pitchers tuck by buddy don: Revlon Run/Walk for Women in Times Square

cleanup reprint: duz it take a evil dicktater?

[i gut hit with a nuther of them filthy lank spam comment thangs on this here post that i dun way back on november 29, 2005, so i am deeletin the ole one n reprintin it here. far as i kin tell, the questchun still stands – duz it take a evil dicktater?]

thays lots of reasons our gummint give us bout why we had to quit goin after osama n invade iraq. dint matter that our own intelligents had splaind to the administrayshun how thay wuznt no lank twixt al qaeda n saddam to the point whar saddam wonted to infiltrate al qaeda to perteck himself.

but that wuz ignord n we wuz tole overn over agin how thay wuz 'lanks' twixt the two evildoers.

we wuz tole stories bout unmanned drone aircraft that could bomb us (twenrt so), bout curveballs mobile labs (turnt out not to be whut he claimd they wuz, even ifn they did trick mr bush into claimin durin a trip to poland that we had found wmd).

we wuz tole we had to git rid of the dicktater saddam on a counta how he had dun such awful thangs to his own folks, but nary a wurd wuz sed bout other evil dicktaters lack kim jong-il or the folks runnin places lack the sudan (they gut slaves still) or liberia or probly duzens of other places with evil dicktaters. fack is, takin out evil dicktaters that aint never attacked wuznt sumthin we dun, period. thay wuz even a treaty on it name of the treaty of westphalia whar ye couldnt justify yer war on a counta wontin to force regime change. that treaty lasted frum 1648 till mr bush gut us to go agin it.

now that we are thar, we been a'sayin we caint 'cut n run' on a counta how twood result in civil war of sumthin. turns out, that thar civil war is a'gone on right under our noses!

not that mr bush wood be lackly to notiss – W deaf to bad news on Iraq, says mag:

President Bush will hear no evil on the Iraq war - even when the bad news comes from military brass and top government officials, a new report says.

Bush "remains convinced that it is his personal mission to bring democracy to Iraq," according to The New Yorker magazine.

The article, echoing a Daily News story yesterday, says Bush and his inner circle are so determined to follow their own plan that generals fear saying what's wrong in Iraq - and senior advisers are snubbed if they have bad news.

"I tried to tell" the President about problems in Iraq, one former senior official told the magazine. "And he couldn't hear it."

The News quoted another Bush confidant yesterday saying that Team Bush has an "unyielding belief in the wisdom of what they're doing" in Iraq and elsewhere, and that "they're talking to people who could help them, but they're not listening."

but other folks is notissin n thays two articulls splainin all bout it today, one frum the new york times n tuther frum the los angelees times. the one frum the new york times is Sunnis Accuse Iraqi Military of Kidnappings and Slayings:

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Nov. 28 - As the American military pushes the largely Shiite Iraqi security services into a larger role in combating the insurgency, evidence has begun to mount suggesting that the Iraqi forces are carrying out executions in predominantly Sunni neighborhoods.

Hundreds of accounts of killings and abductions have emerged in recent weeks, most of them brought forward by Sunni civilians, who claim that their relatives have been taken away by Iraqi men in uniform without warrant or explanation.

Some Sunni men have been found dead in ditches and fields, with bullet holes in their temples, acid burns on their skin, and holes in their bodies apparently made by electric drills. Many have simply vanished.

Some of the young men have turned up alive in prison. In a secret bunker discovered earlier this month in an Interior Ministry building in Baghdad, American and Iraqi officials acknowledged that some of the mostly Sunni inmates appeared to have been tortured.

ye probly orta quit readin that thar articull after them few paragrafs since it gits a lil on the gruesum side. but taint nuthin fer the gruesum details in that la time articull name of Killings Linked to Shiite Squads in Iraqi Police Force; With loyalties to banned paramilitary groups, the fighters have kidnapped, tortured and slain Sunnis, officials and witnesses say. i add vise ye NOT to read it. tiz awful whuts bein dun. heres a lil bit of it:

In recent months, hundreds of bodies have been discovered in rivers, garbage dumps, sewage treatment facilities and alongside roads and in desert ravines. Many of them are thought to be victims of Sunni insurgents, who are known to target Shiite civilians and Iraqi security forces, and even Sunni Arabs believed to be collaborating with U.S. forces or the Iraqi government. But increasingly, the Shiite militias operating within the national police force are also suspected of committing atrocities.

The Baghdad morgue reports that dozens of bodies arrive at the same time on a weekly basis, including scores of corpses with wrists bound by police handcuffs.

Over several months, the Muslim Scholars Assn., a Sunni organization, has compiled a library of grisly autopsy photos, lists of hundreds of missing and dead Sunnis and electronic recordings of testimonies by people who say they witnessed abuses by police officers affiliated with Shiite militias.

U.S. officials have long been concerned about extrajudicial killings in Iraq, but until recently they have refrained from calling violent elements within the police force "death squads" — a loaded term that conjures up the U.S.-backed paramilitaries that killed thousands of civilians during the Latin American civil wars of the 1970s and 1980s.

But U.S. military advisors in Iraq say the term is apt, and the Interior Ministry's inspector general concurs that extrajudicial killings are being carried out by ministry forces.

"There are such groups operating — yes, this is correct," said Interior Ministry Inspector General Nori Nori.

More than 40 people were interviewed for this report, including U.S. diplomats and generals in Iraq, Iraqi politicians, the Interior Ministry's intelligence chief and inspector general, the leader of the ministry's special commando unit, former and current police officers, morgue officials and human rights activists.

i lef out the most gory of the deetails.

corse we bleeve in usin tortchur (thankee mr cheney fer deefendin our rite to tortchur, long as tiz dun in secret lack ye lack to do everthang else) n go agin the rule of law on a counta how awful them terrsts is. n turns out them iraqis on bof sides lacks to use 'exter-legal' means.

whut duz it take to run that place n have wurking lecktricity moren four hours a day or runnin water or securty innyway? a evil dicktater?

random thirteen of buddy don: nuther beeyootifull day

By moon
We walk
To the brujo’s door
Along a path of river stone
Women with their nursing children
Seated on the floor
We join the fevers
And the broken bones

1. Spirit Voices by Paul Simon frum 1964-1993
2. The Disappointed by XTC frum Nonsuch
3. Little Queen of Spades by Robert Johnson frum Delta Blues Legend: Masterworks
4. Gold Dust Woman by Fleetwood Mac frum Rumours
5. Think by James Brown frum The CD of JB
6. Indian Summer by Suzanne Rhatigan frum To Hell with Love
7. Until You Come Back To Me by Aretha Franklin frum Queen Of Soul
8. Tequila Sunrise by The Eagles frum Desperado
9. Jesus of Suburbia by Green Day frum American Idiot
10. Down the Line by Johnny Cash frum Unearthed II: Trouble in Mind
11. Parakeet by R.E.M. frum Up
12. Half as Much by Hank Williams frum 40 Greatest Hits
13. Money (That's What I Want) by The Beatles frum With the Beatles

pinions of buddy don: is that pendulum swangin back?

fer the last thrity years or so, the pallitickull pendulum has been swangin to the rite, hepped by big pushes frum greedy rich folk such as richard mellon scaife, joseph coors, harry bradley n charles koch, to name a few of em. tiz amazin whut folks lack these have accomplishd, but fack is, a pendulum has gut to swang both ways, jes lack a childs swang, no matter how hard sumbidy mite push.

so heres sum articulls on the pendulum swangin back –

• Specter Grants Judicial Nominee Second Hearing; Kavanaugh to Answer Questions on Role in Torture and Spying:

  Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter today averted -- for now -- a possible Democratic filibuster over D.C. federal appeals court nominee Brett M. Kavanaugh by granting a hearing into the White House aide's possible role in controversial Bush administration policies.
  
  Specter (R-Pa.) said Kavanaugh would appear before the committee Tuesday to respond to questions about whether he had a role in the administration's torture and domestic surveillance policies and whether he had dealings with convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

• Rumsfeld Is Confronted by Antiwar Protesters:

  ATLANTA, May 4 -- Antiwar protesters repeatedly interrupted Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld during a speech Thursday, and one man, a former CIA analyst, accused him in a question-and-answer session of lying about prewar intelligence on Iraq.
  
  "Why did you lie to get us into a war that caused these kind of casualties and was not necessary?" asked Ray McGovern, the former analyst.
  
  "I did not lie," shot back Rumsfeld, who waved off security guards ready to remove McGovern from the hall at the Southern Center for International Studies.
  With support for the war in Iraq remaining low, it is not unusual for top administration officials to encounter protests and hostile questions.
  
  But the outbursts Rumsfeld confronted on Thursday seemed beyond the usual.
  
  Three protesters were escorted away by security as each interrupted Rumsfeld's speech by jumping up and shouting antiwar messages. Throughout the speech, a fourth protester stood up in the middle of the room with his back to Rumsfeld in silent protest.

• $100 Rebate: Rise and Fall of G.O.P. Idea:

  WASHINGTON, May 4 — Senate Republicans were frantic. Returning from a two-week recess that had been dominated by a spike in gasoline prices — and heading into a midterm election looking increasingly good for Democrats — they began scrambling for ways to calm angry voters.
  
  The date was Wednesday, April 26. Inside the Capitol complex, Senator John Thune, a first-term Republican from South Dakota, pressed his idea for a gas-tax holiday before a handful of colleagues who called themselves the Energy Working Group. But the group rejected the idea, leaving aides to the Republican leader, Senator Bill Frist, groping for another way to address the issue.
  
  That night, Mr. Frist's chief of staff, Eric Ueland, and a handful of other Senate staff members — the worker bees who drive the machinery of Congress while their bosses take either the credit or the heat — came up with their own version of an idea that had been circulating among Democrats: a rebate to taxpayers, in this case for $100. Mr. Frist signed off and made plans to introduce it at a news conference the next day.
  
  But the idea, part of a larger eight-point plan, fell flat. It was ridiculed by consumers and scorned by fellow Republicans in and out of Congress, including some of the seven senators who, like Mr. Thune, had stood beside Mr. Frist to announce it.

• Our Sick Society:

  Is being an American bad for your health? That's the apparent implication of a study just published in The Journal of the American Medical Association.
  
  It's not news that something is very wrong with the state of America's health. International comparisons show that the United States has achieved a sort of inverse miracle: we spend much more per person on health care than any other nation, yet we have lower life expectancy and higher infant mortality than Canada, Japan and most of Europe.

• Iraq: Get out now:

  The prewar dream of a liberal Iraqi democracy friendly to the United States is no longer credible. No Iraqi leader with enough power and legitimacy to control the country will be pro-American. Still, President Bush says the United States must stay the course. Why? Let's consider his administration's most popular arguments for not leaving Iraq.
  
  • If we leave, there will be a civil war. In reality, a civil war in Iraq began just weeks after U.S. forces toppled Saddam Hussein. Even Bush, who is normally impervious to uncomfortable facts, recently admitted that Iraq has peered into the abyss of civil war. He ought to look a little closer. Iraqis are fighting Iraqis. Insurgents have killed far more Iraqis than Americans. That's civil war.
  
  • Withdrawal will encourage the terrorists. True, but that is the price we are doomed to pay. Our occupation of Iraq also encourages the killers — precisely because our invasion made Iraq safe for them. Our occupation also left the surviving Baathists with a choice: Surrender, or ally with Al Qaeda. They chose the latter. Staying the course will not change this fact. Pulling out will most likely result in Sunni groups' turning against Al Qaeda and its sympathizers, driving them out of Iraq.
  
  • Before U.S. forces stand down, Iraqi security forces must stand up. The problem in Iraq is not military competence. The problem is loyalty. To whom can Iraqi officers and troops afford to give their loyalty? The political camps in Iraq are still shifting. So every Iraqi soldier and officer risks choosing the wrong side. As a result, most choose to retain as much latitude as possible to switch allegiances. All the U.S. military trainers in the world cannot remove that reality. But political consolidation will. Political power can only be established via Iraqi guns and civil war, not through elections or U.S. colonialism by ventriloquism.
  
  • Setting a withdrawal deadline will damage the morale of U.S. troops. Hiding behind the argument of troop morale shows no willingness to accept the responsibilities of command. The truth is, most wars would stop early if soldiers had the choice of whether to continue. This is certainly true in Iraq, where a withdrawal is likely to raise morale among U.S. forces. A recent Zogby poll suggests that most U.S. troops would welcome an early withdrawal deadline. But the strategic question of how to extract the United States from the Iraq disaster is not a matter to be decided by soldiers. Carl von Clausewitz spoke of two kinds of courage: first, bravery in the face of mortal danger; second, the willingness to accept personal responsibility for command decisions. The former is expected of the troops. The latter must be demanded of high-level commanders, including the president.
  
  • Withdrawal would undermine U.S. credibility in the world. Were the United States a middling power, this case might hold some water. But for the world's only superpower, it's patently phony. A rapid reversal of our present course in Iraq would improve U.S. credibility around the world. The same argument was made against withdrawal from Vietnam. It was proved wrong then, and it would be proved wrong today. Since Sept. 11, 2001, the world's opinion of the United States has plummeted. The U.S. now garners as much international esteem as Russia. Withdrawing and admitting our mistake would reverse this trend. Very few countries have that kind of corrective capacity. We do.

• A rising tide that lifts only yachts:

  Incoming White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten has promised "more happy talk about the economy" as part of his five-point plan for righting the president's poll numbers. And President Bush himself has been bragging that "thanks to tax relief, and spending restraint, and pro-growth economic policies, this economy is strong, businesses are booming and the people in this country are working."
  
  Strangely, though, the public doesn't seem to be listening. Americans are more than twice as likely to give pollsters a negative assessment of the economy as a positive one — 64% disapprove of Bush's handling of the economy. It's strange. The macroeconomic numbers are decidedly robust, but the public remains determinedly glum.
  
  If you dig a bit deeper than the base growth statistics, though, the picture clarifies considerably. Our economy has grown so starkly unequal that the statistician's view now says surprisingly little about the average American's experience. Last quarter may have seen 4.8% growth, but hidden in those numbers was a depressing factoid: Wages had only grown 0.7% — slower than housing, health or gasoline costs.
  
  That's been the story of the last few years, a rising tide that lifts only yachts. It used to be that economic growth ensured wide benefits across society. But the last four years of economic expansion have been historic for the steadily increasing poverty rate — a depressing sign that inequality has so split the poor from the rich that the two hardly inhabit the same economy.

pinions of buddy don: cuple stories that make ye go hmmm

furst thays thisn: Tax Deal Sets Day of Reckoning; Tough Choice on Deficit in Store for President, Congress in 2011:

With this week's hard-fought agreement on a $70 billion tax-cut extension, President Bush and congressional Republicans have effectively set a date for a fiscal day of reckoning for the next president and a future Congress: Jan. 1, 2011.

[...]

According to CBO projections, if the Bush tax cuts are extended in 2011, a deficit of $114 billion forecast for the year of their expiration will more than double, to $274 billion. A budget surplus of $67 billion, anticipated for 2016 if all the tax cuts expired, would turn into a $310 billion deficit.

And the red ink would only grow worse from there, as the baby-boom generation swells Medicare and Social Security costs, said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, a former Bush White House economist who recently retired as CBO director.

In that sense, Holtz-Eakin said, synchronizing the tax-cut expiration dates will have a positive impact, forcing politicians to confront what they so far have refused to acknowledge: the mathematical disconnect between government spending and a tax system that can no longer finance those programs.

"The next president has to have a plan for this, at a minimum," Holtz-Eakin said. "This is going to have to be elevated to the top end of the political spectrum soon."

Both Bush and the Republican congressional leadership expressed no alarm yesterday. Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) said sharp reductions in the tax rates on dividends and capital gains have boosted business investment, created jobs and buoyed the economy since their passage in 2003. That outcome, in turn, brought more revenue to the federal government, not less, he said.

Bush said the budget could be balanced by controlling spending while maintaining his tax cuts.

so we gut to cut down on our spendin, accordin to mr bush. how kin that square with this articull, To Earmarking Senators, Veto Seems to Spell Vote:

Senators keep stuffing new provisions into an emergency spending bill for Iraq and hurricane recovery, ignoring President Bush's veto threat to advance their priorities.

[...]

At the bill's core is $72 billion in war-related funding and about $27 billion to aid Hurricane Katrina recovery in Mississippi and Louisiana. But with November midterm elections approaching, senators showed little restraint on items that would prove popular with constituents or important interest groups.

For example, the legislation includes $4 billion in aid to farmers and ranchers to offset rising natural gas costs and provide new relief from drought, floods and wildfires. It contains nearly $800 million in additional highway and transit funding and $2.3 billion to prepare for a possible flu pandemic.

everbidy that bleeves bush is a'gone finely use his veto, clap yer hands till tinkerbell kin fly. everbidy that bleeves palltishuns kin keep frum spendin, clap yer hands till peter pan kin fly with er.

so how bout that tax cut? how will that wurk out fer folks? Big Gain for Rich Seen in Tax Cuts for Investments:

The analysis found the following:

¶Among taxpayers with incomes greater than $10 million, the amount by which their investment tax bill was reduced averaged about $500,000 in 2003, and total tax savings, which included the two Bush tax cuts on compensation, nearly doubled, to slightly more than $1 million.

¶These taxpayers, whose average income was $26 million, paid about the same share of their income in income taxes as those making $200,000 to $500,000 because of the lowered rates on investment income.

¶Americans with annual incomes of $1 million or more, about one-tenth of 1 percent all taxpayers, reaped 43 percent of all the savings on investment taxes in 2003. The savings for these taxpayers averaged about $41,400 each. By comparison, these same Americans received less than 10 percent of the savings from the other Bush tax cuts, which applied primarily to wages, though that share is expected to grow in coming years.

¶The savings from the investment tax cuts are expected to be larger in subsequent years because of gains in the stock market.

did ye ever wunder how long twood take to urn $500,000 wurkin minimum wage? i caint hep but wunder now n then. heres my math (subjeck to miss takes, so lemme know ifn i git it rong):

hours in a year = 24 * 365 = 8,760

hours in a year of 40-hour wurk weeks = 40 * 52 = 2,080

hours in a year of 40-hour wurk weeks minus two weeks of unpaid vacayshun = 40 * 50 = 2,000

urnins in a year of 40-hour wurk weeks minus two weeks of unpaid vacayshun = 2,000 * $5.50 = $11,000

hours of wurk at minimum wage to urn $500,000 (avridge tax cut fer them urnin avridge over $10,000,000 frum articull above) = $500,000 / $5.50 = 90,909.09

years of wurk at minimum wage with two weeks of unpaid vacayshun needed to urn $500,000 = $500,000 / ($5.5 * 2,000) = $500,000 / $11,000 = 45.45

corse, life aint fair, is it?

ifn ye wonta make a comment, ye gut to click 'link' below, witch as that grate fotogruffer fletch ritely notes, tiz sumwhut nixonian. problem is, i caint make the comments show on the mane page no matter how i trick out my blogger template, witch i orta start all over n keep nuthin but the banner tennessee jed made fer me.

pomes of buddy don: The Bee and The Weevil

The Bee and The Weevil

Some folks compare Bush to Richard Nixon
In terms of arrogance and power lust,
But Bush's nasty habit of affixin'
Signing statements to the laws he doesn't trust
Shows that in terms of presidential evil
Nixon was the bee and Bush the weevil.

full disclozure: i voted fer richard nixon in my furst chants to vote, 1972. i wuz verr disappointed at whut cum after that, but the differnts twixt the two publicans is this: when the publick wuz shown the depth of nixons presidentchull violayshuns, he had the good sense to resine. bush is differnt: he brags about the laws he intends not to execute, not to uphold, but to brake. whenever he duz that, he violates the oath he tuck to uphold the constitushun.

i am hopin that arlen specter kin be this generayshuns howard baker ("What did the President know and when did he know it?"). but i fear he will be brung under the wheel lack ever other publican. i pray fer a patriot to emerge frum amung them publicans, but seems lack we only git partisans. we will see whuther arlen specter cums thru on this: Hearing vowed on Bush's powers; Senator questions bypassing of laws.

ifn ye wonta make a comment, click on 'link' below.

ramblins of buddy don: cuple thangs

aint gut much time, but i half to menchun a cuple articulls i almost missed.

furst, did ye ketch thisn? tiz a story bout a meat packin cumpny that deecided it wood test everone of its cattle befor servin to innybidy, the hope bein that folks wood be more cumfterbull eatin meat that wuz tested to make shore it dont have no mad cow disease. seems lack a grate use of the free market principills that them publicans claims they bleeve (mayhap thems the same publicans that bleeves in small gummint n balanced budgets, witch seems lack they dun gone eggstink.)

innywho, here tiz, a sine that our gummint will do innythang to perteck ... well, not usns, but thar clients, the big corporayshuns that dont wonta half to deal with too much competishun – Mad cow madness: USDA stands in the way of broader testing:

If a hospital wanted to advertise that it upholds sanitary standards higher than any required by the government, no one would object. A used-car dealer who decided to offer only vehicles with the best crash-test scores would be free to do so. But after a meatpacker announced plans to establish the strictest program around to protect consumers from mad cow disease, the U.S. Department of Agriculture replied: fat chance.

Eating meat from animals afflicted with the illness can cause irreversible, fatal damage to the brain. Last month, a cow in Alabama was found to be infected, the third confirmed case in this country. Canada, which has similar regulations to prevent the disease, has had five.

You would think those cases would indicate the need for more testing of cattle to keep contaminated beef off our tables. In fact, the USDA, which now tests only 1 percent of all slaughtered cows, is planning to cut back on that effort. Crazier yet, it also intends to keep anyone else from conducting more tests.

One company wants to do exactly that. Creekstone Farms, a premium meatpacker based in Kansas, knows bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, can be deadly for business. After the first American case was discovered in 2003, some 58 countries banned shipments of American beef, costing Creekstone about $100 million in sales.

Those countries were dissatisfied with the safety measures in effect here. So Chief Executive Officer John Stewart decided to address health concerns in places such as Japan and South Korea by going beyond what the U.S. government requires of packers. He pledged to test all his cattle for mad cow in an effort to reassure nervous foreign consumers.

What he didn't account for was that his own government would bar him from doing what his customers want him to do. Creekstone's plan, it said, would undermine federal attempts to "maintain domestic and international confidence in U.S. cattle and beef products." To let the company adopt a more stringent regime would imply the USDA rules were inadequate.

The National Cattlemen's Beef Association agreed, complaining that "if you let one company step out and do that, other companies would have to follow." So last month, Creekstone filed a lawsuit requesting the right to cater to its customers.

fack is, they dont wonta test so much n druther test even less! ye kin read bout it here – Government: Only 4 to 7 Cows Have Mad Cow:

There are probably a few undetected cases of mad cow disease in the United States, but the total - estimated at four to seven - is "extraordinarily low," Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns says.

The calculation comes from new testing data released Friday. Testing is likely to be scaled back after a panel of independent scientists reviews the figures, Johanns said.

"The data shows the prevalence of BSE in the United States is extraordinarily low," Johanns told reporters on a conference call. "In other words, we have an extremely healthy herd of cattle in our country."

The brain-wasting disorder infected more than 180,000 cows and was blamed for more than 150 human deaths during a European outbreak that peaked in 1993.

The first American animal case appeared a decade later, prompting the United States to increase its testing for mad cow disease, which is medically known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. So far, the U.S. has found three cows infected with the disease.

But the first case, a Canadian cow found in Washington state, is not included in the testing analysis. Including that animal would have revised the estimate of infected cows upward to five to 11 nationwide.

The scientific peer review should be finished by the end of May, Johanns said.
Johanns said there is little justification for keeping up the higher testing levels, which rose to about 1,000 samples daily, from about 55 samples daily, after mad cow turned up in the U.S. The current level is around 1 percent of the 35 million cattle slaughtered last year in the U.S.

corse, tiz hard to serve them corporutt masters, witch live by corporutt greed, die by it:

Senate Republicans on Monday hurriedly abandoned a broad tax proposal opposed by the oil industry and business leaders, another sign of their struggle to come up with an acceptable political and legislative answer to high gasoline prices.

Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the majority leader, said he had decided to jettison the provision, which would have generated billions of dollars by changing the way businesses treat inventories for tax purposes. Instead, he said the Senate Finance Committee would hold hearings on the plan "later this year, so the pluses and minuses of the provision can become well known."

The retreat came after a torrent of objections from business leaders and their advocates, who typically view Republicans in Congress as allies. They said they had been blindsided by the inclusion of the proposal as a central element of the Republican leadership's energy package late last week.

tiz gittin sos ye caint even buy yer votes when ye need em most, in a eleckshun year:

The public derision of Republicans' idea for a $100 gasoline rebate has focused on the desperate political pandering embodied in the proposal. But there's another view that makes it seem even worse. Consider the China angle.

With the nation already deeply in debt — and with Congress angling this week to cut taxes for affluent investors by more than $20 billion — lawmakers would need to borrow $10 billion to make the rebates happen. Since more than 80 percent of the immense borrowing of the Bush years has been from foreigners, it's safe to assume that most of the rebates would be courtesy of foreign lenders, of which China has been one of the most willing.

It’s the circle of crude: China's competition for the world's oil is pushing up prices. Congress piles on more debt to calm angry consumers with a rebate. The increased debt is a prescription for a weaker dollar, which in turn would make imports, including oil, even more expensive.

the good news is how at lease them publicans is happy with a gummint lack 1984.

or is it that they dun brung back the king to take the place of this messy democrussy thang we used to have?

but the rilly good news is how on sundy thays a'gone be a music n arts festivull in hoboken, new jersey, witch they gut em a band playin named after one of my favert bloggers, red molly.

so it should be a good weekend. we kin eat, drank n be merry n let the devil wurry bout the gummint.

pomes of buddy don: He Is a Crook!

He Is a Crook!

Oh ours is a land of laws, not of men,
Our freedoms fixed by our constitution
And our bill of rights, which we will defend
To the death – be there no substitution!

Yet though we spend more than all other states
Combined on our military machines,
We live as though we were in desperate straits
As if we could be blown to smithereens!

Is there an army, alliance or state
With power enough to invade and win?
No, Sir! For our freedoms to disintegrate
The attack would have to come from within.

And there is the danger, be not mistook,
For our leader admits he is a crook!

random thirteen of buddy don: beeyootifull day out

tiz a grate day out. me n miz bd has plans to git out in it n later on to have lunch with a cuple of the yungns, jack n vaclav. so heres sum musick to git the day a'goin.


Honey you don't know my mind
I'm lonesome all the time
I've traveled fast on this tough road you see
I'm not here to judge or plead
But to give my poor heart ease
Baby you don't know my mind today

1. You Don't Know My Mind by The Nitty Gritty Dirt Band frum Will the Circle Be Unbroken>/li>
2. Good Morning Little Schoolgirl by Van Morrison frum A Night in San Francisco
3. He's Misstra Know It All by Stevie Wonder frum Innervisions
4. After the Gold Rush by Neil Young frum After the Gold Rush
5. Driving by Everything But the Girl frum The Language of Life
6. Bring on the Raindrops by Count BAsie frum The Legend: The Legacy
7. Can't Let Go by Ludinda Williams frum Car Wheels on a Gravel Road
8. Nick of Time by Bonnie Raitt frum Nick of Time
9. Two Little Hitlers by Elvis Costello frum Armed Forces
10. Picasso's Last Words (Drink to Me) by Paul McCartney and Wings frum Band on the Run
11. Loves Me Like a Rock by Paul Simon frum There Goes Rhymin' Simon
12. Confetti by The Lemonheads frum It's a Shame about Ray
13. My Baby Needs a Shepherd by Emmylou Harris frum Red Dirt Girl

pomes of buddy don: A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

A Self-Fulfilling Prophecy

Why should it come as such a rude surprise
That governance by those proud to believe
That government's the problem not the prize
Should such mismanaged government achieve?

Why do we elect those who soon replace
The competent with those whose only claim
To being worthy of the public's grace
Is being loyal to the party's game?

Why do we elect those who promise they
Will cut the size of government, but who
Expand it from inauguration day
Till record budget deficits accrue?

"The government cannot succeed" is their philosophy –
Their governance makes it a self-fulfilling prophecy!

pinions of buddy don: tecknology

i am wurkin frum home today on a counta bad timin by my germs. i gut a nasty cold over the weekend, witch i wuz still feverish n coffin my fool head off on mundy when i went in to wurk. they sent me home n tole me to wurk frum here. i dun it, witch i druther do almost innythang else besides wurkin at home. on tuther hand, tiz nice that thays that opshun.

the fever gut wurser on tuesdy n windsdy, so i stayed home. today i wonta wurk to try to ketch up, but they wood send me home ifn i wint in coffin this much.

so i will stay home n do as much as i kin frum here.

aint tecknology wunderfull?

meanwhile, did ye ketch how this administrayshuns intelligents gatherin is so shoddy that they caint even figger out who leaked valerie plames name after all this time? even tho folks lack libby has dun been indited n folks lack karl rove are makin a revolvin door outta mr fitzgeralds grand jury?

or did ye notiss how the iraq war that wuz spozed to pay fer itself n cost jes a few billyuns has costs runnin cumpletely outta cuntrol?

i reckun ye dun notissd that the war dint brang down the cost of gas at the pump, lack twuz eggspeckted to. its gittin so seryus everbidy, even publicans, is rethankin how much hep them oil cumpnies need to stay in bizness.

corse, one way to git sum money back is to dun our soljers.

christy hardin smith over at firedoglake asts a questchun that sez it all:

If things in Iraq are going so swimmingly, why is it that no US official ever makes an announced visit there?

n ifn thangs is gittin better, why do we still see this kinda story: Sister of Iraqi Vice President Shot Dead.

maybe a lil snow kin make it all look beeyootifull agin.

now to take a shower n login to wurk. (i dun a lil of it earlier this mornin, jes to git a start on the day.)

pinions of buddy don: fixin thangs

i reckun ye seen whar mr bush cum out with a plan to fix the price at the pump, witch tiz manely a nuther eggscuse to do whut he wished he coulda dun all along. heres whut he thanks will fix thangs:

1. suspend the buyin of petroleum fer the strategick petroleum reserve, witch this is one of them thangs only publicans is allowd to do on a counta whenever one of them dimcrats wonts to doot, tiz wrong:

   At a campaign appearance in Cleveland, Mr. Bush derided the initiative and suggested that Mr. Gore was ignoring advice from top officials of his own administration.
   
   "The strategic reserve is an insurance policy meant for sudden disruption of oil supplies or for war," Mr. Bush said, adding that it "should not be used as an attempt to drive down oil prices right before an election."

2. blame mr clinton:

   Mr. Bush said the decision by the Clinton administration not to permit oil production in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was costing the United States more than one million barrels a day of lost production

   of corse, this ignores a cuple lil facks, witch tiz this:

   Gallons by which daily U.S. oil consumption would drop if SUVs' average fuel efficiency increased by 3 mpg: 49,000,000 [Sierra Club (Washington)]
   
   Gallons per day that the proposed drilling of Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is projected to yield: 42,000,000

   n that dont even take into cunsiderayshun how minny years twood take ere we git inny oil frum drillin in anwr.


3. best of all is one he has been wontin to git dun fer the longest, witch thats to make shore ye dont half to wurry bout trashin the environment long as yer heppin git the price down at the pump:

   The president also said he will temporarily ease environmental regulations that require the use of cleaner-burning fuel additives to cut down on summertime pollution.

4. finely, he is a'gone to keep on a'doin whut he has been a'doin so well, witch in case ye dint notice is, thats investigatin all that price gougin:

   The other news, which the White House first announced last night, was that Bush has ordered the Justice and Energy departments to investigate possible price-gouging.
   
   But Bush has been touting administration anti-gouging enforcement for more than a year now, and there is no indication this new announcement is anything but a feint on his part.

i reckun thar mite coulda been more, but twuz jes more of the same.

lets face it, we live in a worl whar them in power bleeves tiz rite fer one sangle man to git paid a averidge of over $144,000 per day while otherns has to make do on $5.50 per hour (hours at minimum wage to urn $144,000 = 26,181.18; weeks of wurk at minimum wage to git up to $144,000 = 654; years of wurk at 52 weeks a year at minimum wage to urn $144,00 = 54.54).

tiz time fer a maximum wage!

[update: i bleeve thays sumthin rong with my math. twoodnt take nearly so long to urn $144,000 at minimum wage fer year of 40-hour wurk weeks = 13.09. taint the furst time i wuz rong, but the point remains: how kin one persuns efforts in a day be wurth a nutherns efforts in 13.09 years?]

pitchers tuck by buddy don: most poplar foto

i am under the weather with a common cold, witch they sent me home yesterdy sos i woodnt git nobidy else sick. i dont feel lack ritin, so heres sumthin short.

thays one foto i tuck that brangs me lots of traffick. tiz sumthin called sacred lotus pods. here tiz:



i git hits on thisn everday n miz bd cunvinced me to make it a poster, witch ifn ye lack it, ye kin git a huge poster of it here.

now back to bed with my burnin chest cold.

pinions of buddy don: thangs i musta missd

i reckun the liberayshun must be near bout dun by now, rite? we been in iraq now nigh onto as long as we spent on the korean peninsula n wont need much time more till we dun give it more time than it tuck us to win our part of worl war 2.

as we all member, the congress voted to give mr bush the authorty to attack, witch as ye member thay wuz jes this lil condishun, sec 2, paragraf (a) of that septbember 18, 2001, Authorization for Use of Military Force:

IN GENERAL- That the President is authorized to use all necessary and appropriate force against those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001, or harbored such organizations or persons, in order to prevent any future acts of international terrorism against the United States by such nations, organizations or persons.

my problem is how i missd sum of the most importunt facks that musta dun cum out. mayhap ye kin point me to whar i kin find whut i missd. heres a lil list:

• i missd the part whar it sed he had the rite to attack a cuntry on a counta it bein run by a evil dicktater, witch thays a slew of such cuntries we could attack ifn that wuz whut we wuz after.


• i missd the part whar it sed we could have a preemptive attack ifn we wonted to spred democrussy to folks we thank orta have it (whuther they wont it or not).


• i missd the part whar innybidy proovd iraq had innythang to do with the crime of 9/11.


• i missd the part whar twuz proovd that even one of the 15 attackers frum saudi arabia or the 2 frum the united arab emirates or the 1 frum egypt or the 1 frum lebanon wuz ackshly frum iraq


• i memeber bush sayin that they dint have inny proof of lanks twixt saddam n 9/11, so i musta missd the part whar they did have such lanks


• in other words, i still miss how goin after iraq wuz a legal way of usin that aumf!

corse, it dont matter whuther we gut osama, rite? he woodnt be no problem fer us later on, wood he?

songs writ by buddy don: slow down

yesterdy i couldnt post nuthin on a counta blogger bein down. i had me a ruff nite n couldnt sleep on a counta my mind racin a lil too much. i been tole by near everbidy that knows me well that i have only two speeds, hyper n comatoze.

as my mind raced over all thats a'goin on a wurk n the changes i am trine to ackcept bout my life n health, i couldnt sleep. i finely gut up roun midnite n red till bour 4 am. then i wint back to bed n slept n dreamt of this here Bohemian Hillbillies song, witch even tho i writ it, dont seem lack i ever let it do me inny good. the song wuz writ fer a musickull i will tell ye much more bout by n by, but all ye need to know now is the song is sung by death, a care ackter in the musickull. innywho, i figgerd ifn i played the em pee three fer ye, i mite here it my ownself. i hope to larn how to ...

Slow Down

Slow slow slow slow slow down, Everyman!
Slow slow slow slow slow down, Everyman!

Everyman
Don't you know me?
I've been walking by your side from the day you were born

Oh, Everyman
I say, don't you know me?
Won't you open up your ears, can't you hear Gabriel's horn?

I am the original killer
I make no deals with woman or man
I'm at the heart of every thriller
Next to me you're just a flash in the pan
Still playing "Catch me if you can"
But I've got you in the palm of my hand

Oh, Everyman
You are one cool cat
You probably even think you're gonna get the full nine lives

Oh, Everyman
I'll say this about that
Once you have tasted my kiss only the soul survives!

Slow slow slow slow slow down
Slow slow slow slow slow down
Slow slow slow slow slow down, Everyman!

Have you forgotten your maker?

ye kin here the em pee three by clickin on the lank below:
Slow Down

nitemares of buddy don: osama in pakistan

furst thangs furst frum the 'bewhar of whut ye wont on a counta yer a'gone git it' deepartmint: seems lack my trick of deletin the posts with the filthy lanks wurked. my traffick fer the last seven days is:

• wed, 12 apr: 495
• thu, 13 apr: 427
• fri, 14 apr:446
• sat, 15 apr: 459
• sun, 16 apr: 435
• mun, 17 apr: 484
• tue, 18, apr: 469
• wed, 19 apr: 176

i am willin to bet thay wont be 100 hits today, but i aint cumplainin on a counta lease thays a'gone be folks cummin to see sumthin i have writ or writ about or tuck a pitcher of or whutever, not whuther they kin git awful stuff to tittilate tharself.

secunt thangs secunt: thays a brillyunt parody ye mite lack here, witch the gratest praze i kin give it is i wish i had writ it my ownself. tiz writ by a feller name of kayakdave frum appalachian greens (a new favert fer me).

finely, the nitemare frum last nite: i dreamt i wuz talkin with miz bd bout the news. thay wuz chaos in pakistan, our miltary diktater frien (democrussy is on the march!) pervez musharraf had been kilt. i kep astin miz bd ifn twuz true that osama wuz in charge of pakistan or whuther he had dun gut thar nukes frum em. twuz a skeery dream, but whut wuz wurse wuz wakin up to see this story on the a.p. news wire: 7 Pakistani Soldiers Killed in Ambush.

corse, the hole idee that pervez musharraf could git killt or pakistan could fall into the hands of islamick eggstremists is only a dream, not real. it couldnt rilly happen, rite? not to one of our diktater friens, rite? not to a ally in the war on terra!

cleanup reprint: we dont need no minimum wage ...

oops! discuverd a nuthern!

note: this post furst appeared on 7/5/2005. i am deletin the ole one to git rid of the filthy lanks in the comments. i plan to do this fer a while till i git it all cleaned up. thankee fer yer indulgents.

... whut we need is a maximum wage. ifn we had one, we woodnt need no minimum wage. taint my originull idee n i aint gut no idee who cum up with it, but it deserves more attenchun.

ima gone splain how twood wurk direckly, but furst a cuple comments bout how to brang it about. i add mitt thay aint no way rich folks wood allow it to happen by law. they own the congress n presdent n mayhap jes 5/9 of the supreme cort, but tiz a nuff to keep such a law frum ever a'gittin passed.

no, twood be better if thay wuz sum way to shame folks into adoptin it as thar bleef in sted of ritin laws to enforce it. so i ackcept that aint nobidy a'gone let this thang git a chants, but twood make thangs much better fer everbidy in amurka by makin the economy much better. so heres how twood wurk:

eethur by law or better by custom n culchur, twood be grate if the person makin the most in inny bizness or corporayshun be compensated no moren X times as much as the lowest paid wurker in that bizness or corporayshun. fer instunts, in the times of the greek palltishun n flossofer solon, he gut folks to ackcept the idee that the richest only needed five times as much as the poorest. whenever he dun that -- after furst fergivin the debt of the poor -- the economy gut a'goin to whar they call that period of greek histry 'the golden age' to this verr day.

point is, ifn ye spread the wealth around more, then more folks is a'gone have spar money to spend, n that makes yer economy grow faster. tiz the henry ford way of payin, witch he once sed he had to pay a suffishunt wage to make it possibull fer his wurkers to buy a car.

thangs has changed a lot. whenever raygun becum presdent, yer ceo wuz a'gittin about 45 times as much as yer average wurker. then it tuck off:

In 1980, they made 45 times the pay of production and nonsupervisory workers. By 1990, the CEO-worker pay gap had doubled, with CEOs making 96 times as much. By last year, that ratio had reached 458.

thays sum that lacks to say a risin tide lifts all boats n ifn ceos are makin so much more, then sos everbidy else. but money dont wurk that way. if everbidy gits more all at the same time, then ye gut inflayshun. in sted, ifn sum has gut a lot more, otherns has gut to have less. tiz jes whut has happend since 1980:

While workers' 2000 pay was lower than in 1980, adjusting for inflation, CEO pay was ten times higher. In 1980, full-time production and nonsupervisory workers made $28,950 on average and CEOs made $1.3 million (in 2000 dollars). Last year, workers made $28,579 while the Business Week sample of CEOs came away with an average of $13.1 million.

whut we have now is a situwayshun whar thays two sets of rules: one fer ceos (includes the presdent) n one fer everbidy else. in my job, ifn i dont perduce n do a good job, i know i kin be cut as 'ded wood' durin the nex downsizin. ifn that wuz to happen, my parashoot wood not be golden. i mite git a munth of pay fer ever year i dun give to the cumpny, but i woodnt be able to bet on gittin no pension:

Despite ongoing negotiations with its unions, United Airlines has told the bankruptcy court that the "likely result" will be a decision to terminate all of its pension plans.

That would precipitate the biggest pension default in history, more twice the size of the Bethlehem Steel Corporation default in 2002. The move is expected to destabilize the already struggling airline industry, prompting other old-line carriers like Delta to eventually follow suit to maintain competitiveness.

but twood be differnt ifn i wuz a ceo. then i mite make out lack a bandit. cunsidder this:

Forget pay for performance. For example, Walt Disney Co. CEO Michael Eisner received, says Business Week, "a salary increase, 2 million stock options in Disney Internet Group valued at $37.7 million and an $11.5 million bonus--after three years in which net income fell by more than half from $1.9 billion in 1997 to $920 million." Eisner's total 2000 compensation was $72.8 million, a big bite out of Disney's net income.

Most CEO pay leaders underperformed the market going up, and have underperformed it going down. According to a new report by the Boston-based United for a Fair Economy, "If you had invested $10,000 in Walt Disney stock on December 31, 1993, the year CEO Michael Eisner topped Business Week's highest-paid list, held the stock for one year, then sold it to buy the stock in next year's pay leader and so on, by the end of 1999, your $10,000 investment would have eroded to just $3,585. A similar $10,000 investment made in the S&P 500 over the same period would have grown to $32,301."

magine ifn a ceo had to figger out a way of makin shore the lowliest paid wurker had to git a total compensayshu of, say, 1/40th as much as the total compensayshun of the ceo. that wood mean the greediest ceos wood half to make thangs better fer all thar wurkers ifn they wonted to make a lot more money thar ownself. all them wurkers wood have a lot more money to spend. spendin all that money wood make the economy grow on a counta how easy twood be to sell thangs to them folks that had moren a nuff to pay fer rent n grossries n a visit now n then to the docters.

lack i sed, i dont reckun such a idee could be dun by law on a counta them ceos owns a hole lotta gummint. but ifn twuz the practiss of that land, kin ye magin the economy we wood have?

projecks of buddy don: cleanin up the filth

fergive the reprints, but i gut to thankin bout whut to do bout all them filthy lanks sumbidy putt in comments to sum ole posts. i aint shore how widespred the problem is, but i figgerd i wood go thru the referntses to this site n see whar them lanks wuz hidin. whenever i find one, i am a'gone delete it but print a cleaned up vershun here. this way, i wont half to take down this here site or replace it.

btw, yesterdy i writ a query letter to a agent fer the furst volume of life n pinions of buddy don, hillbilly. i writ mine n then showed it to miz bd, who shes a better ritern i am n razed her two kids offn money she urned by whut she writ. once we git a anser one way or tuther, i will show ye the two vershuns sos ye kin see how amazin she is.

corse, shes amazin fer minny a reason other than ritin too!

cleanup reprint: biblicull paradies

note: this post furst appeared on 12/13/2005. i am deletin the ole one to git rid of the filthy lanks in the comments. i plan to do this fer a while till i git it all cleaned up. thankee fer yer indulgents.

i been gittin a lot of traffick lately thanks to a lankt to a ole post by john walkenbach at j-walk blog. thang is, i had dun red books by john walkenbach back whenever i wuz ritin vba fer eggcell fer a livin. tiz a small worl.

innywho, i figgerd i wood make it a lil easier fer folks to find three biblicull paradies writ n posted here.

furst is the one mr walkenbach lanked to, ten commandments eggsplained in footnotes:

i noticed tuther day how aint hardly nobidy that still bleeves in the ten commandments the way they wuz furst writ. i gut to studyin the matter n cum to real eyes how them commandments is ok fer starters, but to fit the modern day moral values of amurka, they need em a few footnotes, lease eight of em by my count. furst, fer them amung ye thats dun fergot em, here they be, frum exodus chaptur 20, versus 3-17:

1. Thou shalt have no other gods before me.(1)
2. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth.(2) Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me; And shewing mercy unto thousands of them that love me, and keep my commandments.
3. Thou shalt not take the name of the LORD thy God in vain; for the LORD will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain.(3)
4. Remember the sabbath day, to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labour, and do all thy work: But the seventh day is the sabbath of the LORD thy God: in it thou shalt not do any work, thou, nor thy son, nor thy daughter, thy manservant, nor thy maidservant, nor thy cattle, nor thy stranger that is within thy gates: For in six days the LORD made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day: wherefore the LORD blessed the sabbath day, and hallowed it.(4)
5. Honour thy father and thy mother: that thy days may be long upon the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee.
6. Thou shalt not kill.(5)
7. Thou shalt not commit adultery.
8. Thou shalt not steal.(6)
9. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.(7)
10. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's house, thou shalt not covet thy neighbour's wife, nor his manservant, nor his maidservant, nor his ox, nor his ass, nor any thing that is thy neighbour's.(8)

Notes:
(1) unless said other god happens to be:

* your country, in which case god shall step aside and let the country be acknowledged first, at least when it is being attacked by some other country or afraid that some other country might someday have the means, motive and opportunity to attack, thus suspending for all combatants any other commandments that might conflict with the needs of the country
* your company, which you will serve without question so long as you wish to have income from said company, especially if your company is under attack from government regulators, market forces, or competition from other companies, in which case god shall step aside and all other commandments that might conflict with the needs of your company will be suspended so long as your actions are taken in support of said company
* your fraternity, sorority, country club, investment club, chamber of commerce, elks, masons, or other exclusive organization that requires, for purposes of being accepted or maintaining membership in good standing, participation in actions that might be construed as being in conflict with one or more of the commandments; in such special circumstances, god shall step aside and some or all of the commandments shall be temporarily suspended so that loyalty to the precepts and principles of said fraternity, sorority, country club, investment club, chamber of commerce, elks, masons, or other exclusive organization may be obeyed and respected without concern about or pangs of conscience over any conflict with any commandment that would otherwise have been in effect
* your party, interest group, lobbyist organization, foundation of experts, or other organization designed to advance any political cause whatsoever so long as said party, interest group, lobbyist organization, foundation of experts, or other organization designed to advance any political cause whatsoever shall be shown to be in competition with any other party, interest group, lobbyist organization, foundation of experts, or other organization designed to advance any political cause whatsoever, under which special circumstances god shall step aside and all conflicting commandments shall be suspended so long as necessary to insure that your party, interest group, lobbyist organization, foundation of experts, or other organization designed to advance any political cause whatsoever can compete
* any other entity whose membership requirements might in any way be construed to be in conflict with the commandments listed above, in which case god shall step aside and all conflicting commandments shall be suspended so long as necessary to allow you to continue enjoying said other entity
* money or any other symbol of monetary value, be it stock, bond, option, copyright, patent, trademark, or any other entity, symbol, or thing that could be construed to have monetary value in any known or yet to be discovered universe

(2) unless said graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth should act as:

* logo, flag, symbol or representative of any entity described in footnote one
* image necessary to provide any form of entertainment, be it movie, television, magazine, poster, fine art painting, or any other likeness that could generate income or human interest
* family memento such as any photo, painting, water color, fingerpaint, or any other likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth so long as said photo, painting, water color, fingerpaint, or any other likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth be something the family, in whole or in part, enjoys, tolerates, or tapes onto a refrigerator
* anything else that is not any other graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth that anyone wants to use for any purpose whatsoever since the plain fact is that the world no longer needs or respects or has any plan whatsoever to honor this particular commandment

(3) note that since nobody actually knows god's name any longer, this commandment only applies if someone figures it out again; in other words, this one is a freebie

(4) unless the purpose of not honoring said sabbath day should involve one or more of the following activities:

* generating income or pursuing any other activity for any organization covered under footnote (1) above
* attending sports contests or watching them on tv
* doing any other thing under which this commandment might be construed as being applicable

(5) unless said killing is covered under one of the following excuses for killing anyway:

* collateral damage
* war
* execution(s) of individual(s) other humans have judged worthy of death

(6) unless said theft occurs on a very grand scale, such as gaming the energy grid to generate profits for your company (see footnote (1) above), robbing the pension funds of your company, union, or any other organization with funds you have been entrusted to protect, or otherwise participating in actions that reallocate the funds of those less worthy to your bank account and so long as said theft occurs on a grand scale worthy of enron -- just don't rob a liquor store or remove anyone's hubcaps!

(7) unless said bearing of false witness should prove useful in any of the following activities:

* invasion of another country in order to prevent them from using weapons of mass destructions, that is, to prevent them from collaborating with your enemies, rather, that is to bring them freedom and democracy, whether they want it or not
* persuasion of gullible individuals to make purchases of items they don't need
* sliming your political opponent, in which case any lie, falsehood, misinterpretation of anything he/she ever said, wrote, or did, or other form of bearing false witness shall lead to god stepping aside and said bearing of false witness allowed
* anything else that might, if successful, lead to the generation of profit, income, revenue or any other value in this and all other known universes and in any universe yet to be discovered

(8) unless said coveting leads to working harder to obtain more things and thus make the economy grow.

heres a nuthern, witch ye mite speck sumthin lack this frum a hillbilly on wall street:

the hordes' prayer

our dollar, which art invested,
hollow be thy name
thy kingdom come, thy damage done,
on earth, as it is on wall street
give us this day, our daily profit
and forgive us our debts as we foreclose upon our debtors
lead us not into inflation, but deliver us from loss
for thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever!
all men

finely, thisn here is my favert:

the re-attitudes
Matthews 5 (King Karl Version)

1 And seeing the multitudes, he went down into an undisclosed location: and when he was set, his disciples and lobbyists and party operatives came unto him:

2 And he opened his mouth, and taught them, saying,

3 Blessed are the rich in material things: for theirs is the right to increase their wealth by plundering the resources of the garden they tend (at God’s command), creating their own kingdom of heaven on earth in gated communities far removed from the toxic waste dumps that shall result from their plundering of said garden.

4 Blessed are they that rejoice in the death of their adversaries: for they shall be widely praised as true Americans who won’t allow themselves to inherit the defeatist attitudes resulting from the Vietnam war (or the pacifist false Jesus of the libruls).

5 Blessed are the bold: for they shall take the earth, remove its exhaustible resources, cut taxes on the rich, criminalize sexual orientation, create a culture of life limited to the unborn and to keeping the suffering agéd safe from euthanasia and the social security they overpaid for from 1983 until the present but not extended to the innocent citizens of countries that must be destroyed to be saved; be allowed to dress up in a jump suit, pretend to land a fighter plane on and strut across the surface of an aircraft carrier before a banner that says “Mission Accomplished” and claim that major combat operations are over and yet later boldly claim that they didn’t put up the banner or mean what they said if it turns out that thousands of the foreigners you invaded to save from death and torture end up dead and tortured or even hundreds of our own brave soldiers should die in further combat operations or an insurgency they bolded assumed would not come, for they shall be given unlimited power in Washington and be praised on Fox news.

6 Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after power at any cost: for they shall be full of it.

7 Blessed are the pitiless: for they shall deny mercy to anyone they suspect of being a terrorist, a homosexual, a journalist with integrity, a librul, a Democrat or anyone else who gets in the way of their need to turn the US of A into a single-party state.

8 Blessed are the pure in partisan policy: for they shall use God.

9 Blessed are the warmongers: for they shall be called upon to kill the children of God in unfortunate instances of collateral damage while they are spreading democracy and self-determination to those who don’t have the sense to vote for it themselves or to determine their own future for themselves.

10 Blessed are they which are persecuted for right-wing causes' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of Washington and the forum of Fox News, corporate cable outlets, and other forms of Infotainment (the practice formerly known as “News”).

11 Blessed are ye, when men shall revile you, and persecute you, and shall say all manner of evil against you based on insufficient evidence (but not necessarily untruth) on CBS or in Newsweek or the New York Times, for they shall provide cover for you by the public feeding frenzy they shall incite on cable TV and in the newsrooms owned and operated by great corporations, allowing you to obscure the necessary evil you do for my sake.

12 Rejoice, and be exceeding glad: for great is your reward in Washington and on Fox News: for so persecuted they the demagogues which were before you.

cleanup reprint: throw the man a kitten

note: this post furst appeared on 11/2/2005. i am deletin the ole one to git rid of the filthy lanks in the comments. i plan to do this fer a while till i git it all cleaned up. thankee fer yer indulgents.

is this our cuntry? i had to wunder when i red the top story in the washington post name of CIA Holds Terror Suspects in Secret Prisons; Debate Is Growing Within Agency About Legality and Morality of Overseas System Set Up After 9/11:

The CIA has been hiding and interrogating some of its most important al Qaeda captives at a Soviet-era compound in Eastern Europe, according to U.S. and foreign officials familiar with the arrangement.

The secret facility is part of a covert prison system set up by the CIA nearly four years ago that at various times has included sites in eight countries, including Thailand, Afghanistan and several democracies in Eastern Europe, as well as a small center at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, according to current and former intelligence officials and diplomats from three continents.

The hidden global internment network is a central element in the CIA's unconventional war on terrorism. It depends on the cooperation of foreign intelligence services, and on keeping even basic information about the system secret from the public, foreign officials and nearly all members of Congress charged with overseeing the CIA's covert actions.

The existence and locations of the facilities -- referred to as "black sites" in classified White House, CIA, Justice Department and congressional documents -- are known to only a handful of officials in the United States and, usually, only to the president and a few top intelligence officers in each host country.

i kindly thunk i wuz livin in a cuntry ruled by law, whar ifn thay wuz a charge agin ye, ye had the rite to here it n to state yer side. ye couldnt be locked up jes on a counta folks bleevin ye wuz a terrst or whutever. but them daze has gone the way of the dodo bird.

aint thay nuthin we kin do bout it?

then thars this articull name of DeLay Loath to Doff His Leadership Hat; Active Role Divides House Republicans bout how delay has steppd down but tiz still bizness a usual:

Former House majority leader Tom DeLay's efforts to retain power despite his indictment have angered some rank-and-file Republicans, many of whom say his ethical problems and uncertain status are staining them and destabilizing GOP unity.

Although he was forced to relinquish his leadership post Sept. 28, after the first of two indictments for alleged involvement in money laundering related to the 2002 Texas election, DeLay continues to use an office in the leadership suite, occasionally presides over private meetings with committee chairmen and lobbies members during key floor votes.

Also, the Texas Republican's staff continues to maintain the House schedule and dash off memos to lawmakers, ostensibly as employees of a majority leader's office without a full-fledged majority leader. And on his trips to the sheriff's office for an Oct. 20 booking in Houston and a court appearance in Austin on Oct. 21, DeLay was accompanied by three bodyguards from the Capitol Hill police force, just as he was when he was majority leader.

"My issue is having an indicted former leader hanging around the leadership offices," said one House Republican, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of DeLay's remaining authority. "This guy did so much good work getting us into the majority. Why does he want to stick around? He's not helping us."

"Tom DeLay should not be in a position of authority," said Rep. Christopher Shays (R-Conn.), who called for DeLay's resignation from the House leadership even before he was indicted. "He should not be calling the shots or driving the agenda, and if he is, that would be unfortunate."

agin, whut do i know? i kindly thunk that ifn ye steppd down, ye steppd down. so thays sum places whar the laws dont apply, lack in that furst story, n a nuther place whar folks dont half to do whut they promissd they wood do.

n that aint nuthin we kin do bout it. hes even gittin the judge fired n his trile moved to whar he kin rig the jury, witch he dun masterd gerry riggin, so why not branch out into jury riggin?

corse ye mite need ye a hammer ifn ye gut to figger a way to repay them huge loans to rich folks – mayhap ye herd bout em, witch they been calld 'tax cuts,' but when ye half to borry $300+ billyuns a year to finants em, thays loans thats gut to be repaid by our children n granchildrn – ye gut to figger a way to pay fer em. how bout ye cut $50 billyuns frum progams that hep pore folk n cut taxes by $70 billyun. woodnt that git us closer? i really do wish them publicans could git em a wurkin calculater! frum that same articull bout how delay has steppd down n steppd up at the same time:

With difficult votes coming, especially on a massive budget bill cutting $50 billion in spending over five years and a $70 billion tax cut to follow, some Republicans say DeLay needs more authority, not less.

but jes in case that dont git it, thays other ways to make shore them rich folks kin git richer, lack havin a do-over on all taxes, witch ye kin read bout that in a articull name of Commission Recommends Overhaul of Federal Income Tax. read it n weep, speshly fer yer mortgidge deeduckshun n yer health insurants.

aint thar no hope? shorely them publicans has at lease dun a good job of pertecktin us by makin shore we caint be attackd, rite? mayhap they hadnt had no chants to git round toot. ye kin read bout all the thangs they claimd they wood do but aint had time to do yet in a articull name of Security Plans Often Overdue:

The Bush administration has missed dozens of deadlines set by Congress after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks for developing ways to protect airplanes, ships and railways from terrorists.

A plan to defend ships and ports from attack is six months overdue. Rules to protect air cargo from infiltration by terrorists are two months late. A study on the cost of giving anti-terrorism training to federal law enforcement officers who fly commercially was supposed to be done more than three years ago.

"The incompetence that we recently saw with FEMA's leadership appears to exist throughout the Homeland Security Department," said Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (Miss.), the top Democrat on the House Homeland Security Committee. "Our nation is still vulnerable."

mayhap our luck kin hold till they git time to pay tenchun to stuff lack that. must be hard to find time when ye gut that soshul securty crisis that went away when the presdints fix dint pole well, witch that makes sense on a counta how his fix wooda broke it fer good!

aint thay no hope? did we git that mushroom cloud? no? missd it too? or wudnt thay ever no chants of one? why wuz bush n cheney n rice n such folks skeerin us bout it then? aint thay sum new smokin guns we orta investigate?

aint thar no hope?

turns out thay is! thays a story bout them dimcrats sproutin a backbone, mayhap sum ackshull balls! kin it be? read all bout it in this here story name of GOP Angered by Closed Senate Session; Meeting Reopened After Two Hours:

Democrats forced the Senate into a rare closed-door session yesterday, infuriating Republicans but extracting from them a promise to speed up an inquiry into the Bush administration's handling of intelligence about Iraq's weapons in the run-up to the war.

With no warning in the mid-afternoon, the Senate's top Democrat invoked the little-used Rule 21, which forced aides to turn off the chamber's cameras and close its massive doors after evicting all visitors, reporters and most staffers. Plans to bring in electronic-bug-sniffing dogs were dropped when it became clear that senators would trade barbs but discuss no classified information.

Republicans condemned the Democrats' maneuver, which marked the first time in more than 25 years that one party had insisted on a closed session without consulting the other party. But within two hours, Republicans appointed a bipartisan panel to report on the progress of a Senate intelligence committee report on prewar intelligence, which Democrats say has been delayed for nearly a year.

wow! who wooda thunk it? n it wurked too!

i wood say i wuz sorry that mr frist wuz affrunted. imagine, usin one of the senate rules without no warnin nor nuthin! but is that wurse than lyin us into a war? is it wurse than covern up the truth bout that? delayin the investigayshun?

i could live with a lot more affruntayshun of folks lack mr frist! kin sumbidy throw the man a kitten to cut up!