Milque toast and the convention part 2

New Orleans! I forgot freakin' New Orleans........ they need to have everyone from the 9th ward there..... All of them, everyone should tell about how they got fucked over.... Oh wait, get someone from the Corps to tell about how they knew this would happen - that they had been warning about.... and how the Corp had been trying to get money for it......and money was cut. And how the Corp and Fema got to be the scapegoats for something that should never have happened.... Something that the administration had been warned was a HUGE FREAKIN" DANGER...... Then bring out the people who lost everything, who got screwed over by the insurance companies, then had the fema trailers yanked out from under them.... All for something that didn't have to happen... becuase Shrub was too busy inspecting his navel lint or something during a briefing. Pictures... lots of Pictures of New Orleans and Gulf Coast......

Marky Mark and the Good Fight

The latest brouhaha here in the Bluff City concerns First Amendment rights to free speech and fascist attempts at squelching said rights. To wit:

• Police director sues for critical bloggers' names


• Director Godwin's Looking For Him -- and We Found Him: MPD Enforcer's Dirk Diggler!


• Mayor says blog case is not about 'whistleblowers'


• Matthews files motion to see blogger papers

Over at Biddies in My Brain, my friend has written a couple of good posts about the whole fiasco. No need to reinvent the wheel when you can link to it!

Aside from the serious constitutional issues this raises, my main complaint is this: WHY, for the love of all that is fried and musical in this city, are our leaders wasting time and energy on this? They will lose this case - it seems pretty darn cut and dried. Why are they not out there trying to clean up the drugs in Binghampton? Why are they not doing something about the aggressive panhandlers or the rampant vandalism and graffiti down the Sam Cooper corridoror? BTW - why have we never heard any more about the Sam Cooper Sniper?

Oh wait - some of them are too busy hurling racist and anti-semitic smears at Congressmen or suing the school board who is (SURPRISE!) upset because their budget was slashed with no warning and now hundreds of millions of dollars of state monies are in jeopardy and school starts in two freakin' weeks.

This city has so much to offer - a world-class zoo, the Mississippi River, trees that would make even my hippie tree-hugger brother gasp, museums, culture, theater, food (other than BBQ even) nationally and internationally recognized colleges and universities, Steve Cohen, unique architecture and neighborhoods, Greg Cravens, cutting edge cancer research hospitals, Fed-Ex, Shelby Farms, Overton Park, Autozone, the Redbirds at Autozone Park (all baseball fans - you really need to visit that place!), Sun Studios, Graceland, Issac Hayes, Al Green, Justin Timberlake, independent movie moguls, The Shell at Overton Park, 3-6 Mafia, the Civil Rights Museum, Gibson Guitar Factory, Huey's, and that's just what I can think of off the top of my head with only one glass of tea in me!

Why do our leaders, elected and otherwise, squander all this with useless, inane, asinine bullshit lawsuits and infighting? They cry and moan about the flight to the 'burbs and flail around for "solutions" and form task forces and advisory panels. Hey - guys - the problem is YOU! Get your heads out of your collective butts and get busy fixing the mess you made or get out of the way and let people like "Dirk Diggler" at MPD Enforcer 2.0 and Smart City Memphis get busy.

Sly Fox

The sly fox
Cyclops
We locked
In the idiot box
The video slots
Broadcast
The Waco Davidian plots
They own YouTube, Myspace
When this ignorant shit gon' stop?
They monopolizing news
Your views
And the channel you choose
Propaganda
Visual cancer
The eye
In the sky
Number five
On the dial
secret agenda
Frequency antenna
Doctor mind bender
Remote control
soul
Controller
Your brain holder
Slave culture
Game's over
What's a Fox characteristic?
Slick shit
Sensin'
Misinformation
Pimp the station
Over stimulation
Reception
Deception
Comcast digital Satan
The Fox has a bushy tail
And Bush tells
Lies and Foxtrots
So I don't know what's real

[Chorus]

Watch what you watchin'
Fox keeps feeding us toxins
Stop sleeping
Start thinking
Outside of the box and
Unplug from The Matrix doctrine
But watch what you say Big Brother is watchin'

Watch what you watchin'
Fox keeps feeding us toxins
Stop sleeping
Start thinking
Outside of the box and
Unplug from The Matrix doctrine
But watch what you say Fox 5 is watchin'

[Verse 2:NaS]

The Fear Factor got you all rattled up
O' Reilly
Oh really?
No rally needed
I'll tie you up
Network for child predators, settin' 'em up
Myspace pimps, hoes, and sluts
Ya'll exploit rap culture, then ya'll flip on us
And you own the post, and ya'll shit on us
What is they net worth?
They gon' try to censor my next verse?
Throw 'em off the roof neck first
While I'm clicking my cursor
Reading blogs about the pressure they put on Universal
It gets worse while I'm clicking my mouse
While they kickin' my house
They figured us out
Why a nigga go south
It's either he caught a body, no sleep they watchin'!
I watch CBS
And I See B.S.!
Tryin' to track us down with GPS
Make a nigga wanna invest in PBS

[Chorus]

Watch what you watchin'
Fox keeps feeding us toxins
Stop sleeping
Start thinking
Outside of the box and
Unplug from The Matrix doctrine
But watch what you say Big Brother is watchin'

Watch what you watchin'
Fox keeps feeding us toxins
Stop sleeping
Start thinking
Outside of the box and
Unplug from The Matrix doctrine
But watch what you say Fox 5 is watchin'

[Verse 3:NaS]

They say I'm all about murder-murder and kill-kill
But what about Grindhouse and Kill Bill?
What about Cheney and Halliburton? (Halliburton?)
The backdoor deals
On oil fields
How's NaS the most violent person?
Ya'll don't know talent if it hit you
Bringin' up my criminal possession charges with a pistol (pistol)
I use Viacom
As my firearm
And let the lyrics split you
Who do you rely upon?
They shoot shells at Leviathan
I'm dealing with the higher form
F**k if you care how I write a poem?
Only Fox that I love was the red one
Only black man that Fox loves is in jail or a dead one!
Red rum
Political bedlam
Don't let the hype into your eyes and ear drum
Murdoch on Fox
Not 18 with Barracas
And he hate Barack cause
He march with the marchers

[Outro]

I pledge allegiance to the fair and balanced truth.
Not the biased truth
Not the liar's truth
But the highest truth
I will not be deceived
nor will I believe
In the Propaganda
I will not fall for the Okey-Doke
I am tuned-in

[NaS]

Watch, cause they're watching
Watch what you're watching

Better watch, cause they're watching
Watch what you're watching

Me-Me-Media
Misleading ya

Watch what you're watching

In the interest of brotherly love, peace, friendship, mutual prosperity, citywide self promotion, political grandstanding and all that

For your reading pleasure:

PROCLAMATION

WHEREAS, it has come to pass that the heavens are shut up and a drought of Biblical proportions has been visited upon the Southern United States, and

WHEREAS, the parched and dry conditions have weighed heavily upon the State of Georgia and sorely afflicted those who inhabit the Great City of Atlanta, and

WHEREAS, the leaders of Georgia have assembled like the Children of Israel in the desert, grumbled among themselves and have begun to cast longing eyes toward the north, coveting their neighbor’s assets, and

WHEREAS, the lack of water has led some misguided souls to seek more potent refreshment or for other reasons has resulted in irrational and outrageous actions seeking to move a long established and peaceful boundary, and

WHEREAS, it is deemed better to light a candle than curse the darkness, and better to offer a cool, wet kiss of friendship rather than face a hot and angry legislator gone mad from thirst, and

Whereas, it is feared that if today they come for our river, tomorrow they might come for our Jack Daniels or George Dickel,

NOW THEREFORE, In the interest of brotherly love, peace, friendship, mutual prosperity, citywide self promotion, political grandstanding and all that

I Ron Littlefield, Mayor of the City of Chattanooga, Tennessee,

Do hereby Proclaim that Wednesday, February 27, 2008 shall be known as

“Give Our Georgia Friends a Drink Day”

http://www.chattanoogan.com/articles/article_122772.asp

muwahahaha

What Famous Leader Are You?
personality tests by similarminds.com

I don't force people to convert before I feed them, though.

Blah blah

yeah yeah busy busy.

Like you people are really interested in my pathetic existence.

I think someone's Republican card is about to be pulled!

Dancing in the Streets

Thank the powers that be - it FINALLY rained - a real gully washer. Thunder, lightening, the whole kit, kaboodle and kitchen sink. People were in the parking lots and streets dancing - seriously. OK - well, we were in Midtown, afterall! Thirty degree temp drop in an hour. We are now at a nippy 75 and falling. WEEEEEEE!

Power went out at a LaserQuest b-day party we were attending, but the staff dragged the tables out into the lobby so the kids could have cake and ice cream. Liz, of course, was in the top 5 of the game they did play. She's bloodthirsty. And crafty - she snuck up behind some middle school girls who were lurking in a corner and shot them like 10 times repeatedly. They whined - who's shooting us? That's so not fair - Liz said "Me. That's the point of the game!" and then ran before they could get her. They rounded up like 8 other girls to hunt Liz down and then the power went out. Ha! Ha! Ha!

Mother of the year

See this skank ho?. She beat her boy bloody in a Walmart - no, not in Ferriday, although that is a good guess. In Mesa, AZ. The story is here. She is on LIFETIME probation for child abuse. The 911 was apparently flooded with calls from shoppers who witnessed it all and recorded it on their cell phones. God bless technology!

To abuse a child, any child, much less your own, is something I cannot fathom. She carried that child, bore that child, and then beats him bloody, not for the first time, because he didn't like a shirt she picked out for him. There is not a bulldike butch enough to do to her what I want done to her in prison.

HOT HOT HOT!

It's so hot here - I got sunburned walking to my car yesterday! and no- I'm not exaggerating- y'all know I am a frail flower of southern femininity. I am ususally sheltered from those dastardly UV rays by my layers of petticoats and large organza hats.

I say, I do believe I need a mint julep.

A.

Yet another reason I want to move to Midtown

Cohen signs on as co-sponsor of bill to impeach Cheney

As if we didn't know this already . . .

Your Inner European is Irish!

Sprited and boisterous! You drink everyone under the table.

Who's Your Inner European?

Money changers in the Temple

I generally don't read Wendi Thomas- actually, I rarely read the Commercial Appeal. But her latest column is something I wish certain factions in this city, and nation, would take to heart. The fact that these "men of God" are willfully ignoring the facts of the proposed law and essentially endorsing violence against other human beings in the name of their interpretation of "God's law" makes me physically ill. Thomas makes excellent points - are these people incapable of stringing together words that support their (supposedly) faith-based aversion to homosexuality without advocating violence? How limited is their vocabulary? How shallow is their faith that they can't allow for difference?

The absolute refusal of people like these ministers, and our president, to accept incontrovertible facts, not only infuriates me, it saddens me. To see a faith that has potential to change the world warped and perverted to further bigotry, hatred, and ignorance is disheartening. Not that I remotely classify myself as "Christian," at least not by their standards, but the faith does have tenets I attempt to live by - compassion, honesty, sacrifice of self for the greater good. I get so angry when professed "Christians" act decidedly unChrsitlike in the name of Christ. Hypocrisy is a pet peeve of mine, as it was of Jesus.

I am reading a collection of essays by Peter Onuf about the mind of Jefferson. There is an excellent piece about his take on religion. Jefferson viewed himself as a Christian in an almost Unitarian sense (nod to Laura P. - I'll pass it along later)- Christ was not divine, but set forth guidelines that, if followed, brought the individual closer to the divine within him/herself. He abhorred organized religion because of the tendency of the bureaucracy to corrupt faith in the pursuit of temporal power. I feel a lot like that.

'Bout damn time

The most important thing to remember about the drowning of New Orleans is that it wasn't a natural disaster. It was a man-made disaster, created by lousy engineering, misplaced priorities and pork-barrel politics.

Read the whole article here.

The good news is that scientists believe they know how to save it. They want the Corps to let go of the river in strategic areas so it can get back to work building land, even if that requires rearranging navigation at the mouth of the Mississippi. They want to fill in oil and gas canals, constrict the Gulf Outlet and start pumping sediment back into ridges and barrier islands. The Corps developed $14 billion worth of Louisiana restoration plans before Katrina, but Bush scaled them back to $2 billion.

OK - so we KNOW how to fix it - why the bleppity bleep bleep aren't we?! Oh wait there it is - BUSH. I know it's not ALL his fault, but damn man. Get the hell out of the way and let the grown-ups take care of this.

Name that Republican

Freedonian said...

I love how they're trying to pretend he's a "Washington Outsider". The two bit actor has never had a tougher role to play than that one.

Seventeen years as a K Street lobbyist, a term in the Senate, and time spent as Dick Noxon's mole. He could have been born with the spire on the Capitol Building hanging out of his ass and not been any more "insider" than that.

hmmm- who could it be?

Riddle me this

How does this:

The legislation would roll back nearly $16 billion in tax breaks for oil companies and provide a broad array of tax incentives and other measures to spur development of renewable energy sources and energy efficiency programs. It would establish new efficiency standards for appliances and other equipment and government support for research into alternative energy such as batteries for plug-in hybrid-electric cars.

not "make "serious attempts to increase our energy security or address high energy costs"?

because Bush is a tool - of the oil industry, I mean.

excerpts from cnn.com

Sisyphus: The Jena Six update: “White tree” is now firewood

Sisyphus: The Jena Six update: “White tree” is now firewood

What you talking 'bout, Fliffis'?

Pottermania

I am, I am Superman?

No! You're Siddhartha! by Hermann Hesse

You simply don't know what to believe, but you're willing to try anything once. Western values, Eastern values, hedonism and minimalism, you've spent some time in every camp. But you still don't have any idea what camp you belong in. This makes you an individualist of the highest order, but also really lonely. It's time to chill out under a tree. And realize that at least you believe in ferries.

Take the Book Quiz at the Blue Pyramid.

(thanks to LAWP for this link)