Lovely parting gifts...

Despite the flurry of press coverage lauding the Bush administration's "unprecedented cooperation" with the Obama transition team, the outgoing administration is quietly passing dozens of deeply offensive and highly partisan rules, corporate giveaways, presidential directives dismantling environmental protections and other pet right wing projects. (Over ninety of them at last count.)

The medical "right to refuse" rule just passed is an example of these, designed to:

"...protect the right of medical providers to care for their patients in accord with their conscience," said outgoing Health and Human Services Secretary Mike Leavitt.

Is that an Orwellian bit of doublespeak or what?

This means that a Emergency room nurse opposed to birth control can refuse emergency contraception to a rape victim, or even to inform the patient that such a thing exists. Receptionists can refuse to make appointments for patients whose medical choices they disagree with. Doctors could legally withhold information about birth defects in a fetus if they felt it might increase the chances the mother would elect to have an abortion.

This "right" to deprive people of their legal health care choices based on religious objection is an appalling "parting gift" to the evangelicals, and a slap in the face to the electorate who overwhelmingly rejected the Bush administration's policies. As usual with this deeply mendacious administration, the public face hides a sinister and narrowly defined agenda.

Having your cake and eating it too... A note on voiding California Proposition 8

The supporters of Proposition 8 in California keep wailing plaintively that the thousands of people in California whose marriages were recently declared invalid should "accept the will of the people."

"Opponents of same-sex marriage have urged protesters to accept the will of voters." - NY Times

Hmmm....

Aren't these the same people who have spent the last 35 years trying to overturn Roe v. Wade, which is the will of the vast majority of the American people who want to keep abortion safe and legal? How many times have they argued that their "moral imperative" overrules the "mistakes" of the courts and legislatures? It seems they'd like to have their cake and eat it too.

Most excellent spam - because all the best law firms use hotmail...

Recently received spam -

I especially like the part about how the beneficent Jürgen Krügger was a "very dedicated Christian who loved to put out." Hmmm...

Plus, I'm pretty sure all the best law firms use Hotmail...
- Will

Barristers' Chambers:
JERRY MORGAN & ASSOCIATES
E-mail: bjmesq4@hotmail.co.uk
Address:33 Bedford Row
London WC1R 4JH, England
PARTNER MANAGING
JERRY MORGAN & ASSOCIATES
LONDON - UK.

Attention

On behalf of the Trustees and Executor of the estate of Late
Engr.Jürgen Krügger. I once again try to notify you as my earlier
letter was returned undelivered. I hereby attempt to reach you again
by this same email address on the WILL. I wish to notify you that
late Engr. Jürgen Krügger made you a beneficiary to his WILL. He left
the sum of Thirty Million, One Hundred Thousand Dollars (USD$30,
100.000.00) to you in the Codicil and last testament to his WILL.
This may sound strange and unbelievable to you, but it is real and
true. Being a widely traveled man, he must have been in contact with
you in the past or simply you were nominated to him by one of his
numerous friends abroad who wished you good. Engr. Jürgen Krügger
until his death was a member of the Helicopter Society and the
Institute of Electronic & Electrical Engineers. He was a very
dedicated Christian who loved to put out. His great philanthropy
earned him numerous awards during his life time. Late Engr. Jürgen
Krügger died on the 13th day of December,
2004 at the age of 80 years, and his WILL is now ready for
execution.According to him this money is to support your humanitarian
activities and to help the poor and the needy in our society. Please
if I reach you as I am hopeful, endeavor to get back to me as soon as
possible to enable me conclude my job. I hope to hear from you in no
distant time.

Contact me upon the receipt of this mail: bjmesq4@hotmail.com

I await your prompt response.

Yours in Service,
BARRISTER JERRY MORGAN ESQ.
PRINCIPAL PARTNERS: Barrister Aidan Walsh.Esq Markus Wolfgang, Mr.
John Marvey Esq, Mr. Jerry Smith Esq.

The 'Ol Soft Shoe...

In a new height for media cluelessness, when reporting on the Muntadhar al-Zeidi - George Bush shoe throwing incident in Iraq this week, a CNN anchor said: "We're still trying to get to the bottom of why someone would do this." Hmmm.... Let's see -

Could it have someting to do with the Bush regime's cherrypicking the intelligence to promote a totally unnecessary and massively destructive invasion and occupation of Iraq? Thousands of civilians dead? The country in ruins? The brutal civil war the invasion unleashed?

Perhaps we should look to what Muntadhar al-Zeidi said as he tossed the shoes?

"This is a farewell kiss, you dog," al-Zeidi yelled in Arabic as he threw his shoes. "This is from the widows, the orphans and those who were killed in Iraq."

Why indeed?

Can you be more specific, please?

Hmmmm...

Can you be more specific, please?

- Will

Prop 8

On the passage of prop 8 I am reminded of the words of Thomas Jefferson: 

"Error of opinion may be tolerated where reason is left free to combat it" 

John and Cyndy McCain

Did you notice the weird moment in the Cyndy McCain bio-pic shown at the RNC, describing John and Cyndy's first meeting?

The film said: "Cyndy, who was 24 told John she was 28. John, who was 41 told Cyndy he was 37."

They both lied about their age - isn't that just darling?

Presumably the RNC was trying to finesse the 17 year age difference between them. (A difference that isn't at all creepy at 71 and 54, but could be perceived as a tad creepy at 41 and 24.)

What I found illuminating about this was something totally different. The not so subtle subtext is: "I'm willing to lie to get what I want."

That's pretty revealing when you look at how many of his principled positions John McCain has tossed out in his pursuit of the Republican nomination. Watching him jettison one ofter another position to appeal to the radical right has been a nauseating exercise in politics as usual.

Straight Talk?
I'm not so sure.

Does this look like a tax increase?

Don't belive McCain's scaremongering about Obama. McCain's Tax plan offers a much LOWER tax cut for 79 percent of Americans than Obama's according to the Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center. Read about it in the LA Times.

Which begs the question - we are in the midst of the most expensive war in world history, financed entirely on our children's credit cards. Despite Republican orthodoxy, what possible justification for a tax CUT can be made under these conditions? *

Why is is that the only thing the "cut tax and spend" Republican party has asked us to do to support this illegal war is to go shopping?

Hmmm...

* Yes, I know that tax cuts do spur the economy, but so does a balanced budget, just look at Bill Clinton's presidency, which created the largest peacetime expansion of the economy in US history.

Life without Plastic?

I just read this piece from a BBC reporter who is trying to live without plastic in any form for a month. My first thought is that it will be very, very difficult to do.

Nearly everything these days comes packaged in plastic.

Reading the comments on the article it strikes me how limiting the left vs right view of the environmental issues we face really is.

Painting this issue as a left - right dichotomy misses the point, since we're all going to end up buried under the plastic waste.

How strange is it that conservatives in the US have such a rabid reaction to the idea of conservation. Isn't the concept of conservation central to their worldview?

I do understand the knee-jerk reaction. I am an environmentally minded lefty, yet on a nearly daily basis am repulsed by the smugness and holier than thou behavior I see on the left around environmental issues. If I want to smack us is it any wonder the conservatives do too?

If we could let go of that a bit maybe we'd be able make real progress. This attempt to retool the stranglehold of left / right dichotomy is part of what makes Barrack Obama so interesting to me.

a "Stain on the Department of Justice"

The unfolding department Justice scandal sheds light on an ongoing pattern of placing ideological "purity" over qualifications for job hiring.

Bush appointees illegally interviewed prospective employees for the justice department to determine their beliefs on unrelated matters like abortion, gay rights and other "hot button" topics.

This pattern of "stacking the deck" with ideologues is a stated part of Karl Rove's blueprint for a "permanent Republican majority".

It's not just happening in the DOJ either. This month a gay community based non-profit I work with was initially denied IRS 501(c)3 status when an employee at the IRS wrote to us saying "though we wish to apply the law equally, why should the IRS recognize an organization that espouses immoral and possibly illegal behavior?" (we do safer-sex education) This has nothing to do with the agent's responsibility to vet weather we meet the qualifications, and everything to do with enforcing a right wing Christian worldview on the country.

Similarly - the Bush administration has stacked the immigration department with unqualified Regent law school* political hacks with little or no immigration law experience. Do you suppose that this has anything do do with the face that my sister in law, who is Taiwanese, has been waiting nearly four years for her green card?

As is standard administration practice, this is being passed off as mistakes by "senior aides", while the higher up's (Gonzalez et al.) refuse to testify; citing either "executive privilege" or first amendment rights against self incrimination.
____________________________
*Regent is Pat Robertson's law school - and a favorite source for unqualified political appointees of the Bush administration. Regent's stated mission is to bring Christian teachings to bear with the force of law in this country. For many years the graduates of this school couldn't pass the bar, presumably because they spent so much time studying the legal ramifications on parking regulations of Jesus' riding dinosaurs into Jerusalem on Palm Sunday.

Tall ships to make a comeback for freight?

How cool is this? A 108 year old British schooner, the Kathleen & May, docked in Penzance (cue singing pirates) with a cargo of French wine. The commentators are all very quick to point out that it travels at half the rate of a modern freighter, but the bonus is simple - zero carbon output!

It is fascinating to me how many of the solutions to our carbon problem will be found in the re-invention of 19 century technologies. Sail & Rail represent a huge environmental opportunity, particularly given potential increased efficiency due to computer control.

It could also help to promote an economy that favors local consumption, as slower shipping times will increase costs for goods from far away. (This is logical, and in the long run will be good for the planet as well as local economies.)

Batman Dog

No particular reason, just a cute dog sitting in a Batman chair at the Wellfleet flea market.

- Will

A Funny thing about New Englanders...

As a lot, New Englanders are known for their pragmatic skepticism and thrift.  I notice this a lot when I return here from California, the land of wanton excess in all things, particularly in excess.

The local bird-watching shop (The Birdwatcher’s General Store, in Orleans Massachusetts) carries bulk bird seed in big barrels.   You scoop and fill your own container with the seed. 

They have two bins for thistle seed, one marked “Fancy” and one marked “Plain”, and both cost exactly the same per pound.  There is a sign calling attention to the fact that they cost the same, and are in fact identical, but for the name. 

It’s a funny thing about New Englanders;  the “plain” bin is always half empty - and the “fancy” one virtually untouched. 

Ayeh... 

Ahhhh Provincetown

Just got into Provincetown for a week.   This is the harbor as seen from the porch on the room I'm renting.    Ahhhhh.... 

- Will

Right Wing Distortion of the Week

In response to Barrack Obama's recent off the cuff comment that - 

"“...it’s embarrassing when Europeans come over here, they all speak English, they speak French, they speak German. And then we go over to Europe and all we can say is ‘merci beaucoup!’” 

The right wingers went bonkers.  As is so often the case,  the nativist "English only" argument is a cover for ugly xenophobia and racism. Writing in the "Dakota Voice", a particularly cosmopolitan media oulet, Anton Kaiser (I'm not kidding!) distorts this - alleging Obama said - "We are now told that every American child should learn to speak Spanish."    Huh?   When did he say that?  *

The science is in on this - learning languages improves brain function, employability,  cognition and widens our understanding of the world around us.  This is a bad thing?  

It is embarrassing.  I am always secretly a little pleased when someone assumes that as an American I only speak English.  When I've been overseas and respond in Spanish, French or Italian they always have a double take moment when the ask if I am really American.

(In the sprit of full disclosure - I should say my French doesn't go much beyond Merci Boucoup...")

Hmmm... 

"are you really 'merican?" 

a bit like Anton  Kaiser... 

*  I notice that whenever someone says "we are now told"  this seem to be a cue that what follows is a gross distortion.  From a neuro-lingustic perspective "we are now told" implies reactivity. (I am acted upon, and thus must react aggressively.)  Along with the infamous "some say" It seem to be a favorite phrase on Fox news as a way to attribute things people never said to them. 

Moved to the Dark Side.

Just lettin' everyone know I've gone over to the dark side and bought a Mac.

My first observation is it's only intuitive if you've never, ever used any other kind of computer.

Actually, the very first was that it's gorgeous.

Hard to get used to - mousing with no right click feels like I'm computing wearing mittens.

Bailout of Bear Sterns by JP Morgan Chase - backed by the fed. (That's you and me!)

I think what is prominently missing from the media discussions of the economic meltdown is how much of the current financial crises is a direct result of the ideological darling of the right - deregulation of financial industries.

Remember back when banks and investment firms were prudently regulated? These sort of economic meltdowns didn't happen every nine months.

Enron, the California energy crisis, the sub-prime mortgage meltdown, all of these are the direct result of the Republican's shredding of "burdensome" regulation in the last three decades.

Cheshire Cats - David is Fine!

Whew - the procedure went very smoothly and David is fine. It's amazing how something like this makes you reevaluate life.

We sat in the recovery room grinning like Cheshire Cats. It's an oddly beautiful thing to say all those things you know you'll regret if you leave them unspoken, and then have the urgency of loss removed so suddenly.

For the most part, I live pretty comfortably with death. I've lost a lot of friends and family, some very suddenly. Though I grieve those losses deeply, I accept them as a part of life.

All that said - I am very glad "we have some more time" as David put it.

Waiting Room - Cedars Sinai

I'm sitting in the cardiac catheter lab waiting area. They are doing an angioplasty on my friend David. Due to the variety of health issues he has, the Docs have termed this "very risky." They transferred him here from another hospital, as they didn't even want to try the procedure there.

It's been a weird few days. I am struck by how extremely differently folks react to medical situations.... Some with acceptance, others with horror or avoidance.

My favorite was when David asked our most death phobic friend to witness his advance directive /do not recusitate order. Such a kidder, that David!

Roxio Software wins the Golden Cheeseball!

Ok, so it's Roxio, they of the pre-installed, resource hogging, system crashing bloatware.

I have never had a piece of software made by these people that actually worked - or even ran without crashing my system. So why does it come pre-installed on nearly every windows computer in the world?

The most recent Roxio sponsored fiasco came using their "image transfer wizard". I had just gotten back from a trip to Mexico using a friend's borrowed digital camera. I plugged the sucker into my laptop and Roxio's "wizard" popped up, offering to transfer the files for me. I thought - "OK, I'll give it a whirl." One of the options was "delete files from source when done moving" Sounds good - since I'm giving the camera back - I'm sure he'd like to get this card back clean.

The "wizard" began it's work and I noticed it was naming all the files - "ImportedPicture0001.jpg" etc. Let's stop this process and change that to something more descriptive like PuertoVallarta0001.jpg I clicked cancel - and it stopped the import, but it STILL DELETED ALL THE PHOTOS - without moving them!

Wizardly indeed! Roxio's Image Transfer wizard succeeded in erasing 900 megs of my vacation photos in a twinkling of an eye. Not moved to the recycle bin, not in the tmp directory - just GONE! Thanks Roxio!

Who designed this piece of crap?

Not a mention of the problem on Roxio's "support" website.

The good news is that I was able to recover them using ZAR (Zero Assumption Recovery) Software.

I think it is interesting that computer magazine editors and reporters routinely rate Roxio products as "excellent" while in nearly every forum related to Roxio software the users consistently rate the products from "poor" - to "mediocre" to "appallingly bad".

Must be taking a lot of reporters out to lunch, huh?

Shameless Republican Race Baiting.

Once again the Republicans stoop to race baiting to try to maintain an electoral edge in the South.

Facing questions on displays of the Confederate flag, Huckabee called it a matter of states' rights. "You don't like people from outside the state coming in and telling you what to do with your flag," the former Arkansas governor said in Myrtle Beach. "In fact, if somebody came to Arkansas and told us what to do with our flag, we'd tell them what to do with the pole." - LA Times, Jan 19th 2008

While Huckabee's folksy humor is often disarming - it cannot conceal the rising desperation in the "party of old white guys."

America looks less and less like the Republican party. That simple fact is behind the Illinois laws requiring a driver's license to vote. (Now under consideration by the Supreme Court, whose right wing majority have telegraphed their contempt for overturing the clearly unconstitutional measure.)

After forty years of race baiting with the infamous "southern strategy" it is critical for the Republicans to disenfranchise Black and Latino voters. Besides simple racist yahoo-ism, this is an often overlooked factor in the anti-immigraiton drumbeat coming relentlessly from the right.

"If we let them in - they'll vote Democrat!"

As usual, Huckabee comes in firmly on the slimy side...

My Food Blog & Cookbook store.

Folks have been asking about my cookbook store and food blog -

they are at: http://www.theperfectbite.net/

Happy Eating! - Will

CNN Political - James Dobson lauds Huckabee win

This alone is reason to support anyone other than Huckabee!

CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time Blog Archive - James Dobson lauds Huckabee win « - Blogs from CNN.com

Album Release - Abstract Image - "Red Chateau"

I'm listening to my youngest brother's first album release as I write this, and I really like it.

His band is called Abstract Image and the album is "Red Chateau"

So far my favorite track is "Turquoise".

I expected to most like the one called "Magickal Island Song", for reasons that will be well known to anyone who knows us.

Check it out!