They love us everywhere we go.

Fox News porn.

They can't show real pornography on Fox News (that would destroy all their credibility... wait, what?) but evidently they're trying. (This is all hearsay for me, I recoil from Fox News like a vampire from sunlight.)

They have articles about salacious subjects and while the newsreader drives out the drivelous words, behind him or her are images of women in bikinis or prostitutes or whatever you might find in a lurid Maxim article.

So one of the bastions of the Republican Party and, consequently, the Religious Right and what they call "family values" is lowering itself to pandering shots of half naked women.

Why exactly are they doing this? I suppose it's because these men who chant the party line on "family values" patronize a lot of strip clubs and magazines that objectify women. Just another example of right-wing hypocrisy.

It scares me when it smells of 1984. "We say this, but we do this, and you'll just ignore that now because we invented some new words to confuse you." It makes the Cold Lizard of Creepiness crawl up my spine.

The way I quote myself works is not entirely understood.

Waterboarding is torture.

Special Comment: On waterboarding and torture

I found this on Bpaul's blog. I had to post it. Only 50,000 views, and that's not enough. I forget sometimes that there are people in the media that care enough to get angry and put that into words.

Death takes a holiday.

A confluence of events caused October to be the first month in 3 years that the United States didn't execute someone. A month off from this barbaric practice is a month well spent.

Support for the death penalty remains strong in the United States, one of only a handful of democracies that still carries out capital punishment.

But the unofficial hold on executions comes amid a steep decline in the number of death sentences imposed and rising concern about wrongful convictions.

"All of this suggests that the death penalty is under a significant review in a way that we haven't had in almost four decades," said Jordan Steiker of the University of Texas at Austin School of Law.

October 2007 was the first October since 1989 without a U.S. execution and the first month without one since December 2004; December is a typically quiet month in the death chambers because of a reluctance to execute near Christmas.

Let's make every day Christmas, and get rid of the death penalty altogether.

What are we doing in Iraq?

Why are we there? We can't leave until somebody can answer this question.

It seems like a simple question. "The United States has 150,000 troops deployed in Iraq because..." I can't finish that sentence.

Personally, and this is just me, when I'm doing something and I don't know why, I quit doing that and do something else.

That darn Congress.

Your House of Representatives questioned hip-hop artists about their objectionable lyrics. (Evidently they could find nothing more important to discuss.) I wish to God that one of those artists had responded like this:

"Congressman, when you say 'f-word,' do you mean 'fork'? Or 'flag'? I don't know what words you are talking about. I know what words I wrote and sang in my song, but I don't think you know what I wrote or said. If we're here to talk about words, tell me what words you are most concerned with, rather than speaking baby talk."

I hate all this pussyfooting around.

Ten steps to end our democracy.

Naomi Wolf wrote a book called The End of America that lists the ten steps that dictators have historically taken to replace democracy with totalitarianism. Here's an essay that details the steps with some historical references. She calls it a "blueprint" and asserts that it's been followed many times before.

Some of her points are more general than specific, but many annotated historical references are provided (about Hitler and Mussolini along with Bush and Rove). I believe in the power of words, and examples are given like "war footing" and "enemy combatant" which are terms created to circumvent the rule of law.

The question Wolf asks many times is: "Why?" Why was an unending "war on terror" created which has no goals and no possible victory? Why were steps taken to curtail personal liberty and pass laws and resolutions that give the executive branch the power to act without checks and balances?

For me, this connects dots that I was already aware of in a most frightening manner. This is not a Democrat/Republican issue. This is not a liberal/conservative issue. There is no reason to believe that things will get better when the administration changes.

Like An Inconvenient Truth, if you believe what's being said here, it's terrifying. The book ends with a call to action and a list of organizations working to preserve our way of life, such as The American Freedom Organization. I'll be checking into these sources.

I used to think that our democracy is resilient enough to survive, even bounce back against the damage it's taken recently. I used to think that way about the Earth, too, but now I'm buying new light bulbs and working on my carbon offsets to help fight global warming. Our form of government, like our planet, requires constant vigilance and hard work to keep it operating. It deserves no less.

We hate everybody.

According to a recent Harris poll, we hate everybody.

President Bush's approval rating slipped to new lows in the most recent Harris Interactive survey, but he's not alone: For the first time since the series began, all of the political figures and institutions included in the survey have negative performance ratings.

The only thing they didn't poll was whether we hate people who take polls. We hate them too.

Why my generation is all fucked up.

Or maybe this is just why I'm all fucked up when it comes to icons, legends, and heroes. All of mine died.

JFK? Way cool guy, I was 6 years old in first grade and told to take off my "If I Were 21 I'd Vote For Kennedy" button. Shot dead in 1963. Jimi Hendrix? An amazing individual. Dead in 1970. Janis Joplin? Just getting her shit back together when she died in 1970. Jim Morrison? I idolized him, and he died in 1971. Was I a big Elvis fan? No, but he was an icon for my generation. Dead in 1977. John Lennon? I changed my sense of humor when I saw him on the Mike Douglas Show for a week. Assasinated, a pop singer assassinated, in 1980.

You can say that lots of these celebrities killed themselves with drugs and alcohol, and that's true. I'm just saying that growing up, I didn't have much to hang on to. So maybe that makes me a little less attached to heroes. All I can tell you is that it was a strange time and things have never been like that before or since.

More colonoscopy humor.

You should read Indexed every day.

Funny colonoscopy story.

In case you're wondering what happened to Your President last weekend, here's a full report from Wonkette.

When you are sleeping the doctor breaks into your house and turns your TV to the Discovery Health Channel. Then, Donald Pleasance, Raquel Welch, and Isaac Asimov shrink themselves and journey in a tiny submarine into your body where they fight The Cavity Creeps with lasers.

Bush had five polyps. I only had two, and mine were "diminutive." Clearly, I am nowhere near the man he is. Or conversely, he had more removed than I did, so that makes me more man than him. Choose your own adventure.

TSA exec calls it "security theater."

Kip Hawley, assistant secretary of the TSA (that stands for Making You Wait In Line Two Hours Extra For No Reason), said this:

“Taking lighters away is security theater,” Mr. Hawley said. “It trivializes the security process.”

The ban on lighters will be lifted August 4th. Mysteriously, the ban on Deadly Explosive Liquid Bombs That Don't Exist is still in force. Don't go thinking they have their heads on straight now.

I guess their research (reading old issues of Popular Mechanics, evidently) showed that you can't use a lighter to ignite a Deadly Explosive Liquid Bomb, so lighters are okay now. Again. For a while. Until they need to scare us again.

Personally, I would have ditched the liquid ban first but hey, what do I know about making people inconvenienced... uh I mean, making people safe?

Security theatre.

How to smuggle a water bottle aboard an airplane.

All you need to do is surrender the bottle at the screening station, wait for the the TSA to throw it away in an unguarded trash-barrel on the "secure" side, and then retrieve it from the trash.

The reason this "smuggling" technique works, of course, is that liquids aren't dangerous. Everyone knows this -- even the TSA. That's why they don't guard the barrel after they confiscate your wine, water, and salad-dressing. The point of taking away your liquid isn't to make airplanes safe, it's to simultaneously make you afraid (of terrorists with magic water-bombs) and then make you feel safe (because the government is fighting off the magic water-bombs). It's what Bruce Schneier calls "security theater."

Do not try this yourself. You never know when the TSA agents you're dealing with have been ordered to arrest someone for no particular reason in order to prove their worth.

I don't like the TSA because it makes millions of people waste lots of time every day. Just like Windows.

Word of the day: Vexillology.

Vexillology is the scholarly study of flags. (So says Our Lady of the Wikipedia.) I love logos, and flags are like logos. It's corporate identity for a nation's government. In fact, there are five basic principles:

1. Keep It Simple: The flag should be so simple that a child can draw it from memory.
2. Use Meaningful Symbolism: The flag’s images, colors, or patterns should relate to what it symbolizes.
3. Use 2–3 Basic Colors: Limit the number of colors on the flag to three, which contrast well and come from the standard color set.
4. No Lettering or Seals: Never use writing of any kind or an organization’s seal.
5. Be Distinctive or Be Related: Avoid duplicating other flags, but use similarities to show connections.

The related part of #5 explains all those crazy Scandinavian flags I can't tell apart.
(Shown is the glorious banner of my Nation States nation, a proud member of the region of Decipheria, known as Shocho. Oops, I broke #4.)

Pleases girls completely.

Happy Canuckistan Day! They tell me that this song can flush 'em out of any bar, no matter how American they look. They can't resist singing along. (Here's a punk version.)

You guys are so lucky to get Monday and Wednesday off this week! (What's that you say? They don't get Independence Day off? I thought they were independent already.)

Cell phones on planes: Threat or menace?

Both, of course. What are the technical reasons for banning cell phone calls on planes? Why can't they be overcome? Has a plane ever crashed because someone made a cell phone call while aboard?

None of these questions matter, because the media are the lap dogs of business and government. You have no voice with which to ask these questions. The only thing they let you do is vote on American Idol.

Whew, I got a little liberal nihilistic there, sorry.

But it's true.

Too many war dead for Congressional memorial.

A memorial to fallen soldiers from Iran and Afghanistan in Washington, D.C., is running out of room.

In a grim sign of the times, the "Wall of the Fallen," set up by House Republican leaders in June, is almost full. The mounting death toll from Iraq has forced U.S. House staffers to study how to reconfigure the display in the lobby of the Rayburn Building - the largest office building for members of Congress - to squeeze in more names.

Happy Wiretap Day!

Today is the day your ISP has to install a back door so that "law enforcement" agencies can spy on you when they're too lazy to do police work or protect your rights.

May 14th is the official deadline for cable modem companies, DSL providers, broadband over powerline, satellite internet companies and some universities to finish wiring up their networks with FBI-friendly surveillance gear, to comply with the FCC's expanded interpretation of the Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act.

"The innocent have nothing to fear" in 3, 2, 1...

Republicans for president again.

People of my ilk, that is to say liberal Democratic types, have some hope that the current political era will be coming to an end soon. I do not.

I believe that the level of manipulation and control exhibited and maintained by the Neo-Conservative Republicans will again make the 2008 presidential elections a sham and a farce.

I believe that their marketing to hearts and not minds will once again destroy the careers of qualified politicians, perhaps even visionaries, who hold opposing viewpoints.

I have seen votes and elections not matter. I have seen plans and dreams not matter. Why will this next contest be any different? When one participant has control of the process, the outcome is no surprise.

Punishing the innocent.