Light Blogging Yesterday

All I did yesterday was drive around and read magazines in doctors' offices in two states.

Tuesday evening, Mrs. G complained of a sore throat. She rarely gets colds or the flu and she took some ibus and Theraflu and forgot about it.

It wasn't any better on Wednesday so she sent me out for the ingredients for a couple of her favorite folk remedies, which I suspect are vaguely Celtic, maybe Boston Celtic, as she mentioned "holy stick" and some guy named "Homey O'Pathic". Anyway, I found out you have to ask for them at the health food store because they don't keep them out where you can see them, but you can get organic Eye Of Newt and Toe Of Frog. Other stuff too. She put on a funny hat and mumbled something while she mixed it up:

"Eye of newt, and toe of frog,
Wool of bat, and tongue of dog,
Adder's fork, and blind-worm's sting,
Lizard's leg, and howlet's wing,--
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble."

Didn't smell very good either.

Didn't work either.

She suffered through Thursday. She was just plain fuckin' miserable, and Friday morning she had me call the doctor for her because her throat was all swollen up and she couldn't talk.

They got her right in on a walk-in basis and diagnosed a tonsil infection, which we had both considered but didn't want to think about. They called up an ear, nose, & throat guy in Reno for her, my ol' nurse buddy Air Force Molly shot her up with steroids and off we went.

Update:

Mrs. G just came in doing curls with 5lb weights. I'm not kidding. She says she'll kill me if I mention shrinkage of her...

Note: Nurse Molly did 20 in the Air Force. She says givin' shots to civilians ain't near as much fun as givin' AF weenies assloads of penicillin with the square needle for ailments nowhere near the tonsils. Heh.

We got a little concerned when the ENT's office in Reno was in the Surgery Center of Reno, but in for a dime, in for a dollar. I thought for sure she was gonna have to have 'em out and maybe spend a night in the hospital, but luck was with us.

The ear, nose, & throat guy turned out to be a 6ft. tall redhead with big shoulders and build to match whom I instantly dubbed "Xena, the Warrior Otorhinolaryngologist". Awesome!

The doc did a procedure on Mrs. G involving a laser, a length of hose, and a drain pan. Except for the laser it bore an incredible resemblance to draining a flooded sump on a motorcycle. I was spared the gory details because the medical personnel, all women, convinced me that no mere man could possibly survive what was about to happen and would certainly pass out and convinced me to leave the room.

I'm glad they did. Mrs. G told me it was fucking gross.

She walked outta there feeling a lot better. I dropped her and the dogs, who had been in the truck for about five hours without relief but never complained, off at home and sped to the pharmacy at Safeway. Well, I sped to Safeway. Getting to the pharmacy at the back of the store through a milling herd of Friday afternoon out-of-towners was something else. I put on my Marine face and assaulted toward the rear of the store. If I pissed anybody off, they didn't say anything. I was focused in and wouldn'ta heard 'em anyway. I don't remember actually runnin' over anything.

I got 170 bucks worth of antibiotic and painkiller for 20 bucks, thank you Part D/Medicare Advantage/whatever, picked up an enchilada plate at El Rinconcito and a vanilla shake at DQ for Mrs. G and headed home.

Did I mention that neither of us had anything to eat yesterday until 5PM? My whole day was fueled by ONE cup of coffee. Mrs. G didn't even have that, which actually worked to her advantage when it came to slicing her tonsils open.

She ate half her enchilada plate followed by her antibiotic and her painkiller and was out like a light. She just snored gently, kinda like an outboard idling at the dock, so I knew she was OK. She had had quite a day and I was glad she was getting some rest. I had to wake her up to get her to go to bed.

She woke up this morning as chipper as ever, all things considered, made breakfast*, and all's right with the world. She's quite sturdy of mind and body and will be fine soon. Thank you, Jesus.

*I did the cooking while she was under the weather. My cooking violates not only the Geneva Convention, but conventional morality in that I would expect other people than myself to actually eat the swill. I'm always glad when nobody dies.

And how was your day?

Newly Elected RNC Chair

Here. Why?

Note to Left Blogtopia: If we ain't callin' this guy "Rancid Prybar" we're blowin' it. Heh.

Update:

Eschaton

I am tickled by the observation, from esteemed Atriot Jeffraham Prestonian in the comments earlier, that removing the vowels from Reince Priebus leaves the utterly appropriate acronym "RNC PR BS."

Heh indeedy.

Heh indeedy!

Be Careful, BuzzFlash

Yer steppin' on my Marine role models. This is close to desecration!

New terms ...

This goes along with my last post:

Stochastic terrorism is the use of mass communications to stir up random lone wolves to carry out violent or terrorist acts that are statistically predictable but individually unpredictable.

This is what occurs when Bin Laden releases a video that stirs random extremists halfway around the globe to commit a bombing or shooting.

This is also the term for what Beck, O'Reilly, Hannity, and others do. And this is what led directly and predictably to a number of cases of ideologically-motivated murder similar to the Tucson shootings.

All these "hate-talkers" are underwritten by corporate interests (whomever owns the network they appear on) not just for the profits from advertisers on these programs but also from perpetuating, and deepening, the ideological divide in this country to produce a stagnant, inefficient government only capable of controlling the masses. As I said below, a divided (and ignorant) republic only serves to keep our attention off the fact that the rich and the corporations are taking us (and by "us" I mean all of us, "red" or "blue", who used to be known as the middle-class) for all we're worth.

A look at reality ...

[A big welcome to Avedon's readers - F]

I think this is about as honest read on today's state of affairs as there could be.

We have reached a pivotal moment in government and politics, and it feels like the last, groaning spasms of New Deal liberalism. When the party of activist government, faced with an epic crisis, will not use government's extensive powers to reverse the economic disorders and heal deepening social deterioration, then it must be the end of the line for the governing ideology inherited from Roosevelt, Truman and Johnson.

...

I've been thinking for a while now that we're at a point where we need something different, that this two-party system we have is no longer operative in light of all the societal and economic changes occurring in the last 40 years. I don't consider myself smart enough to know what it is but it seems to me our current system resembles a carburetor in the age of fuel injection.

...

Reformers today face conditions similar to what the Populists and Progressives faced: monopoly capitalism, a labor movement suppressed with government's direct assistance, Wall Street's "money trust" on top, the corporate state feeding off government while ignoring immoral social conditions. The working class, meanwhile, is regaining its identity, as millions are being dispossessed of middle-class status while millions of others struggle at the bottom. Working people are poised to become the new center of a reinvigorated democracy, though it is not clear at this stage whether they will side with the left or the right. Understanding all these forces can lead to the new governing agenda society desperately needs.

...

I firmly believe the change some of us hoped might happen when Obama was elected will come, though at this point I believe things in this country will have to get a lot worse before anything affects the status quo.

The corporatists who co-opt both parties have taken a divide and conquer stance toward the American people. The deep partisan ideological chasm that exists today is no accident, coincidence, or natural evolution of society. My gut tells me that if the "blue/red" line wasn't so severe, if the acrimony weren't so violent and entrenched, both sides would see how we are being used by interests that transcend national borders; for whom borders are nothing but a speed bump in their quest to make government nothing more than a way to control the proles.

Make time to read this today.

Great thanks to A Tiny Revolution for the link.

This is what bugs me ...

About Obama. Greenwald:

...

I've heard a lot of twisted reasoning employed to defend the full-scale immunity which Obama has vested in Bush officials for their chronic lawbreaking. But I doubt even Robert Gibbs would be willing to stand up in public and call it "courageous." Obama's decision to protect Bush-era crimes from accountability earned him the praise of conservatives, the gratitude of leading Democratic officials (petrified that their own culpability would be exposed), and the virtually unanimous support of the entire establishment media class. Initiating investigations and prosecutions of Bush-era crimes would have required substantial political courage; by contrast, blocking all such accountability was the easiest, most cowardly route, as it's what all of official Washington was demanding. That's the path Obama took.

...

That's when I knew ("we must look forward, not backward") he was just another of those looking to keep the status quo. Not showing any accountability for our crimes during the Bush administration showed the true hypocrisy of "American values". As Bush did after September 11th, Obama squandered the opportunity to polish the American brand once he was elected. He talked a great line everywhere he went, but when it came time for action, when others watched to see if we'd admit any type of wrongdoing by investigating at the least, Obama did nothing.

We had the chance to show we believed in the phrases we bandy about so frequently, "Rule of Law" especially, but once again we showed what everyone has come to expect from a hollow, shallow, superficial society. We are no better than any other tin horn dictatorship. Nobody pays except the little guy.

...

What's most extraordinary about this, of course, is that this is exactly the form of elite immunity we were not supposed to have. In fact, this is what the Founders waged a war to emancipate themselves from. As Thomas Jefferson put it in an April 16, 1784, letter to George Washington, the foundation on which any constitution must rest is "the denial of every preeminence but that annexed to legal office." Even the executive-power-revering Hamilton in Federalist 71 argued: "the fundamental principles of good government" require that even the President "be subordinate to the laws." "Law" simply makes no sense, and has no good function, unless all are subordinate to its dictates. [em in orig]

...

Refusal to hold those accountable who committed crimes in our name (regardless of party affiliation) makes Obama not only culpable but an accessory.

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

It's always good to hear this one.

Emmylou Harris ~ The Boxer

Thanks to masa777hokkaido, Japan.

He might be a loon ...

But he's undoubtedly a right wing loon:

What was going on in Jared Loughner's mind? Based on his online rantings, the man who allegedly emptied a 31-round clip into Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and dozens of bystanders Saturday was preoccupied with theories on a massive government fraud. Many of his seemingly random statements—on "grammar," "the ratifications," "the new currency," and more—echo the teachings of the "sovereign citizen" movement, a right-wing school of thought alleging that Americans have been surreptitiously stripped of their God-given rights.

...

The "sovereigns" have one thing right, we have been stripped of our rights, but it was done by an Act of Congress. Not a damn thing surreptitious about it.

Great thanks to Pensito Review for the MJ link.

A little more hypocrisy please ...

The Republicans can't manage their own money and they want to manage ours? The party of "fiscal responsibility"? Yeah, right:

Whoever wins the RNC chairmanship tomorrow will inherit a committee deeply in debt. According to Reid Wilson of The Hotline, the party faces more than $21.8 million in outstanding debt as of the end of 2010.

But in an ironic twist, the RNC basically raised its own debt ceiling. The committee was scheduled to make a $5 million payment on its debt by the end of February, but has been granted a significant reprieve.

...

Tomorrow you'll find out who the "fiscally responsible" replacement to Michael "Wut Up" Steele is.

Yeah, that"s about right ...

Jill:

Now let me see if I have the twisted Teabagger mindset straight: In Teabag America, Sarah Palin and Rush Limbaugh are victims because people say their rhetoric is unnecessarily inflammatory, but Gabrielle Giffords had it coming:

...

They Gave Us A Republic:

...

Conservatives live in like-minded communities -- either geographically or in those Fox Nation-like exclusive conservative communities on the radio and cable dial. These are places where everyone not only knows your name but also thinks exactly as you do. And so when everyone they know thinks of liberals and the President as being "American-hating traitors," then such beliefs aren't hatefulness or even "politics" at all. They are common sense and conventional wisdom.

...

They know they're right and nothing thinking people do can change their minds. There is no compromise with these people because they see compromise as giving in to subversives who want to upset "the way things have always been" and "destroy the nation". It's why I have little hope this country can overcome what ails us.

Update:

Digby.

Update Zwei:

Dr. Attaturk (Podiatrist to the Stars).

And just a note to conservative Jews: The conservatives look at you like they do Michael Steele. You serve a purpose and the day you stop serving that purpose, you will be vilified as well.

Update Trois:

This doesn't help:

...

As to why it exists, well, I merely speculate, but from poking around their site, I think their gig is this. Suppose you have home-schooled your advanced blastocyst in the best evangelical wingnut way, to the age of 18. And suppose you recognize that no matter how much you would like to pray otherwise, your advanced blastocyst, age 18, is an absolute lettuce.

Dumb as a box of Bibles. A cretin by Sarah Palin standards. A doorstop. A rock.

...

Solution! The Rivendell Sanctuary offers for a fee a place to deposit wingnut lettuce-children so that they might be subject to some form of vegetable processing, as per for example what is done with freeze-dried potatoes. You think I'm kidding...

Exceptionalism ...

D-cap has an excellent post up looking at the state of our Union:

...

In just about ever[y] statistic that is measured, we are below average when compared to the rest of the world. The only place we come out as leaders of the pack are in military might and waging war - and even those two have not had a good ride as of late. Look at the state of education, health care, savings, tolerance, happiness, poverty, and manufacturing in this country - nothing we do anymore screams innovation or leadership. All it screams is how much money can it make for the investor class. The politicians can rile up the crowds with American exceptionalism all they want - all the facts prove they are wrong.

...

USA! USA!

America in the 21st Century has become the land of delusional idiots.

Three Queens ...

No, it's not Gay Pride Day in NYC. Cunard Line's three Queens (Mary, Victoria, Elizabeth) met in New York yesterday and the city threw them a big send-off.

If you see fireworks over New York Harbor this evening, don’t be alarmed. The pyrotechnics display is for the Cunard Royal Rendezvous, a gathering of the cruise line’s three Queens—Victoria, Elizabeth, and Mary 2—at the Statue of Liberty...

Rep. Harper: "We Hunt Liberal, Tree-Hugging Democrats"

Political Correction

POLITICO: What in the world does the Congressional Sportsmen's Caucus do?

HARPER: We hunt liberal, tree-hugging Democrats, although it does seem like a waste of good ammunition.

Bring it, Harpo. Hugging a tree makes for a damn steady sight picture.

Sometimes I feel more like a Marine than a kumbaya liberal. Somebody has to.

Dog Whistle for Prayer Warriors - Palin as Victim of Blood Libel

Interesting. Creepy. In two parts. Many links.

Talk To Action

Palin's use of the term "blood libel" has caused a furor for reasons described in Chip Berlet's article. Journalists have speculated whether use of the term was inadvertent, with one writer stating that because Palin is from Alaska, she is "oblivious to the sensitivities and political correctness" of the lower 48. Palin knows her base and its sensitivities. Some of her supporters believe themselves to be the most persecuted and oppressed minority in American history. Their media warns that Christian patriots are the new Jews, headed for a holocaust at the hands of a "dangerous Marxist/Leftist/Homosexual/Islamic coalition." In a video titled "Marxism in America," (Ret.) Lt. Gen. William Boykin warns that Obama and his brown shirts (planned in the healthcare bill) are leading to an authoritarian state. The video was promoted on numerous Tea Party websites prior to the election. Militant imagery has become commonplace, including "spiritual mapping" featuring marked targets showing the location of demons which must be eliminated from communities. (More on this in Part Two.)

The underlying and growing anti-Semitism in these narratives has been evident for years to anyone who bothers to look at the books and videos being marketed to millions in the prophecy/conspiracy genre. The message is often camouflaged in Christian Zionist "pro-Israel" sentiments and many Jewish leaders have decided to look the other way. In these prophecy narratives all other religions are brutally destroyed, but there is a particular fixation on the humiliation and destruction of Judaism. Those promoting these narratives do not see them as anti-Semitic since they are convinced that they will save many Jews from eternal damnation.

Shorter: they feel they have to burn the village in order to save it.

From Part Two:

In Alaska the New Apostolic Reformation or "apostolic and prophetic" movement and the organizing of prayer warriors was spearheaded by Apostle Mary Glazier. Glazier spoke at a national convention about Palin joining her group at the age of 24 and Glazier continued to meet with Palin through the 2008 election, as confirmed by Charisma magazine.

Apostles and prophets throughout the movement celebrated Palin as having been "anointed" by God. This included a prophecy disseminated internationally by Glazier which was supposedly a vision indicating that Palin would take on the mantle of leadership after a death, presumably John McCain's.

I think I mentioned somewhere some time back that McCain would have been dead or committed by now had he been elected.

In addition to mapping and prayer warfare, apostles will often anoint the location with oil or plant a bible in the ground. Most of the spiritual mapping that I've seen also targets other religions including Hindu, Buddhist, and Islamic houses of worship. Tolerance of others, such as homosexuals and those of other religions, is not considered a virtue but a failure to fight evil. Palin's quote from today's speech "...we certainly must not be deterred by those who embrace evil and call it good" is a common refrain which attacks liberals as supporting evil in the guise of tolerance and acceptance.

Scary shit. I think I'd rather face a platoon of zombies armed only with a salt shaker than these zealots.

Headline of the Day

DeLay Blames Liberal Jury For Conviction (VIDEO)

Well of course he does, but he says it like it's a bad thing. Heh.

Cry me a river ...

The Bugman's whining "those nasty libruls did it".

Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX), who has long argued that his indictment on money laundering charges was politically motivated, said on the "Today Show" this morning that his conviction was political, too.

"I was tried in the most liberal county in the state of Texas and, indeed, in the United States," he said, referring to Travis County, the home of Austin. DeLay and his lawyers had tried to get his trial moved to a different, more conservative county, to no avail. [my em]

...

Shut up, crybaby. You new wife Bubba is waiting for you.

Asking for Decency from an Indecent People

The Rude Pundit on President Obama's Tucson speech:

We are not, though, a nation of the goodhearted people Obama presented us as. We have become a nation where there's so much noise that only the screams get heard. We fall into a couple of camps: in one, the vast majority of the country, the apathetic who have decided that it's all white noise and just want to be left alone while they try to get or keep a job, pay the bills, and live a life that doesn't suck; in the other, that small tincture bottle's worth of Americans who engage, who understand that democracy is a responsibility and not just a term that you might learn for a high school social studies test. And in that bottle, there's the drops of poison, the people who do not seek to better the nation at large, who see only individuals rather than a society, who, in essence, hate the concept of a more perfect union.

Those are the savages. Some of them are elected savages. Some of them are the media savages. Some of them are the kind of savages who anonymously post things on blog or website comment sections because seeing their vileness in print makes it appear like valid discourse. The savages will not be converted.

Too true.

Former Bush speech writer: Blame marijuana for shootings, not gun laws

Fixer, please edit this for me if you spot any mistakes or typos. My vision's a little blurry from bangin' my head on the table.

Raw Story

David Frum, a former speechwriter for President George W. Bush who now works as editor of his own conservative political website, suggested in a recent opinion essay that last weekend's tragic events in Tucson, Arizona remind him of why the US must continue prosecuting the war on drugs -- and in particular, the war on America's marijuana users.

"After horrific shootings, we hear calls for stricter regulation of guns," he wrote. "The Tucson shooting should remind us why we regulate marijuana.

"Jared Lee Loughner, the man held as the Tucson shooter, has been described by those who know as a 'pot smoking loner.' He had two encounters with the law, one for possession of drug paraphernalia."

Smoking weed makes me want to shoot things - it makes me want to shoot Twinkies into my vein.

Note to Frummie: You're a fuckin' idiot.

And just a note ...

President Obama showed more leadership last night in Tucson than he has the last 2 years.

We are a nation ...

Of stupid motherfuckers. (H/T: Fez)