The "TB Dude" Speaks Out

The T.B. Dude And Wife

Everyone's up in arms about the TSA/the border inspector who allowed the TB "typhoid Annie" into the U.S. Especially me. And all the 80 year olds with his replacements. . .as the drug smugglers and others waltz right up the jetway. As I stepped onto the 737 in California last night, I had been frisked and patted down 12 times by the TSA times this month alone (due to my stainless steel femur).[1] And yet this guy, teeming with deadly cooties gets passed right onto the plane. Even though the "system" had flagged him as a risk:

An Associated Press article today said: "A globe-trotting Atlanta lawyer with a dangerous strain of tuberculosis was allowed back into the U.S. by a border inspector who disregarded a computer warning to stop him and don protective gear, officials said Thursday. The inspector has been removed from border duty."

From ABC News: Andrew Speaker has asked for forgiveness from the airline passengers he exposed to a rare strain of tuberculosis, and told ABC's Diane Sawyer in an exclusive interview that he has a tape recording of a meeting with health officials that he claims will confirm his view that it was all right to travel in his condition.

Germs Lurk on Planes, Trains and Buses

Tuberculosis -- Are You at Risk?

"He says he wants everyone to know how he made the decision, why he felt so strongly that it was not endangering anybody else and [is] also asking forgiveness of those onboard who are now having to be tested," Diane Sawyer said after spending an hour with the TB patient and his wife, Sarah Speaker, at the National Jewish Research Center in Denver, where he is currently in isolation.

"He talks at length about the decision first of all to go abroad, to hold his wedding abroad, and … there is a tape recording of the meeting that he had with health officials, and they say it confirms completely their view that it was all right for him to travel," Sawyer said.

You can see a video of Diane Sawyer on her interview here.

[1] Let me also note that I have now been patted down and frisked by the same TSA agent in Newport Beach three different times. He stands out in my mind, because of all the searches I get, his are the most, shall we say, extensive or intensive? This guy is thorough, and I started wondering this time if he doesn't enjoy his work a little too much?
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Painting: President Bush Dissembles And Disassembles

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Cindy Sheehan now outside the tent, pissing in

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From Jack in Newport Beach, California:

"Good riddance, attention whore," wrote Cindy Sheehan on Monday's Daily Kos blog, "I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called "Face" of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such "liberal blogs" as the Democratic Underground. Being called an "attention whore" and being told "good riddance" are some of the more milder rebukes." Her rambling and raving screed blamed just about everyone, and ended with her "resigning" as the face of the anti-war movement. How do you resign from that post??

The last straw for Sheehan was what liberal blogs are calling the "Memorial Day Betrayal," where the Democratic-majority congress voted to continue funding the Iraq War with no real restrictions.

“There is absolutely no sane or defensible reason for you to hand Bloody King George more money to condemn more of our brave, tired, and damaged soldiers and the people of Iraq to more death and carnage,” she wrote in another diary entry on Saturday.

As she was leaving the now pretty big anti-war tent, he couldn't resist whizzing on her former peace pals: “I have also tried to work within a peace movement that often puts personal egos above peace and human life. This group won’t work with that group; he won’t attend an event if she is going to be there; and why does Cindy Sheehan get all the attention anyway? It is hard to work for peace when the very movement that is named after it has so many divisions.”

That seems just a little disingenuous since Sheehan helped engender plenty of factionalism herself! She had a falling out with Move on!--they were too moderate! She ended up working with Code Pink, a left-wing anti-war group.

So now the anti-war movement is eating its own. But hasn't it ever been thus? The bottom line, however, seems to be that Cindy Sheehan had no stomach for politics. She was a passionate mother who suffered a great loss. Yes, if you speak as loud, as vitriolically, and as up front publicly as she did, you are going to be attacked. They will try to marginalize you like a Michael Moore today, or a Jane Fonda in 1971. Not being as poltical as they were--or maybe they were just immune to the politics?--Sheehan just couldn't take it any longer. I don't really blame her. But then, I am not really going to miss her much either.

Previous stories on Cindy Sheehan on All This Is That:

Cindy Sheehan rides again

Cindy Sheen picks up the cudgel again

Matt "Sleazeball" Drudge Strikes Again

Sheehan arrested at President's speech

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The Big Donor Show: Win a dying woman's kidneys

A Dutch reality television show, in which a terminally ill woman selects a contestant to receive her kidneys when she dies, goes on the air this week.



The government has called for De Grote Donorshow (The Big Donor show) to be dropped because it is "unethical" and "wretched" but the broadcaster BNN said it would go ahead to highlight the difficulties of searching for kidney donors.

The whole story appears here, or here, or see the G.I.S. links here.
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Ari Gold/Jeremy Piven's greatest moments on Entourage

From what I've heard from other fans of Entourage (probably the best knucklehead show of all time), you either love Jeremy Piven, or you hate him. The only person I know who knows him is decidedly not a fan. I love his Ari moments--it's a guilty pleasure, enjoying someone saying the things you never have the nerve or enough disregard for fellow man to actually say. . .

Here is a compilation of some of Ari's moments from the first two seasons of Entourage.




And a video clip from Ari's session wirh his wife and shrink...


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Photograph: The perils of Keef

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Another chapter in the adventures of Keef. . .smiling his way through a squall.
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"Who has killed more, God or Satan?"

This is the fascinating question another blogspot dweller delved into last summer.



Believe it or not, this was a more or less scholarly endeavor! Anyhow, check out the story in Steve Well's Dwindling In Unbelief blog.
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Carl's Jr., Hardee's, and Jack In The Box in dust-up over cow butt

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The Carl's Jr. and Hardee's fast food chains filed suit on Friday against archrival Jack In The Box and their television ads that seem to suggest Carl's Jr. and Hardee's use cow anus in their hamburgers. To read yesterday's Associated Press story click here.

CKE Restaurants Inc. sued Jack In The Box in U.S. District Court over an ad in which executives laugh hysterically at the word Angus, and another, where the chain's CEO/mascot, Jack, is asked to show on a diagram of a cow where the Angus meat comes from. "I'd rather not," Jack replies. Judge for yourself whether this was meant to be malicious. Look Carl's Jr. and Hardees. . .who the hell are you to be sniveling? It must really gall you to see Jack In The Box knock it out of the park, while your miserable franchises languish in obscurity, while no doubt serving just as fine of fare as J in the B. Here is one of the YouTube videos:


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A new banner for all this is that?

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Young Fresh Fellows Videos: Still There's Hope-Picture Book-Barkley's Spiritual Store

One of the beloved Seattle bands (1980s-now). Young Fresh Fellows is lead by Scott McCaughey (McCoy), who is also a member of Minus 5 with Peter Buck, Ken Stringfellow, et al). He is also (like Stringdfellow) in the REM touring group). I have seen them play before, at the Horiuchi Mural, in the 90s.









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Sparrow unloads its bowels on President Bush during Rose Garden press conference

Even the birds have begun flinging ca-ca The President's way. During Thursday's Rose Garden press conference, a passing sparrow made an editorial comment on George W. Bush's performance in office. The LiveLeak video appears below. . .

Poem: Late Spring

The wind has taken the blossoms
And the fruit is set.
The roots that clutch,

Hanging onto the globe
And the branches reaching out,
Rising to the nimbostratus clouds

Are lodged in the troposphere.
In between earthbound roots
And limbs reaching for the stars

Are us, and our cousins
Clad in fin, fur, flesh and feather.
We must be in heaven

And if we're not
We're growing one
Right here, right now.
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