative of these CEO’s grasp of reality, or hubris. So they’re either stupid or dangerously arrogant. Either way, they have no business running these companies any more. But we will have to bail them out somehow should necessitate some government ownership/oversight which is in fact socialism. And all this is predicated by the actions of the uber-Republican type. The CEOs and Wall Street financiers who embody the symbol of success in the Republican Party.

Good job GOPers! You’ve created socialism in America!

So apparently there is some agreement cooked up in the Senate (of course appropriately bipartisan) that the mere announcement that it exists (no details) boosted GM and Ford’s stock prices. But, it might not get voted on because Congress might not stay in session all this week because they’re going home early in advance of their very long Thanksgiving break. I think it likely that my former coworkers are going to have to work over the Thanksgiving holiday. And with unemployment at its highest in sixteen years, there will be families who will be eating the cheapest turkey they can find (which is gross) but Congress can’t stay in session to deal with this.

Out of touch and oblivious to reality. I can often be accused of this given I’ve never not worked when I wanted to nor did I ever not have what I wanted (within reason) when I wanted it. But even I get that the people running the show are clueless. We did our job in shaking up Congress. Now they need to do their jobs and shake up the executives. Or at least stay in session.

Cross-posted to Realist Theorist.
 

Normally I try to treat the subject of abortion either very dispassionately and logically, or very sensitively (yes, that’s my version of sensitivity). I appreciate it’s a touchy subject. But the latest regulation Lame-Duck Curious George wants to push through is going too far and is getting me rather cross.

The proposal defines abortion as follows: “any of the various procedures — including the prescription, dispensing and administration of any drug or the performance of any procedure or any other action — that results in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception and natural birth, whether before or after implantation.”

Normally I wouldn’t get all hot about this given who is coming in next, and what his record is on women’s reproductive rights. I have no doubt this will be reverted and probably even repealed entirely. It’s the insult that gets me. That this guy (Bush) and his backers (antiquated nits) think so little of my rights and freedoms; that they are so arrogant as to try and regulate this in a lame duck session; that they are so obvious in their overall contempt for women; that’s what earns me the red hair temperament.

I can see no other motive behind this except that Bush and his antiquated nit supporters in this want us to stop having sex. They have this weird idea, I guess, that if they throw up more and more barriers to safe birth control methods, that we’ll stop having sex.

How’d that work out for Bristol Palin?

But more importantly, how well will that work out for the woman who can’t take the Pill and wants an IUD? How well will that work out for the woman with an ectopic pregnancy if she happens to run into a hospital worker opposed to abortion of any kind?

Enough! I am sick of having these arguments about sex, birth control and abortion. The sexual revolution was like 40 years ago. We won it. We’re having sex. We have methods to prevent pregnancy. The abortion battle was 35 years ago. We won that too and keep winning it over and over again. With Obama likely to appoint as many as 3 justices to SCOTUS, we’ll win it for decades to come.

The very simple fact is: Humans like to have sex. Humans like to have sex without consequences. Humans will continue to develop methods and technologies to have sex without consequences. Cleopatra stuck rocks in her naughty bits so she could have sex without consequences. Every time someone tries to stop humans from having sex, we find a way around it. Medicine, the 60’s, the Internet. You get the idea.

So please stop banging your heads against this biological wall. You cannot legislate adult sex. Not well, not effectively, and not without creating some seriously bad edge cases. Or maybe not so edgy? One in fifty pregnancies can end up being a life-threatening ectopic pregnancy and this regulation would allow people to not treat that. When I’m rushing to the emergency room because I think my innards are about to rip apart and kill me, I’m not stopping to check whether the nearest hospital receives federal funds and whether there might be a virulent pro-lifer waiting to treat me (or not).

I can be sympathetic and agree that no one—excepting for the life and health of the mother—should be forced to perform an elective abortion. But birth control? Stay out of my fallopian tubes!

Birth control has become so accepted that no one dares speak openly against it anymore unless it’s the Catholic Church (and boy howdy do they have the moral superiority when it comes to sex). So the antiquated nits are going after it from the other end; calling birth control methods that work after conception abortion. More and more women are opting out of the Pill towards less hormonal methods, primarily the IUD (my data is anecdotal, not statistical; I’m too lazy to do the real research right now). But even if I don’t have the numbers, that any form of birth control is included in restrictions against abortion is nothing more to me than further invasion of my reproductive tract against my will.

Usually that’s called rape.

Cross-posted to Realist Theorist.

* I prefer modern methods, of course, but applaud that ancient lady for her inventiveness.

Some may say it’s perverse to quit you career when it appears that you’re on the cusp of hitting the next big step. The problem is, I don’t know how to make that step. I mean, I guess I do, but I don’t want to. So after stepping up the ladder, stepping sideways on the ladder, getting stepped upon, I didn’t just step off the plank, I swan dived. And I don’t care. But somehow I have to get from here to the end goal,

You know you need a manicure when typing the above paragraph took way too long due to typos. That and I’m really tired, so it’s all inanities today.

I could spend the next four years looking at Rahm Emanuel. He’s so good looking. Oh yeah, I get to!

I’m watching an entertainment tonight-type special about the election. Anyone remember Fred Thompson? Without the da dumb?! But seriously, this is on CNN, and it is totally playing like a Entertainment Tonight! episode. Wait, there went Kucinich and the UFO. This brings back memories.

There’s something quite contemplative about just sitting and relaxing in a hotel room. I took a red-eye from Seattle to Philadelphia last night. I will endeavor never to do a red-eye that isn’t a non-stop flight again. I normally do red-eyes to the East Coast ‘cause I can sleep through it (gotta love xanax) and bypass the whole time change. But when you have to layover, it disrupts the whole process. So rather than wandering around Philly today, I stayed in the room waiting for my gal friend to arrive. Nice room, and I can smoke and drink wine and write. That’s something you don’t get to do in many places anymore, all at the same time. I need to do this periodically, with knowledge aforethought, just to write and think. Not that this post is a good example of that, but like I said, knowledge aforethought.

Now they’re talking, on CNN, about stabilizing consumption. I have really dropped the ball on this one. I used to be highly consumptive (that does not mean I have TB) and obviously since I’m not working, I can’t buy as much as I used to. Which I’m very fine with, surprisingly. Own one Von Furstenburg coat and you own them all? Nah, not really, but one has turned out to be plenty.

Ooh ooh, up comes Palin’s return attack on the McCain campaign. Wait, I’m already done talking about her. I hope. There’s a reason my political blog is called Pandora’s Politics.

Krugman! On CNN now. With Tivo there is little to stumble across. So I would have missed this at home. I love Krugman.

BTW, for anyone who sends me the little people things rather than plants on Facebook’s Lil Green Patch, I turn around and sell them. So thanks for the greenbucks! What a useless but addictive app.

Ew, Arnold is talking about getting expelled from the bedroom with Maria. TMI!

So how do I get from my mini-retirement to a driveway moment on NPR? Updates to come.

Cross-posted to Realist Theorist.

I hope this will be the last I write of Sarah Palin. The best thing Sarah Palin could do right now is to shut up. Let the McCain camp tear her to shreds and show her sophistication and strength by rising above it all and refusing to engage. Do the “I’m rubber you’re glue” schtick and preserve what’s left of her reputation.

But she won’t do that and in a big way, that’s indicative of the overall Palin problem. She’s not that smart. She’s definitely not sophisticated. And she’s not strong.

Many people equate sophistication with celebrity, money, and the trappings thereof. That’s not what I mean. If being sophisticated meant wearing Valentino, then I’d say she was sophisticated. She wore Valentino very well. But it’s more than that. And that’s what she doesn’t have.

Sarah Palin never built on any of her education, such as it was. Being educated isn’t just earning a degree. It’s taking what you learned and building upon it as you go through life. It’s making what you learn relevant to many facets of life, policy, and ideology. It’s understanding your limitations and building on your strengths. There is no evidence that Sarah Palin has done that in the context of the national stage. She may have done that for her role as a small-state governor. I leave that to the Alaskans to decide. But translating and making relevant that experience on the national stage. Oh no she didn’t.

It is my opinion that when you enter the presidential race, you are leaving yourself open to have your entire life and every word under a microscope. The Clintons had to go through that, and they still do. Barack Obama had to endure that, and he emerged victorious. John McCain has endured it for many years. So cry no tears for Sarah Palin. When she entered this race by accepting, she opened herself to that same scrutiny. My only question remains, why on earth McCain picked her? Oh, I know the stories about how he was forced to over Lieberman or whoever, but in the end, he has to own his shit. He made the choice, he defended it. It’s unseemly for his camp to attack her now.

However much fun it is to watch. Call me cruel, I don’t care. I love this country and she told me I wasn’t part of it. I don’t forgive her that. Own your shit Sarah. You said it, and I believe by your subsequent statements and insinuations you meant it. You hate us urbane, intellectual types because we make you feel dumb. But whether you are smart or not is within your power. You are not dumb, but you are not smart. You do not use your intelligence to make good decisions and that is ultimately what made you unqualified for the highest office in the land.

As for McCain, I do think Campbell Brown says it best:

You are the ones who supposedly vetted her, and then told the American people she was qualified for the job. You are the ones who after meeting her a couple of times, told us she was ready to be just one heartbeat away from the Presidency. If even half of what you say NOW is true, then boy, did you try to sell the American people a bill of goods. If Sarah Palin is the reason some voters chose Barack Obama, that is no one's fault but your own. John McCain, as he so graciously said himself the other night, lost this election. He lost it with your help, your advice, your guidance, and yes, your running mate recommendations. And that is crystal clear to everyone, no matter how hard you try to blame Sarah Palin or anyone else.

She’s exactly right. McCain’s choice of Palin is indicative of his wisdom in general. If it’s true, as it’s rumored, that the only reason she was picked is because she’s A) a woman and B) pro-life, what did that tell us about a candidate running for president during these extremely troubled times? McCain shouldn’t blame Palin, but Palin should blame herself as well for accepting.

As I said, I hope this will be the last I write of this lady, and it will be as long as I don’t continue to hear that she’s ready for national office. To be prepared you have to have an intellectual grasp—or even curiosity—about the world around you. She didn’t. She may have a fine intellectual grasp of Alaska, again, not my state. But she doesn’t look outside it (even when gazing at Putin from her front porch). Folksiness and small town “real” America “values” isn’t going to do us jack shit against this failing economy and our troubles overseas. Can we please, finally, realize it takes exceptional intelligence to run this country and that is what we elected?

Everyone can grow up to be President. But not everyone deserves it. Please, let’s hear no more about Ms. Palin except in context of Alaska.

Oh, and if I were her—after getting treated like this by the McCain’s—I’d totally keep the clothes.

Cross-posted to Pandora’s Politics.