With tears in my eyes, all I can think is “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!”

No other words adequately describe my feelings.

From the philospher Josey Wales, as interpreted by Clint Eastwood

“Now remember, when things look bad and it looks like you’re not gonna make it, then you gotta get mean. I mean plumb, mad-dog mean. ‘Cause if you lose your head and you give up then you neither live nor win. That’s just the way it is.”

I love that movie.

A nice heartwarming video for Christmas – getting a flasher arrested

Viral NYC subway flasher caught – Dickflash.com mourns?
[Via Boing Boing]

Jezebel follows up with the story of the awesome take-no-prisoners attitude of the woman in the video above, who, after being flashed by a creep on the NYC subway, gave him the tongue-lashing of a lifetime, which drew the attention of her fellow passengers and led to the man’s arrest.

[More]

Do not flash New Yorkers on the Subway when cameras are all around. Good for the woman for turning the tables so effectively.

Mon, 17 Nov 2003 02:57:40 GMT

The battle for the soul of the Democratic Party. It is no secret that the Democratic Pary has been… [Daily Kos]

Nader was wrong when he said that there was no difference between the Democrats and Republicans. We see the difference everyday. But he was right if you look at how political machines work. Although many of the reforms in the political process over the last 40 years have been to weaken the nation political machine, it still finds ways to have an influence.

The Reublican machine is easy to see. The RNC and the leaders of this administration prevent anyone from moving forward on a national level without their approval. The DLC, run by Clintonites, perform the same on the Democrats side. If any politician wants acess to the big bucks, they have had to go through these 2 groups.

Until Deam’s campaign. He may not win but he and Trippi have found a way that gets them acccess to large amounts of money in ways that scale very well. His campaign is a threat to the established Democratic leaders.

As the article says, every other campaign is in deep with the DLC. The conventional wisdom was that to become president you had to go through the DLC. I think that is why they were happy with the candidates already there. They figured last year that Bush would not be beatable, so let Leiberman run. He’ll lose but he helped before. this would leave 2008 ready for Hilary, or whomever else the DLC annoited.

But Dean came on and blitzed everyone, WITHOUT needing the DLC. He now has ig unions behind him. He is a threat to the DLC so, not surprisingly, they bring out Clark, hoping to deflate Dean.

The Democrats have always governed by a coalition. The tent is so big. FDR put tpgether a great coalition that lasted 50 years. I think it is about to shift again. I think that the DLC may have to remold itself. It may not happen this election but I think the transition will result in the ouster of many of those now running the Democratic party. I think that if the DLC continues to hold the party’s heart, without moving to the new hill, it will be left with nothing but a memoriy.

Thu, 12 Jun 2003 16:44:15 GMT

Fight, Martha, Fight. William Safire provides an insightful explanation in today’s New York Times why Martha should fight the charges against her. I… [TalkLeft: The Politics of Crime]

Sometimes Safire has it right. Martha is being charged with the Federal crime of standing up for herself, not for perjury, not for insider trading. To say it is a Federal crime for anyone to proclaim their innocence is really twisted. So, if you say nothing, you look guilty and if you stand up at a press conference and say you are innocent, you are guilty. Talk about a Catch-22. This case stinks. But then it appears to be more about intimidation than justice. Sounds pretty typical for the current times.

Thu, 12 Jun 2003 15:59:41 GMT

Looters riddle ancient Iraqi sites with holes [New Scientist]

Wasn’t there a very nice movie about this just recently, called Holes? Art imitating life?

Mon, 26 May 2003 05:14:32 GMT

Richest Could Soon Pay Little or No Taxes. Wall Street Journal: Some Investors Could Trim Their Tax Bills to Near Zero. After Congress gets through with President Bush’s… [Dan Gillmor’s eJournal]

Check out Warren Buffet’s op-ed piece. Buffet is someone I have always listened to. He has always appeared to have a good perspective on the financial world and has made a lot of money for people in ethical ways, in contrast to so many we read about on Wall Street.