War Stories from Iraq

I don't even remember how I found this site, From NYC. Freelance journalist/photographer, Brian Palmer, is embedded with the U. S. Marine Charlie Company at Al Asad Airbase in Iraq.

Every time I hear our non-com militarist leaders Donald Rumsfeld, Dick Cheney or George Bush wax on about how democracy is taking a foothold in Iraq, how the Iraqi Army is almost ready to take over stabilization efforts, how the insurgency is in its "last throes" - I wonder how courageous these men would be, how decisive they would be about sending young men off to a pre-emptive war if they themselves were actually embedded with the Marines for just a short time. Here are some excerpts from Palmer's blog:

The shooting is loud and furious and disorienting, particularly to me. This is my first real firefight. I point my video camera at the loudest clump of shooting. I pan to my right toward Marino and his team as they fire rounds into the field at an enemy I can't see. I’m trying to concentrate on the action happening in the viewfinder while keeping my head parallel to the mud . . .

Someone spots something or someone moving in the canal among the reeds. A wounded, possibly dead, fighter is either hiding or dying.Gunfire erupts again. I peer through the swaying stalks but see nothing. Marino and the Laube spot the body. Marino puts two final bullets into the man. All I see is a spray of blood after the second shot. That’s the fourth and final “enemy KIA” . . .

I crouch behind a berm with Marino and a squad of Marines. “Thirty seconds!” Corpsman Chin shouts. Then, Boom! The Explosive Ordnance Demolition team has “blown in place” two of the dead fighters, one of whom wore the suicide vest. (The other carried a grenade with the detonation pin pulled, Marines said.) “Stand by for body parts,” shouts a grunt. I don’t hear anything hit the ground after the blast, but as I walk back to the farmhouse, I notice moist coin-size bits of pink, brown, and red glistening in the dirt. I identify one chunk as a piece of liver. Corpsman Chin corrects me. “That’s lung."

These kinds of images and stories won't be seen on NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN and certainly not Fox News, which yesterday had their neocon intellectuals speculating over the question, "All-Out Civil War in Iraq: Could It Be a Good Thing?". There are just a few degrees of detachment here in America, as we sit in our recliners watching filtered news clips from our very own war of choice.

Reluctant Meme Quartets

Doc Larry at Lost Chord (who I'd like to meet after reading his interesting work history) tagged this space. Like the Doc, I give this curmudgeonly reply:

Four Jobs I've Had
1. Janitor
2. Photographer
3. Personnel Manager
4. Teacher

Four Places I've Lived
1. Toronto, Ontario
2. North Hollywood, CA
3. Fair Grove, MO
4. Springfield, MO

Four Movies I'd Watch Again
1. As Good As It Gets
2. My Life As A Dog
3. Life of Brian
4. Off the Map

Four TV Shows I Love
1. Seinfeld
2. Bob Newhart
3. Frontline
4. Daily Show (when I had cable)

Four Places I've Vacationed
1. Negril, Jamaica
2. all over Ontario
3. Old Route 66 'tween here and points west
4. Buffalo River Cabin

Four Favorite Dishes
1. Han's Chicken w/kimchi (Korea House)
2. Casper's Chili (w/lots of crackers)
3. Burrito Enchilada Style (half order please, lots of hot sauce)
4. Sunday breakfast at home with the paper

Four Sites I Visit Daily
1. Truthout.org
2. Slate
3. News-Leader online
4. Huffington Post

Four Places I'd Rather Be
1. You mean actual locales?
2. Or places, like Hammons Field?
3. Or maybe having a drink listening to a good band
4. Or on a beach somewhere warm.

Four Books I Loved
1. Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu
2. Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy
3. Henderson the Rain King by Saul Bellow
4. Underworld by Don DeLillo

Four Video Games I Love
1. None - I'm a little behind the curve on this.

Four Tags
1. Everybody I link to has already been tagged.
2. Dick Cheney (should be tagged on his ear so he can be tracked)
3. Dee Wampler (Season's Greetings Asshole!)
4. South Dakota Legislature (real hard)

Cheney Tool Decries Media "Jihad"

Things got a little dicey on Meet the Press today as Cheney spokesperson, Mary Matalin, in a typical Bush administration maneuver, went on the attack, attempting to put the media on the defensive and dodge the persistent questions about inconsistencies in the Cheney hunting story. MTP host, Tim Russert, allowed Matalin to spin freely for half the show, which left prescious little time for rebuttals or follow-up questions.

Matalin, in an exchange with NBC White House correspondent David Gregory, decried the media "jihad" against Vice President Cheney. She then described NY Times columnist and Cheney critic, Maureen Dowd, who sat across the table, as "the diva of the smart set." Dowd's response was the clearest statement of the broadcast:

The reason this story has evoked such fascination is because the vice president is like the phantom. You know, we hear the creak of the door as he passes, but we don't really know what he's up to. We don't know his schedule. We don't always know where he is. We don't know what democratic institution he's blowing off at any given minute, and so this allowed us to see how his behavior and judgment operated pretty much in real time -- with the delay, but pretty much in real time. ... And it covered all the problems of the Bush/Cheney administration: secrecy and stonewalling, then blowing off the rules that are at the heart of our democracy, then using a filter to try and put the truth out in a way that would most suit their political needs, and then bad political judgment in bungling a crisis. I mean, if there's one thing the Republicans are great at since Reagan, it's damage control. But he is such a control freak, you know, he doesn't even care about the damage. ... Mary, it isn't only the press. He blows off the FISA courts, he blows off the Geneva Conventions, he blows off the U.N. to go to Iraq. He wants to blow off everything. He's got a fever of about presidential erosion just the way he had a fever about going into Iraq.

Granted, the whole story became an obsession with the press, but when you're as dark and secretive and powerful as Cheney, what do you expect? Characterizing the media attention as a "jihad" cleverly brings the language of the ever-present War On Terror to the table, which effectively shuts off any meaningful debate. Well done, Mary - you've proven an old adage to be true - dogs really do take on their owners' personality traits.

There's a pretty good in-depth piece on Cheney in the latest Newsweek, entitled: The Shot Heard Round the World.

But it's not that big a story, really. Two guys out hunting with two women - not their wives, just a couple of nice Republican women - not drinking anything. Well, drinking just a little. Then, one of the men is accidentally shot in the face and neck at fairly close range (They claim 30 yards, but could that many pellets land in so condensed a space and penetrate a hunting jacket, clothing and lodge in the liver and heart? I'm not a hunter, can anybody enlighten here?).

Later, it turns out that the "eyewitness", Katherine Armstrong (described as "eyewitness" no fewer than six times in the news conference), who at first said she didn't know what was going on and assumed Cheney had suffered another heart attack, is somehow, just a day later, able to recall viewing the entire event with some detail.

And what about the other woman, Pamela Willeford? She was reportedly standing right next to Cheney when he fired. Who is she? Where was Lynne? We know that Willeford is the current ambassador to Switzerland and that she is figurehead president of Pico Drilling Company (oil drilling equip).

Is Pamela Willeford Dick Cheney's lover? Were there semen stains on her camouflage? Does she, in fact, bear some responsibility for Dick's premature firing? Where is Kenneth Starr when you need him?

Cheney Shoots From the Hip Again

Dick Cheney accidentally shot his hunting partner today - or yesterday. I think the story was held 24 hours for some reason, perhaps to avoid the Sunday morning talk show circuit. This raises all kinds of questions:

1) What is a guy with all kinds of health problems doing out tromping around with a shotgun?
2) How will Bill Clinton ultimately bear the responsibility for this?
3) Why wasn't Scalia with him when it could really do the country some good?
4) Will the public finally understand that this guy hasn't been shooting straight since he took office?
5) Is this the real reason why he had five deferments during the draft?
6) Will Rove spin the blame for this on the victim for stepping in front of Cheney's target?
7) Is Elmer Fudd really a heartbeat away from the presidency?

I've got to see Leno, Letterman and Stewart tomorrow night.

Radical Fundamentalists in Education

The King Fahd Academy in Bonn, Germany is a Saudi-funded private school for the children of Islamic families in the area. A few months ago, a German television station smuggled a camera into an academy classroom and recorded a teacher inciting a holy war in the name of Allah and advocating martial-arts training for their young Islamic terrorists of the future.

According to an article in Newsweek, "the Saudi government pumps tens of millions of dollars every year into such institutions around the world, including Islamic centers, mosques and schools named for King Fahd in Los Angeles, Moscow, Edinburgh and Malaga, Spain."

After the television station aired their hidden footage, the German government vowed to shut down the Bonn school, but quickly did an about-face after conferring with Saudi government officials. The Germans eventually backed down completely, citing "foreign policy reasons". A government spokesman recently praised the Kind Fahd school as an "important cultural institution" that contributed to good Saudi-German relations. Proving once again that when push comes to shove, links to money and oil outweigh any considerations about fighting institutionalized propaganda. Didn't the 9/11 terrorists hatch their plan in Germany?

Much has been said about how radical Islamic schools have been breeding young terrorists around the world, but then I read about another fundamentalist group spreading propaganda right here in the U. S., and the Bush administration seems to be doing everything in their power to help them spread their message of ignorance and mind control.

I'm talking here about those that espouse a complete rejection of instruction regarding evolution in the science classroom in favor of creationism. This does not bode well for the future of this country, especially when you consider the Bush administration (and our own boy-governor) is pushing public funding of private schools - where they can freely teach this anti-science propaganda to impressionable children.

A piece in the LA Times called "Their Own Version of a Big Bang" tells the story of a well-financed and popular (among Christian fundamentalists) new evangelical push that teaches children to openly question their science instruction. Austrailian evangelist, Ken Ham, is just one of many who have made a good living traveling around the country propagating this new brand of backward-thinking religious propaganda on thousands of school children.

During a recent stop at a school in New Jersey, Ham encouraged a group of 2,300 elementary school children, with the help of dinosaur puppets and silly cartoons, to reject much of geology, paleontology and evolutionary biology as a sinister tangle of lies.

"Boys and girls," Ham said. If a teacher so much as mentions evolution, or the Big Bang, or an era when dinosaurs ruled the Earth, "you put your hand up and you say, 'Excuse me, were you there?' Can you remember that?" The children roared as one, "Yes!".

Then he further works them into a frenzied state by leading them in cheers.

"Who's the only one who's always been there?" Ham asked.
"God!" the boys and girls shouted.
"Who's the only one who knows everything?"
"God!"
"So who should you always trust, God or the scientists?"The children answered with a thundering:
"God!"

How different is this from impressionable children in radical Islamic school chanting "Allah" at the exhortations of their fundamentalist indoctrinators?

"Who will help us fight the American infidel?"
"Allah!"
"Who will lead us in the jihad against the great Satan?"
"Allah!"

Evangelist Ham, a former biology teacher, likes to say that he is arming his youngsters with "Christian Patriot missiles" during his seminars and Christian pep rallies. The name of his ministry is called "Answers in Genesis".

According to the Times, this kind of "creation evangelism" has become a booming industry, with churches, colleges, private schools and rotary clubs providing venues for anti-evolutionary rallies.

With pulpit-thumping passion, Ham insists the Bible be taken literally: God created the universe and all its creatures in six 24-hour days, roughly 6,000 years ago. Answers in Genesis has an annual budget of $15 million to produce DVD's and home school materials. One popular seller is an alphabet rhyme that begins, "A is for Adam, God made him from dust / He wasn't a monkey, he looked just like us."

Ham's well-publicized speaking tours are supposedly booked three years in advance, and I see he does have Missouri listed on his itinerary. If you were wanting to preach this kind of baloney to Missourians, which part of the state would you pick?

Cartoon Mohammad, Hollywood Jesus

I received an odd piece of mail last week from an organization calling itself Saint Matthew's Church of Tulsa, Oklahoma. Of course, I'm immediately suspicious of any kind of religious material emanating from Tulsa, where Oral Roberts proffered up his peculiar brand of evangelical dementia.

This mailing contained a "Church Prayer Rug" depicting a rather effeminate image of our lord and savior, Jesus Christ, with his eyes closed, wearing the obligatory crown of thorns. At the bottom of the "rug", which was really nothing more than an 11 x 17 sheet of paper printed on both sides, there were some basic instructions.

Look into Jesus' Eyes you will see they are closed. But as you continue to look you will see His eyes opening and looking back into your eyes. Then go and be alone and kneel on the Rug of Faith or touch it to both knees. Then please check your needs on our letter to you. Please return this Prayer Rug. Do not keep it.

Cool! Sort of like a Highlights Magazine optical puzzle for believers. I gazed into his eyes, and sure enough, he stared back at me, somewhat cross-eyed.

There was an addressed, pre-paid mail envelope enclosed along with a checklist of prayer request that included: My Soul, A Closer Walk With Jesus, My Health, Confusion in My Home, My Children, To Stop a Bad Habit, A New Car . . . and on.

This Saint Matthew's Church, of course, wanted some compensation for petitioning the Lord on my behalf. They call it a "seed gift". The enclosed testimonials told of a woman in Maryland who mysteriously received $46,888.20 after sending in her prayer rug. "If I may have more blessings come again, I would like to help others," she said. Another woman testified that "God blessed us with $10,700. We went out and bought us a car!."

We all know this bogus St. Matthew's Church is not mainstream Christianity, but the truth is that churches have been using images of Christ to save souls and raise revenue for centuries. Hollywood has even exploited images of "The Christ" to churn up money. This is perhaps why so many westerners find it hard to understand why Islamic true believers get so bent out of shape when somebody prints a cartoon caricature of Mohammad in a newspaper.

Which image is more obscene? The one intended to persuade the ignorant to send money in the name of God, or the one that makes a political statement about violence and the killing of innocents in the name of God?

This weekend, thousands of frothing Islamic demonstrators took to the streets in Afghanistan, the West Bank, Iraq and New Zealand, and Danish and Norwegian embassies in Syria were set on fire by mobs who charged past security barriers.
All because of a cartoon image.

I'm wondering if maybe I should try to organize a march on Tulsa.

From Our Fear Monger-In-Chief

You don't see much of the vice president these days. It used to be a joke that VP's were only visible at funerals and conventions - kept in the background. Some were actually political opponents within the party, like Lyndon Johnson. The job disarmed them, so to speak.

But Cheney came to the Bush administration fully armed and seemingly obsessed with a long-brewed neocon scheme to conquer Iraq and install an oil-rich democracy in the Mideast. To that end, he has twisted the truth and blatantly lied many times to the media - it seems to be his function in this administration. And yet nobody seems willing or able to hold him accountable for pushing blatant propaganda on the American public. The following are snips from various interviews with Tim Russert on NBC's Meet the Press.

It's now public that, in fact, [Saddam] has been seeking to acquire... the kinds of tubes that are necessary to build a centrifuge. And the centrifuge is required to take low-grade uranium and enhance it into highly enriched uranium, which is what you have to have in order to build a bomb. [9/8/02]

"We do know, with absolute certainty, that [Saddam] is using his procurement system to acquire the equipment he needs in order to enrich uranium to build a nuclear weapon." [9/8/02]

"Well, I think I've just given it, Tim, in terms of the combination of his development and use of chemical weapons, his development of biological weapons, his pursuit of nuclear weapons... It's only a matter of time until he acquires nuclear weapons." [3/14/03]

"We know that he has a long-standing relationship with various terrorist groups, including the al-Qaeda organization." [3/14/03]

"We learned more and more that there was a relationship between Iraq and al-Qaeda." [9/23/03]

None of the above statements were true, and he knew full well at the time. No wonder he stays in his bunker.

Impeachment and the State of the Union

Nobody I know is seriously considering the impeachment of our stealth president, Dick Cheney, and his sidekick George Bush. But like a lot of people, I've read the list of possible offenses, and they seem pretty valid, especially when considering the human carnage and suffering they have exacerbated - and I also remember vividly the Clinton impeachment with all its sordid drama and moral outrage. It was an embarrassment. A Bush/Cheney impeachment would be incredibly ugly. I'm wondering if the American people have the stomach to expose the world to the inner workings of their crooked, corporatized executive branch.

As Gore Vidal says in his essay, President Jonah, "Not since the glory days of Watergate and Nixon's Luciferian fall has there been so much written about the dogged deceits and creative criminalities of our rulers."

I ran across this article from The Texas Observer by Ronnie Dugger, and it's better than anything I could write on the subject of a possible Bush/Cheney indictment or impeachment. He touches on crucial questions about America - the values of its leaders and the people who elected them. I think there's a little embarrassment down in Texas - that they helped grease their favorite son's ascendance to bungling leader the free world. I don't blame them.

This country has taken a path under the Bush/Cheney administration that is a radical departure from life as I knew it growing up here in god's country. Our representatives to Congress, for instance, have never been so brazenly connected to big corporations and party fundraising as is Roy Blunt.

"Our elections are bought, and our government is run by and for the major transnational corporations," Dugger writes, and our boy Roy is right there making it happen with a wink and a nod from the Bushies. Everything's cool, the money is rolling in.

On Bush's grab for unconstitutional executive power, Dugger says "Bush announced in 2002 his illegal presidential policy that the United States can and will attack other nations first, waging war on them, when he so decides. He is now waging, as if he were doing it in our names, a bloody war of aggression against Iraq . . ."

And here we are four years later with 2,200 American soldiers dead, 35,000 Iraqi's killed (give or take 5,000), a terrorist group winning election in Palestine, U. S.-run secret prisons overseas, condoned torture by the military, warrantless wiretapping of American citizens, a massive national debt, $250 billion sucked away in Iraq, an emboldened, antagonistic Iran with nuclear capability . . . and let's not even talk about solving our considerable problems here at home with perhaps the most corrupt (and certainly the most corporate) Congress in history.

I remember talking to my neighbor out in the driveway before the 2000 election. We both thought the presidential election would be close, but we figured Gore would win. And he did, but that's another issue entirely.

Remember how people used to say it didn't matter who was president? "Six of one, half dozen of the other." Right. I may be grasping for a silver lining here, but do you think it's possible the disastrous Bush presidency might persuade more people to participate in the choosing of their leaders next November? Are enough people even paying attention? If not, I guess we will continue to get the leadership we deserve.

Do you ever wonder how a Gore administration would have dealt with 9/11?

On Tuesday, George Bush will take the podium and tell us how great things are. Just Pretend It's All Okay. But there's no telling what else is coming down the pike with these guys. I understand Bush is poised to solve the health care crisis in America, and we'll hear all about it Tuesday night. "And now, from the same folks who brought you Homeland Security's Rapid Response Katrina Team, Social Security Reform and the War in Iraq . . ."
Everybody knows this will go nowhere.

Speaking of state of the union addresses, here's a link to Bill Clinton's last State of the Union speech, just a reminder of what life was like before 9/11 - before all the fear-mongering, the lies, the corruption that the Bush/Cheney team and the Republican Congress have brought to the table.

Images of the Dead

Abortion will once again be a huge distraction in coming weeks as legislators wrestle with the parental consent issue - yet another attempt by fundamentalists to strip away by layers the laws that protect the privacy of pregnant women in America. A big anti-abortion rally is scheduled tomorrow in Washington with a plan to march on Congress and the Supreme Court, placards raised high.

The politics of life and death in this country are hard to understand. How the government, political movements and media deal with the images of death reveals an odd juxtapositioning.

Christian fundamentalists, for instance, revel in the bloody images of Christ, but they also use the image of an aborted fetus to bludgeon the public into understanding what they see as the true nature of abortion.

But where is the outrage when sensitized pro-life proponents come across images of Iraqi children whose bodies have been blown apart by bombs? Why are these images considered anti-war propaganda? A dead Iraqi child is just not their issue of choice, I guess.



And how can our government protect the rights of abortion protesters foisting obscene images upon women entering clinics but steadfastly refuse to let photographers capture the pristine image of caskets containing the remains of American soldiers returning from war overseas?

Three takes on Perception Management.

Apathy Paves Way For Blunt

It appears the upcoming House vote for Majority Leader will be a cake walk for our boy Roy. According to the Washington Post, congressmen returning to their districts for the break are finding that nobody much cares about the upcoming leadership vote. This is a big boost for status quo candidate, Roy Blunt, whose own ethical lapses involving Jack Abramoff's lobbying interests and Tom DeLay's tainted PAC money have made him the GOP's poster boy for extra-legal fundraising in Congress.

Blunt's ethical lapses have been neatly air-brushed by the our Gnews-Leader editorialists, but the Washington Post had this to say:

"The lack of grass-roots enthusiasm for broad changes on Capitol Hill may work to the advantage of Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), several legislators said. By most estimates, he is leading the race to become the next House majority leader -- despite his extensive connections to lobbyists, including some involved in the Abramoff scandal."

Everything I've read indicates that the Abramoff depositions to federal prosecutors will entwine a multitude of prominent Republicans in the legislative and executive sectors, so it seems very unlikely that our boy Roy will emerge from this with his squeaky clean, good Christian image intact. But these revelations are not likely to appear in the media until after the GOP leadership elections (and maybe never in Roy's fan club newsletter, the News-Leader). And even if Blunt is exposed as just another in a long line of corrupt politicians seeking money for special interests, does it really matter to the straight-ticket voters here in God's Country? I doubt it.

Fact is, voters here would more likely turn on Blunt for dumping his wife of 31 years to marry a younger woman than they would for him secretly inserting provisions in leglislation that helps his sweety's tobacco firm. I can just see the sleazy commericials . . . but wait, Roy's a Republican, not a Democrat. As disorganized and feckless as the Democrats are sometimes, they do have enough class and integrity not to stoop to GOP's level of personal smear.

My prediction: if Abramoff information starts leaking to the press in the next couple of weeks and there aren't any big terrorism stories in the news, Roy loses the secret ballot vote, and John Shadegg becomes Majority Leader. If nothing new emerges, Roy leads the chorus for lobbying reform and is home free to replace his mentor Tom DeLay.

"Perception Becomes Reality"

It seems the News-Leader is intent on "Perception Management" when it comes to supporting Roy Blunt in his candidacy for House Majority Leader. Editorial page editor Robert Leger became the official media apologist for Roy Blunt today, pointing out that . . .

"Rep. Roy Blunt's quest to become the House majority leader is a major local story for southwest Missouri. If he is successful, it will assure continued federal support for key Ozarks projects such as highway improvements, university research, water quality protection and Jordan Valley Park."

But isn't obtaining federal support for district projects what any good Congressman would do for his constituency? True, it would be a lot more fun for the local paper to cover a House Majority Leader than another bland party functionary like Gene Taylor, but is Leger really being completely open with his readers when he says . . .

"No evidence has surfaced that Blunt crossed legal lines like DeLay did. He doesn't make a habit of dining or traveling with lobbyists other than his wife. The amount Abramoff donated to Blunt's leadership PAC is relatively minor."

Technically, Blunt probably didn't cross legal lines, and he won't be indicted like DeLay, but his well-documented ethical lapses - his eleventh-hour addition to a Homeland Security bill to benefit big tobacco interests (not to mention his sleeping with a lobbyist working for said interests), his letters sent on behalf of Abramoff clients to protect their gambling interests in Mississippi, his shuffling of PAC monies to help his son's candidacy back home - does anybody really know how much tainted money ended up in ROYB's coffers?

But Leger shrugs off such questions. "For purists," he says, "any liaison with lobbyists is suspect. Perception becomes reality."

Perception has become reality for Roy Blunt. In reality, Blunt actually did do Jack Abramoff's bidding by writing letters to the Department of Interior urging them to limit tribal expansion that would compete with Abramoff's casino clients. In reality, Blunt did try to attach an after-hours rider that would benefit Philip-Morris, the company that employed his girlfriend. And, as far as we can tell, none of this directly benefited Blunt's constituency in the Ozarks.

Of course, Blunt is now calling for lobbying reform, but this seems a little disingenuous given the fact that he was the main GOP connection to K Street during the lobbyist feeding frenzy that has characterized this Republican-controlled Congress. In effect, Blunt is calling for lobbying reform to curb his own questionable behavior. I guess that's admirable.

Despite what the News-Leader would have its readers believe, Roy Blunt isn't the "aw shucks" former social studies teacher who was sent to Washington to inherit the GOP's 7th District seat. He has become nothing more than a very effective full-time fundraiser for the Republican Party - and what's worse, he has chosen to favor a new constituency while he was away. Blunt has represented lobbyists and PAC's more than his own people back here in Southwest Missouri - and that perception-turned-reality is precisely why his once promising bid to become Majority Leader is now in jeopardy.

Fight for Leadership Gets Ugly

Roy Blunt's campaign to permanently replace Tom DeLay as House Majority Leader took a couple of body blows this week from members of his own party. First, a new candidate for the post, John Shadegg (R-AZ) threw his hat in the ring, and many GOP conservatives appear ready to jump on his bandwagon as an alternative to the status quo (Blunt/DeLay).

A second blow to Blunt's ambitions came when a printed timeline depicting a series of Abramoff/Blunt connections began circulating among GOP house members this week. The timeline shows the following:

June 1999 - Abramoff donates $5,000 to ROYB fund.
February 2000 - Abramoff donates an additional $1,500 to ROYB Fund.
March 2000 - Abramoff donates maximum amount to Matt Blunt's campaign for Missouri Secretary of State.
April 2000 - Abramoff's Mariannas Island client donates $3,000 to ROYB fund.
April 2000 - Abramoff client, Juan Franco (Puerto Rico), contributes $3,000 to ROYB fund.
August 2000 - Blunt and DeLay host Republican National Committee events sponsored in part by Abramoff client, the Mississippi Band of Choctaws.
September 2000 - Blunt requests GAO study on tribal recognition issues and simultaneously seeks a six month moratorium on further tribal recognition - protecting existing casinos from further competition.
February 2002 - GAO report on tribal recognition issued.
March 2002 - Blunt writes letter to Department of Interior citing the GAO report and expressed specific concerns about the Jenna Band of Choctaws and their status in Louisiana. The Jenna Band would have been competition for Abramoff's client with tribal recognition approval.
March 2003 - Abramoff contributes to ROYB fund.
May 2003 - Blunt sends letter to Department of Interior Secretary Gale Norton regarding his concerns about Indian gaming and specifically the Jenna Band in Louisiana.
June 2003 - Blunt joins DeLay, House Speaker Hastert and House Majority Whip Cantor in penning another letter to DOI Secretary Norton regarding the opposed Jenna Band casino.

Isn't it nice to know that Roy is up there in Washington representing our interests here in God's Country? Here is a guy who needs virtually no money whatever to retain his permanent 7th District House seat, and he's up there throwing his influence around trying to protect a favorite lobbyist who is concerned about his client losing gambling revenue in Mississippi.

Further, here we are in socially conservative Southwest Missouri, where family values and high moral character are political euphemisms for "Republican" - yet we continue to elect a guy who goes to Washington and totally immerses himself in party fundraising - not that there's anything inherently wrong with that - but it gets to the point where the lobbyists become his primary constituents. And he gets so cozy with some lobbyists - is literally in bed with one Philip-Morris lobbyist - that he dumps his wife of 31 years and subsequently attempts to sneak a provision into the massive Homeland Security bill that would have aided the very tobacco firm that just happens to be represented by the lobbyist who shares his bed.

Where is the outrage here in God's Country?

Don't expect to see any of this on KY3 or the Gnews-Leader either. No, our local media has remained characteristically silent on the disturbing series of revelations regarding our elected representative to Congress. That's not to say there aren't folks in the local media who wouldn't love to run a big expose' on Blunt's ethical lapses. It just ain't happening, given the "walking-on-eggshells" approach local media has with their conservative reader/viewers. It would be like telling a small child that the Easter Bunny was a fraud (oh, for an image of Roy in bunny ears). Maybe the St. Louis and K. C. media will start making some noise about this.

Oh, and here's another little timeline I ran across in the New York Daily News that further implicates our boy-governor in this fundraising shell game.

March 30, 2000 - DeLay's ARMPAC fund donates $50,000 to Blunt's ROYB fund.
April-May 2000 - ROYB fund pays $40,000 to Alexander Strategy Group, which is run by DeLay's former chief of staff. Christine DeLay also works there. (ASG is closing its doors this month due to the Abramoff scandal.)
April 14, 2000 - Abramoff client from Marinna Islands (garment manufacturer fined by the U. S. government for sweatshop practices) contributes $3,000 to ROYB fund.
May 9, 2000 - ROYB fund contributes $1,000 to Cancer Research Foundation by way of political consultant Jim Ellis (indicted with DeLay), who runs ARMPAC.
May 24, 2000 - ARMPAC contributes $100,000 to ROYB fund.
June 15, 2000 - ROYB fund contributes $100,000 to Missouri Republican Party, which in turn eventually donates a total of $160,000 to Matt Blunt's campaign for Missouri Secretary of State.
October/November 2000 - DeLay's ARMPAC fund contributes $50,000 to Missouri Republic Party.
November 2000 - Matt Blunt is elected Missouri Secretary of State.
November/December 2000 - the Missouri Republican Party contributes $50,000 back to ARMPAC.
November 2000 - Abramoff charges Marinna Island client for meetings held with Trevor Blackann, an aide to Roy Blunt.
September 2001 - Abramoff lobbyist for Marinna Island client meets with Blunt staffer John Dutton to discuss strategies in fighting a minimum wage bill. The minimum wage bill never made it into law.

I'm just wondering how much tainted PAC money found its way to our boy-governor's gubernatorial campaign?

Abramoff "Just As Close to Blunt"

While our esteemed 7th District Congressman, Roy Blunt, is trying desperately to downplay his cozy relationship with indicted lobbyist/swindler Jack Abramoff, it appears that the Abramoff stain just won't wash out.

We ran across a November 2002 feel-good piece by John Bresnahan in Washington Business Forward that introduces mover-and-shaker Jack Abramoff as the lobbyist who is taking Washington by storm. The article begins:

"Greenberg Traurig’s Jack Abramoff is the most unlikely establishment Washington lobbyist: he made his bones producing a Dolph Lundgren movie, working with Indian casinos and doing a riverboat gambling deal that turned messy. Now Abramoff has emerged as an insider’s insider, with close ties to top Republicans and a hefty book of business. But even with his ally Tom DeLay poised to become House Majority Leader, Abramoff’s still found time to go into the restaurant business. Don’t bet against him."

The piece is pure fluff, with lines like: "It’s classic Abramoff: He’s a master at making money while pushing his conservative, free-market ideals." But there's an interesting quote near the end of Breshahan's little promotional that flies in the face of Blunt's earnest denials that he and Abramoff were fundraising pals for several years running. In this interview, Abramoff made an effort to downplay his close relationship with Tom DeLay by naming other associates who were dear to his heart and pocketbook.

“The DeLay thing is played up a lot in terms of our relationship. The fact is when I pitch a client, I never mention Tom DeLay. I never say I know Tom DeLay.” Abramoff says he’s just as close to other Republicans, like Reps. Roy Blunt (MO), Christopher Cox (CA), John Doolittle (CA), Phil Crane (IL) and Dana Rohrabacher (CA)."

The Washington Business Forward piece closes with this ironic little bit of smarm . . .

"Beyond the political world, it’s Abramoff himself who’s a bit unheard of, but that won’t last for long." I'll bet Ol' Roy is wishing he'd never heard of the guy.

Washington Post Links to Ozarks Angel

This probably isn't all that newsworthy, but I thought it was pretty cool that the Washington Post online edition printed a lead from the "Blunt, Inc." piece I posted here last night. It was one of several blogs in a "Who's Blogging About This Article" they feature each day.

I watched Matt Blunt trying to deliver a rousing State of the State speech tonight on public television. He did mention his 65% solution for fixing public education, but I don't think it's going to be high on his agenda this session - too much criticism of his little trial balloon last month.

Daddy Roy was on the tube as well during the evening news, trying to persuade folks that he didn't really know Jack Abramoff and that he'd already returned the measly $8,500 he'd received "over a six year period". Gimmee a break, Roy. This is the same Congressman who was on a short list of VIP customers treated to free meals at Abramoff's swank restaurant in D. C. And the "$8,500 over six years" is just laughable - maybe that was all the money that came directly from Abramoff, but this guy was a master at shuffling donations from one PAC or bogus charitable organization to another. My guess is that a careful look at the tortuous money trails these guys put together would reveal considerably more than $8,500 of tainted money resting in ROYB's political coffers. You can bet on one thing - the more air time the Abramoff scandal receives, the less likely it is that Blunt assumes his much-coveted Majority Leader spot.

Blunt, Inc.

Thomas B. Edsall, of the Washington Post, wrote an interesting piece last May on the rapid rise of Roy Blunt and the incredibly vast network of lobbyists and corporate donors that have made him one of the most well-financed representatives on the hill. The story, entitled House Majority Whip Exerts Influence by Way of K Street, outlines how Roy, his new lobbyist wife Abigail and sons Matt and Andrew have benefited greatly since Roy took office as our 7th District Representative in 1997 and began schmoozing around with big money interests.

Blunt's corporate and K Street connections have grown at an uncanny rate over the past eight years - to the point that his own financial holdings through PACs and re-election committees rival, or even surpass those of his mentor, Tom DeLay. In short, Blunt has become the GOP's "key liaison to lobbyists . . . who direct the flow of individual and political action committee contributions from the 1,600 corporations and 1,200 trade associations with PACs." Hence the moniker Blunt, Inc.

"Here in Washington, Blunt has converted what had been an informal and ad hoc relationship between congressional leaders and the Washington corporate and trade community into a formal, institutionalized alliance. Lobbyists are now an integral part of the Republican whip operation on par with the network of lawmakers who serve as assistant whips."

So, according to the Washington Post, at least, we can thank our boy Roy for helping to create the lobbyist feeding frenzy that has overtaken D. C. during the Bush years - a climate that has helped breed the likes of our favorite fedora-wearing shyster, Jack Abramoff.

Blunt's campaign committee has raised some $8.58 million since 1997, including $3.35 million to his (not one, but two) Rely On Your Belief funds (ROYB) from 2000 to 2002. Altria, SBC Communications, Union Pacific, Burlington Northern, Verizon, United Parcel Service and BellSouth are major corporate contributors.

Roy Blunt: Man of the People.

Within the next three weeks or so, House Republicans are going to elect a new slate of leaders in the wake of the DeLay indictment and the looming Abramoff scandal. One wonders if they have the will to really make some meaningful changes. If the GOP has any inkling of making true reforms in their party operations in Congress, they might want push ethically challenged fundraiser types like Blunt to the background and place some people with higher ideals in positions of leadership. I wonder, what's the likelihood of that happening?

Roy Blunt - Ethically Challenged

It will be interesting to see if the mainstream media will ever reveal what so many people in Washington, D. C. already know about Roy Blunt's trail of ethical missteps during his climb to Majority Whip and interim Majority Leader. Here are a few questionable activities that the good folks here in God's Country probably don't want to hear about:

*Blunt divorced Roseanne Blunt, his wife of 31 years, in 2003 to marry Abigail Perlman, a lobbyist with Philip Morris tobacco, now owned by Altria.

*Altria is the largest single contributor to Blunt's Political Action Committee (PAC), Rely on Your Beliefs (ROYB), giving some $270,000 to his personal PAC.

*Just hours after taking the role of Majority Whip (Blunt was hand-picked by his mentor, slimeball Majority Leader Tom DeLay), and before anyone knew of his association with Ms. Perlman, Blunt attempted to secretly insert a last-minute provision to Homeland Security legislation that would have benefited Philip Morris at the expense of their competitors. Exactly how this was to further protect the homeland has yet to be explained. An aide to House Speaker Dennis Hastert discovered the stealth insertion and Hastert immediately had it deleted from the bill. Blunt's bold move to aid a big campaign contributor without notifying House leadership surprised many in Washington, but little was said in the media.

*Altria also contributed $24,000 to Matt Blunt's gubernatorial campaign.

*Blunt's younger son, Andrew, landed a sweet lobbyist position with Altria in Missouri just a few years out of college. He is also a lobbyist for UPS in Missouri. Both UPS and Altria are major contributors to ROYB.

*In April, Blunt successfully inserted, once again without debate or Congressional review, a provision to a Senate bill that benefited UPS and FedEx shipping companies. The bill blocked expansion of a foreign shipping competitor. UPS and FedEx have contributed a combined $120,000 to Blunt since 2001.

*Blunt is the largest single contributor ($20,000) to the legal defense fund of Jack Abramoff's good buddy, Tom DeLay.

*Jack Abramoff's phony U. S. Family Network received $500,000 from the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), which was later fined $280,000 for this under-the-table transaction. Blunt's future wife, Abigail Perlman, was the finance director for NRCC at the time.

*Blunt's ROYB fund operated out of the same townhouse suite with Abramoff's U. S. Family Network and, for a time, was run by Tom DeLay's buddy, Jim Ellis, who now faces indictment.

Oh what a tangled web this is . . . and our boy Roy seems to be right in the thick of it all. It's no wonder that he's been listed as one of the thirteen most corrupt members of Congress by Beyond DeLay.

Missouri GOP's Dirty Money Trail

The coming months will be uncomfortable ones for many GOP politicians, including our own 7th District representative and acting house majority leader, Roy Blunt. I saw Roy's picture on the evening news tonight - it was right next to a shot of the nefarious Tom DeLay and beleaguered Ohio congressman, Bob Ney. Looks like good old Roy really has made it big this time.

Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff's guilty plea to three felony counts of conspiracy, mail fraud and tax evasion opens pandora's box to one of the worst cases of Washington, D. C. corruption in a couple of generations. So far, GOP leaders have been relatively quiet - perhaps waiting for another natural disaster to take the headlines - but they have managed to utter a few weak defenses, such as . . . "He gave money to Democrats, too."

Well, I checked into that, and here's a list of recipients of Abramoff donations since 2000 as compiled by the non-partisan Center for Responsive Politics:

Tom DeLay (R-Texas). John Ashcroft (R-Mo.). Frank A. LoBiondo (R-NJ). Eric Cantor (R-Va.). Arlen Specter (R-Pa.). John Ensign (R-Nev.). Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.). Charles H. Taylor (R-NC). Chris Cannon (R-Utah). Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa). Mark Foley (R-Fla.). Richard Pombo (R-Calif.). Christopher S. "Kit" Bond (R-Mo.). Curt Weldon (R-Pa.). Dana Rohrabacher (R-Calif.). Doug Ose (R-Calif.). Ernest J. Istook (R-Okla.). George R. Nethercutt Jr. (R-Wash.). Jim Bunning (R-Ky.). Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.). Tom Feeney (R-Fla.). Dan Burton (R-Ind.). Eric Cantor (R-Va.). Suzanne Terrell (R-La.). Rob Simmons (R-Conn.). Charles W. "Chip" Pickering Jr. (R-Miss.). Connie Morella (R-Md.). Gordon H. Smith (R-Ore.). James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.). James M. Talent (R-Mo.). John T. Doolittle (R-Calif.). John Thune (R-SD). Tim Hutchinson (R-Ark.). Bob Smith (R-Fla.). Bob Ney (R-Ohio). CL. "Butch" Otter (R-Idaho). Carolyn W. Grant (R-NC). Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.). Elizabeth Dole (R-NC). Heather Wilson (R-NM). J. Randy Forbes (R-Va.). Jack Kingston (R-Ga.). James V. Hansen (R-Utah). John Cornyn (R-Texas). Kimo Kaloi (R-Hawaii). Marilyn Musgrave (R-Colo.). Mike Ferguson (R-NJ). Mike Simpson (R-Idaho). Ralph Regula (R-Ohio). Ric Keller (R-Fla.). Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.). Ted Stevens (R-Alaska). Thad Cochran (R-Miss.). Dave Camp (R-Mich.). Phil Gingrey (R-Ga.). Tom Young (R-Ala.). Bill Janklow (R-SD). Craig Thomas (R-Wyo.). Spencer Abraham (R-Mich.). William L. Gormley (R-NJ). Bill McCollum (R-Fla.). Bill Redmond (R-NM). Bob Riley (R-Ala.). Claude B. Hutchison Jr. (R-Calif.). Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.). Francis E. Flotron (R-Mo.). George Allen (R-Va.). Mike Enzi (R-Wyo.). Walter B. Jones Jr. (R-NC). Paul Ryan (R-Wis.). Bob Smith (R-Fla.). Joe Pitts (R-PA). Charles H. Taylor (R-NC). Bob Ehrlich (R-Md.). Charles R. Gerow (R-Pa.). Ed Royce (R-Calif.). Elia Vincent Pirozzi (R-Calif.). Jerry Weller (R-Ill.). Mark Emerson (R-Utah). Tom Davis (R-Va.). Van Hilleary (R-Tenn.).

Notice the "R" in each case. But where is Roy?

One of Abramoff's money laundering setups was a PAC called, cynically enough, the "U. S. Family Network", which was basically one employee manning a phone and computer in the backroom of a D. C. townhouse. Millions in illicit funds swindled from Indian tribes and shady Russian gas and oil magnates came through this office. And guess whose own personal PAC shared office space with the Abramoff front? None other that our own Roy Blunt's "Rely On Your Beliefs" (clever acronym - ROYB).

There's an interesting article in the New Republic about how warm and fuzzy Roy and Tom DeLay have become over the past five years - and how this association may eventually lead to our golden boy's fall from grace.

DeLay was instrumental in boosting Blunt's rise to power in Congress, but Blunt (and his lobbyist wife) also became involved in DeLay's fundraising network, which led him into the great political fundraising arena with none other than the master of slime, Jack Abramoff.

Abramoff also reportedly gave the Bush campaign $100,000 of his ill-gotten gains. The White House, of course, denies this.

Ah, don't ya just love the GOP with their high moral stand and Family Values? One can only hope that this scandal will be the beginning of the end of their nauseating brand of "Christian" ethics in government. Almost makes you wistful for the good old days when the Dems were in power, when we dealt with simpler transgressions like questionable book deals and using congressional postage meters for campaign mail.

Interested in finding out more about who contributes to candidates? Visit a new local blog called Granny Geek. Interesting stuff.

The 2005 Ozarks Angel

I started this blog back in May when I had a couple of days off from work due to a swollen nut. That healed up nicely, in case you were wondering, but I'm still paying the $800 bill. Gotta love our healthcare system - oh, and my wonderful school health insurance covered a whopping $82. Anyway, that was an unlikely topic to start a blog, but there it is. Now, some 3,400 clicks later, we're still plugging away. Here's a review of the year 2005 sifted through some of the Ozarks Angel posts.

Of course, the really huge story that christened this crazy year of 2005 was the slow discovery of the devastation incurred by the killer tsunami that swept away some quarter of a million lives in Asia. Here at home, president Bush was characteristically distant and, despite daily briefings, seemingly uninformed about the magnitude of this disaster - a foreshadowing of his lackadaisical response to the Katrina disaster seven months later. It seems Bush can only get himself worked up if there's evil afoot. These natural disasters just don't move him much, whether foreign or in the "homeland". There's no bad guy involved. It does seem odd, though, that a man who feels called of God to fight tyranny (at least in oil-rich parts of the world) can be so indifferent to cataclysmic acts of God that dwarf his man-made crusade in Iraq.

By March of 2005, the American public and media, which we now can confirm suffers from acute Attention Deficit Disorder, had turned its attention to the plight of Terri Schiavo, whose feeding tube was finally yanked after numerous judicial appeals and a great gnashing of teeth from the Christian right - but not before a special session of Congress was called by Republican leadership as they sought to keep her brain-dead body alive for still more court appeals. President Bush, at the urging of his handlers, leaped to action this time and cut his vacation short in order to get the federal courts to deter Ms. Schiavo's natural departure from this life. Talk about skewed priorities. The Ozarks Angel spoke briefly to this issue when we reviewed an article from an Assemblies of God. Strange, we don't get mail from A/G anymore.

Pope John Paul II died in April - like Schiavo, another case of a person living too long. Not to be disrespectful, but this once vital and energetic man, who will be regarded as one of the greatest popes of modern times for helping to bring down the Soviet empire, was reduced in his final days to muttering unintelligible homilies and waving at pigeons from his balcony. Some of my best friends are Catholic, but I've never understood the appeal of this religion. I see Catholicism, from my vantage point here in the hills, as a male-dominated, authoritarian, superstition-filled holdover from medieval times. I don't think the new pope is going to do much to alter that view, but we mentioned back in July how folks here in God's Country seem to like Pope Benedict, particularly for his stand against homosexuality.

In May, we wrote about how the Springfield police had busted Mayor Carlson's son and fast-tracked the lab work in order to beat the mayoral election. Chief Rowe brought in a buddy from Miami, Florida, of all places, to oversee the internal investigation. This intense search for the facts, of course, turned up no misdeeds whatsoever by SPD. Was anybody shocked? The story was basically buried, and Carlson's son pleaded guilty a few weeks ago.

In Middle School Mind, we see a teacher trying to explain the Iraq invasion to a class of inquisitive adolescents. Some seven months later, the concluding statement still stands true.
"So, based on the newspaper day discussion in Exploratory class, one could conclude that we are at war in Iraq more out of ignorance than duty and that our busy lives won't allow us the time nor the inclination to find the truth behind the spin."
Some of the Bush spin on Iraq has come unraveled a bit since then, but even the most obvious truths become a hard sell when lies and half-truths are so persuasively marketed by those in power. Here in God's Country, Bush still gets high marks for his handling of the war - but Vlad the Impaler would get high marks around here if he was a Republican.

Probably the most frequently downloaded image from Ozarks Angel is the Hammons Field photo from May 30. I still maintain the return of real minor league baseball was the most significant event in Springfield in the last fifty years.


Another very popular download (even though I stole it from another website) is the photo of Washington girl-about-town, Jessica Cutler, whose between-the-sheets blog, The Washingtonienne, revealed the secret sex lives of certain anonymous diplomats. My favorite line: "Oh my god, I'm fucking six different men, ew." Ms. Cutler has a new blog called Jessica Cutler Online.

In July, I found myself whining about the mainstream media and wondered if the Valerie Plame scandal might finally get some people looking at the unethical and unconstitutional activities of the Bush administration. I speculated that Cheney and Rove were behind the whole thing, and that has turned out to be accurate. It looks as though Rove lied to the grand jury, and Cheney's little toady, Scooter Libby, was chosen as the one to fall on his sword to protect our stealth president from indictment.

In mid-July, we featured a story criticizing Bush's war on terror, pointing out how he and his neocon pals ignored advice from nearly every quarter in pressing for war in Iraq. One of our dictator allies in the Middle East, Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, who "won" re-election in a fixed vote this fall, was one of many world leaders who tried to dissuade Bush & Co. from invading Iraq. He warned that such an invasion would create 100 Bin Ladens and turn even moderate Arabs against the U. S. His warning proved to be true - the invasion of Iraq has inspired tens of thousands of young Islamic men to join the jihad against the infidel invaders from America. Our own military, however, is having trouble meeting recruitment quotas.

In late July and August we started posting some cartoons from the springfieldian, a little underground newspaper that circulated around town during the early 90's. These turned out to be some of the most frequently downloaded images from Ozarks Angel, especially SPD Blues and cartoon parodies of Charlie Brown and Garfield that had a local twist.

Another frequently visited story was the strange and twisted tale of the "Self-Abduction of Tim Carpenter", the James River Assembly associate pastor who chose to fake his own abduction rather than face up to his wife, family and church that he was carrying on with a Jezebel in Memphis. It would be funny if it weren't so sad.

In mid-August, right before the first day of school, our brilliant school board chose to roll back a much sought after tax levy, which sent all kinds of wrong signals to the community and to R-12 teachers. It was an awful start for new superintendent, Norm Ridder, but there will be much more on the education front in Ozarks Angel this year. Among other things, there's a new quality initiative being pushed by Dr. Ridder that could lead to some real changes at the administrative level and in the classroom. I'm hopeful but skeptical.

By September, we were talking about the Drowning of New Orleans and how warnings of impending disaster had been ignored for years. Of course, nothing was going to happen on that front during the Bush administration. Yer doin' a great job Bushie!

If hurricane Katrina exposed the administration's indifference to the poor, the nomination of Harriet Miers exposed Bush's blatant arrogance and ignorance when it came to high-stakes judicial appointments. Our Girl Harriet generated the most heated comments from readers - mainly because of my description of Supreme Court justice Clarence Thomas as an Uncle Tom. It's never helpful to bring race into the discussion, but I've always felt it was a very cynical appointment by daddy Bush. The Miers appointment surprised everybody - and the fact that conservatives were the most vocal critics sure surprised me. She would have done anything they wanted - but the nomination seemed so cavalier and disrespectful to the court, even the faithful stepped back from this one. The emperor's clothes were starting to unravel a bit.

In October we wrote about the Community Safety Initiative that would have funded a new crime lab and, more importantly, a program aimed at providing education services to poor children in a cooperative effort with the school system. The local citizenry were predictably wary of this "big government" approach to helping poor kids. "Let the parents take care of this," they wrote in letters to the editor. "It's big government taking over the family". The sad truth is, a growing number of parents aren't taking care of their children - it's a huge problem that nobody wants to talk about. Early childhood development is simply not a major concern here in God's country. We simply invest in bigger and better prisons to later house the large segment of under-educated poor folks who end up turning to drugs and criminal behavior to get by. Who will take up the slack and help the growing number of children born into poverty? Apparently nobody. Where do we look for help in dealing with poverty-related issues like this? Jefferson City? D. C.? Nothing there but cutbacks and vaccuous rhetoric. Maybe Jesus will come and save the children, you suppose? This local initiative was relatively small, but it had the potential to pay huge dividends in lowering crime and providing early basic education for poor children in our community. I was one of the minority of Springfieldians who were willing to invest an additional penny for every four dollars spent on this plan. The CSI initiative was, of course, summarily squashed by local voters in November.

Merry Christmas, Yada, Yada

I gave all my classes a test on the last day before Christmas break. Humbug! One kid asked why I was such a Scrooge, and my answer went something like this:

The original cause for celebration was suppose to be the birth of a spiritual being whose life and teachings changed the entire world and inspired countless millions of followers to love their neighbors as themselves, pursue peace over war and violence, protect the innocent, take care of the poor and sick and to spread love and understanding among all people, regardless of their social standing.

And what do we now do to celebrate this spiritual being's birth? We get out our credit cards and shop like madmen . . . we measure the season's success by keeping a close eye on consumer spending, credit card debt and whether or not massive department stores match their earnings estimates. We erect quaint little prop-up manger scenes outside fast food restaurants - I saw one manger scene in front of a Baptist church that had Santa Claus kneeling with the wise men. Aww, how precious.

It took generations to bastardize the Christmas season into this blind orgy of mass consumerism, but here we are, lining up like lemmings trying to get in the mall, deluding ourselves into thinking this is a spiritual holiday.

The best thing I can say about the holiday season is that, for better or worse, it brings families together. True, we dutifully buy gifts for people we don't care about much, but we also take time to give of ourselves to those we love immeasurably, and that is no small thing to remember. It helps get me through it all.

Oral Arguments for Impeachment

from Lady Bunny Blog