From politics (moderates who lean to the right) to Pogo (drools during poker stare) to rants (Whatcha expect from savvy, sassy sexagenarians?) to raves (Have you had your kudo today?) -- we never take ourselves too seriously.
We do, however, reserve the right to slaughter an occasional sacred cow. And in case we fail to mention it -- we will never forget....
Don't get me wrong. I neither "follow" nor agree with GWB on all issues or on a majority of the decisions he has made. Heck, I'm not even a Republican. Why is this relevant? It's relevant to me because I have a deep and sincere respect for institutions. Always have. Always will. Especially for the image and office of the Presidency.
Until the Clinton Debacle, that is.
Few "things" grate more on my proverbial last nerve than hypocrisy, graft, sexual deviancy and betrayal.
A succinct explanation (assuming I even have to provide one) for my "support" of GWB is that his very carriage and character represents what the Clinton image did not. IMO, the Clinton mystique consisted of little more than a polished and self-serving "good ole boy" who networked and connived his way into power, prestige and finally, the Presidency. And when Clinton's Camelot crumbled, relatively normal people -- still refusing to admit that the emperor wore no clothes -- mounted an assault on the one person who displaced their fantasy-king.
Others explain it much better than I, however .....
Bush Derangement Syndrome: "the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency -- nay -- the very existence of George W. Bush." -- Charles Krauthammer
What's so significant about BDS?
In November 2004, Dr. Sanity blogged about the psychology of hatred for George Bush:
"the acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency -- nay -- the very existence of George W. Bush."
Krauthammer mainly discussed our homegrown variety of Bush Haters. Since Bush's re-election, Bush Hatred has spread like a biologically deployed weapon of mass destruction, hitting individuals and entire countries, destroying their reason and impairing their cognitive faculties- probably beyond repair.
Take, for example, France. In that country, the citizens as well as their leaders welcomed Yasser Arafat as some sort of folk hero; and even go to the ends of the earth to protect him after death. They also welcomed Robert Mugabe the Zimbabwe dictator, responsible for untold deaths. Yet they have made it clear that President Bush is not welcome in their country, burned him in effigy and insisted he stand trial for "war crimes".
Take Canada. LGFlinks to an articledetailing how the enlightened "Peace Activists" of Canada, cannot rule out violent acts when Bush visits their country in the next week. And these are just a few countries that pretend to be "friends" of the U.S.
So, what is psychologically going on here? Besides the usual Leftist/Socialist/Communist bullshit, of course.
A post by Virginia Postrelsome time ago had some interesting thoughts about the psychological origins of Bush Hatred that I think are extremely pertinent:
"When I was in New York a few weeks ago, a friend in the magazine business told me he thinks the ferocious Bush hating that he sees in New York is a way of calming the haters' fears of terrorism. It's not rational, but it's psychologically plausible--blame the cause you can control, at least indirectly through elections, rather than the threats you have no control over. I thought of that insight today when I glanced at Maureen Dowd's column and read this sentence, "Maybe it's because George Bush is relaxing at his ranch down there (again) while Osama is planning a big attack up here (again)."
That is the voice of a petulant child, angry that she has a tummy ache while Daddy is at work or Mommy is visiting a friend, or the voice of a grouchy wife angry that she has a migraine while her husband is out coaching the kids' baseball team. You're upset that you're in pain (we've all been there), so you get mad at someone whose presence wouldn't make the pain any better. No mature student of politics believes the president of the United States goofs off on vacation. It's not the kind of job you escape. George Bush may be completely insane to voluntarily. spend July in Texas--as opposed to Bill Clinton's favored coastal retreats--but Osama bin Laden is no more or less a threat than in Bush were in Washington. But if blaming Bush makes people feel better, safer, or at least able to focus their anger on someone they can hurt, they'll blame Bush. "
It is truly laughable at the number of things that Bush has been blamed for in this world. He is blamed when he does something (anything) and he is blamed when he does nothing. He is blamed for things that occurred even before he was President, as well as everything that has happened since. What makes Bush Hatred completely insane however, is the almost delusional degree of unremitting belief in Bush's evil; while simultaneously believing that the TRUE representatives of evil in the world are somehow good and decent human beings with the world's interests at heart.
This psychological defense mechanism is referred to as "displacement". One way you can usually tell that an individual is using displacement is that the emotion being displaced (e.g., anger) is all out of proportion to the reality of the situation. The purpose of displacement is to avoid having to cope with the actual reality. Instead, by using displacement, an individual is able to still experience his or her anger, but it is directed at a less threatening target than the real cause. In this way, the individual does not have to be responsible for the consequences of his/her anger and feels more safe. How else to explain the remarkable and sometimes lunatic appeasement of Islamofascists by so many governments and around the world? (e.g. here)
A very good example of displacement that comes to mind is the plot of an old movie called "The Seven Percent Solution",which is about Sherlock Holmes' intense obsession with Moriarity. In Holmes' mind (distorted somewhat by the use of cocaine) Moriarity is the master criminal who must be stopped at all costs. He is evil incarnate, and the source of all the diabolical events of the world (sound familiar?).
Not until the end of the movie, under hypnosis by Sigmund Freud, do we discover that in truth, Mr. Moriarity was Sherlock's hopelessly mundane math teacher, who happened to be having an affair with Holmes' mother and escaped when Holmes' father murdered her (with the young Sherlock looking on). This event in his youth apparently traumatized Holmes to such an extent, he was eventually driven to using drugs to eradicate it from his memory. And pursuing the mythical genius of crime--instead of holding his father or his mother to account.
I submit to you that this is exactly the same process going on now in the minds of many of the Bush Haters. They want desperately to forget that there is a tidal wave of terror reverberating around the world and to pretend that everything is America and Bush's fault. So what do they do? They lionize terrorists like Arafat. They explain away the horror and brutality of Zarqawi and his followers. They support Palestinian suicide bombings and vote for resolutions against Israel. They believe that Osama is a reasonable person, but that Bush is not. They threaten violence toward Bush and hold demonstrations; and implement Sharia Law in their country without a qualm. Hundreds of their fellow countrymen are murdered by terrorists, but they demand that their troops be pulled out of Iraq (thinking that if they hadn't cooperated with the evil BushHitler, their countrymen would have been spared).
Rather than blame the terrorists; rather than admitting they have to take action against them; their fear is transformed to anger and displaced onto President Bush. If everything is his fault, then the reality of what happened does not have to be faced (this also explains the intense psychological denial that these same individuals tend to have about 9/11). Bush thus becomes the "criminal mastermind", so devious, so evil, that everything he says is a "lie", everything he does is part of a vast global conspiracy. His family has intimate ties to Bin Laden and the Saudis; He is trying to avenge the insult to his father by getting rid of Saddam; He plans world domination etc. etc. I could go on an on, but you get the point.
What is most funny is that these psychologically naive individuals simultaneously think of Bush as this criminal mastermind, a genius of evil; and also as a complete moron who isn't capable of uttering a sentence without making a hash of it. The cognitive dissonance required to have all these contradictory beliefs swirling around in one's brain is astonishing. But besides the primary function it serves to erase from consciousness what is happening in the world today, it is serving a secondary purpose--it makes them feel in control of what might come.
They can predict with the complete accuracy of the delusional mind that whatever happens--whatever horror is unleased by Al Qaeda or Hamas or Islamic Jihad--was caused by President Bush's actions/inactions/intentions (take your pick). They can conduct a brave protest march against the evil Bush...but clearly they don't dare protest real terror or terrorist acts. The terrorists are simply poor, misunderstood individuals who have been oppressed by...Bush. Get rid of Bush (or America; or Israel) and voila! Problem solved!
BDS taken to the highest levels of irrationality:
(From the Urban Dictionary) .... Bush Derangement Syndrome (or BDS) is a loss of the capability for rational thought. This loss is often displayed over a period of hours, days or even months and years. The sufferer in all cases blames President George W. Bush for any and all types of disasters, human maladies, etc. despite abundant evidence of contrary causal effects. BDS is also manifested in many sufferers by a determination to label President Bush as the greatest single threat to democracy and freedom in the United States since the passage of the Alien and Sedition Acts during the presidency of John Adams. Also, closely related, see Karl Rove Syndrome (KRS).
Examples:
A person who refuses to remove the Kerry / Edwards bumper sticker from his / her car, believing that keeping such sticker will in some way alter the results of the 2004 election. This is the most common example of Bush Derangement Syndrome - especially in Blue states.
In close relation to the above example, a person who from time to time will comment that Al Gore was really elected in 2000 despite the fact that however anachronistic, the results of the Electoral College determines the result of presidential elections, not the results of the popular vote.
And in yet another related area, any person who insists that in 2000 that voter irregularity in Florida gave that state to Bush and /or in 2004 that voting machines in Ohio were tampered with by the RNC, again to throw the last, critical state over into the Red column.
A person who resolutely insists that hurricane damage is controlled from the White House and is routinely directed towards areas of lower income / high minority population.
Persons who routinely use terms such as "dictator", "fascist", "monarchy" or "Generalissimo" when discussing George W. Bush.
Persons who never had any problem with former President Bill Clinton attending Sunday worship services with Bible in hand, but who see in George W. Bush the man who would be Grand Mufti of the USA.
and ....
Symptoms of Bush Derangement Syndrome include: 1. Believing that Bush caused Hurricane Katrina. 2. Believing that Bush was behind 9-11. 3. Calling Bush stupid despite the fact that he has degrees from Harvard and Yale and is a trained fighter pilot.
Why offer a B.D.S. Brigade blog roll?
A. To reveal the displaced frustrations and irrational associations which some people make to mask their inability to accept reality.
B. To reveal the very nature of the "blame game" and those who play it.
C. To do so with fact(s) and (when possible) humor.
3. Notify me at jww2006 at gmail dot com when you have the image/code posted and I will add you to the blogroll! Remember to tell me your blog link!
You may also copy this icon and use it freely when you wish to "alert" your readers to a BDS incident. If you read this blog regularly, you'll be seeing it!
This is a realistic scenario of how government-controlled health care will work if liberals (especially Hilly Clinton) gain control of national health care legislation.
Two patients limp into two different Canadian medical clinics with the same complaint. Both have trouble walking and appear to require a hip replacement. The first patient is examined within the hour, is x-rayed the same day and is scheduled for surgery the following week.
The second patient sees his family doctor after waiting a week for an appointment, then waits eighteen weeks to see a Specialist, then gets an x- ray which isn't reviewed for another month -- and finally has his surgery scheduled "within the next year."
Why the different treatment for the two patients?
The first patient is a Golden Retriever; the second patient is an elderly man.
"Whatever?" WHATEVER? Bill Maher (with prettyboy-puppet Ben Affleck on his knee) is taken to task and intellectually whipped on his own show and all he can stammer is, "whatever???"
Those following YouTube's purging of anything-but-the-comedic-and-inane videos (and who aren't impressed by the over-statement, lies and/or hype of Bill Maher or Ben Affleck) should watch THIS video.
What a hoot -- a guest who has Maher and Affleck stumbling and mumbling ....
Danielle Pletka is the vice president for foreign and defense policy studies at AEI. Her research areas include the Middle East, South Asia, terrorism, and weapons proliferation. While at AEI, Ms. Pletka has developed a conference series on rebuilding post-Saddam Iraq and a project on democracy in the Arab world. She recently served as a member of the congressionally-mandated Task Force on the United Nations, established by the United States Institute of Peace. Before coming to AEI, she served for ten years as a senior professional staff member for the Near East and South Asia on the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.
It must be terrible to be upstaged and outclassed by a conservative woman.
If the Party of *BDS wins next month, Americans are in for a bad season. And for good reason.
* Bush Derangement Syndrome "BDS: The acute onset of paranoia in otherwise normal people in reaction to the policies, the presidency -- nay -- the very existence of George W. Bush."
Our economy is booming. The job market is the lowest it has been in years. National Debt has been reduced. There is progress in the fight against terrorism. Gas prices are way down. Our nation is more secure than it has ever been.
What's gone wrong?
Two fundamental, precipitating phenomena, in my humble opinion:
1) The Bush Derangement Syndrome has finally seeped through to middle-America.
While liberal media and talking heads have harped headlines and sound-bytes on the foibles of Foley-gate and Abramoff-gate (nevermind that these gates swing both ways), the party of hype and histrionics has dominated the media and the Internet. "Blame Bush" has also been the undertone from both sides of the aisle.
Can Bush awaken the nation during the next three weeks?
Yes, if he is allowed to focus on issues and rattle a few cages.
2) Americans FEEL secure. With security comes complacency. With complacency, comes low voter turn-out.
Low voter turn-out means that hype and histrionics will prevail.
Complacency at the ballot box also results in political laissez-faire, which, under the guise of band-aid diplomacy, has historically provided a fertile field for liberals to AGAIN front secret deals at taxpayers' expense and to AGAIN trade critical security secrets to appease our sworn enemies.
Think North Korea and Iran .... Think Clinton and his "secret deals" with China and Russia. Think Carter and his love-fest with North Korea and Chavez. Think Sandy Berger stuffing national security documents into his undies.
Think February 26, 1993.
Remember September 11, 2001.
I can't imagine an America that would vote for a party or congressional leadership that has YET to visit or commemorate the six victims of the first WTC attack in 1993: A terrorist attack that included unexploded biochemical weapons (which may be why Clinton did not visit the site) and a homemade 1,500-pound bomb that badly damaged the tower's inner support beams and caused $500 million in property damage. Yet the twin towers were repaired, cleaned, and reopened in less than a month .....
Amazingly, an MSM that devoted gallons of ink and immeasurable air-time to a forged document to discredit George Bush and HIS responsibility for 9/11/01 -- never investigated the responsibility of the Clinton administration or a correlation between the collapse of the WTC towers on 9/11/01 and the damages done to the structural integrity of the towers on 2/26/93 -- during the Clinton administration.
In addition -- I hold MSM responsible for feeding a growing anti-war frenzy; yet, neither the MSM nor its constituent Party of BDS have shared any viable suggestions (beyond the ole "cut and run" partisan puke) for how and when.
If the Party of BDS, the Party of Hype and Histrionics, wins in November -- we can blame ourselves for our own complacency.
And our inevitable self-destruction.
Vote, America. Have the foresight and resolve to vote.
With a war going on in Iraq and with Iran next door moving steadily toward a nuclear bomb that could change the course of world history in the hands of international terrorists, the question for this year's elections is not whether you or your candidate is a Democrat or a Republican but whether you are serious or frivolous.
That question also needs to be asked about the media. In these grim and foreboding times, our media have this year spent incredible amounts of time on a hunting accident involving Vice President Cheney, a bogus claim that the administration revealed Valerie Plame's identity as a C.I.A. "agent" -- actually a desk job in Virginia -- and is now going ballistic over a Congressman who sent raunchy e-mails to Congressional pages.
This is the frivolous media -- and the biased media. Republican Congressman Foley was wrong and is out on his ear. But Democrats in both Congress and the White House have gone far beyond words with a page and an intern. Yet the Democrats did not resign and Bill Clinton's perjury, obstruction of justice, and suborning of perjury by others were treated as if these were irrelevant private matters.
Even when serious issues are addressed, they can be addressed either seriously or frivolously. If you are content to see life and death issues of war and peace addressed with catch phrases like "chicken hawk" or to see a coalition of nations around the world fighting terrorism referred to as "unilateral" U.S. action because France does not go along, then you are content with frivolity.
You may deserve whatever you get if you vote frivolously in this year's election. But surely the next generation, which has no vote, deserves better.
Weak-kneed members of both parties have been calling for a timetable to be announced for withdrawal from Iraq. No other war in thousands of years of history has ever had such a timetable announced to their enemies. Even if we intended to get out by a given date, there is not the slightest reason to tell the terrorists that. It is frivolous politics at its worst.
There has never been any reason to doubt that American troops will be removed from Iraq. They were removed after the first Gulf War. Before that, they were removed from Grenada and from other Western Hemisphere countries throughout the 20th century. Millions of American troops were removed from Europe after World War II.
Why should there be the slightest doubt that they will be removed from Iraq? The only question is whether you can run a war on a timetable like a railroad and whether you need to announce your plans to your enemies.
All this rhetoric about a withdrawal timetable is based on trying to make political hay out of the fact that the Iraq war is unpopular. But all wars have been unpopular with Americans, as they should be.
Even World War II, won by "the greatest generation," was never popular, though the home front was united behind the troops a lot better than today. The last shot of that war had barely been sounded before the cry arose to bring our boys back home. The exuberant celebrations across this country when World War II ended showed that we weren't looking for more war or more conquests. We weren't even trying to hold on to all the territory we had conquered. There has probably never been a time in history when a military force in the millions was disbanded so quickly. Even after the first Gulf War, with its quick success and low casualties, the biggest ovation that the first President Bush got when he addressed Congress afterwards was when he announced that our troops would start coming back home. Those who discuss the current war in terms of frivolous talking points make a big deal out of the fact we have been in this war longer than in World War II. But, if we are serious, we would know that it is not the duration of a war that is crucial. It is how many lives it costs. More than twice as many Marines were killed taking one island in the Pacific during World War II than all the Americans killed in the four years of the Iraq war. More Americans were killed in one day during the Civil War. If we are going to discuss war, the least we can do is be serious.
If the vote next month focuses on the frivolous -- we will deserve what we get.
On Oct. 8, I posted Reaffirming US-Japan Accords, referencing the need to validate agreements which have evolved for approximately 60 years.
I had no idea those Accords would be tested so quickly.
What I did know was that we have pledged to defend both South Korea and Japan in the event they are attacked by other nations.
On the diplomatic front, we have literally dragged our mighty feet in confronting (albeit enabling proliferation during the Clinton era) Korea's development of nuclear weapons.
We now have a deceitful, irrational madman -- who we (ala Clinton) provided with nuclear reactors for non-military use -- in possession of a weapon of mass destruction.
Is the world going to wait until this madman either launches an attack on another country or shares his nuclear weaponry with another madman?
Kim Jong Il has already thumbed his nose at the prospect of U.N. sanctions.
Will Russia, France and China actually honor sanctions against Korea? They were deceitful in honoring sanctions against Saddam. They failed to intervene in either Syria or Iran -- why should they be trusted now? What effect would an air or sea blockade around Korea actually have when they share borders with China and Russia?
China is the key, but will China assume a responsible role in curtailing the Korean threat?
The U.S. must act quickly.
While this is not the ideal option, I anticipate that the only true deterrent to the proliferation of nuclear weapons among irrational nations is to inform our faux-friends in China and Russia that IF they don't intercede in Korea, we will make these weapons available to our reputable Asian-Pacific allies: Japan, Taiwan, Australia and South Korea.
It's time to call Congress back to Washington, Mr. President. Our nation needs a unified front in addressing this critical issue.
One key to bringing our troops home: Cut the hype and partisan rhetoric; allow Iraq to determine its own form of government.
Although government officials have delayed official discussions on federalizing Iraq's provinces into 3-4 aligned Iraqi states, political discourse is moving in that direction.
Critical to this decision will be a centralized, representative government which assures control (with equitable distribution of services and profits) from Iraq's greatest resource: oil.
Recently, Sunni tribal leaders united to form the equivalence of three infantry divisions (30,000 fighters) to combat insurgents and terrorists along the Syrian border.
The immediate impact? Over 80% of the al-Anbar region has now joined Iraqi government forces in confronting al Qaeda. A significant gain for Iraqi and coalition forces is that they are now joined by fighters who know the local terrain. The long-term effect? The region will receive critical government services administered by a more secular Shia-dominated government in Baghdad.
Most importantly, Shia and Sunni Iraqis have crossed ethno-religious barriers for a common cause.
And the third ethno-religious group located in northern Iraq, the Kurds?
Therein may lie the key to Iraq's nationalization.
The dark and light green areas in the map to the left indicate oilfields, pipelines and refineries in Iraq.
There are practical and political reasons underlying Kurdish cautions in fully accepting nationalization.
The Kurdish north has enjoyed self-rule and self-defense for 15 years -- enabling the region to escape Saddam's continuous domination experienced by other regions. The Kurdish North consists of two distinct zones, which, prior to 1998, were engaged in a civil war for control of the region. At the heart of this dispute was and continues to be control of Kirkuk, a city "Arabized" by the discovery of oil in the 1930's and by Saddam's "Anfal operation" in the early 1990's when approximately 250,000 Kurds were massacred.
The city of Kurkirk, once a prominent Kurdish city, is located on approximately 15-20 percent of Iraq's vast oil reserves. The area could produce as much as 800,000 barrels of oil a day.
While supporting Iraqi nationalization, the Kurds insist that their autonomy be protected. Why? Were the Kurds to secede from Iraq, they would need these oil revenues to sustain their independence.
"Without oil revenues of their own (as opposed to oil revenues earmarked for them by the central government) the Kurds' room for maneuvering would diminish appreciably. Kurdistan's neighbors – Turkey, Iran and Syria – concerned about the effects an independent Kurdistan would have on their own Kurdish populations, oppose the Iraqi Kurds having control of these oil revenues. In the eyes of an Iraqi, the controversy over Kirkuk has to do with its oil: 'Oil alone is the reason for the Kurdish insistence, Arab refusal, Turkmen protests and the regional austerity. If Kirkuk were not an oil city we would not have heard all the historical and geographical arguments from all sides.'"
The Kurds could (and likely will) negotiate with the central government an agreement that would guarantee them a reasonable percentage of oil revenues. Their concern is that such an agreement would make them dependent on political forces that could turn against them as was done in the past .....
To alleviate part of this caution, the Iraqi Constitution (Article 58) addresses the ethnic cleansing that occurred in Kirkuk:
Restore the original residents to their homes and property
Compensate those who were introduced to specific regions [e.g., Arabs in Kurdistan] and resettle them in or near the district from which they came
Provide compensation for those who lost their jobs by being forced to emigrate
Allow individuals to determine their own national identity and ethnic affiliation free from coercion and duress [again, this applies primarily to Kurds who were forced to declare themselves as Arabs for the purpose of population census]
What about the other two major ethno-religious groups? The Sunni and the Shia?
"Many Shiite (Shia) leaders – some allegedly encouraged by neighboring Iran – also want to split ... their area in central and south Iraq, which holds holy Shi'ite shrines and pilgrimage sites as well as rich oil fields. Sunnis, who prospered under Saddam Hussein's ousted regime while their neighbors suffered his repression, are more attached to the idea of a strongly centralised Iraq which would guarantee their rights as a minority."
Will federalization work in Iraq? Yes. The solution, however, will not be crafted on the battlefield. The solution will be found through discourse, negotiation and ethno-religious concessions. Will federalization be achieved in a timely fashion? Yes. But it cannot be mandated or measured by Western timelines. After all -- it took the United States 200 years to achieve our fundamental structure.
What is timely, however, is that our President begin to expound in detail the constitutional process and political achievements evolving in Iraq -- while concurrently exemplifying a successful War on Terrorism as a conduit for Iraq's road to peaceful co-existence -- nationally and internationally.
We've already piqued Europe's critical eye by recent economic accords with Japan .... Russia, and especially China, have long invaded Japan's maritime boundaries to search for oil reserves.
It is time to publicly announce our reliance on Japan as a primary co-negotiator with North Korea, in the Middle East AND beyond.
Why? One reason is that "Toshiba has become the dominant force in nuclear reactor construction worldwide. The firm currently holds a 35% market share in Japan. Its controlling stake of Westinghouse Electric will now give it a 28% share in the global market. Investors who fear that the recent slide in the price of oil will be short-lived, who are perhaps inspired by China's plans to build as many as 40 nuclear reactors over the next 15 years, might want to give Toshiba a serious look as one of the few 'alternative energy' plays that we know can actually work."
It is not a coincidence that Japan recently visited China and will visit South Korea in the immediate future.
It would also boost both the US and Japan's interests to re-affirm our agreement to support/defend Japan militarily if needed -- in exchange for continued strategic placement of our defense systems.
As important -- a public re-affirmation by President Bush would certainly divert current pre-election attention toward a region of critical concern.
Ben Stein can either jolt you with his humor or his perspective. Today, it's his perspective:
... in a world where 3,000 women and children are raped and/or murdered every day in Congo, a member of the United Nations, in which a genuine genocide is going on in Sudan, a member of the United Nations, in which more than fifty men and women per day are being tortured with electric drills and murdered in Iraq, in which two of the world's most dangerous and insane men, Kim Jong Il and Mohammed Ahmadinejad, are developing nuclear weapons, the e-mail of one deranged middle class white man does not really count to me as much as it might to some other people.
......
We do not devote more than a few instants each month to the rape and murder in Congo. We barely notice the rape and genocide in Darfur. No one on earth except George W. Bush and John Bolton and Condoleezza Rice is trying to stop two maniacs from acquiring nuclear weapons even though one of them has promised to wipe out Israel if he gets them. But we can devote 24 hours a day, day after day, to the e-mails of one nutty Member of Congress to a teenage boy.
A country with its priorities so out of whack does not deserve to be the world's shining city on a hill. Let's take a moment, pray for guidance, turn Mr. Foley over to the proper mental health authorities, and try to, as the moral exemplar of the world, use every bit of strength we have to stop the slaughter of the innocents now and in the future. Mark Foley is important, but to me, he's no more important than those teenage girls in Congo who get raped, have their arms chopped off, and then are murdered...and there are a lot of them. Let's get our priorities straight.
SUB-TITLE I: Don't let your kids grow up to be politicians. Or pundits. Or pages. Or punsters, for that matter.
SUB-TITLE II: Somebody Oughta Write a(nother) Book. Or as Nancy Pelosi's friend was supposedly doing -- script it like a B-grade movie!
Frankly, I'm far *too old to be electronically-stimulated by repulsive IMs between some latent-to-active homo-savvy page-boy and a power-pandering peccadillic poliwag.
*Euphemism for totally uninterested in some old-enough-to-know-what-he-was-doing political operative's edited exposè of an Over-the-Hill [pun intended] homosexual hag.
For those who want to read REAL "page" sex -- flip through that dog-eared paperback classic of yester-year:
Save this image on your computer and add it in your sidebar. Link it 
and use it freely when you wish to "alert" your readers to a BDS incident. If you read this blog regularly, you'll be seeing it!
to 
If the Party of *BDS wins next month, Americans are in for a bad season. And for good reason. 
Will Russia, France and China actually honor sanctions against Korea? They were deceitful in honoring sanctions against Saddam. They failed to intervene in either Syria or Iran -- why should they be trusted now? What effect would an air or sea blockade around Korea actually have when they share borders with China and Russia?
Although government officials have delayed official discussions on federalizing Iraq's provinces into 3-4 aligned Iraqi states, political discourse is moving in that direction. 
The US-Japan Accords: Remember them? 
I'm far *too old to be electronically-stimulated by repulsive IMs between some latent-to-active homo-savvy page-boy and a power-pandering peccadillic poliwag. 