Thursday, December 20, 2007

Danger Dog! The New Homeland Security Threat Rating System



Someone at Wired (a magazine I haven't read for about 10 years) came up with a hot-dog based security threat rating system. The last time I flew to Texas, about two weeks ago, we were at Orange. But that was really the Chicago Dog level.

Notes on the Hot Dog System:

1. Fried, Bacon-Wrapped Tijuana Danger Dog. In the Mexican States of Nayarit and Jalisco (where I have visited several times), and, possibly in Baja, these are called Tocino Dogs. Our old pal and restaurateur, Jorge, often peddled these in Bucerias from a cart at fiestas. I have also seen Tocino Dogs sold on the streets of Los Angeles, around Staples Center when I have attended E3.

2. Chicago Dog With Everything. Have you ever had a Chicago Dog? A Hot Dog on a nice roll, with mustard, that neon green relish they use, a slice of pickle, celery salt, sport peppers (a pickled chili of medium hotness), mustard, and tomatoes.

3. Hebrew National Kosher Dog With Relish and Onions. Not quite a traditional NYC dog, which usually has chili onions, mustard, and sauerkraut.

4. Microwaved Oscar Meyer Wieners on White Bread Roll with Ketchup. A really bad American dog.

5. Steamed Tofu Pup on Sprouted Wheat Roll. Often called a Not Dog in the vegie/vegan world. Yuk!

Here is the current, laughable, National Security Threat Level System:



And, finally, the Sesame Street threat level system:


---o0o---

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

The Enquirer John Edwards Affair Story...


---o0o---

John Edwards caught in an affair/"love child" scandal?



This is a mindf**ker of all mindf**kers, to quote John Sebastian at Woodstock. John Edwards, close to the last person of either party I would have pegged, seems to be caught up in a "love child" scandal.

The Drudge Report reported this late Tuesday (but Drudge's developing story has been taken down). In short, The National Enquirer *seems* to be about to break a story on John Edwards having an affair and now, apparently impregnating his paramour, who has either come forth, or whose friends have now leaked (or sold!) the story to the National Enquirer. Sure, it is a P.O.S. periodical, but on the other hand, they have broken a lot of real scandal news (along with Matt Drudge) over the last few years.

The story, as I understand it, will appear in the National Enquirer print edition (and their website) tomorrow. It seems to have appeared earlier today on Drudge, but I can't tell, since their story, too, is now a dead link.

Drudge now has a link that goes to a dead Enquirer page. If Matt Drudge has backed off from the story, he was either hectored with the threat of a King-hell lawsuit, or he had doubts about the story himself. And if Matt Drudge has doubts about the story, it has to be pretty flimsy.



According to ogpaper.com: "The National Enquirer is brewing the latest political scandal, John Edwards accused of having a love child."

"The National Enquirer is like an alligator - once the jaws lock, there is no way out. Earlier this year the NE reported on John Edwards and his affair with an unnamed woman from his campaign (follow the links below to read that story). Now, the latest John Edwards scandal - a love child. According to reports, the John Edwards love child scandal will run as part of the front cover of the National Enquirer on Wednesday, the picture was found on the Drudge Report. According to the cover, a woman is pregnant with John Edwards baby and is hiding. The story has not been confirmed or denied by the National Enquirer yet, watch for the magazine tomorrow and keep an eye on further developments in the John Edwards love child scandal. "

I did snag the bitmap above online, but have no way to determine its veracity in this paucity of information. It may be a spoof, or a mockup, or the real thing, of tomorrow's National Enquirer.

You may remember, I always thought both John Edwards and Mitt Romney would surge ahead from their positions at 3rd place, or further back, in the pack. If these allegations have even a whiff of authenticity, we can expect John Edwards to bail out of this race like he was hopping in the first lifeboat off the Titantic. John may have been able to weather this one had it just been another tawdry affair. But Ex-Senator Edwards happens to be married to probably the best-loved spouse among all the G.O.P. and Democratic candidates (except for maybe Bill Clinton), who also happens to have incurable breast cancer. If he is guilty, he, naturally, deserves every bit of ignominy that has been and will be heaped, upon him. If he is just a victim of rumor mongering (as was his running mate John Kerry...remember the stories of the young woman he had a tempestuous affair with? They all turned out to be false), well, then, long may he run! I did support him for President previously, but not this time around, although I would have supported him had he become viable (which so far in this race, he never really has).

If you did have this affair, well then drop out ASAP John, and give a decent guy like Joe Biden a chance! And if you did have the affair, well, then you are a sub-human piece of dogsh*t, and I am embarrassed that I supported you in 200o and 2004.
---o0o---

Tuesday, December 18, 2007

painting: the dream is over


click to enlarge
---o0o---

Ron Paul video: 'When fascism comes it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross'...

Presidential candidate (this year's dingbat, filling in for Ralph Nader, Ross Perot, and George Wallace) Ron Paul recently told Fox News (quoting Sinclair Lewis) that "When fascism comes it will be wrapped in a flag and carrying a cross." Like many dingbats, he is sometimes correct.


---o0o---

Monday, December 17, 2007

Video: Dake Wakeling and The English Beat perform "Save It For Later"

The English Beat perform their song "Save It For Later" from their final great album, Special Beat Service. Dave Wakeling and The English Beat are still touring (I saw them two weeks ago in Austin, Texas. . .click here to read that post.).


---o0o---

It Can Happen Here: Japanese Relocation Camps, 1942-1946

Almost immediately after the attack on Pearl Harbor in December, 1941, most Japanese-Americans were rounded up and transported to concentration camps across the United States. Nearly every Japanese family in my home town of Kent, Washington was removed. Less than half returned following World War II. I am not proud to say that one of the most famous images of Japanese relocation was this photo, taken in Kent, in January, 1942:



In our war hysteria, we didn't want any Japanese Americans near the west coast. They would form cells and assist soldiers and pilots from the motherland in attacking The Pacific Coast. The number of Germans and Italians placed in the camps is only a fraction of their total population compared with the Japanese, virtually all of whom were locked up.

After the war only about thirty families returned to the valley area. I remember the Miyoshis, Yamadas, Nakaharas, Koyamatsus, Hiranakas, and Okimotos. Some of them got back into farming (not on their old farms, which had been confiscated and sold). I worked on the Yamada's farm a couple of springs, cutting and boxing rhubarb, and I worked for a couple of weeks on Kart Funai's farm one summer, bunching radishes and scallions.

Sinclair Lewis wrote a well-known novel "It Can't Happen Here," and Frank Zappa penned a song by the same title. As you can see, and as you just read, it can 't happen here. This is the map of the Japanese-American concentration camps run by the W.R.A.:




click to enlarge

Link to an earlier, and far more detailed, post on the internment camps, and the story of the Japanese-Americans in Kent, Washington. A link to an article here explaining how this might have happened (Growing Up In Kent, Washington: Tarheels, Hayseeds, Hicks, Hillbillies, and Crackers).
---o0o---

Even Jeri Kehn can't resuscitate her husband's wheezing, tubercular campaign (but it's fun to watch while she tries)

Following are some recent photos of Jeri Kehn Thompson on the campaign trail, visiting VA hospitals in South Carolina and Virginia, on the set of Neil Cavuto's TV show, at an endorsement dinner, and various other stops. She is on the campaign trail, attempting to breathe life into ex-Senator Fred Thompson's moribund and flailing campaign. Following the photos are links to other Jeri Kehn photo roundups on All This Is That).


Jeri orates to a women's group


Photo opportunity with Nevil Cavuto (he's the one on your right)


The Thomson's pose with a supporter.


Another photo-op



Jeri Kehn and daughter at the V.A. Hospital


Jeri on the beach with another lady in red (notice the 100
watt smile is utterly absent)

Jeri makes a cameo appearance on stage...


Jeri and daughter in matching outfits.


"I kid you not," Jeri Kehn tells a supporter


Jeri in another photo-op.


Jeri Kehn smiles for the win in a babe-off with two other women.


Other recent Jeri Kehn photograph round-ups on All This Is That:

Photomontage: Jeri Kehn pressing the flesh (includes one photo of her husband) and links to Jeri Kehn photo motherlode
Latest Jeri Kehn sightings and photographs
Two more Jeri Kehn Thompson Photos
Latest Jeri Kehn sightings and photographs
Jeri Kehn Thompson photo update No. 12--eleven new Jeri Kehn photographs
Two more Jeri Kehn Thompson Photos
A Jeri Kehn Thompson cameo appearance in a Fred Thompson campaign video, four new Jeri Kehn photographs, and a Mrs. Fred Thompson photo roundup
Three additional photos of Mrs. Fred Thompson a/k/a Jeri Kehn
Meet the Thompson Twins: Fred Thompson's wife, Jeri Kehn (with photos)
One More Jeri Kehn Thompson photo
Jeri Kehn Photos, Part 3: Three more photos of Mrs. Fred Thompson
More Jeri Kehn photos--> A follow-up to "Meet the Thompson Twins: Fred Thompson's wife, Jeri Kehn (with photos)
Not Jeri Kehn: people who are not Mrs. Fred Thompson, yet who often turn up in search engine searches on "Jeri Kehn"
Three new Jeri Kehn photos; links to Jeri photos; and Fred Thompson describes the beauty of having a hot first lady;"
New photographs of Jeri Kehn Thompson on the campaign trail (and a couple of her husband Fred too)---o0o---

Friday, December 14, 2007

George Bush sees ghosts






Thanks to Jeff Clinton for pointing out this nugget. Robert Draper's new book, "Dead Certain: The Presidency of George W. Bush," unloads a few bombs on the stumbling President, but perhaps the most interesting one had to do with spooks. No, not the C.I.A. kind; the apparition kind!




"On this particular evening, Poppy and Bar were away for the evening. For the first time in his life, [George W.] Bush had the run of the White House. The Secret Service detail gave the president's son a few pointers on their way out the door. There's some security downstairs. And the steward's on call. Otherwise, he was on his own.

"Bush had the steward bring him an early dinner. He intended to catch a baseball game on the tube. But the emptiness of the third floor only jostled his preternatural restlessness, so he changed into his grubby attire and headed to the small exercise room in the southeast wing.

"Bush turned on the TV, mounted the stationary cycle, and proceeded to burn through the fidgets. Eventually he got tired of that as well. Sweating, he stepped out into the hallway in his T-shirt and gym shorts with a towel around his neck.

"The usher had turned out most of the lights. Bush took a few strides down the hallway and found his steps slowing. At the entryway to the Lincoln bedroom, he froze. What had he just seen? Something. No. Nothing. No!

"Ghosts. He saw ghosts -- coming out of the walls! Or were they portraits? Or ghosts coming out of the portraits? Rubber-legged, he retreated to his bedroom and shut the door."
---o0o---

Thursday, December 13, 2007

Mitt Hits Huckabee: Values

This is a video response by Stranahan on YouTube to Mike Huckabee's Message to Iowa . I like it. Thanks to Dean Ericksen for suggesting it.



---o0o---

Clinton Hints Obama Drug Use::::::maybe Kev was right & I should switch my allegiance to the guy I liked in the first place: Senator Biden

I have, of late, been dodging some the barbs hurled my way by Kev, claiming the Clinton campiagn is coming apart at the seams and devolving into a jumbled one-ring circus of mud-slinging, obfuscation, innuendo, outright prevarication, and cheapjack skullduggery launched like a desperate Hail Mary as the campaign drifts downward in the polls.

Maybe he's right. She may have crossed the line on this one. Maybe it's just hardball, but I don't think so. This one kind of has an air of savage desperation. Remember when they floated ominous and unsubstantiated rumors about something dark in Barack's past? The Associated Press reported from New Hampshire yesterday that the Clinton campaign has once again begun dropping sinister hints about Obama remarkable for their lack of proof and specificity:



"A top adviser to Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign said Wednesday that Democrats should give more thought to Sen. Barack Obama's admissions of illegal drug use before they pick a presidential candidate.

"Obama's campaign said the Clinton people were getting desperate. Clinton's campaign tried to distance itself from the remarks.

"Bill Shaheen, a national co-chairman of Clinton's front-runner campaign, raised the issue during an interview with The Washington Post, posted on washingtonpost.com.

"Shaheen, an attorney and veteran organizer, said much of Obama's background is unknown and could be a problem in November 2008 if he is the Democratic nominee. He said the Republicans would work hard to discover new aspects of Obama's admittedly spotty youth."

Kev would have me switch allegiances to Senator Barack Hussein Obama. I'm not ready for that yet. If I had to vote my heart, my choice would be Senator Joe Biden. But I am a pragmatist, and if Clinton falters I'm not quite sure which way I should turn. Not that it matters much in this heavily front-loaded primary season. By the time my caucuses roll around, the matter will have been decided. All the contestants want from me is a check.


---o0o---

Wednesday, December 12, 2007

Seven years ago today, The Supreme Court put the screws to the American people



Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000), is the United States Supreme Court case heard on December 11, 2000. Do you remember we had to wait over a month to find out who "won" the election? It only took the court one day to render a decision.

In a per curiam opinion (ed's note: A "per curiam" decision is delivered in an opinion issued in the name of the Court rather than specific justices. In short, I think it means no one personally wants the stink upon themselves of their almost criminally partisan decision) by a vote of 7-2, the Court (to at least one of their rumored later regrets) held that the Florida Supreme Court's scheme for recounting ballots was unconstitutional, and by a vote of 5-4, the Court held that no alternative scheme could be established within the time limits established by Florida Legislature.


The decision ended the whole circus—thousands of lawyers and observers, fixers, and spin-meisters, bagmen, horse-traders, and talking heads flown in to the swampy scene of massive voter fraud and election board malfeasance—and allowed Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris's previous certification of George W. Bush as the winner of Florida's electoral votes to stand. Florida's 25 electoral votes gave Bush, the Republican candidate, 271 Electoral College votes, defeating Democrat Al Gore, who had won the majority of the popular vote. Al Gore went on to become a crusader for the environment, and win the Nobel Peace Prize. George Bush presided over an unpopular war, episodes of criminality in the White House, and numerous domestic disasters, economic setbacks, and an enemy attack on U.S. soil, and will probably be remembered best for the war he fomented, and his cure for all that ails the country, and world—widespread retrenchment of civil liberties.


Supreme Court of the United States
Argued December 11, 2000
Decided December 12, 2000

Full case name: George W. Bush and Richard Cheney, Petitioners v. Albert Gore, Jr., et al.
Docket #: 00-949


Citations: 531 U.S. 98; 121 S. Ct. 525; 148 L. Ed. 2d 388; 2000 U.S. LEXIS 8430; 69 U.S.L.W. 4029; 2000 Cal. Daily Op. Service 9879; 2000 Colo. J. C.A.R. 6606; 14 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. S 26

Prior history: On writ of certiorari to the Florida Supreme Court

Argument: Link to Oral Argument

Holding: "In the circumstances of this case, any manual recount of votes seeking to meet the December 12 “safe harbor” deadline would be unconstitutional under the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. "

Court membership: Chief Justice: William Rehnquist; Associate Justices: John Paul Stevens, Sandra Day O'Connor, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, David Souter, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer


Concurrence by: Rehnquist
Joined by: Scalia, Thomas
Dissent by: Stevens
Joined by: Ginsburg, Breyer
Dissent by: Souter
Joined by: Breyer; Stevens, Ginsburg (all but part C)
Dissent by: Ginsburg
Joined by: Stevens; Souter, Breyer (part I)
Dissent by: Breyer
Joined by: Stevens, Ginsburg (except part I-A-1); Souter (part I)
---o0o---

President Lyndon Baines Johnson orders trousers from Joe Haggar

Thanks to Bill Schneider for pointing this out. It's been a while since we've written anything about LBJ. It's not The Johnson Treatment exactly, but LBJ puts the Haggars through their paces! It's classic Lyndon--at once imperial, demanding, profane, and fawning. If you'd like to hear the fascinating audio tape of this call, click here.

Earlier articles on LBJ appearing on All This Is That:


This is the White House transcript of an Aug. 9, 1964 conversation between President Lyndon Johnson and Joe Haggar:


Operator: Go ahead sir

LBJ: Mr. Haggar?

JH: Yes this is Joe Haggar

LBJ: Joe, is your father the one that makes clothes?

JH: Yes sir - we're all together

LBJ: Uh huh. You all made me some real lightweight slacks, uh, that he just made up on his own and sent to me 3 or 4 months ago. There's a light brown and a light green, a rather soft green, a soft brown.

JH: Yes sir

LBJ: and they're real lightweight now and I need about six pairs for summer wear.

JH: yes sir

LBJ: I want a couple, maybe three of the light brown kind of a almost powder color like a powder on a ladies face. Then they were some green and some light pair, if you had a blue in that or a black, then I'd have one blue and one black. I need about six pairs to wear around in the evening when I come in from work

JH: yes sir

LBJ: I need...they're about a half a inch too tight in the waist.

JH: Do you recall sir the exact size, I just want to make sure we get them right for you

LBJ: No, I don't know - you all just guessed at 'em I think, some - wouldn't you the measurement there?

JH: we can find it for you

LBJ: well I can send you a pair. I want them half a inch larger in the waist than they were before except I want two or three inches of stuff left back in there so I can take them up. I vary ten or 15 pounds a month.

JH: alright sir

LBJ: So leave me at least two and a half, three inches in the back where I can let them out or take them up. And make these a half an inch bigger in the waist. And make the pockets at least an inch longer, my money, my knife, everything falls out - wait just a minute.

Operator: Would you hold on a minute please?

[conversation on hold for two minutes]

LBJ: Now the pockets, when you sit down, everything falls out, your money, your knife, everything, so I need at least another inch in the pockets. And another thing - the crotch, down where your nuts hang - is always a little too tight, so when you make them up, give me an inch that I can let out there, uh because they cut me, it's just like riding a wire fence. These are almost, these are the best I've had anywhere in the United States,

JH: Fine

LBJ: But, uh when I gain a little weight they cut me under there. So, leave me , you never do have much of margin there. See if you can't leave me an inch from where the zipper (burps) ends, round, under my, back to my bunghole, so I can let it out there if I need to.

JH: Right

LBJ: Now be sure you have the best zippers in them. These are good that I have. If you get those to me I would sure be grateful

JH: Fine, Now where would you like them sent please?

LBJ: White House.

JH: Fine

LBJ: Now, uh, I don't guess there is any chance of getting a very lightweight shirt, sport shirt to go with that slack, is there? That same color?

JH: We don't make them, but we can have them made up for you.

LBJ: If you might look around, I wear about a 17, extra long.

JH: Would you like in the same fabric?

LBJ: Yeah I sure would, I don't know whether that's too heavy for a shirt.

JH: I think it'd be too heavy for a shirt.

LBJ: I sure want the lightest I can, in the same color or matching it. If you don't mind, find me somebody up there who makes good shirts and make a shirt to match each one of them and if they're good, we'll order some more.

JH: Fine

LBJ: I just sure will appreciate this, I need it more than anything. And uh, now that's a..about it. I guess I could get a jacket made outta that if I wanted to, couldn't I?

JH: I think that - didn't Sam Haggar have some jackets made?

LBJ: Yeah you sent me some jackets some earlier, but they were way too short. They hit me about halfway down my belly. I have a much longer waist. But I thought if they had material like that and somebody could make me a jacket, I'd sent them a sample to copy from.

JH: Well I tell you what, you send us this, we'll find someone to make it

LBJ: - ok

JH: We'll supply the material to match it

LBJ: Ok, I'll do that. Uh now, how do I - can you give this boy the address because I'm running to a funeral and give this boy the address to where we can send the trousers - don't worry, you'll get the measurements out of them and add a half an inch to the back and an give us couple of an inch to the pockets and a inch underneath to we can let them out.

JH: What you 'd like is a little more stride in the crotch

LBJ: Yeah that's right. What I'd like is to give me a half a inch more then leave me some more. Ok here he is.

JH: Thank you, I'm glad you enjoyed the others
---o0o---

Video: Bob Dylan with The Rolling Stones Playing his "Like A Rolling Stone" (wth lyrics)

An odd pairing, with Bob and the Stones around the turn of the century, playing one of Bob's greatest tunes.



Like A Rolling Stone, by Bob Dylan


Once upon a time you dressed so fine
You threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn't you?
People'd call, say, "Beware doll, you're bound to fall"
You thought they were all kiddin' you
You used to laugh about
Everybody that was hangin' out
Now you don't talk so loud
Now you don't seem so proud
About having to be scrounging for your next meal.

How does it feel
How does it feel
To be without a home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?

You've gone to the finest school all right, Miss Lonely
But you know you only used to get juiced in it
And nobody has ever taught you how to live on the street
And now you find out you're gonna have to get used to it
You said you'd never compromise
With the mystery tramp, but now you realize
He's not selling any alibis
As you stare into the vacuum of his eyes
And ask him do you want to make a deal?

How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?

You never turned around to see the frowns on the jugglers and the clowns
When they all come down and did tricks for you
You never understood that it ain't no good
You shouldn't let other people get your kicks for you
You used to ride on the chrome horse with your diplomat
Who carried on his shoulder a Siamese cat
Ain't it hard when you discover that
He really wasn't where it's at
After he took from you everything he could steal.

How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?

Princess on the steeple and all the pretty people
They're drinkin', thinkin' that they got it made
Exchanging all kinds of precious gifts and things
But you'd better lift your diamond ring, you'd better pawn it babe
You used to be so amused
At Napoleon in rags and the language that he used
Go to him now, he calls you, you can't refuse
When you got nothing, you got nothing to lose
You're invisible now, you got no secrets to conceal.

How does it feel
How does it feel
To be on your own
With no direction home
Like a complete unknown
Like a rolling stone?
---o0o---

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Poem: But you can't



You can withdraw it
Marginalize it
Forget it
Hide it
Lie about it
Or deny it three times before the cock crows.

You can laugh about it
Weep about it
Shout about it
Hide it under a bush (oh no)
Sing the blues about it
Or sweep it under the rug.

You can get an ulcer over it
Commit suicide over it
Lose your family over it
Lose your shorts over it
Lose your mind over it
Or pretend it never happened.


You can dream about it
Run away from it
Rationalize it
Explain it away
Or drink it away
But you can't take back love.

---o0o---

Monday, December 10, 2007

This week's photographic update on Jeri Kehn Thompson

There were few interesting Jeri Kehn photos from the campaign this week, so instead we put up a few of her miscellaneous photos we have kicking around. Who knows how much longer anyone will even be interested as the Thompson campaign sags. The incredible surge of Mike Huckabee has been mainly at the expense of Ex-Senator Fred Thompson. In the meantime, if Fred was smart--and anyone watching his campaign has to question that--he'd send Mrs. Jeri Kehn Thompson to even more campaign appearances.














Some other recent pages of Jeri Kehn photos on this blog:

Where All This Is That readers come from...


click to enlarge

Every once in a while, I check into Site Meter's tracking of people who end up on All This Is That. On Sunday, just under 400 visitors came here. Most were from the USA. A handful hail from Canada, Europe, Australia, and a couple of people arrived from Africa, Asia, and Australia and New Zealand.

The US map is interesting. The west coast has a line of people stretching from Victoria, British Columbia to Tijuana, Mexico. It's fascinating how this line hugs the Pacific Coast, but then there is no one until you get to Denver, and Austin, Texas, and a few other cities sprinkled in the middle of the country. There is a swath of people running down the industrial rust belt, in Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, and other cities, and then a cluster around the east coast, mostly in the NYC metro area. Clearly, we're not hitting that middle-west demographic, nor our brothers and sisters in Canada!
---o0o---

Sunday, December 09, 2007

War is over for The Brits?

According to The Sun, war is over for the British troops. Prime Minister Gordon Brown has saidhe wants his troops home. Soon. Click here to link to the full article.


click to enlarge
---o0o---

Saturday, December 08, 2007

27 years ago today, John Lennon was assassinated



John Lennon was assassinated by a deranged fan outside his home 27 years ago today. We lived in the neighborhood at the time, and could hear the sirens. I was listening to Vin Skelsa that night on WNEW when he broke in in tears, to tell us the news about his friend. Lennon had just released Double Fantasy (his best record in years) two weeks earlier. It was an incredibly depressing time, especially in New York City. Hostages were being held in Tehran, Jimmy Carter had just been trounced in the election, and Ronald Regan would be sworn in as President in a few weeks. For months fans gathered across the street from The Dakota, in what would become Strawberry Fields in Central Park.
---o0o---

Friday, December 07, 2007

Poem: Stages

I am no one's grandchild
Or nephew or great nephew
I've never been a great grandson

I am still a son
Still a brother and uncle
Son- and brother-in-law
First second and third cousin
Daddy and husband

I am still to be a grandfather
Great uncle and father-in-law

And always have been

And always will be God's boy.
---o0o---

Thursday, December 06, 2007

Happy Birthday, Washington Monument!

In 1884, 123 years ago today, the Washington Monument was completed as workers placed a nine-inch aluminum pyramid on the tower of white marble. The city's (and my state's) namesake, George Washington finally had a fitting monument. 100 years earlier, Congress decided a statue of the great Revolutionary War general should be placed near the site of the new Congressional building, wherever that ended up being. It wasn't until 1832, 33 years after Washington's death, that much really happened on the monument front. After holding a design competition and choosing an elaborate Greek temple-like design by architect Robert Mills, the society began fundraising money for the statue's construction. These efforts raised some less than a fourth of the the $1 million needed. Construction began anyway, and on July 4, 1848, they laid the cornerstone of the monument: a 24,500-pound block of pure white marble.

By 1854, with funds running low, construction was halted. Around the time the Civil War began in 1861, author Mark Twain described the unfinished monument as looking like a "hollow, oversized chimney." In 1876, President Grant ordered the construction to be completed.


another phallic monument,
known locally as "The Brick
Dick"in Ypsilanti, Michigan

At the time of its completion in December 1884, those 36,000 blocks of marble and granite stacked 555 feet in the air, were the tallest structure in the world. A city law passed in 1910 restricted the height of new buildings to ensure that the monument will remain the tallest structure in Washington, D.C.
---o0o---

Alien Lore No. 119: The Holloman AFB meeting between President Ike Eisenhower and The Greys



Thanks to Jeff Clinton for pointing this one out. Holloman, of course, has always loomed large in the alien lore world. This is the first time I ever heard about Ike's involvement (the story reminds me of the episode in Dark Skies were President Truman meets with The Greys and then orders the army to shoot down with departing "UFO").



According to Clark C. McClelland, once with the U.S. Space Shuttle Fleet, a UFO landed in front of former U.S. President Eisenhower and other officials at Holloman Aair Force Base. Holloman looms nearly as large as Roswell or Area 51 in Alien Lore.

The old Alamogordo airfield (aka Holloman) had been a training base for heavy bombers. But one day, to the surprise of almost everyone, President Dwight D. Eisenhower landed there.


There was no band or parade--only a few birds calling in the distance. Everyone wondered "why is Ike here? What's going on?" The civilians and military were told that while the president was here, this would be a "business as usual" day.



Whatever was happening would happen was as far away as it could be from the base. Little could be seen unless one had a vantage point and binoculars. Soon, the radar officers gave instructions to shut off all radar. He had turned base operations over to his deputy base commander as long as the President was here. He felt it his duty to be with him with no distractions.

A phone rang in the tower with a report of two UFOs passing over Range Road 12. A minute later, the bogies were over Range Road 7, just a few minutes from the runway. Men in the tower swung their glasses to the north in the morning haze.

Something glinted in the sun, and then something else just below it. Now, a report came in of a third bogie five minutes behind the first two. The tower personnel who did not know what these were, were stunned. The objects had no tails, no wings, and no motors. They were just round objects heading toward the president's plane. They reported the objects, logged them and did their job which was "business as usual." The two objects stopped 300 feet over Air Force One, and then one touched about 200 feet ahead of the plane.

The other UFO hovered above the buildings over the tarmac. The disc had a good vantage point of anything that might come towards the president's plane and the UFO on the ground. Most people who saw or heard about the two craft at the base that day did not believe they were ET, but possibly new Russian or German innovations.

After the UFO landed in front of Air Force One, a man (whom people assumed was the President), came to the doorway of the plane, and approached the saucer on the ground. The man walked up the ramp, stood at the opening, shook hands with someone, and went inside.

Observers thought the President was inside the UFO about 45 minutes. When he emerged from the craft, he walked towards Air Force One. Most observers believed it was President Ike. Many of the witnesses recognized that famous bald pate and his stiff military walk.
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Video: a sylvan car ride

I don't know who made the video (if it was you, contact me!), but I like it. A nice little sylvan ride in the boondocks. . .


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Tuesday, December 04, 2007

Idaho Statesman unearths more dirt on Senator/chocolate thief Larry Craig (with bonus audio clips)



Two months after Senator Larry Craig weaseled on his promise to resign, his old nemesis, The Idaho Statesman is back with interviews (and audio clips) of some of the randy Senator's pickups and victims. It's not just foot tapping this time, friends.

Five men came forward with lurid tales of Senator Craig, most of them were offended by Craig's vehement denials, including his now famous "I am not gay, I never have been gay." [1] Yes, it's a case of he said/she said, but four of the men are willing to make their names and accusations public:

David Phillips, a 42-year-old IT consultant in Washington, says Craig picked him up at a gay club in 1986 and that they subsequently had sex. Audio clip: David Phillips talks about oral sex with the Senator. Audio clip: David Phillips talks about the Senator performing anal sex on David Phillips.

Mike Jones, a former prostitute (who you may remember also told the world he had sex with another Republican, the Rev. Ted Haggard, last year). The former evangelist denied it but later 'fessed up and went off to be "cured." Audio clip: Mike Jones explains why the Senator's backing out of resigning drove him to go public.

Greg Ruth was hit on by the Senator in 1981 at a Republican meeting in Idaho. Audio clip: Greg Ruth describes a bathroom encounter with Larry Craig at the Republican convention.

Tom Russell, now 48, a former Nampa resident had an encounter with Craig in the early 1980s.

An anonymous fifth man from Boise who declined to be named said he was in a restroom at Denver International Airport in September 2006 when the man in the next stall moved his hand slowly, palm up, under the divider. Freaked out, the man said he waited outside the restroom and identified his stallmate as Craig, whom he had met once in Idaho.
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[1] Craig's denials are now also available in a Talking Senator Larry Craig Action Figure.
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Beaten to the punch? A disgruntled Jimmy Dean sausage customer



My fierce competitor Dean Ericksen has beaten me to the punch again. Jump here to Dean's blog to hear one of the very best viral audio files of all time. . .a disgruntled Southern Man, a Texan actually (Randy Taylor), unloading on the Jimmy Dean Pure Pork Sausage complaint line.

An excerpt:

"You've got three men who weigh over 200 pounds apiece, a woman that's a little plump--Scotch girl--and a daughter who's 13, and you're going to try to take a 12 ounce roll of sausage and a couple dozen eggs and feed that, it ain't going to work. And I'm not going to purchase your product anymore or ever again. And as far as your 16 ounce maple and sage, I don't eat that. I'm not from the North. I'm a Texas man. Jimmy Dean sausage is for southern people to eat with their breakfast with their fried eggs and their T-bone steak."
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