Bring On The Moose Killer

The 2012 elections are still a long way off. That's good for the Republicans because they have a lot of rebuilding to do and it looks like they still have a wait until the party completes it's current wave of deconstruction. Daily, more prominent Republican leaders are melting back into the foul black dirt of ignorance and ethnocentric enmity from which they sprung.

Barring complete political catastrophe, the Democrats are going to count on the leadership of their transformational leader, Barry O, to aggressively promote a liberal domestic agenda, while trying to co opt traditionally Republican leaning, independent, family values voters. The Republicans, with a stable of incumbent leaders with histories of graft, corruption, closeted homosexuality or marital infidelity, will have a hard time competing with them.

Karl Rove is counting on historical precedent to replenish Congressional ranks in 2010. I'm not certain that will happen. I think they will be lucky if they pick up enough new seats to replace further losses. They have a few attractive young up and comers with novel backgrounds. Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia is one. Gov. Bobby Jindal of Louisiana is another. I doubt they can make either of these boys fit the mold they need to win the Presidency. I don't think they can retread either Huckybuck or Romney again and hope to win a national election. Who knows, I could be wrong on both counts.

Personally, I think Sarah Palin is too stupid, unsubtle, and mean to be elected President but it is looking more and more like she is the only candidate that can make an impressive enough showing in the Republican primaries to be a believable candidate in 2012. Whatever her failings may be, she is a bonafide modern female candidate. She owes no fealty to a stronger male figure, lurking in the background. Whatever she is, she is self made. This is a milestone in American politics, liberal or conservative.

Win or lose in 2012, the Republicans need to start building a new group of future party leaders. This new crop needs to be packed with women, minorities and people with openly alternative life choices. If they want to make a comeback, it can't be with their father's Republican brand.

I don't think that the culture wars are over. Not by a long shot. Reproductive and Gay rights will continue to be hot issues for years to come. I think that's the way it should be. Easy victories aren't victories at all. The longer that these public dialogs remain hotly debated, the more public opinion on them will moderate, on both sides and that is exactly what is needed. We also need to keep examining racial, religious and cultural diversity and what it takes to meld us all into some kind of workable homogeneous society. We're nowhere near there yet but a lot closer than we used to be.

Yo Ho Ho!

I found the link to this at W.C. Varones. You have got to hand it to the Russkies. Protect the sea lanes. Make a little money. Have a good time on vacation. All rolled into one. Well rounded life.

Health Care

Healthcare is a snakepit. You can't have a system of any kind that gives everybody the best possible healthcare. Even mundane care if provided to everyone, can produce mindboggling costs.

Use Steve Jobs as an example. Pancreatic cancer is not curable but death can be delayed, sometimes significantly. First, you get a Whipple procedure. You need a really good surgeon and it takes all day. He guts you like cleaning a fish for dinner, then reconnects what little is left. Convalescence takes a really long time and there will be complications and surgical revisions, no matter how otherwise healthy and young you are. If they do everything right, when you heal, you can eat but you won't digest anything. You'll need to have intravenous nutrition for the rest of however long you live. It's amazingly expensive and the risk of sepsis is extemely high, no matter how much care is taken.

Even with all of this, the cancer will metastasize and must then be dealt with. Chemo, radiation, organ transplants, all these can eventually be done if the patient lives long enough.

From the minute you decide to aggressively treat pancreatic cancer you are committing to millions of dollars a year in costs.

Given a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer, most people are willing to submit to any measures necessary to stay alive. Even if it's not for that long.

There are a whole shitload of diseases just as expensive to treat as pancreatic cancer. There are some that are more expensive. Steve Jobs is a billionaire. If it costs him 10 or 15 million a year to stay alive, it's no problem for him. If we commit to treating everybody aggressively for every disease we can, it's a whole different matter. When those "Culture of Life" fuckheads get involved, it will be even worse. You think they're bad now, just wait.

There's maybe a billion people out of the six or seven billion on earth who are starving to death. There are a lot of places where the life expectancy is under 40 years. In many of these places, birth control is not practiced and consensual sex is not a recognized concept. Basic sanitation infrastructure is absent. Basic health care is not even productive in these areas. Lowering the infant mortality rate makes conditions worse in the long term. Maybe comprehensive health care is not where we should be focusing our best efforts right now.

I'd like to see Americans get basic health care. It seems to me though that we haven't even decided what that is yet. It seems to me that old people and poor people already get too much free health care, while the uninsured don't seek treatment even when sick for fear of burdening their families with unpayable bills. There's no way that's fair.

Traitorous American Catholic Militias To Fight The Culture Wars ?

I don't think this is any coincidence, do you?

The American Catholic press has chosen this time to rehash one of the most brazen and brutally punished mutinies in American military history. They are suggesting that the motivations for it were a gallant cause and worth emulating today. Old Zach Taylor rounded up every last one of these guys he could find and hung them publicly.

Today, when Pope Ratzo and his bishops are demanding all loyal Catholics to disregard American civil law on social issues and instead follow their edicts, can exhortations of armed resistance and rebellion be far behind?

I don't think any American Catholics will follow Ratzo on this and the thought of any fat, faggot bishops taking up the gun is laughable. Still, it tells you where Ratzo's head is at.

Tin Soldiers And Nixon Coming

Today, the wing nut, blood mongers of the Republican Party. decry the murder of the beautiful and innocent young Iranian girl Neda, shot down, presumably by para military thugs on the streets of Tehran. They aren't wrong but they are now and have always been, cringing little cowards.

Four decades ago, the voice of the Right was silent over the shooting, in cold blood, from several hundred yards away, of 13 students on the campus of Kent State University in Ohio. President Nixon, as newly elected as Barry O is today, said the shootings were the treatment that student protesters on campus should expect. No attempt was ever made to uncover who gave the order to fire. The soldiers who fired were not prosecuted because they were supposedly threatened by the students, most of them innocent bystanders, going from class to class, more than a football fields distance away.

On another note, we learned today that Nixon was generally against abortion, not on any quasi-religious or ridiculous "natural law" grounds but because he believed it weakened family values in America. He believed abortion should be allowed for cases of rape or miscegenation, which he no doubt believed would be mostly the same thing. He would have had no problem aborting Barry O. Hey, neither would I, if that's what his mother wanted. Dicky might have made it mandatory. He wasn't a big fan of the mulatto condition. Everyone knows they're uppity.

Family values and Richard Nixon. What a joke. It is well known that his wife despised and was disgusted by him and that he was a homosexual pedophile, indulging in his filthy passion with his friend "Bebe" Rebozo, down in Florida on Key Biscayne every chance he got.

So Smart

Here's a nifty little article from Australia. A catholic charity set up in support of women seeking abortion, found that most of the women seeking abortion were experiencing economic challenges and abused either physically or psychologically by their domestic partners.

What a surprise.

They advocate social and financial support that will enable these women to bear and raise their children but bemoan the tremendous costs and effort required.

The long term solution is obvious. Criminalize abortion and punish these women even more.

Iran Revolts, Again

A lot of Americans have been surprised by the reaction in Iran to the suspicious election results. No one who has ever paid any attention to Persian history, recent or ancient or who knows any Iranians should be surprised. They are capable of and willing to engage in revolution.

Nobody should expect that in the end the government that is installed is not Islamicist, anti-Israel, and very leery of American influence. Those things are just going to be a given. It's going to be a given in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan too.

Democratic or not, functional governments mirror the attitudes of the people.

Oh Please Marse Mitch, Don't Throw Me In That Briar Patch

Mitch McConnell says a filibuster in The Sotomayor Supreme Court confirmation is possible. We can only Hope!

When There Were Guns To Bear Or Earth To Plow, I was Always There, Right From The Start

During the ten years after I got out of high school. That is 1970-1980, America had record inflation pressure. Then things tapered off and even backtracked a little, so that a working guy could barely get along on about $20,000 a year. A lot of families started to depend on having two incomes during this period.

Since then, most costs have gone up 3-5 times as much. Some things, like housing have gone up more, even with the present real estate meltdown added in. Most working people are lucky to currently have a job that pays $40,000 or less. They are working a lot harder for a lot less and no promise of anything but harder times ahead.

It's alright though. The top 10% are doing fine and the top 1% are cruising along better than ever.

Does Michelle Obama Look Like A Gorilla ?

I think this is interesting because several people have told me recently that Michelle Obama looks like a gorilla.

Is this some kind of GOP talking point? Maybe it's a throwback to overt racism from the past but I can't imagine anybody thinking that would get any kind of sympathetic response.

I don't really see that much resemblance. Gorillas have broad shoulders, thick chests and short legs, Michelle doesn't. She doesn't seem to me to be that hairy, either. Still, a lot of people have said it. What do you think? Does she look like a gorilla?

I always thought Marlon Brando looked like a Gorilla. Especially in the Godfather, with his cheeks all puffed up.

Ride Sally Ride

June is Gay and Lesbian Pride Month. The acting administrator of NASA posted a notice on the website of the Office of Equal Opportunity at the Goddard Space Center stating this, lauding gay and lesbian NASA employees for past achievements and contributions and encouraging employees to participate in celebratory activities during the month.

Catholics are all upset about it. I guess they feel that an iconic organization like NASA should not be condoning people who engage in perverted sex acts. Maybe they should take a breather, anally rape a few alter boys and Irish orphans, and get over it.

And They're The Ones That Make The Eskimo Whore Jokes

As the toll of senseless and deadly gun violence from the Right rises this Summer, instead of trying to curb their rowdier factions, they want to whine that Sarah and Bristol have been made fun of by some late night TV comedian. The mother accused of looking slutty, the daughter of acting it.

They should face facts. Both these women, mother and daughter, are known for the casual use of controlled substances, followed by indiscriminate fornication, out on the tundra, under a cloud of blow flies, in the season of the midnight Sun. Both mother and daughter claim these acts were of love and not commercial. Isn't that what women of this type always say? The days of the mother's youth, when this happened, may be long past, it happened, none the less. The daughter's youth is fresh upon her. With her illegitimate child in tow, she has contracted to teach other young girls the consequences of round healed complicity. She would make a more honest living out on the tundra, butt down in a caribou wallow. The season is right. The nights are long. The methamphetamine is cheap and plentiful. I guess we should be grateful mother and daughter have not taken up arms, to avenge their soiled virtue, spilling yet more blood across the National landscape. The death toll on that would likely run to scores, maybe hundreds.

Walks like a duck. Quacks like a duck. Hoors. Mother and daughter both. God help the poor younger girls still not grown.

What, Me Worry?

I have said before that American money will be worthless. Pretty soon.

A lot of people don't think think this is true.

Read this and think about it a little bit.

If I wasn't right, this could never happen. Two guys? In a suitcase? With a false bottom?

What does this tell you? They're starting to sell our debt in Asia. Deeply discounted. For Cash. Probably any currency but the dollar. These guys were going to do a little arbitrage, get some cash and go back for more bonds.

This Is Evil. God Hates Fags. It's The Truth.

Read this. What Fester is saying here, is that true authority must always be right. The silent subtext is that he is the true authority. Ergo. God Hates Fags.

You, get no recourse or input into what becomes, for all intents, the absolute truth. Fuck consensus. Democracy is not a Catholic concept. God will speak to you if you listen and what he'll tell you, is to believe Fester and do what he says. Whatever he says. Some pretty out there stuff. How come when Fred Phelps puts up a God Hates Fags website, everyone trips over themselves calling him a hate monger but when il Popo says it, it's golden. God Hates Fags.

Luckily, most people realize Popo is an evil, perverted, anal raper and blow off everything he says. Unluckily for a few, they will heed his call and end up with dilated sphincters and blood running down their leg. God Hates Fags.

If you think the Pope , Rick Warren, James Dobson, Jimmy Swaggart or Creflo A. Dollar are any different from Fred Phelps, you're dreamin'. God Hates Fags.

Hey! Carrie Made The National Catholic Register

Our Miss California, Carrie Prejean, as we all know from the well publicized time she spent with everyone's favorite Olympian, Michael Phelps, fucks like a mink and is a total slave to the reefer. She's got a clamshell full of Ortho Novum and never leaves home without it. Mouth on her like a stevedore. Yet she's as pretty and plastic as a Hugh Hefner girlfriend. Hose her down and use a dilute bleach solution on her mucous membranes, check for open lesions or suspicious pustules, she's ready to go again. A girl after my own heart. Plucky. High spirited.

I'm pretty sure she's never even been in a Catholic church. She hates the Homos though and that makes her an honorary mackerel snapper, today, anyway.

It was the Homos that made her lose her crown, poor girl. That Trump guy is probably a Homo, too. Why else would he do that creepy, comb over thing. Way Elton John.

Quick! Re-Elect the Republicans

When the Republicans are running things, the gun waving, Right Wing Terrorist factions are at least minimally mollified, and tend not to shoot, mutilate, string up on barbed wire fences or drag behind their pick up trucks, Jews, Niggers, Homos, Abortion Doctors and Women or at least the ones who don't know their place.

It is the fault of the Left that all these recent acts of violence are taking place. If the Republicans were still in charge, everything would be peaceful here at home and we could get back to the legitimate business of water boarding towel heads at Gitmo and gang raping little Iraqi girls, like God wants us to.

This is your last warning, Liberals. There's returning veterans out there, with rental garages full of nitrate fertilizer and an old, dog eared copy of The Protocols of Zion, longing for Republican leadership. Give it up, now.

Why didn't I think of That

This explains Dick and Lynne Cheney's daughter, Mary and George and Laura's daughter, Barbara. So what? Nobody thinks they're not good parents.

Bolivians Have No Need For Other Gods

Of course not. They have the baby Jesus and his mother, Pachmama, the Earth Goddess, just as they have for thousands of years.

Along with the rest of the indigenous Latin American peoples.

Mr Peabody's Coal Train Done Hauled It Away

Anybody that thinks that the wing nut bloc of the Supreme Court; Roberts, Scalia, Thomas, and Alito have any integrity needs to read this.

These little white kittens suck the corporate teat 'til the bitter end. I wonder if a wise Latina would see it different?

GOP Rift

Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich are in a clinch for the leadership position of the Republican party. Newt's main bitch is that minorities are racists who strive to oppress old, white, Christian men. Palin, on the other hand believes that the biggest issue in America today concerns the right of citizens to do whatever they want with the money they get from government entitlement programs.

Does it get any better than this?

No Fall Back Position.

Most people believe that if Catholic priests were allowed to marry, the profession would attract a lot fewer homosexual pedophiles, Catholic children would be a lot safer and families would feel better about sending a son off into the priesthood. Most American Catholics would like to see women have equal participation in the Church with men, it hasn't happened. They would like to see a more democratic church structure instituted, it hasn't happened. In the past, the Catholic church tried to hold the line against divorce within it's membership, and failed. They tried to hold the line against premarital sex and cohabitation within it's membership, and failed. They tried to hold the line on birth control, and failed. They tried to ignore the feminist movement and that hasn't worked out well for them either. Catholics don't go to mass, they don't feel like they need communion. They don't confess. They aren't contrite.

The Catholic church has watched as other Christian groups have tried to liberalize with the mainstream of culture and then fade into irrelevance. They don't know what to do. They've been around too long to just give up. The current fights in the culture wars that the Catholics have been forced into are destigmatization of abortion and homosexuality. They are losing both, badly. Young Catholic women are more likely to have abortions than their secular or Protestant counterparts. Pro life activists are reduced to thuggish demonstrations in front of clinics and cowardly apologetics over the murder of physicians, while mainstream Catholics recoil in revulsion and disgust at their behavior. Gays are increasingly demanding to live openly within the Catholic communities that they grew up in and those communities are letting them. When these fights are lost, as so many others have been, where is the next fallback position? What can the Church then point to, as the dividing line between the faithful and the fallen?

The Church has to have some reason for being, some relevance in the life of the people. What is it? Where is it?

How To Tell They're Schmucks

When you realize it isn't really about abortion being murder. It's a sex thing. They don't like contraception either, or divorce, ever. They won't let their kids have sex education or information. They want the right to force their children to bear children. They insist that it's abstinence outside of marriage, or face the consequences.

There is only straight heterosexual intercourse. Between a married couple. For the purpose of reproduction, only. If she doesn't want to, it's alright to beat her with a stick, as long as it's not any bigger around than the thickest part of your thumb. The thing about God's law is, it never changes, ever.

When you fuck the right way, it is a sacrament, from God. Yahoo!

Schmucks.

Life Choices

My local paper ran a little feature story today. It's about a young Afghan woman who won a scholarship to attend high school and college in the West.

Now her family wants her to return home and marry her first cousin, to whom she was betrothed at age seven. This is not something she wants to do.

I remember, in the Zumwalt Navy, back in the Seventies, there was a stand down and we all had to spend a week attending assertive training classes. The trainers emphasized that we all have freedom of choice, all the time. They also emphasized that often those choices could result in a Court Martial, a long stretch at Leavenworth, and a Dishonorable Discharge.

This girl's choices would seem to involve outcomes even more grim than that, no matter what she chooses.

Bummer.

May God Have Mercy On Us All

I haven't written about the economy in a while. There's nothing new really, to talk about. A lot of the States are broke. The Feds are going to print half the money they spend this year.

The government is the last bubble. The rest of the World doesn't like it but they are holding big bags of our debt. What can they do but stand by silently and hope for a miracle?

You can argue, short term, about inflation versus deflation. In the long run, there can be no debate. America is heading for insolvency and bankruptcy.

Nothing has changed. Nothing can change, this late in the game. It's just not the American way to give up before the clock runs out. We still have time, if not hope.

May God have Mercy on us all.

Buy a little farm if you have the money. Organize a militia with your neighbors. Grow opium. Learn to distill liquor. Otherwise, stockpiling food, guns and ammo will have to do. Become a Mormon, couldn't hurt. Any port in a storm.

A Pro Life Interview

This guy pretty much meets my expectations for a pro life activist. The only thing that makes him unusual is that he's willing to speak honestly in public.

After all the mealy mouthed liars. He's a breath of fresh air. You know where he stands and what he thinks.

Radical Right Wing Terrorists, Smoke'em If You Got'em

Not every Muslim is an Islamist. Not every Islamist is a Radical willing to bomb public places, hijack planes or perform Jihad, killing innocents by the thousands and ultimately bringing about the downfall of the West.

The problem is that large numbers of Muslims are willing to remain silent, or even aid and abet their coreligionists that are willing to do these things.

The pro life movement is the same way. There is a history and continuing pattern of grievous violence by those in the pro life movement against their opposition. While those carrying out the violence may be only a small number, many others are obviously not only passively aware but willing to tolerate, aid and abet those among them that do these things. They are a real threat to our society and must be rooted out and destroyed. Thanks to the Bush administration, we have a bureaucracy designed to deal with them.

Turn DHS loose on them. Root them out. Stomp them down. intercept their communications. Infiltrate their organizations. Round them up. Do it now.

They Shot Him Down On "Common Ground"

They blew away George Tiller today, Sunday morning, at his church services. They will say it was a deranged, lone gunman, like they always do. It doesn't matter if he turns out to be a representative of the pedophile whore masters of Rome, eager for more mongoloid children to ass rape, or the subhuman, glue huffing Pentecostal community, who could never hope to replenish their numbers without a plentiful supply of ignorant young girls and CNS depressants, the motivation is the same. Twisted, perverted, coercive sex and the subjugation of breeding females.

Every time they shoot an abortion doctor, public opinion hardens against them. Every time they burn or bomb a clinic, they marginalize their cause. Every time a worker or client is killed, burned, maimed, crippled or merely terrorized, they ensure that abortion will remain legal forever.

Cowardly, back shooting scum. Come on out and fight.

The Truth ? You Can't Handle the Truth

I don't know about you but this seems to be pretty much what I've been waiting for all my life. I'm not surprised it is the evil secular humanists, atheists and agnostics that have been hiding the truth from the rest of us.

I feel so at peace.

Ireland

I don't want to get all maudlin about this because I'm not part of it but I've always recognized that the Irish Catholic Church is different. There is a certain remove between the laity and the religious hierarchy that exists in the Catholic Church to a greater or smaller extent in all other Catholic countries that is completely absent in Irish Catholic culture.

That special closeness is gone now. Maybe for good. The Church in Ireland has failed the people. Taken their innocence. Told them it was their fault. Then punished them for what they were never guilty of. The Church lied and remained aloof when the people came to ask why. The Church needs to recognize the full extent of its sin, confess and do penance. The Church needs to feel the same measure of hurt that it caused, for the same measure of time. It needs to clean its own body and house. The clergy need to return whatever material goods they have acquired from the people in the name of God. They are no longer fit stewards. I don't think they will do these things, do you?

The people would probably forgive the Church if they didn't so clearly see that the Church has already forgiven itself and moved on.

Sound and Fury, Signifying Nothing

California Proposition 8, which modifies the State Constitution to stipulate marriage is an institution between one man and one woman was upheld today by the California Supreme Court. The fundos see this as a big victory. Libs see it as an infuriating barricade on their march toward utopia. Symbolically it is both. Really, it's neither.

All Prop 8 does, specifically, is preserve the word marriage to be used only as the civil union between a man and a woman and require that homosexual civil unions must be called something else. As far as I know, members of homosexual civil unions could still use the terms husband and wife, in any context or combination they like. As far as I know, non hetero couples can have whatever kind of joining ceremony and call it anything they want, as long as it's not marriage. It's a pretty good deal, really. Gay rights activists will tell you that if it's not marriage, it's not the same. It isn't, strictly speaking, equality. Equality is what they are after and what they feel that traditional marriage supporters are trying to withhold from them.

What's going to happen is this ruling will set off a whole new war between the homosexual community and fundamentalist traditional family and religious factions. Oh well, anything to breath new life into the culture wars.

A Different Kind of Catholic Nominee to the Supreme Court

It's good to see Barry O is having a little fun with the perks of the Presidency. He has nominated Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court. Her academic qualifications are as good as any man ever nominated. She was a crime busting New York district attorney. She's been a judge for a long time, originally brought to he Federal bench by George H. W. Bush. She continues in the Obama mold of high level, high powered, pro choice, Catholic women nominees. She has an established paper trail and it's a liberal one. She's an up from the bootstraps kind of girl, who will generate fans from a lot of corners. The East Coast, ethnic working classes, the Caribbean community, all Hispanics, feminists in general, Catholic women in general, perhaps all women in general. Many that support her will be of humble origin but very conservative in both social and political outlook. They will not see her support for entitlement programs and anti discrimination as inappropriate at all but rather needed help for new members of society on the way up. They will not see her pro choice views as anything but a women's right to control her own life and body, something still sadly lacking in many of the cultures that make up America.

Another very interesting constituency she appeals to is the insulin dependent diabetic community. This is a large and fast growing segment of the American population, that often feels discriminated against and left out of the mainstream. It could be an interesting twist.

All things considered, it would be a good thing if the Senate confirms Sonia quickly but it will be even better if they don't. Foiling her confirmation would cause the Republican party an untold amount of damage and then leave Barry free to nominate someone even more liberal and with a more positive long term health outlook, more conducive to an extended term on the Court.

Good Luck Republicans. Try a little bite of Sonia.

Christian Charity. One Bleeding Red Weal at a Time.

Two articles, here and here, tell the story of a young girl who was accused of being pregnant by her highschool principal, after student rumors were passed along to him. The girl denied the allegations. After further arm twisting, she admitted to a favored female teacher, brought in to gain a confession in private, that she might be. The school then sent her to a "Christian" pregnancy counselling center. They did a pregnancy test, confirming that she was indeed gravid. The result of the pregnancy test was sent to the school, then disseminated to the staff, students and parents of students in the community.

The school then expelled her, with only two weeks left in the school year. There are three outcomes that this young woman now suffers. First, she loses a year of school credit. Second, all of her peers at school are made aware of her condition and she is humiliated before them and not allowed to graduate with her class. Third, if she did decide now to have an abortion, everyone in the local, inbred, fundamentalist community would know and she would be further branded by the community, not only as a whore but a baby murdering whore. She can probably kiss that scholarship to Bob Jones University goodbye too.

The parents of this girl are now suing the school, since all of this was done by the school, start to finish, without their knowledge or consent.

I'm not sure I have much sympathy for the parents, since they voluntarily committed the education of their child, into the hands of this snake pit of ululating weasels. I do have sympathy for the girl, who may not have had much input into where she went to school.

I do have some questions. Where is the father of this fetus, was he a student at the same school and if so, why was he not expelled? Why would anyone send their children to a school run by such obviously fucked up, black dirt ignorant, Bible thumping, snake handling scum?

I know a lot of Christians. I live with them, work with them, grew up with them. They are good people. Kind, gentle, considerate, loving, non judgemental people. They belong to many denominations. The people depicted as running this school and pregnancy counselling center, besides being unethical are not Christian by any definition.

What's Your Take On The Cancer Boy ?

Hodgkin's Disease has been one of the most successfully treated cancers for decades. There was a family friend who got Hodgkin's, in his teens, almost fifty years ago. He went through an exhaustive therapeutic process. Last I heard, he was fine.

If I was a young person with Hodgkin's and I knew with treatment there was a 95% cure rate, I'd go for it.

Still, the Cancer Boy seems aware of the situation and his chances either way. I say he's made an informed decision. So be it.

Red Shoes, Dark Continent

When the Pope was in Africa, last month, it seemed like he was universally acclaimed by Africans. He made bizarre statements about why Africans should stop using condoms and was immediately proclaimed as some kind of scientific genius by seemingly all Africans of intellect.

Here is a response to the Pope's African visit that seems more reasoned, if not very enthusiastic. I don't know how many Africans agree with it. At least we know there is at least one published dissenter to the otherwise universal Pope adoration. This guy seems to be a lawyer in Nigeria.

Memorial Day is for Livers

I saw an obit in the paper today for a guy my age, who died suddenly last Friday. Rich guy. Family money. USC. Law degree. Worked several years as an assistant district attorney, then retired to private life. Wife and kids. Country, hunting, garden and beach clubs. Travelled freely. Several homes, both in and out of the local area. Liked the ponies at Santa Anita. The obit said he was a happy guy. Laughed loud, hard and often. Why not? Sounds like he had a good life.

Last week, when we were both alive, many differences could have been pointed out between the two of us. You know what the biggest difference is between us now? I'm still alive. To you, my life might appear to be privileged. It might not. We share at least one thing in common, that the dead guy will never again have. We're both alive.

Take a lesson from the dead on Memorial day. You'll be dead too, soon enough. Today though, you're still alive. Go out to the park. Share a beer with a guy who claims to be a homeless veteran. Throw a stick to a dog. Cook burgers for some kids, give a couple to the homeless guy. Cheer while the kids play a little ball. Play a little yourself, if your knees still work. It's never just another day, when you're above ground. Just ask a dead guy.

What did the Doctor say, Luke?

I love stories like this. They usually are more prevalent after Memorial Day, when the Summer alcohol imbibing season really swings into effect. Do you think sucking the snake venom out of the dog's nose really saved it's life?

Do you think this guy really spent $14,000 on anti venom to save his puppy? I wouldn't have. He doesn't look like he has it to spare. Then, he had to spend $14,000 on anti- venom for himself. Expensive day.

Rattlesnake venom is a protein. If you suck it out of a snake bite and swallow it, once it reaches the stomach, the digestive juices denature it, neutralizing its effects. It has to be injected into the bloodstream to cause ill effects. In order for a venom sucker to be adversely affected, they would have to have large open wounds or lesions, in the mouth or esophagus, capable of absorbing significant amounts of the, by this time, quite dilute venom, mixed liberally with dog squeezings.

I think maybe this whole story lacks veracity. Very picaresque though.

Wish I Was In The Land Of Groton, Good Times There Are Not Forgotten. Look Away, Look Away, Look Away, Duty Sock.

Spending a few years of your youth on a submarine at sea is an experience not too much like anything else I can think of.

Sometimes during periods of extreme death defying danger, they make you get into your bunks with orders to be quiet, breath slow, and fall asleep. No shit.

Then, during a time of mind numbing boredom, for no reason at all, they will keep you awake for days on end. They perform bizarre drills simulating things that could never happen, during which you are required to perform improbable acts. They repeat the drills over and over again. You become an expert at spraying imaginary flame retardants, over surfaces not really burning. Then they demand that you remove every speck of debris and drop of hydraulic oil from your assigned cleaning space and shine all its surfaces to a high gloss, while the guy next to you is pushing more oil and debris into your space in a vain attempt to clean his own. Hundreds of pounds of paper towels are used up for this purpose, compacted into bales and stored away. All the while, all around you, hundreds of valves are cycling, releasing more oil and miles of ventilation ducts are blowing grit and dust into these streaks of oil, newly released in the areas you have just cleaned. Eventually the XO comes by, pronounces you unsat and tells you to start over.

My favorite part was drinking really strong, greasy, bitter coffee by the gallon and chain smoking carton after carton of cigarettes that they sold you almost for free. You quickly developed the kind of cardiac arrythmias that immediately kill you if you aren't young and healthy. The backs of your eyelids become as rough as sand paper but it's OK, you start to like the feeling and you rarely blink anyway.

Old Paul Simon songs get stuck in your head. That Mess Specialist Three, with pale skin and funny lesions, the one that fried eggs in the morning, started to like me, a lot. And you know what, I started to like him back.

Psychedelic.

The Navy Wants You, Baby!

Man Of the Week

Calvin Borel won the Preakness on Saturday, riding a filly, Rachel Alexandra. He won the Kentucky Derby last month, for the second time, on Mine that bird. This guy is 42 years old. He keeps life simple. He communes with thoroughbred race horses.

He's been a jockey since he was eight. He's been working the circuit, full time, since he was twelve. He doesn't read. He doesn't write. He doesn't ride the big racing events on the East or West coasts, even though he has had the opportunity to do just that, after garnering the fame which came with winning the Kentucky Derby two years ago. He lives with the horses he rides. He mucks out their stables. He feeds them. He exercises them daily. He trains them to race.

He's not married. He has a girlfriend. He lets her handle his financial matters. This may be his one big mistake. He should develop a business relationship with a banker and a CPA and let them supervise each other, while managing his money. He should just keep riding horses. He seems pretty good at it. It seems like steady work. He seems to like it.

Calvin is the kind of guy that every boy secretly wishes he could be. I know I always did. I still do.

Get Your Passports If You Want To Be A Real American

Next month, all American citizens will have to get a passport if they want to go across the border, even to Mexico or Canada for a day or two. Most Americans don't have a passport. I don't. I've never needed one. A little camping in Canada. A week or two in Baja. That's about my speed.

I'm sure that all terrorists, drug smugglers and borderland gangsters have unimpeachable credentials. What a joke. What's really going on here? Whatever it is, it sure as fuck isn't about homeland security.

I'll get a passport. I won't like it. Fuck George Bush. String him up. And his little dog too!

Responsible Gun Ownership

I believe in pretty much unrestricted gun ownership. Here's one problem with that. There are a lot of people who, while they might not be immediately identifiable as unsuitable for gun ownership, would be better off winnowed out of the process.

I hope this does not include my old shipmate Bothenook, but the resemblance is uncanny.

Higher Hill on the Right

Wingnut politics in America has staked it's chances for survival on the abortion issue. It's interesting that they are doing that, because it's not a pressing issue but one which has been more or less in stasis for 35 years. What's even more interesting is that the Roman Catholic Church has staked it's credibility as a relevant institution in America on the same issue. Most Catholics do not support the Wingnut abortion line or any of their other positions. The only explanation for this can be that the Church fears the kind of marginalization, as a quaint cultural relic, with no real influence, that is their current role in most of Europe.

Abortion is going to be the major point of contention in domestic politics during the Obama administration between the right and left. This will be fun to watch because as strident as anti abortion voices have been and continue to be, Obama refuses to engage. Unlike politicians on the Right, Obama apparently faces no lefty litmus test on support of the issue, upon which support for him depends.

The Right has a much higher hill to climb on abortion than the Left. The Left doesn't have to convince you that abortion is a good thing. It only has to convince you that it is a decision that women; your mother, sister, girlfriend, or wife, have the right and the faculties to make. The Right must convince you that abortion be punished with criminal penalties and that none of the women you know, are responsible enough to decide whether or not to have one, when the situation arises. That's harsh.

I had been thinking that the Republicans might want to put the social issues on the back burner and go with issues of fiscal responsibility. It doesn't look like that will be the case.

The Catholic Church seems to be preparing to force its members to either accept a more Orthodox religion and the lifestyle that goes with it, or formally separate from the Church.

These two organizations, the Republican party and the Roman Catholic Church are like cornered, injured predators, unused to being the hunted and preparing to fight to the death for continued existence.

If there is going to be a time for reactionary societal forces to make a final stand, it is now. It may already be too late. The demographics of the non elderly do not favor their positions.

Culinary Orthodoxy Matters

A lot of conservative commentators are critical over the way that Barack Obama likes his hamburgers. They don't like that he doesn't use ketchup. They don't like that he prefers the meat fully cooked. Most of all, they don't like that he requested Dijon mustard.

You know what? I agree with the pundits. A good quality burger with a thick patty should be cooked on the rare side. I almost always use ketchup, in some form or other to dress my burger. Dijon mustard has too subtle a blend of flavors to work on a fully dressed hamburger. I like to use regular old yellow mustard with a generous amount of fresh grated horseradish mixed in. The flavors in that really come through.

I don't really judge a persons politics by their gustatory inclinations. Obama can still be an OK president even if we don't share the same taste in burger preparation.

Eating My Way to the Straits of Juan de Fuca

I booked a cruise starting next Sunday, a few days ago, on the Carnival Splendor. They cancelled its regular weekly itinerary out of Long Beach to Mexico, and it's going to Canada instead. This was due to the swine flu pandemic. What a joke. Most people don't want to go to Canada this early in the Spring and cancelled their reservations. It's a humongous ship, that can carry up to 3700 passengers in pampered luxury, so they were literally giving the ducats away. I couldn't pass it up. It turns out to be pretty much free and will be a nice little break from my usual very relaxed schedule. I'll take a few books along and wallow in high quality, 24 hour, all you can eat buffet. We will take some nature walks on Victoria Island, high tea at the Empress Hotel, and prowl around the Chinese sections of Vancouver.

Since it is so cheap anyway, I'm not planning on doing a lot of ancillary spending. One of the things they really soak you for on board is Internet, at a few dollars a minute. Usually I never turn the computer off and am connected 24/7. I'm sure at least one of my four regular readers will miss my 3 or 4 normal posts next week. Sorry. If you can get to Long Beach cheap, you should consider coming along. We can get a table together. Last I looked, they were still selling $200 tickets. Try cruisedirect.com. The whole thing, for two people, is costing me $500 and I'm getting a $250 kickback on my Carnival cruisebucks account that should cover gratuities, parking, and all other incidentals. You don't need a passport 'til June.

Not A Pejorative Term

I love this. Joe the Plumber won't let Queers near his kids. He explains that Queer is not a pejorative term because queer means "odd or strange" and that's what gays are.

Yeah! Boy Howdy, and Nigger is just Latin for black, too. What could be wrong with that? We need to get Miss California and Bristol Palin to weigh in on this one.

Arnold Keeps Things Interesting

I smoked my first marijuana cigarette during the Christmas/New Years holidays of 1966-1967. That's going on forty two years. Many people I know have smoked marijuana regularly during that whole time.

They turned out to be no different than anybody else. They are no more likely to have committed crimes or be guilty of moral turpitude. They are no less likely to be religiously active or successful financially. They are no more or less likely to have used or abused other drugs, including alcohol. I believe they are less likely to have used tobacco habitually.

It is far past the time for us to have a serious discussion about the legalization of the recreational use of marijuana.

Liberals, Quake in Your Boots

The Wing nuts do not feel that they should have to moderate their views in order to increase support among the voting center of the populace. Why should they, they're sitting pretty.

They have George W. Bush, the greatest war president since FDR in their corner and his entire former cabinet and array of statesman and advisers, patriots and heroes, one and all. They have a stable of former Congressional leaders, Newt Gingrich, Tom Delay, Dick Armey, and a score of others whose names strike fear into the liberal heart. They have the choirboys of the court; Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, Alito and their leader, Seizin' John Roberts, who get their marching orders from Pope Fester himself. They have an intellectual brain trust that virtually controls the media and public opinion, Limbaugh, O'Reilly, Hannity, Glenn Beck, Ann Coulter, both Lauras, Doctor and Ingraham, and most importantly, Steve Doocy. They also have within their ranks the most powerful and inspirational figures in popular culture since Davey Crockett and Daniel Boone; Sara Palin, Joe the Plumber and Miss California. They are fighting against the most galvanizing and perverted social forces in modern times, those of abortion, sodomy and climate change.

Don't ever forget, they have God on their side, too.

Mine That Bird

Owned by a tinhorn racketeer. Trained at a dusty, quarterhorse ranch in New Mexico's Hondo River Valley, by an old rodeo roustabout. Small head, short neck, spindly legs, ridden to victory by a slap happy alcoholic, with no teeth. He beat the best young thoroughbreds in the World, sliding past the front runner on the inside rail, on the home stretch, in America's premier horse race, at fifty to one odds.

I love America. Fire up a Lucky Strike. Have a drink.

Everybody Liked Jack Kemp

He was an admirer and disciple of Ronald Reagan. It should have been the other way around. He was everything in fact, that Ronnie only pretended to be.

He wasn't a racist or a sexist or a religious fanatic. His kids and wife really loved him. He always performed better than expectations and best of all when things got tough. He was a better athlete than he should have been. A better politician. A better businessman. A better family man.

He worked hard to do the best he could and to help others to do the same. He wasn't mean. He wasn't cynical or corrupt.

Everybody knows people like Jack Kemp when they're growing up. Everybody admires them and wishes they were more like them. The factors that make them so admirable usually limit them from going as far as they should. Jack got pretty far in life but in the end, the same was true of him.

He was a great American. We could have used more like him. It's our fault there weren't more, not his.

Rest in Peace, Jack.

What the Fuck's a "Social Conservative"

I believe in the merits of free enterprise and that all should have an equal chance to prosper.

Before we pass a death sentence on someone, we should make really, really sure they did the crime. Other than that, I don't have a problem with the death penalty or which crimes it should be applied to. Prisons should be hell holes of punishment and despair. Prisoners can rehabilitate themselves after their sentence is served, if they don't want to go back to prison or face the gibbet.

I don't think people should be allowed, as a general rule, to starve or freeze to death but other than that I am against social welfare benefits of any kind. County workhouses are not a bad idea. People could be fed, provide needed public sector labor and learn basic employee skills.

I think free, public education should be available but only to those who are enthusiastic about applying themselves and are intelligent enough to benefit from it. Thugs, criminals , wastrels and retards need not apply. Those who abuse the privilege of public education should not simply be expelled, they should be punished harshly.

I think citizens should have access to the best and most advanced lethal weapons made, no exceptions for the size of ordinance or rate of fire. They should elect leaders and form themselves into militias for mutual protection against any and all external threats.

People should be able to live, think and believe any way they want, as long as they don't interfere with others just trying to do the same.

I hate the drooling, inbred, religionists, whether they be casted Hindus, woman stoning Islamists, Papist inquisitionists, glossolalian snake handlers or Buddhist navel gazers, who want to tell me there is some "natural law", imparted to them exclusively by their deity and that I must observe it by not practicing birth control, not working at certain times, dressing in certain ways or whatever the fuck it is their pasty, little, two bit savior wants. These people have highjacked the entire Republican political party in this country. They call themselves "social conservatives". I don't even know what the fuck that's supposed to mean, except they apparently want to enslave the rest of us.

My family have been Republicans since before the Civil War. Who are these degenerate, leprous, scumbags who have taken over my Party? I curse them and their children's children.

Pope Sorry, Again or Still

Pope Fester met with a delegation of Canadian aboriginals at the Vatican. He apologized to them for an entire century, during which young children were ripped from their homes and families and forced into Catholic Church run boarding institutions, far away. There they were held in bondage, against their will, commonly for over a decade, raised coldly and impersonally under the direction of priests and nuns, subjected to harsh physical and psychological punishments over extended periods of time, for offenses they didn't even understand they had committed, sodomized and otherwise repeatedly sexually abused, at the hands of perverted and opportunistic staff. When they complained or rebelled against the treatment they recieved, their lives were made even worse or terminated. The grounds of these children's boarding institutions are littered with unmarked graves, though the children that filled them were unusually resilient, stoic and hardy.

This resulted in a native culture that was and still is rife with isolation, distrust of authority, mental illness, domestic violence, criminality, substance abuse and suicide.

He wants everyone to know, he couldn't be sorrier.

To paraphrase Madeline Kahn, in Blazing Saddles. " What a nice guy !"

Most of these institutions were closed in the 1970s. Even after they closed, one of the favorite strategies of the Church in dealing with documented pedophile priests was to transfer them to the ministry of remote, Canadian aboriginal communities, where complaints were rarely lodged. In these communities the sexual abuse of children by priests was so commonplace it was regarded as part of White culture that must be accepted. It's not uncommon to find whole regions of remote native communities, where every single child, over multiple generations, has been the victim of priestly sexual abuse.

Gay Marriage May Not Be Such A Good Thing

I'm pretty sure no more than 3 % or so of the population are homosexual by nature. On the face of it, gay marriage doesn't seem like such a bad thing. I'm beginning to have doubts. Heterosexual marriage has been one of the bulwarks of human society for a long time. Homosexuality, while it may not be stigmatized as much in some cultures as in others, is not mainstream in too many places.

Not everybody in society is real smart or real successful. Not everyone is able to read and write well. The ability to actually evaluate large quantities of conflicting data and come up with personal opinions about individual subjects is beyond the abilities of most. A great many people simply accept the cultural norms as great truths by which to live. They find a job, go to work every day for forty five years and do what everyone else does. One of the things that most people of even marginal ability and intelligence aspire to is marriage. For many of them it's not an easy thing. Men and women are not that much alike. Unless you're dealing with an arranged marriage, getting someone of the opposite sex to agree to a life long sexual bond, requires skills that a person may never have developed or use again, unless they are interested in fornication. Of course almost everyone is interested in fornication but it is too expensive and time consuming for most.

If gay marriage was not stigmatized, it's possible that a lot of heterosexual young adults would simply settle for a life together with a same sex friend. Someone of similar interests and outlook. The sex might not be everything they ever dreamed about but it likely wouldn't be with an opposite sex spouse either and probably beats the fear and uncertainty of dating.

Another problem would be with slippery slope issues. Some young men would probably like to marry their sisters or girl cousins. These are females that they have known for a lifetime and are comfortable with. Most people have already formed an opinion about polygamy involving one man and many women. What about a group of young men who pool their resources to afford one really attractive and compliant female. After all, twenty minutes a day is really about enough quality time, isn't it? Is that something society should legally sanction? It would have sounded pretty good to me when I was twenty.

I think we may not, as a society, have evaluated all of the consequences of gay marriage. What do you think?

Swine Flu

It's flu season. A new strain is coming into the country, this time from Mexico. Supposedly it's more virulent than most strains. Supposedly it is a killer. No evidence of either of these things has yet been presented. Numbers of cases are small, as are the numbers of deaths. The deaths are among those groups that you would expect. The very young. The very old. Those with compromised immune systems. The kill rate isn't very high, even in Mexico, where preventive innoculation and therapeutic medications are not always available to everyone. There are several anti viral medications stockpiled that work effectively against this flu.

Why the huge amount of news coverage? Why are they cracking down on the borders, issuing travelers alerts and cancelling cruises to Mexico? I don't get it.

Bristol is focused on going to college, raising Tripp and advocating abstinence

Read all about it on the Fox News site.

These people are the lowest kind of ignorant, bestial, permafrosted, white trash. Hopped up on drugs. Fornicating indiscriminately out on the tundra, under the midnight Sun. Squatting to birth wherever they happen to be and then taking another snort of crank, before burning down Mommy's church.

It's surprising Bristol was even able to identify Levi as the father. I wonder if anyone has thought to do a paternity test.

Both sides can see personal gain in the raising of little Tripp. Lawyers have been put on retainer and a custody battle looms. It's obvious nobody really gives a shit about the kid.

Cheney Says Torture Is Good

Dick Cheney says we got good info from the guys we tortured. He says there is evidence to prove this. Hillary says Dick is not a reliable source.

There were two guys, that between the two of them, were water boarded 266 times. That's a lot. They should tell us what info they got from them and exactly when in the process of hundreds of water boardings over multiple years, they got it. We need to know if the information was valuable or even true.

Cheney lies. He lies a lot. No WMDs have ever been found. There were never any nuclear or biological threats from any countries in the Middle East, other than Israel. Nobody bought any yellow cake. The only country whose government has documented ties or gives money to al Qaeda is Saudi Arabia and we're not fighting them. The United States gets no political, military or economic benefit from its support of Israel. Cheney says all these things were true. He still says they are. Dick Cheney is a guy who drinks too much at lunch on hunting junkets, shoots a friend in the face after lunch and tries to cover it up.

We should do that whole trust but verify thing with Dick.

Health and Human Services.

Kathleen Sibelius is going to weather the nomination process and be named HHS Secretary. She is a Catholic girl. A graduate of perhaps the premier Catholic women's college in the country. She is quiet, clean living, well behaved and has devoted her life to public service. She has a degree of intelligence and sensitivity for the concerns of others unknown in any of the George W. Bush cabinet, of either term. She is well prepared by experience and disposition for the job, another obvious difference from most of the Bush cabinet.

The wing nuts don't like her because she believes women should be allowed to make their own choice about abortion, when faced with the prospect although in this, she seems no different to me, than Sarah Palin. The elderly, largely closeted gay, reactionary Catholic hierarchy hates her because she exemplifies the liberal, affluent, Catholic elite and a growing segment of the middle and working class, over which they no longer have any influence or control. Fuck'em. I think she'll do a great job.

I hope Barry puts her on the Supreme Court before he leaves, if Oprah isn't available.

Plan B Available, Without a Presciption, to Minors

20 years ago, big pharma came up with RU 486. It was a cheap, effective, morning after contraceptive pill. The wingers, church ladies, thumb screwers and other minions of the reactionary right criticized it from the very beginning. It's action is abortifactant in nature. Never mind that it is only used within the first few days of conception. RU 486 went on to be an effective and much used drug, all over the World, for a generation. It is still used today. It was never widely available in this country because of the opposition of the whack job right, who presumably would never even have any use for it.

The drug companies spent a whole lot more money and came up with a morning after pill that isn't and abortifactant. They call it Plan B. There was nothing the Bush administration could do to stop it from being made available. They were able to stop it from being distributed to girls under 18 years of age. The Bush administration is history. That decision is being reversed.

Cry me a river.

This Guy Beck is Tapped In to the American Psyche

I was watching the Glenn Beck Show today. He had John Bolton and Karl Rove on at the same time. They were all three of them agreeing how President Obama is an Islamic jihadist, Shining Path Communist, miscegenated Mud Person traitor, selling out white, Christian America to the slavemasters of the Axis of Evil. After them, for the lighter, softer women's view of the same issue, he had on Michelle Bachman, because she loves small children and fluffy kittens.

It was very well scripted and produced but I'm not convinced that the strategy is all that great. I think these commentators, while undoubtedly sincere, might have credibility issues with the target audience. Perhaps Fox should stick to some of their more intellectual and objective commentators, like Michael Hayden, Alberto Gonzales or Dick Cheney.

Did you see this show? Were you impressed? What do you think?

It's perfect, just the way it is

There are a hundred parodies and responses out there. If you haven't seen it, here is the original one minute spot commercial by the National Organization for Marriage against the legalization of homosexual marriage.

It doesn't need satirization or excoriating commentary. It's perfect, just the way it is.

Why Is She Being So Coy?

We're getting a clearer picture of Sarah Palin's true feelings on abortion. We now know she purposefully kept her recent pregnancy of a mongoloid child secret until very late and considered having a abortion. She is very proud that she chose not to. She is very proud that her daughter, Bristol, chose to recently have a child in her mid teens, out of wedlock, resulting in her quitting school. The daughter lives with Sarah and Todd and is a stay at home mom. Sarah doesn't believe in abortion for any reason, except perhaps the documented death of the fetus.

Sarah Palin has still not publicly stated that she wants to remove from all women the choice as to whether or not they have the right to terminate their pregnancies under any circumstances or what circumstances an abortion might be acceptable.

Why is she still being so coy?

Who Would Be Left?

I don't have a problem with the tea baggers out in force yesterday, protesting high taxes and big government. I am more concerned with the spending of money that the government doesn't have than high taxes and am more against government programs that are full of waste and corruption than money spent that actually does some good for somebody. That's mostly semantics though. I think I agree with them, that the government is fucked up.

The reason I'm not a big Republican voter or supporter, is that they continue to provide a home for the religious fanatics seeking to impose their rules on everyone, the xenophobes who want to stigmatize, ostracize and persecute those that don't meet their strict definition of "real American" and the warmongers who want to bully and terrorize the rest of the World through constant military aggression. These three groups were the face of the late, unlamented Bush administration. This was the same administration whose profligate spending and blatant graft and corruption dwarfed anything that had gone on in America before. They get rid of those people and I'll support them. The problem is, who would be left? Right now, I have no place to go but the Democrats, uncomfortable as I may be with that.

Dangerous Right Wing Extremists

I think it's hilarious that Obama's big dyke, running DHS, is going to use all it's questionably legal investigative resources, built up during the lawless Bush years, to target right wing extremists. I don't know how dangerous they are but they're probably at least as dangerous as the pathetic losers that they have been victimizing.

I hope she castrates them, not that the little cocksuckers have any balls to begin with.

I'm not identifying Obama's big dyke as Hillary Clinton or Janet Napolitano. I figure it's a twofer.

Throw the Bitch Out

People are saying that Caroline Kennedy was proposed as ambassador to the Vatican and turned down. I don't know that's true but she's obviously not a fit candidate. In the first place, she's a woman. She doesn't seem mentally impaired at all, so how Catholic could she really be? She doesn't have a big whisky nose. She's not actively pro life or even a member of Bill Donohue's Catholic League. She doesn't make excuses for priests that suck the penises of little boys.

I mean, even if they made her ambassador to the Vatican, what use would she be?

He Talked Just Like Elmer Fudd.

I knew this little kid. It's fifty years ago now. Long time. He was real smart but only did OK in school. He spent a lot of time by himself. A very quiet, gentle soul. He had big hips and narrow shoulders and was kind of doughy soft. He stuttered a little but a lot of kids did that. The main thing with his voice was, when he talked, he sounded just like Elmer Fudd. Not really a lisp, something else. I don't know what that's called.

This kid got picked on and made fun of, a lot. He never got mad or fought back. He just withdrew a little more. He seemed to be halfway living in another dimension anyway. Seeing things the rest of us couldn't see and hearing things we couldn't hear. Maybe it was a better, kinder place. Maybe the voices there all sounded like Elmer Fudd. The ribbing that he took from all of us was not that vicious. People liked him OK. The fact that he could take a lot of kidding was a definite plus. He was a pretty fair baseball player. He was one of the first guys to get a steady girlfriend, in the fifth grade. She was a little wall eyed and didn't talk much but a lot of us envied his social skills with the opposite sex and the fact that he had access to an actual girl.

His shortcomings didn't go unnoticed by his parents. They were concerned and got right on it. They made sure he was involved in a lot of activities, scouting, little league, top hatters, which was an organization that taught social skills and dancing, church youth groups. They fed him a low carb, high protein diet and kept him in swimming programs to ensure he got plenty of exercise. They arranged intensive speech therapy for the Elmer Fuddism. I remember once, his mother picked up a group of boys and gave them a ride. She implored them not to make fun of her son or call him names anymore. That may have been a mistake.

So by the time this kid is out of high school, he's a lanky six foot two. He grew his hair long so nobody could notice his head was a little funny shaped. He spoke in lovely, well modulated tones. He had learned to concentrate on didactics and his grades had gone from OK to very good. He got out of college with a degree in geology, which was something you could actually use to make a decent living. He had a setter named Gandalf and pretty little hippie girlfriend that he married. They all moved up to a mountainous region of Oregon, not too far from the coast. He did geological surveys of the area, quadrant by quadrant, for a big mining company. In his spare time he would collect logs on the beach, mill them himself and do woodworking. They had a shitload of kids, six or seven, right away.

Eventually, the geological work petered out. He couldn't bring himself to leave Grant's Pass. He and his family were happy there. He opened a small business that went bust after several years. He tried teaching in the local public school but didn't like it, too much pressure.

In the end, he and his wife made a marginal living by working as walk on coaches for high school girl's sports, driving school buses morning and evening and doing schoolyard supervision. The kids got plenty to eat. They went to State schools. They did all right. It was a big, happy family. They loved their parents.

Sometimes I used to talk to Mike on the phone. Not often. He talked just like Elmer Fudd and seemed to be living halfway in another dimension. Maybe it's a kinder, better place. Maybe all the voices there sound like Elmer Fudd.

Barry Doesn't Need It

I never realized but it has been a tradition since John F. Kennedy that newly elected US Presidents accept the invitation of the University of Notre Dame to speak at commencement. The Catholic hierarchy is dead set against President Obama speaking this year. They don't feel he embodies the attributes and values that a commencement speaker at a Catholic college should have.

I think President Obama should decline the invitation of Notre Dame. There are plenty of places that would like him to speak. Notre Dame was never prestigious as an academic institution. They were a big football school but not even that, anymore. It seems to me that it would be a sign of sensitivity to the differing sensibilities of others for him to decline and not something he could be faulted for. I can't imagine he really cares about speaking there.

He could speak at the U of Hawaii commencement. He and the girls could get in a little beach time. I'm sure Rush Limbaugh or Laura Schlessinger would be glad to speak at Notre Dame. I don't think either one of them is Catholic, so it would be kind of ecumenical. Talk radio hosts are more their speed at ND and they have the preferred moral persuasions. They could also get almost any Catholic prelate they wanted or perhaps a nice Abbess or Mother Superior, to prove they aren't sexist.

A Bushel of Light Exposed

You know what? During the recent election cycle I overlooked Meghan McCain. She didn't seem substantial but kind of silly and Valley girl. My mistake.

She is beginning to emerge as the young, affluent, secular humanist, gay friendly face of the conservative movement. She is smart to remain in the pro life camp but I bet on closer inspection, she will prove to be as functionally pro choice as her mother has always been. I like the way she rides into the conservative camp on the back of Ronald Wilson Reagan. The old queen ought to be good for something still and was always a comfortable and gentle mount. Somebody get her a bio of Barry Goldwater. She could get some mileage out of him too. If Daddy can get through one more term in the Senate, she will be old enough to take over and Mommy has the money and friends to make it happen.

She put Laura Ingraham, Ann Coulter and fat Rush down and out. The fundies don't know what to do with her. She's made it to 24 without a drug problem, a boyfriend with a drug problem, pregnancies or abortions. At least as far as we know.

She's got a better book deal than George Bush or her Daddy.

Anglican Seminary President Named

You gotta wonder what this story is doing on a Catholic website. I guess maybe they're just warning the faithful that even though the Pope talks a lot about ecumenism and the eventual "one big church" goal, it's not probably going to happen as long as this Sister is in the saddle.

Jesus Lives

Didja go to church today to commemorate the resurrection of Christ? If you did, why? It seems to me that the churches are full of very evil conservatives and all they do is preach and make up rules that they want others, including non believers, to follow. They are disgusting and nobody listens to them, not even their own spouses and children. They never make converts. Others join them when they get too old, mean and stupid to get along with regular people.

There are some Christians that you find out in the World, with real people. They don't make rules, they set an example. Many of these Christians are politically progressive. Many are women. Most are not openly acknowledged by organized religion as "real" Christians. They may be the kind of gay or lesbian that don't molest little children, the kind the Church doesn't like. The Churchmen may think they want to usurp positions of authority in the hierarchy, although this is almost never the case.

I grew up with enough Christianity to know what the major tenets are and when the significant annual celebrations are. I don't believe any of it. Still, I admire and respect those Christians out in the World doing good work. The ones in the churches are Nazis and scare the shit out of me. When they start to spread their poisonous hate they should be put down like hydrophoby skunks.

Abortion in Brazil to Change.

Abortion laws in Brazil, the largest Catholic country in the World, may soon be liberalized. Who is responsible for this? Catholic priests.

Thank you priests.

Barack Should Stop Puffing In Secret

About 25% of Americans still smoke. Heavy new taxes, designed to discourage smoking went into effect today. So far, smokers have been pretty laid back in their acceptance of the prejudice and discrimination of their fellow Americans against them. Eventually there will be a backlash.

It is a myth that smoking costs society. Smoking is actually a big bonus. Most smokers die young and die quick. They use only a small percentage of the health care services that a person who lives to be old does and even less in retirement and Social Security benefits. The government should celebrate and encourage smoking.

At 25%, smokers could be a powerful swing voting block. The first major political party to include a rollback in tobacco taxes could well gain control of the Federal government for the foreseeable future.

Don't Hold Your Breath

Still, this can't be bad. Maybe in thirty or forty years, the main use for petroleum will be as cheap lubricants.

Big Pole on a Pedestal, No Hard Feelings Here

This is pretty interesting. You would be pressed to find a woman more revered in Italian culture, alive now or in the past century. Born illegitimately in a charity hospital, whose own marriage was not sanctioned by the Catholic church and persecuted because of it. Yet she is often held up in Italian society as a paragon of wisdom and virtue, worthy of emulation.

She takes an active interest in the doings of the church. She endorses the church plan to give the big Pole his halo as soon as possible. She clearly sees JP II as a good influence.

Interesting woman. I wonder what else she thinks.

Is That Better?

From now on, the Catholic Church says it will be carefully screening prospective priests for "homosexual tendencies". This, they say, will help to prevent further sexual molestation of young boys by the clergy. Has anyone checked out the relationship between Popo Ratzo and his personal secretary? It's kind of like closing the barn door after the horses have already bolted.

I don't understand what good screening seminarians for "homosexual tendencies" will do. In the end they will just substitute young girls for young boys who are being molested. Is that better?

Maybe they should let priests and nuns have sex like normal people, gay or straight. The emphasis here is on normal. Celibacy doesn't work. Seven billion people can't be wrong.

Does it Work Both Ways?

I'm seeing quite a bit of coverage about the importance of protecting the actions of conscience among health care workers. The thesis is that they should not be required to participate in abortions, prescribe, dispense or administer any contraceptives or otherwise act in a manner which is contrary to their beliefs.

I don't have a problem with this as long as the same is true for those that believe in birth control and abortion, that they may perform, prescribe, dispense and administer to those requesting reproductive control services in any facility serving the general public in which they work, or have privileges.

Who's Really Ignorant?

A lot of Catholic websites are making fun of Hillary Clinton, because she asked in Mexico City, who painted the famous image of the Virgin of Guadalupe on a cloak, not realizing that the spirit of Mary herself supposedly caused it to appear in miraculous commemoration of her visitation in Mexico, giving solace to the indigenous peoples, recently converted to Christianity by the none too righteous or selective sword of Hernando Cortez.

It wasn't until several months ago that I knew about these claims of Mary's divine artistry. It's a lovely legend but not very believable. It seems awfully Shroud of Turin-ish. I'm not sure Hillary is the foolish one here.

Pope Fires Flack. Starts Fresh. Can't Hurt.

The Pope has been having trouble with the press lately. He is firing his flack. I didn't even know he had a press agent but to think otherwise would be naive.

Probably not a bad idea to get a fresh start. I don't think it will do him any good, couldn't hurt though.

George Tiller Was Aquitted Of All Charges In Kansas Today

So fuck all you witch hunting, fundo fascist scumbags.

Have a nice weekend.

If It Doesn't Help, Don't Go There

Here's an editorial by an African, talking about the AIDS crisis in Africa. Condoms may not be the final solution to AIDS in Africa. For the individual African, who chooses to consistently use condoms, when engaging in consensual sex, with partners not concurrently experiencing acute traumatic blood loss or otherwise exuding large amounts of virally active bodily fluids, it may greatly decrease their chances of sero conversion, leading to a life free from wasting, rogue cancerous lesions, opportunistic brain parasites, chronic pneumonia and lethargy, followed by abrupt death.

The Pope is not just another old, closeted gay Catholic priest, traveling around the World with his significant other in his sunset years, seeing the sights and sending postcards to the other old queens at home. He is also one of the major recognized moral authorities in the World. Millions of people take every utterance he makes to heart. In light of this, many of his statements and actions seem careless and ill considered.

Go Ahead, Knock Yourself Out, Norm

Norm Coleman will lose the contested election for the Senate seat from the State of Minnesota. His current plan is to continue to contest the election as long as possible and tie the inevitable outcome up in the courts. In this way, he denies the Democrats one more Senator in their bicameral Congressional majority. If it made some kind of functional difference it might be a smart move by Coleman. As it is, it doesn't and it's not.

In the end, Al Franken will get the seat. Minnesota will have been without half of its Senate representation for who knows how long. When they ask why, the answer will be the intransigence of the Republican party and Norm Coleman. It's not good public relations. It isn't going to help the Republicans win any future elections. It doesn't change the outcome of any Senate votes.

Franken is quietly and politely waiting for the issue to be decided. It's not hurting him. He doesn't need any more publicity. His name recognition is among the highest in the nation.

What Money?

Were you following the markets today? What do you think. I think the trading relationships between the major asset classes are coming unglued. This could be a very treacherous and unpredictable time to be trading the markets. Unless you are a true believer in whatever it is you are holding, my advice is to get out now, no matter what your losses are at this point. Day traders and buy and hold investors will be equally at risk in the coming days and weeks.

The dollar may have reversed its upward movement against other World currencies. Nobody really knows. The American Government, absent other demand, has begun to buy its own debt. Hello Zimbabwe! Equities are in the middle of a rally that has seen them appreciate nearly 20% in little more than a week, with no fundamental reasons apparent. Gold, after a two week slump, went on a 6% seesaw today and ended up 3%. Commodities are up, even in the face of diminishing demand. Real estate values continue to plummet. 10% of American homes are in foreclosure. Retail spending continues to dry up as credit card defaults rise dramatically. Half of those supposedly in the know, think that economies around the World will be reviving from here on out but many are beginning to believe that a depression of greater proportions than that of the 1920's and 1930's, worldwide, has already begun.

My opinion is that most investment classes will be unstable and trading will be very volatile, at least for the short term. I think that for the most part, the volatility will be heavily weighted to the down side. I think that those assets that end up higher will be far fewer in number than those that go down and that the downers will be down by a much greater margin than the uppers are up.

It's a fools game. Sell out now and wait. Having said that, I'm fully invested and believe I will make a killing. A fool and his money. What money?

Impeach The Pope!

You gotta like the way this guy thinks. More and more people, everywhere, are coming to the same conclusions.

Stop Loss To Stop

Bob Gates, current Secretary of Defense, former Iran Contra criminal, cringing, treasonous, coward and raging alcoholic, announced the military will be phasing out the infamous stop loss program, whereby enlisted men can be kept in service, under arms, for months or years after their active duty enlistment expires.

Good. Nobody in the military, with the exception of the worst elements of the effete, poncy, officer corps oligarchy ever thought this program acceptable. It's lamentable that it was allowed to be implemented at all and that it's going to take two more years to abolish.

Pope Says Rubbers Make Things Worse.

The first thing that the Pope said to the press after his embarkation upon the Africa trip this morning, was about how the use of condoms cannot help in the fight against the spread of HIV/AIDS. He says they, in fact, make the situation in Africa worse. He didn't say how.

It's difficult to respond to the Pontiff's comments on this subject. His opinions are mystifying. I guess that's the way he wants it. He's a very magical/mystical guy. Do you think he might be the Walrus?

Instead, I'll leave you with a very nice link to an article in which the Pope deplores the sloppy haberdashery of the clergy and thinks they should take a little more pride in how they look, since they are the direct representatives of the divine Lord and Savior here on earth and all. He also would like it if more of them wore those man dresses, like he does.

Red Birds Turn Into Yellow Dogs

Lo and behold. God's law changed over the weekend. Read about it here.

I'm glad for the little girl and her family if this means something to them. The important thing here isn't abortion rights or rule of civil law. It's all about the transparency of religious hypocrisy.

What this proves is that there is no absolute law of God, at least when it comes to the Catholic Church. First, theology is about controlling the people. When they rebel against that control, punitive measures are taken. If punitive measures are not effective and the people continue in their rebellion, it becomes a problem of retreat and retrench. Damage control and public relations. No thunder. No burning bush. Not even any thumbscrews. Just impotent old men. Blustering in the rapidly cooling twilight.

They cringe. They whine. They slaver. And back down. One unsteady step at a time. The will of God dwells in the plaque clogged, neural synapses of an octogenarian, ex Hitler youth poofter, in a frilly, brocaded, satin mu mu and red patent leather slippers. Eyes sunken and unfocused. Slack jawed. Drooling.

How Can A Man That Dresses Like This Be Homophobic?

Last Christmas, the Vatican sided with Iran and Wahhabi Arabia, voting against a measure in the United Nations that would condemn the criminalization of homosexuality. This is not the act of homosexuality we're talking about, it is the state of homosexuality. The measure was supported by every other European nation. Joy to the World, the Lord has come.

In Iran and Arabia, the sentence is death by strangulation. Read all about it. Nice pic of Popo Gigo. Vatican sources were quick to point out that the Pope does not advocate the death penalty as a punishment for being a sissy boy. I'm glad they straightened that out.

Michael Steel, Redeux

A month or so ago, I commented here on the choice of Michael Steele as chairman of the RNC. I made the case that he was a reasonable man, with moderate views, from a State where political compromise was not uncommon. He was a good choice for leadership of his party but an unrealistic one, for exactly those reasons.

He is pro life in the sense that he is personally apposed to abortion. I do not believe he is lying about this. He believes that Roe versus Wade is bad law and that legality of abortion is appropriately better left to voters at the State and local level. If Roe is ever reversed by the Supreme Court, it will undoubtedly be on this basis and not because of some Christ-o-ramic cavalcade of fetal person hood, dog and pony show, sponsored by the Vatican and performed by Pentecostals .

His temperate nature and the sensibility of his beliefs, make him unsuitable for leadership in the Republican Party. If the Democrats were the party they claimed to be, there would be room for him in their tent. There isn't now. Not only is this a mistake, it shames them.

Brazilian Excommunication Update

Here's an article documenting how that excommunication of the doctors and family of the little Brazilian girl pregnant with twins by her stepfather, aborted in the fourth month, is going for the Catholic Church.

Pretty much like you'd expect.

I think maybe some liberalized abortion laws are in Brazil's future.

A Modern Catholic Hero

Tony Blair is a great hero to the Christo fundies here in America, who remember him as George Bush's seemingly only friend, among the leadership of the democratic, developed, World. His star has risen even higher with them, now that he has joined the Catholic church.

It doesn't surprise me that most Catholics welcome him into the fold. His views seem totally compatible with those of my Catholic friends, neighbors and co workers. It does seem strange that the bile spewing, hate mongers, among the values voting crowd, welcome him as well. How stupid are they?

Tony supports subsidized birth control and abortion on demand, for everyone from the age of puberty on, in all cases, with no parental notification. He always has. Tony believes in total integration of homosexual families into society, with no reservations. He forced Catholic adoption agencies to provide gay couples equal service or shutdown. He made it against the law to even speak of homosexuality negatively or as a sin, at any gathering, public or private, including at any church or religious venue in Great Britain. Tony believes in the ordination of women into the priesthood. He believes in abolishing celibacy among the clergy. He believes that the laity must take more responsibility for and greater control of, church doctrine, dogma, liturgy, finances and public outreach. He is supported in all of these beliefs by his wife, a lifelong Catholic and the person he credits with his conversion to Catholicism.

I wish Tony well in his adventures in the Catholic World. He sounds like the kind of man I would be proud to call a friend. George Bush was lucky to have him. He should have listened to him more, instead of playing him for a dupe.

Don't Drag the Rest of Us into Them

I have many problems with the minions of organized religion. Every one of those problems has to do with their desire to make me live or act in a certain way that satisfies their belief structure. I have no problem with the way they live. If they want to subjugate their women and the women put up with it, fine. If they want to condone the sodomizing of their sons and marry their daughters off at thirteen years old to old men, more power too them. They don't have to practice birth control or have abortions. They don't have to practice or condone gay marriage. They can conduct their services in any way and in any language they want. I don't care whether their holy men pretend to be celibate or not. It is offensive and injurious to me that the religious make charges that atheists and secular types are attempting to persecute and penalize those that choose to be religious.

The problems in religious society are of their own making. Progressives within the church seek to reform the church while the traditionalists seek to stop them. Atheists have nothing to do with this. We do not instruct progressive believers in how to make trouble. We do not evangelize among the faithful, attempting to bring them over to our side. There are no large, powerful organizations made up of atheists with leaders that attempt to influence the political process. We do not attempt to influence the religious in any way except to leave us alone, to live our lives in peace.

The religious should give up all this culture war crap and mind their own business. They would be best advised to put their own house in order and leave atheists alone. There are very few abortions among the atheist community. We generally are pretty good about birth control. Unwanted pregnancy is a problem primarily among those who profess to believe in God. If they don't want abortions they don't have to have them. I have not met many gay atheists. Those that I have met could care less about being "married in the eyes of God". At most, they are completely satisfied with secular equality in the eyes of the law and who could argue with that. Atheists want the same protections under the law to live their lives in peace as the religious. If their beliefs and practices are not the same as the majority, they should be protected, as long as it doesn't affect the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness of others.

The great unspoken truth about the culture wars is that it is a struggle between the progressive religious and the traditional religious. I would say to them, please keep your fights in church where they belong. Don't drag the rest of us into them.

The Truth That's Always Been

First the Bush administration and now Obama and his representatives, tell the American people that although the economic times are perilous, things should turn around in at most, several months and then the country and the World will be back on track for continued economic growth and prosperity. By putting out information like this, they do no service to anyone. The World economy is just beginning to unravel. There are no factors present which might stop or reverse this process. It will likely take several years, at least, to reach a bottom. History tells us there will be famine, plague, genocide and war in the meantime. At that point, we can begin to reorganize, rebuild and regain some measure of economic well being. This process is likely to take an extended period of time before anything like the previous levels of affluence in the developed World emerge, if they ever do.

The people deserve truth. They get lied to all the time. They hear lies about the reasons we go to war. About supposedly evil but non existent enemies, foreign and domestic. They are taught to put their faith and trust in a God that doesn't exist and in leaders who don't care about them.

I guess the real truth they are being taught is that it's every man for himself. That is the truth that's always been.

Who's Winning the Culture Wars?

The Culture wars have been going on in this country for at least since it was founded and arguably since the first settlers came. Who's been winning? I wonder.

Seen any slaves, lately? Do women have the vote? Are labor unions legal? Contraception? Abortion? Divorce? Is evolution of the species taught in public school? Is it legal to have a sexual relationship outside of wedlock? Can you set up housekeeping with that person? Does that person even have to be of the opposite sex? Is there a military draft? How many more examples can you name. How many that you, yourself, exemplify? What are some of the victories of the Right? There must be some. They escape me at the moment.

The Right Wing, Christo-fundies are crowing about the impending victory they believe they will win in California, to keep marriage between a man and a woman. Think about that. Is that what they are reduced to, in their fight to hold the line on traditional culture? Pretty sad.

Even if they win on traditional marriage. How long do you think they can hold the line there? 3 years? 5 years? More than that? You're dreamin'.

Oh, It's OK Then

A Brazilian Archbishop explains why the excommunications over the abortion received by the 9 year old, pregnant by her stepfather with twins and whose life was determined to be in danger, was justified.

Only the mother of the girl and the medical personnel who participated in the process were excommunicated. The little girl herself was spared. I bet she feels better about the whole thing now.

What a relief. I'm glad the Archbishop explained that.

Read about it here.

Ratzo and His Redcaps Strike Again

The Mother and doctors of the raped 9 year old given an abortion yesterday, when her life was determined to be endangered, have been excommunicated from the Catholic church.

The rapist stepfather enjoys the wine and wafer at Brazilian jailhouse mass.

Read here.

9 Year Old Has Abortion In Brazil

Just an update on the 9 year old Brazilian girl pregnant with twins I wrote about last week.

I don't have a problem with the outcome.

The Catholic church does.

Do you?

Sell Low, Before You Have To Sell Lower

American market equities are at 10 year lows. The Dow broke below 7000 today. Unless the markets rebound substantially from this point, forming a double bottom, the markets are heading lower. Much, much, lower and soon. Maybe this week or next.

The stimulus isn't going to work. We're fucked.

So, What's the Problem With Bob, Kathleen and Joe ?

Bob Casey, Kathleen Sibelius and Joe Biden. Three Democratic politicians. All prominent in the new Obama administration. Given the temper of the times, none could be categorized as extremely liberal. Why does their presence set the Rights teeth on edge?

They are all members, born and raised, in the Roman Catholic Church. In most ways, they are more typical than not of their generation of American Catholics. They attend church, partake of the sacraments and are very attached to their religion. On the other hand, they do not agree politically with many of the stands that the increasingly conservative church leadership has taken. They are vilified for the differences between what they espouse and the exhortations of the elderly, brandy swilling, cigar chomping, snaggletoothed Princes of the Catholic Church, the whiskey blossoms across their cheeks and wattles on their jowls belying a supposedly ascetic lifestyle.

Fifty years ago, John Fitzgerald Kennedy, another Roman Catholic politician, stood before the people and vowed that while he was a devout Catholic, his duty as President would require him to act in a secular manner, for the benefit of all Americans and not to act as a servant to the man that many still characterized as the "Whore of Rome". That man was Pope John the XXIII. Pope John was a popular and populist man, beloved by the common folk around the World. He introduced many changes that led to a new era of cooperation and understanding between people of conflicting religions and philosophies. Under his guidance, Catholics were taught to no longer regard Jews as "Christ Killers" and shun them from society. The man who currently holds the job in Rome is nowhere near the man that John was. Not inclusive. Not popular. Some would say not so much a man of God, as he is a man of the church. Two very different things. Have standards of what is expected of American politicians changed so much in fifty years?

Apparently they have.

Why Pro Life Is Dying, Like a Late Term Fetus with a Crushed Head

The Democratic Party is in ascendancy in America, right now. Whether they stay that way or not doesn't really hinge on the success of President Obama's policies, so much as how well the electorate bonds with him. It would be unrealistic to assume that the Democrats will control the government indefinitely, or even for very long. Things just don't work that way.

The Republicans will sooner or later put together a coalition that again controls Congress, the Executive branch or both. It seems likely though, that one faction that will not regain momentum any time soon, is the one that espouses pro life policies.

The real barrier to future popularity of the pro life agenda rests with American women. Women, of every racial, religious, political and socio economic group are pro choice in the majority. They are, in every case, more pro choice, both in numbers and degree than men in the same groups. Women have also become the majority of voters in this country and will remain so, at least for the next generation. Demographics tell us that younger women are more pro choice than older women. With each passing year it is going to become harder to pass pro life legislation.

The last Republican first lady who was not openly pro choice was Pat Nixon but it's likely that both she and Mamie Eisenhower before her, were in fact pro choice. Few prominent Republican women politicians actively campaign on the issue of criminalizing abortion. Sarah Palin is a good example of this. While she constantly stressed that she did not believe in abortion, under any circumstances, short of those that threaten the life of the mother, also loudly touted that she was proud she had "chosen" to bear a special needs child and that her unmarried teenage daughter had "chosen" to bring her pregnancy to term. She did not make these statements simply because they were true. She made these statements to appeal to women voters who, while they themselves would like to think they would never choose abortion, still believe all women deserve to have the choice.

Some churches now seek to make abortion a litmus test upon which to base membership in good standing, with full privileges and access to sacraments. This would be a mistake. Women are the primary motivator that determines if a family attends church regularly and where they attend. It is much easier for women than men to switch churches to one more amenable to their way of thought, especially if the church they are attending is a traditional paternalistic, male only clergy organization. Women have not much vesting in such churches and little to lose in the way of status if they take their families away.

Abortion Story

Here's a pretty amazing and distressing story from Brazil. A nine year old girl, after years of illicit sexual activity with her stepfather, is pregnant with twins. The stepfather allegedly enticed her to have sex with him for money. She has a handicapped sister who was also abused in this way.

Because of her young age and lack of physical development, she will not be able to sustain the pregnancy. She will be kept in hospital and watched until her life is endangered, at which time, an abortion will be legal under Brazilian law.

Sounds pretty humane to me.

I wonder if her parents stressed the importance of chastity and abstinence with her and went over that whole "good touch, bad touch" thing.