stevengharms.com

First the BoSox and then John F. Kerry!

I gotta give props to Patrick Buchanan. I’m not anywhere near as conservative as he is, but he’s been conservative when conservative wasn’t cool and he is ideologically consistent with Reaganite conservativism (not the Radical neo-conservative insanity proposed by Bush et. al.).

Here’s his magazine’s statement endorsing John Kerry for president:

Bush has behaved like a caricature of what a right-wing president is supposed to be, and his continuation in office will discredit any sort of conservatism for generations. The launching of an invasion against a country that posed no threat to the U.S., the doling out of war profits and concessions to politically favored corporations, the financing of the war by ballooning the deficit to be passed on to the nation?s children, the ceaseless drive to cut taxes for those outside the middle class and working poor: it is as if Bush sought to resurrect every false 1960s-era left-wing clich? about predatory imperialism and turn it into administration policy. Add to this his nation-breaking immigration proposal — Bush has laid out a mad scheme to import immigrants to fill any job where the wage is so low that an American can?t be found to do it — and you have a presidency that combines imperialist Right and open-borders Left in a uniquely noxious cocktail.

He is my favorite curmudgeonly conservative.

That’s my endorsement, here are my top 10 reasons

1. George Bush is not a moderate He is not a Republican of the Reagan, Schwarzenegger, Giuliani mold (as much as he likes them to parade during his pow-wows). He is an extreme right radical. I am a left-of-center moderate. I do things out of pragmatism, logic, and fact. He does things out of religiousity, ideology, and faith. This overarching complaint can be found several times throughout my post.

2. The Bush Administration is rife with right-wing ideologues of the “Neoconservative” movement (Wolfowitz, Perle, Rumsfeld, Libby)

This is a political perspective which singles out now, in the post-Soviet era, as an opportunity in which the US should assert its military might, change regimes and otherwise govern the world at the end of our very large stick.

I disagree with this view. I think this is the short route to building an Empire, not advancing our Republic. I believe this war got us into a war in Iraq that need not have been fought (yet).

Without the spectre of re-election hanging over their political figurehead their boldness, arrogance, and wrongness shall use another four years to drive this country in the wrong direction.

1. I dislike Bush’s overt religiosity It bothers me to no end. When I was in high school there was a group of church kids who would gather in front of the flagpole to pray every morning. This bothered my spiritual sense and my legal sense. Incidentally many of them were known to be drinkers of the highest regard come Friday evening. I’m not judging their choices (they were in high school, you have a right to screw up at that time) - but that feeling, that sick warmth in my gut, Bush’s displays of religiosity inspire that.

The conflation of church and state gets you Iran or the Massachusetts Bay Colony situations. That’s called a theocracy and we ditched that when we started this little federalist experiment of ours.

Bush’s overt religiosity is a hurdle in the court of international opinion. With Bush conflating his faith with the State, who can blame our international peers for perceiving actions of the state (say, the war in Iraq) as an action in the name of his religion?

I dislike that instead of asking his (biological) father about war in Iraq, GW Bush is said to have found affirmation of his plan in the assent of “a higher father”.

The last group of people “doing God’s will” in the middle east were the Crusaders - and they couldn’t find a good exit strategy either.

At the end of several centuries of Christians slaughtering Muslims (and vice versa) both parties were bled, weakened, backward, and feudal. The places where understanding and tolerance flourished (Spain in the Convivencia), culture and civilization flourished.

The man who proposed a constitutional act to fracture the American public along the lines of sexual orientation is not a uniter or a divider. He is a right wing ideologue catering to the likes of Bob Jones.

1. Bush is anti-science Bush has limited federal support for stem-cell research. FACT: If we don’t do it, someone else will. Genetics research and stem-cell technology offers promise of cures to horrible diseases. This research is good for the economy and can create thousands of jobs.

Right now Singapore has removed all of its stem-cell research laws and is building skyscrapers exculsively for the purpose of cellular research. Ready to see the biotech industry of the Bay Area peninsula dry up? Four more years of restricted federal assistance in this emerging technology should do the trick.

Why is Bush binding the success of capitalism? I thought the Republicans were the party of business?

We live in a global-free-agent marketplace - if you can’t provide people the capital and the location and resources to achieve their intellectual orgasm, they’re going to go somewhere else to do it. That’s the other side of globalization.

1. I cannot trust Bush to put non-ideologially biased justices in the Supreme Court I like Roe v. Wade. I believe that suicide should not be a crime (unless you’re idea of going out involves driving backwards down 101 during rush hour) and that you have the choice to decide what life you quicken. The government has no business in this.

2. Bush has bungled war in Iraq

We had no business being there at this time. Yes, we should fight dictators who put children in prison and dig mass graves. BUT if this were important, how come Bush didn’t intervene in Africa during the first months of his presidency? No, his piety and respect for human rights only came to surface after it was politically expedient for advancing his radical right-wing military agenda.

Further if you’re going to wage a war for liberation of humanity, you should be able to build more than a smattering of countries into a coalition. You should be able to build a grand army of humanist values.

The reason the public was told that we needed to go into Iraq was that there were WMDs and ties to al-Qaeda (maybe even 9/11). This was a sham cast upon a fearful public to advance tho goals of the neoconservatives. This equally shameful as wrong. We have found concrete proof of neither WMDs nor al-Qaeda.

But now that we’re in Iraq, have we managed the burden well? No. The management of the occupation is a debacle and we are losing lives and treasure in this quagmire.

For what? If you accept the neoconservative goal of “blowing up people we don’t like because no one can stop us” you don’t care about the fact that the reasoning was faulty and that the occupation is a mess. I don’t buy that argument and am disappointed and saddened that American sons are bleeding for….what? American daughters are becoming torturers in those faraway sands? How is this progress? We’re selling our American Republican souls for the icy chill of Imperialist frigidity.

How much more cruel shall we be when cruelty runs free for 4 more years?

1. The war in Iraq has hurt international relations The Bush administration’s arrogance has pissed off our Western European allies. In the coming age we need more cooperation, more information sharing and less bullying. Bush’s team, when left to their own devices, will bully people around to get their way. GHW Bush and Bill Clinton were masters at this. We need a statesman, a politician, not some yokel who can’t even define the word “sovreign” on the spot.

The coup de grace on this one? Abu Ghraib. Way to give the enemy the greatest tool for propaganda ever.

1. Bush administration officials have acted against the Bill of Rights Jose Padilla was stationed at Guantanamo as a muslim chaplain and was found guilty of passing messages for the enemy. Whatever else he is, Jose is a US Citizen. He has still not been charged. This is a violation of due process. US Citizens have a right to know what they are imprisoned for and access to legal counsel!

2. Bush is inflexible He will not change his position (mostly because he likes to beat up Kerry on this issue). He will not change his position even when new information dictates otherwise. This is the cornerstone of a bad leader. Why can he not admit that we are in a fiscal crisis in this country? Why is he fighting more wars and lowering taxes. Even Reagan knew when he needed to raise taxes to do it!

Would you tolerate this kind of inflexibility out of your boss after a dear friend had been laid off? Would you tolerate this kind of inflexibility in a teacher of your child?

1. The man can’t deliver a speech that doesn’t make me cringe If the stammering pauses in the middle of a sentence don’t kill you the rhetoric stuns me.

Andrew Sullivan has a much more even handed approach at the New Republic.

Update: Mice rightly pointed out that I did not give a reason to vote for Kerry, but rather listed deficiencies of Bush.

I will say this. Banks use past behaviour to predict future accountability, so shall I. Faced with this record as commander-in-chief, I do not believe that, in a secondary term, these unliked behaviors will cease.

In light of this being a two person race and that, by the aforementioned criteria I have eliminated one candidate, I must cast my support for the other.

Mice errs though to say my title is misleading. I am advocating a certain person for a job, not advocating for what reason a person should have a job.

Dvorak users like myself can celebrate a bit

[ LINK ]

Why’d you have to lipsync your SNL appearance?

And why didn’t your band ad-lib, start over?

You’ve been outed as a Milli-Vanilli.

The Train Wreck.

At the end she blamed the band. Classy. I guess that’s why they kept on playing instead of helping you.

Update: Worse yet, maybe they were afraid you’d start — “dancing” again?

I love pulp fiction art work: the grittier, cheaper, grimier, more lascivious the better.

Writers are grimy people. Yay for writers.

Here’s a collection of art

Surrealist photo comics:

A softer world

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Here’s a listing of some commonly used dirty rhetorical tricks — and a list of how to counter them!

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When I was young, my sister and I would occasionally make “EZ Cheesy Pretzels” - it was a recipie she had gotten in 1st grade (“following directions”) - on an idle summer afternoon.

Troublingly though, they are a righteous mess to clean up. So…get adult supervision if needed.

Bon Appetit!

EASY ?Che-e-e-sy? Pretzels

1 1/1 c flour
2/3 c milk
_ c shredded cheddar cheese (2 oz.)
2 T soft margarine
2 t baking powder
1 t sugar
1 t salt
1 egg
1 c flour for rolling
Wax paper
Non-stick spray

Directions:
1. Heat oven to 400.  Spray cookie sheet with spray.
2. Mix together flour, milk, cheese, margarine, baking powder, sugar, salt.
3. Smooth dough into ball and knead 10 times.
4. Make 1? balls, put flour onto hands and roll balls into ?snake? shape on wax paper.  Shape into ?e? and place on cookie sheet.
5. Beat egg and brush onto pretzels.
6. Bake at 400 for 10 minutes.
7. Remove from cookie sheets and cool on rack.

..You wear your Prisoner t-shirt to the gym and receive no less than 3 “Be Seeing You” salutes.