By His Own Words

Dubya, in the big apple today, talking economy. He says we’re doing well as a country. Stronger than it’s ever been, and you can thank him and his administration for it.

Talking with business leaders on Wall Street today, Bush said the salaries of CEOs should be linked to performance. He told the leaders that Americans are sickened and resentful of the massive compensation that CEOs have been pulling in for the past several years without demonstrating that they deserve all that money.

Okay, let’s take fearless leader’s words and apply them to him. Does he deserve his paycheck based on his performance of the past six years?

We already know how he’s screwed up both foreign and domestic policy, the court system, and health care. What about this strong robust economy that he is bragging about.

Since Dubya took office, the federal deficit has sunk into the trillions of dollars from the surplus that Clinton presided over.

Since Dubya took office, one in five manufacturing jobs has disappeared...that’s 2.96 million jobs lost.

Since Dubya took office, the trade deficit is expected to hit a record mark for the fifth consecutive time when it is announced next month.

Since Dubya took office, gas prices have climbed through the roof, despite falling prices per barrel of oil.

Since Dubya took office, household incomes have stagnated, while the richest 1-percent have gotten richer.

Since Dubya took office, the number of the people living in poverty has increased dramatically.

Since Dubya took office, interest rates, while stable for the past couple of months, have risen to uncomfortable levels.

So, should he continue to get his paycheck based on his performance in the White House?
Hell No!

ITMFA, please!

Halfakin American!?.....”Yo Mama!”

I don’t usually waste time listening to the would-be commentators of the far, far right who pass off their racism under the guise of Christian conservatism or pseudo-political punditry. I would rather watch grass grow than spend time reacting to these walking wastes of oxygen.

But once in a while, one of these bottom feeders rises from the muck and says something that pushes my buttons releasing my inner Laqitta Shaquitta Jefferson, making me want to go ghetto on their behind.

Rush Limbaugh has taken to referring to Barack Obama as a Halfakin American, apparently in reference to his white mother and black father. Limbaugh apparently can’t find anything of substance with which to attack Obama at this time so early in his run for the White House, so he resorts to veiled racism, playing to the race mixing fears of his listening audience.

Halfakin, indeed!

Say what you really mean Limbaugh. Use the word you really, really want to use. No need to hide. We already know what you are.

Halfakin, indeed!

Everybody in America is half something. The only racially pure people in America are the ones who recently swam the Rio Grande or hopped off an airplane from somewhere else. We are a nation of half-somethings....ALL OF US! It’s what makes us Americans.

Halfakin, indeed!

Truth be told, Rush and Obama are probably cousins twice removed. Or, Rush, can you prove your granddaddy didn’t go into the slave quarters for some midnight chocolate delight. It’s one of those open American secrets that next to being sandwiched by lesbians, the second most popular fantasy of white guys Rush’s age is having sex with a black woman.

Prior to the repeal of laws banning miscegenation, white guys were very busy making Halfakins, some of which were light enough to pass into the mighty Caucasian race. So, Rush, do you know where your ancestors have been?

Hell, who’s yo daddy.....what is yo mama s’posed to be, eh? She passin’? You passin’?

Halfakin American, indeed!

Here’s an idea...take your hillbilly heroin addicted, viagra poppin’, bloated ass back to the bottom of the barrel. Better yet, let’s strap your big butt onto the next unmanned NASA rocket headed to the sun and thereby do something to improve the air quality on earth for the rest of us.

Halfakin, indeed!

Dick’s Other Daughter, Liz

Well, at least this one talks. Liz Cheney, who works at the state department and is Mary’s older sister penned an Op-Ed piece in today’s Washington Post, that reads like Daddy dearest wrote the script.

It was an attack on Hillary Clinton and the rest of the big bad politicians who are daring to go against Darth and Dubya on the Iraq question. Nothing new put forth, just more partisan neocon attacks, albeit from a baby neocon.

What gets my goat is that instead of attacking Hillary directly, as they would any front running male candidate, the head neocon in charge rolls out one of his mute and spineless female offspring. That’s like trying to turn the pillow dwelling, rhinestone collared, miniature shih tsu into an attack dog, to ward off the pit bull confronting you on the sidewalk.

Give me a break. The least they could have done was to send a woman to do the job. Where’s Lynn Cheney? Where’s Libby Dole? Don’t they know how to cat fight?

Isn’t that what all straight guys want anyway, two women duking it out for male pleasure? Isn't that the real desire powering the Condi-Hillary dream race talk?

Despite what you may think of Hillary, she is a real candidate with real money, who has a real possibility of taking the nomination and the White House. Don’t insult her with baby neocons. Send in the heavyweights. She can handle it. Apparently, nothing scares a man more then when the woman behind, steps out front to deal with the situation.

C’mon Darth, you can do better than this. Where’s Scooter? Oh, I forgot. He’s on trial for obstruction. What about the brain? Is he still at the White House? How about the Minister of misinformation, Tony Snow? He’s probably snowed under trying to spin Dubya, these days.

Well, let me see...who can talk for this administration?

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm..............maybe the babies are the only ones left.

President Hillary

She’s not the first woman to make a run for the White House, but she is the first woman who actually has a chance. She is considered the democratic front runner for the nomination and has a real war chest with which to make the run. She is a very real and viable candidate.

I should be happy that she announced today, but I’m conflicted. I want a woman president. This country needs a woman president. The USA needs a feminine touch to dilute the overwhelming testosterone agenda that has been pushed, well since the formation of this republic and has been seeping like a garbage spill from the White House for the past six years.

But Hillary? I have a problem with giving her my support solely based on her gender.

I don’t support candidates simply because they are black. I don’t support candidates simply because they are gay or lesbian. I don’t support one issue candidates, no matter how strongly I feel about that one issue.

Hillary Clinton is extremely intelligent. She is a United States Senator. She is a former first lady and has lived in the White House. She’s married to Bill. I like Bill. I would love to see him as first husband.

So what’s wrong? Well, she feels like a professional politician to me and I just don’t trust professional politicians. By that I mean, the ones who will say anything to get elected. The ones who pander to all racial groups or hot topic grassroots groups while standing in front of them, but then take the money, only to disappear on the important issues when the vote comes up.

That’s just crazy. I said previously that I like Bill and he is the consummate politician. Bill Clinton can sell snowballs to Eskimos, as the saying goes. Yet I trust him to ultimately do the right thing. His loyalty to the people of this country has never been in question. It just hides behind his libido sometimes.

But Hillary? She never stood up to Bush in the past six years. She voted for the war on Iraq, a vote which she has yet to repudiate. She went along like a good little professional politician, more interested in protecting her job than leading her people.

She courts the LGBT vote, but has yet to really do anything to derail the blatant discrimination against gays and lesbians coming out of Washington.

She courts blacks, but I don’t see it reflected in her stance on anything in particular.

I’m curious about where she is on immigration or legalizing illegals. Does she have an illegal maid in the closet like Bush did? Don’t know.

She is the junior Senator from New York. Yet, I haven’t heard her say anything about the Sean Bell execution by New York City cops, this past December.

I want to support her. I need to support her. But I want some answers first.

I want to get rid of this hollow feeling inside that if I support her and she does get elected, that it won’t be more of the same.

I want the fun back in the White House. I want a return to glamour and an end to cowboy chic and school marm logic. I want the fanatics to go back to church and ask God for forgiveness for what they’ve done to this country. I want the Neocons to apologize. I want my civil rights back. I want to feel protected by the Constitution, the Justice Department, the FBI and CIA. I want New Orleans rebuilt. I want the guts put back into FEMA.

I want Homeland Security to do its job and not be the dumping ground that it is for stupid, sycophantic, political hacks who must be appointed to something because they can’t get elected.

I want to fight the war on terror for real, not the vendetta called war that is now civil war in Iraq.

I want the sunset clause removed from the 1965 voting rights act. I want “don’t ask, don’t tell” repealed.

I want our schools to go back to educating the young rather than teaching them how to take tests.

There is so much to be done. There is also another saying in this country, “if you want the job done right, send in a woman to get it done.”

I just hope Hillary is up to the task.

It’s the End of the World, As We Know It

Well, for the first time since 2002, the Doomsday Clock has been adjusted. The minute hand has been moved to five minutes to midnight and that is not a good thing.

The Doomsday Clock was created by the scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project in 1945. It was unveiled to the world in 1947, after America bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki to end World War II. The scientists of the Manhattan Project invented the bomb, in case you missed that day in history class. They decided a simple clock would be the best way to make people understand the gravity of nuclear power. Midnight on the doomsday clock symbolizes the end of the world. The closer we get to midnight reflects just how close we are to blowing ourselves up.

The BAS, which stands for The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, says the move reflects the perilous times in which we are currently living. They say we stand on the brink of a second nuclear age.

According to the announcement from the BAS. You can read it here.

Life, as we know it is threatened by 27,000 nuclear bombs, with 2000 of them capable of being armed within minutes. Couple this with world climate change, which directly affects human habitation and you have a very good recipe for annihilation.

The doomsday announcement doesn’t surprise me, considering the number of crazy men who now have access to “the button.”

Take that fool in Korea, the minuscule idiot in Iran, toss in the nut who runs America along with the crazies in India, Pakistan, Israel and probably every other black market arms dealer from Russia or in Africa, and you have a world gone mad, possibly all the way to oblivion.

Even Japan is thinking of changing its enforced pacifist world stance. The Japanese government is currently debating whether to re-arm itself in these trying times. Japan, you will recall from your history lessons, was forced into pacifism by the USA after losing World War II. The pacifism was actually written into their constitution. Those clauses must be removed before Japan can jump into the nuclear race and buy itself a bomb.

World watchers think Japan wants to re-arm because of the 800 pound gorilla named China that sits on its doorstep. China, with it’s massive globe-killing population, its blossoming economy and its penchant for killing girl babies, which is leading to a testosterone fueled, overwhelmingly aggressive, totally masculine future, will be the next superpower to dominate the world stage. As anybody who watches chop-socky martial arts movies knows, there is no love lost between China and Japan.

Since its creation, the doomsday clock has only been adjusted 17 times, the last time, as I said, back in 2002, following 9/11.

The BAS does offer solutions to the problem. It asks that the United States and Russia take a step back from launch readiness and completely remove nuclear weapons from day to day military operations.

The BAS also wants 20,000 nukes dismantled and destroyed over the next ten years, and to find a better and safer way to store the dangerous material.

The scientists are also asking that all production of nuke materials be stopped, for both military and civilian use.

And finally, the BAS is asking that the world leaders start talking to one another again, rather than using military tactics to make a point.

Ya listening, George?

I should insert some kind of joke at this point to downplay the seriousness of which I write, but I don’t have one.

The end of the world isn’t funny. It’s just the end, senseless and preventable.

Failure to Communicate

An Open Letter to the President

Dear Mr. President,

I listened intently to your speech last night, waiting patiently for clarity, and some indication that you finally understand what you’ve done by sending American troops into Iraq. I waited and waited for you to reveal the logic behind your actions. I waited to see you return to the realm of sound thinking about the way we, as a country, deal with the rest of the world.

Instead, with mind firmly planted in the old west, you handed us more platitudes, lies and denials fueled by the religious fervor of your arrogance. The smugness with which you have tried to sell this travesty to the American people is still very much in evidence.

You just don’t get it. You still refuse to face the reality of your actions. You are going ahead with sending more troops into danger, despite the recommendations of your generals, whom you’ve now replaced with puppets. You have turned your back on the Baker-Hamilton commission and their recommendations for getting us out of this trouble. You have steadfastly refused the counsel of the United States Congress, circumventing them and bypassing the Constitution at every given opportunity.

Sir, you were elected President, not Emperor of the United States. The last King George lost, and you will too. The difference is that he didn’t take us down with him, but you might accomplish the destruction of America, if you continue down this perverse path. History will not treat you well. Your legacy is in shambles.

You say that you are fighting the war on terror, keeping it away from American shores. I understand the move into Afghanistan. I understand going after Osama Bin Laden. It makes sense to go after the people who have tried to harm us. I even understand the recent retaliation bombings in Somalia, albeit late in coming.

But your move to Iraq and your wrong headed decision to stay there boggles the brain. What are you thinking?

There was no Al Quaida in Iraq before you invaded. Now the whole country has been turned into a terrorist practice ground ready for export to the rest of the world.

There were no weapons of mass destruction.

The man who tried to kill your Dad has been hanged.

Your policy of forcing democracy with the business end of a gun has not worked.

You haven’t tried diplomacy and you should. It served your father well. Maybe you should ask Dad for some help.

The new Iraqi government is a sham. Your puppet, Maliki, is a joke and unable or unwilling to confront the Shia death squads that are dominating the streets of Baghdad.

You asked for more money, a billion dollars more, to rebuild and restructure Iraq. This after you’ve already poured billions into the country and your cronies' coffers for the past four years to do this very thing.

Yet, the people still don’t have the necessary comforts of safety, electricity, and water.

You want to rebuild a country when you can’t even rebuild Louisiana and Mississippi after Katrina.

I guess what scares me most are your blatant threats against Iran and Syria. Threats such as the ones you issued should only be made from a position of power. We have none. Our dog in this fight is the little one in the corner, not the pit bull with the big teeth.

You have taken us from being the one true superpower to a shadow of our former competence.

We don’t have the troops to open another front in your war on the middle east. Some of your generals have recently asked for repeal of "don't ask, don't tell," thereby bolstering military numbers and enlistments, while providing more cannon fodder for your fatal dream of a democratic middle east.

Your mea culpa comes four years and 3000-plus lives too late. How many more are going to die for your ego and your perceived legacy?

You have ruined this country financially for years to come. We are a debtor nation in debt to China which is slowly buying us one highway at a time.

My fervent hope is that Congress will finally stand up to you by refusing to support this death march that you call a surge.

Saner heads are needed now. You, Mr. President, and your invisible vice president, need to step aside and let more rational people take over, before you take us from civil war in Iraq to global World War III. A war that I fear, given the current climate, we may not win.


With sadness and little respect,

Jo Anne Moore

You’ve Had Worse Things in Your Mouth

I’ll admit, right off the bat, that I’ve run across some pretty disgusting food in my travels. Some of it has even ended up in my mouth, since I will usually try anything once, as long as it doesn’t appear to be poisonous and I’m allowed to spit it out, if I don’t like the taste.

However, I do draw the line at things that have been consumed by others, both animal and/or human first.

I recently came across something called Kopi Luwak, which roughly translates to “cat coffee.” Cat coffee, I’m told, is a much sought-after coffee served in the far eastern lands of Indonesia and Vietnam. It is made from coffee beans that are gathered from the “cat sh**” of a weasel like animal known as the palm civet. Its closest north American cousin is the skunk, I’m told.

This coffee has apparently been around for hundreds of years, with most people who’ve heard of it, thinking it was an urban legend. Well, I’m here to tell you Kopi Luwak is real and has made its way to America and is being sold at select coffee houses around the country. But I don’t think you can buy it at Starbucks, just yet.

It is being sold for about 10-dollars a cup, which to my mind is outrageous. But then I think Starbucks prices are outrageous.

I’m not a coffee drinker and never have been. Other than a sip of my sister’s vanilla bean frappachino, a couple of years ago, I’ve never had Starbucks coffee.

Back to Kopi Luwak. In some circles, it is actually called monkey coffee, but except for hanging in coffee trees, the cat has no resemblance to a monkey.

The cat loves to eat ripe coffee cherries and while digesting the fruit, it poops out the allegedly untouched coffee bean. Harvesters then walk around picking up coffee beans off the ground. After the s*** is cleaned off, the beans are shipped out to coffee houses to be brewed and consumed by the discerning coffee lover.

The washing, I’m told also helps lower the bacteria content making consumption safe, even though in China, civets have been linked to the SARS outbreak. The Chinese used to eat civet steaks until the SARS disease began killing people. Sale of civet meat has now been banned.

Some who have had the coffee say it has a strong aroma, why am I not surprised. They also say it tastes good, coffee-like but a little musty.

Thank you, but please don’t pass the coffee, somehow I can’t imagine it being good to the last drop.

Bipartisanship? When Pigs Fly!

One day before the historic 110th Congress is sworn in, Dubya is published in the Wall Street Journal calling for Congress to work with him for the benefit of the American people.

This administration has fed us nothing but arrogance and partisan politics for the past six years, and now that the GOP no longer controls the Hill, it suddenly wants to work together?

Well, let’s all build a campfire and sing “cum by yah,” why don’t we? Pass me that jug of moonshine, hey partner.

The big message from the American people, last November, was to do something about the war in Iraq. Most people now think it was wrong to go there in the first place. But is this president paying attention?

No! He reportedly is going to give a speech next week, calling for more troops in a “surge and accelerate” action. He has decided to do this, despite what the Baker-Hamilton Commission recommended, despite what his generals are telling him, despite public opinion, despite losing a midterm election and control of congress.

To whom is he listening? Was he on that party line to god with Pat “there will be a mass killing in America” Robertson?

Mr. President, the voices inside your head are still cracked out. You don’t regain brain cells once you’ve burned them out with alcohol and cocaine. Maybe a stem cell transplant would help. But then you did veto the funding. So never mind.

Bipartisan...no, we don’t need bipartisanship if it means continuing the course set forth by this administration. Dubya has made it clear that the only trail he follows is the one he blazes. His idea of cooperation is for the democrats to jump behind him and blindly follow him off the cliff.

What the democrats need to do is to grow balls, plain and simple. Congress needs to remember that it represents the people’s interests, not their own individual wants and desires.

Realistically, we can’t pull the plug on funding in Iraq. That is an even bigger death sentence for our troops already there in harm’s way. Besides, if memory serves me correctly, Dubya already has many, many billions of dollars to play within the already approved defense budget. So he really doesn’t need congress right now on anything military.

What congress can do, though, is to challenge any new money subsidies, challenge those no bid contracts for Haliburton as well as other companies favored by the GOP. They can challenge this new plan to send thousands more of our young into that quagmire.

If Dubya is so set on sending more troops, call the twins back from South America and give them some guns. Arm that half Hispanic nephew and send him to the front lines. Tell Cheney to swap out Mary’s hunting rifle for an AK-47 and put her in a humvee outside Baghdad. Oh wait. She’s pregnant. Ok, then, what about her wife, the former forest ranger? She’s a kept woman now, isn’t she? Send her to defend her growing family.

This war is not being fought by the folks who started it. There is no shared responsibility for it. The middle class and poor kids are again the cannon fodder for rich men seeking more money to fill their already overflowing private coffers.

Sending more troops is not the answer. Iraq is in civil war between Shiite and Sunni. We precipitated it and now the time has come for us to admit our error and figure out a graceful, if not face saving way to get out.

That is why the American people put the democrats in control.

Playing bipartisan games....No!

Recovering our national sanity, our national integrity, our international standing, and our ethics.....Yes!

The Godfather, The President and The Dictator

Old folks, or those older than me, have always said that deaths come in threes. Well, we got quite a triumvirate this past Christmas weekend.

On the first day of 2007, as we mark the loss of 3000 troops dead, and 22,000 wounded in this illegal war in Iraq, we also lost James Brown, and former President Gerald Ford.

The third member of the big three went quietly but not willingly. He was ushered out kicking and screaming. That would be Saddam Hussein, who was hanged for crimes against his people. He was buried Sunday, in the town of his birth.

Brown, not that you’d know it, had a connection to the City of Cincinnati. He began his recording career at King Records, which was based right here in the Queen City. King Records is long forgotten. The only evidence are the many still existing vinyl records in my collection and the collections of others, bearing the King label.

My favorite album, was Brown’s “Live” at the Apollo, recorded October 24th, 1962, but pressed right here in Cincinnati. I was twelve and would put on that album and dream of being old enough to be in the audience when performers like Brown took to the stage.

I’m surprised it’s still in such good shape, because I literally wore the grooves out playing it over and over.

I think it would help the city resurrect its image by remembering what Brown and King Records in particular, meant to the music industry and to Cincinnati. How about a street named after Brown. How about a King boulevard or Avenue in the neighborhood where the record company used to do business?

I’ve already talked about Mr. Ford (The Accidental President). I liked him. He was one of the good guys. We now know that he was against going to war in Iraq, and that he was not too fond of how his former proteges Rumsfeld and Cheney were handling our military. That news comes after his death because he was too much of a gentleman to slam a sitting president.

We’ve also learned Ford favored, and quietly worked for affirmative action, LGBT rights, as well as women’s rights. I wish he had spoken up. Maybe the republican party, while still leaning right, might not have stepped off into the deep end of fundamentalist conservatism in which it is now mired.

Both James Brown and Gerald Ford leave huge holes in the cosmic fabric that surrounds us, as did Saddam Hussein.

He was a bad man, a killer, a despot, a dictator. I guess he deserved to be hanged. But while he was alive, there was no al Quaeda in Iraq. There was no terrorist machine turning out angry young men and women dedicated to killing Americans. There was no practice field for would-be terrorists to get good at killing innocents while perfecting their homemade bombs.There was no threat to the USA from Iraq. He served his purpose. America did not suffer while he was alive.

Those of us left behind by the passing of these three, must now pay the price of their loss.