Half-Staff

According to U.S. Code, Title 36, Section 10

The flag shall be flown at half-staff
* thirty days from the death of the President or a former President;
* ten days from the death of the Vice President, the Chief Justice or a retired Chief Justice of the United States, or the Speaker of the House of Representatives;
* from the day of death until interment of
-- an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court
-- a Secretary of an executive or military department,
-- a former Vice President, or the Governor of a State, territory, or possession;
* on the day of death and the following day for a Member of Congress.

Those Missing Links

The White House says Saddam was linked to al-Qaeda because of their numerous contacts. The contacts consisted of Saddam refusing them every time they called. By that definition, how many millions of Americans today are linked to telemarketers?
-- Argus Hamilton

Miranda Rights

Los Angeles was the scene of yet another videotaped police beating of a black suspect in South Central. There were the usual explanations. The cops say they weren't really beating the suspect, they were reading him his rights in Morse Code.
-- Argus Hamilton

Bring Them On!

A year ago today George W. Bush uttered that infamous taunt: "Bring Them On!".

Well, the insurgents and terrorists took the challenge. Result: disaster. Our troops' casualties have quadrupled since them.

Foriegn policy by deceit, bullying, and bluster has been a miserable failure. Can you say "Miserable Failure"? (Notice what made the top of the list)

Grand Old Party Has Taken On A Whole New Meaning

Jack Ryan (Republican candidate from IL) is now disgraced because of his penchant for sex orgy clubs.

Rush Limbaugh (Republican mouthpiece) is a recovering drug addict.

Bill Bennett (Republican designated moralist) is a big-time gambling loser (can you even imagine blowing $8,000,000 on slot machines?)

Gingrich, Hyde, Barr, Livingston (Republican persecuters of Clinton) are adulterers.

Trent Lott (Republican senator) is a racist.

Any Republican worth his/her salt is homophobic (even those who, like Dick Cheney, are parents of gay children) and wants to use the Constitution to ensure that gays remain 2nd class citizens.

Dick Cheney (Republican vice-president) is going through some kind of melt-down after verbally attacking a reporter who challenged one of Cheney's lies and then using the F-word in public - directed at a U.S. Sentator.

George W. Bush, never known for his verbal skills, had the oddest mispronunciation of a word - followed by a look of complete confusion, followed by a total non-sequiter. I think he should have taken a breathalyzer right there on the spot.

And on it goes.

Vox Populi, Vox Dei (the voice of the people is the voice of God)

Crowd boos Cheney at the Yankees game
or
Yankee fans tell Cheney 'go f#$% yourself.'

During the 7th inning stretch at Yankees Stadium, they play God Bless America and show on the big screen pictures of anyone famous who's in the audience that night. Dick Cheney was there, and as soon as his face went up, the entire crowd started booing!

If Blue-collar Bronx is any indicator of what John Q. Public thinks - and Cheney gets booed - then it's not a good sign for the Bush-Cheney ticket. As soon as the camera guys realized Cheney was getting booed, they quickly switched the picture on the screen to someone else.

ESPN put it this way:

"Cheney, who visited both clubhouses after batting practice, watched part of the game from the box of Yankees owner George Steinbrenner and part from a first-row seat next to the Yankees dugout, where he sat between New York Gov. George Pataki and former New York City Mayor Rudolph Giuliani. Cheney was booed when he was shown on the right-field videoboard during the seventh-inning."

Vox Populi, Vox Dei

Be Careful What You Wish For....

Michael Moore is finding out the hard way.

He wanted huge audiences to see his film, hoping to stir up a groundswell of anti-Bush sentiment, thus helping vote the guy out of office.

It may backfire.

The theatres are selling so many tickets - and so much popcorn - that the economy is roaring, thus ensuring a Bush election.

As Homer Simpson would say.... Duh-oh!

Travis and The Self-Cleaning Turkey

OK, the turkey wasn't self-cleaning; the oven in which it was going to roast WAS self-cleaning. For those of you unfamiliar with self-cleaning ovens, here's a quick summary of the concept:
  1. To run the "self-clean" process, the operator somehow engages the self-clean settings on the oven. That procedure varies from one oven model to another.
  2. The oven heats to an extremely high temperature; if there are any baking splatters, grease, etc. stuck to the oven walls, said detritus is incinerated. It then turns to an easy-to-wipe-up/off char.
  3. The cycle is unstoppable and irreversible. Once started, it has to run through the whole cycle. To enforce this, the door locks - and I do mean "locks".

OK, on to Travis and the bird.

One year, Travis had friends over for Thanksgiving dinner. No doubt everything was just about perfect - table settings, side dishes, condiments, beverages, etc. That's how Travis is.... The turkey was in the oven, slow-roasting to perfection. Some of the guests were kvetching in the kitchen. One of the guests leaned against the wrong place on the range, and unintentionally engaged the self-clean cycle.

Predictably, the oven super-heated in an hour-long uninterruptible cycle. As you might guess, that was not going to do the bird any good.... Nor would it do Travis any good - he is not renowned for his ability to handle stress.

The tale does have a happy ending. One of the guests (more mechanically inclined than Travis) figured out how to remove the oven door, thus stopping the unstoppable process.

I guess you had to be there. I wish I had been.....

PS: NOW Travis can laugh about it...

Bush Misleads About Transfer Of Power In Iraq

Speaking at the NATO conference in Turkey yesterday, President Bush said, "15 months after the liberation of Iraq...the world witnessed the arrival of a free and sovereign Iraqi government." The reality, however, is much different.

The same day that U.S. administrator Paul Bremer officially ended the occupation, U.S. prosecutors refused to abide by an Iraqi judge's order acquitting Iraqi citizen Iyad Akmush Kanum of attempted murder of coalition troops. Instead, the prosecutors returned Kanum to the infamous Abu Ghraib prison, claiming that "they were not bound by Iraqi law."

In the days leading up to his departure, Bremer "issued a raft of edicts" in an effort to "exert U.S. control over the country after the transfer of political authority."

Specifically,
- Bremer empowered a seven-member appointed commission "to disqualify political parties and any of the candidates they support."
- Bremer also "appointed Iraqis handpicked by his aides to influential positions in the interim government" with multi-year terms to "promote his concepts of governance" after the handover.

Iraq remains plagued by violence and "the primary military responsibility for fighting the insurgency remains as much in American hands as it did yesterday." As a result, the New York Times concludes it is "ludicrous for administration officials to suggest that America's occupation of Iraq has now somehow ended."
Sources

W.W.J.D. ?

Even The Rightest Of The Right Think It Was A Bad Idea

"I would not have voted for [President Bush's] tax cut, based on what I know. . . . There is no doubt that the people at the top who need a tax break the least will get the most benefit.... Too often presidents do things that don't end up helping the people they should be helping, and their staffs won't tell them their actions stink on ice."

-- Former senator Jesse Helms (R-N.C.), in a recent interview with Business North Carolina magazine.

An Opportunity To Vent Your Frustrations

Take advantage of the opportunity to vent your frustrations regarding President Bush at SpankBush.com

Note: if you're at work, turn down the volume. You've been warned.

Restoring Dignity To Our Government

Illinois Republican U.S. Senate candidate Jack Ryan was accused by his wife of asking her to perform public sex acts. It had to happen. After hearing for two weeks about Reagan Democrats, it's about time we heard from the Clinton Republicans.
-- Argus Hamilton