I totally forgot to add something to my most recent post. Totally.

I understand that certain elements of the Christo-fascist Zombie Brigades of the Neo-con Death Cult (tm Marc Maron of "Morning Sedition") have decided to beat the "War on Christmas" drum again this year.

Two things.

1) Old Yurp is on the side of the Devil in this case. Try as you might, you will be hard pressed to get a Merry Christmas out of a local on the Yurpeen mainland. Evil.

2) Maybe the Faschos are on to something with this WoC schtick. I was thinking back and recalled that, as a college lecturer and high school teacher, I made a conscious decision to say "have a good break!" and "how was your break?" and suchlike instead of any variation on the words Christmas OR Holidays (and don't get me started on Easter). What's more, I did this solely to avoid encouraging the folks to think of it in terms of religion, because I am an evangelical atheist. Mwuhahahahahahah!

Some parts of western Yurp, as you may know, got a good bit of snow over the last few days. Here is my report from the scene: The good news about driving a Mr Bean-style Mini in heavy snow is that it handles well and gets good traction. The bad news is that it sits *really* low. I gave the middle of the road a light plowing this morning with my front bumper.

In other, only slightly-less-light news, I learned today that a final decision has been made and that Air America Radio's "Morning Sedition" program will soon be dead. That sucks. I really like that show.

I started listening to AAR on its very first day. "M.S." started out a bit slow, to my mind, because there were some chemistry and role-playing issues (the original line up included Sue Ellicot, who left relatively quickly), but it hooked me pretty early on. I also loved (and preferred, I think) "Unfiltered". That got killed a few months ago. It was replaced by Jerry Springer (who I find unlistenable).

I'm not sure what's going on with AAR. I hope they are making these decisions (the ones related to my two favorite shows) based on ratings information to which I'm not privy (and in which I have no real interest). I fear they aren't, though. I also wonder what's going to happen after Franken leaves (assuming he runs for the senate) and Garafalo (who annoys me the more I hear her) acts.

Two odd innovations of late do not bode well. One is that they have you register to listen. Or rather, they did. I've only had to enter my password once (perhaps it remembers my IP address: in the interim I have installed a new browser). The other is that they have started playing "Dueling Banjos", the theme from "Hawaii Five-O", the ballerina song from the 70s (that piano number), the theme from "Chariots of Fire", and other old public domain tunes as filler music when they don't have ads. Even worse, they play the same ads over and over (which, back when I was in the radio business, meant "we ain't makin' no money") and even *worse*, they sometimes just play the songs bookended with ads (no content at all).

I'm not yet at the point of swearing off AAR, but I do vow to stop buying Flexofactor, SmokeFree, term life insurance, Trinity debt relief, and Funny Times magazine. If they fuck with me, I'll delink them!

On a not-unrelated note, what's the deal with Sarah Silverman all of a sudden? She seems to be the "it" girl for left leaners. I must have come across 5 or 6 extended comments on Silverman lately, and all of them involve some sort of "should we be laughing?" handwringing. Seems a bit silly to me. It ain't like she's reinvented the wheel or anything (see Cho, Rickles, Pryor, Kennison, the Diceman, Diller, Rivers, Bruce, et al).

The hubub surrounding this Congressman Murtha fellow and the related calls for a swift US-military withdrawal has prompted me to say the following. If you don't care, look away.

The "phased withdrawal" and "don't cut and run" crowd (which includes mainstream liberals of the Al Franken variety) argue, essentially, that by leaving too quickly the US would send "the wrong message" to the bad guys (i.e., those who are shooting at US troops). This message, presumably, would be that if you shout, shoot, stomp, bomb, and scream enough that you want the US to fuck off, they might fuck off. This would be wrong, because the US reserves the right to fuck off at its leisure. It will stay where it is, even if it shouldn't be there, and do what it does, even if it is wrong or not working, for "as long as it takes", even if it doesn't think it can get IT done. This is what they call resolve.

This is resolve has a proud history. Such resolve was shown by the French and US in Vietnam, the French in Algeria and elswhere, the Brits all over the world, me in my relationship with my first serious girlfriend, and the post-Alexander Greeks in Palestine (ever heard of the Maccabees?). It continues to be shown by the Turks in Kurdistan, the Russians in Chechnya, the Indians and Pakistanis in Kashmir, everybody who has ever been in Afghanistan (including some Afghans), and Michael Jackson.

The US should have no troops in Iraq, save (perhaps) a Marine contingent at the embassy. It should never have had troops in Iraq. It should get them out ASAP (and P starts now). There are a buhgillion reasons for this, and I hold out hope that most honest people agree to this, deep down inside.

But it is academic, really. I don't think the US will pull its troops out until there is no other alternative. I, unlike many who lament the lack of an "exit strategy", don't think the Dubyah administration ever intended to pull the troops out. Of COURSE there is no exit strategy. The troops were not supposed to exit, and they won't so long as there is any way they can stay.

But you know that. Everyone knows that.

Chris secretly returned (sorta) to maintaining his blog. If you click the Chris link, you will no longer be directed to a porn site (which was the case for some time). Chris is much more fun to look at than naked people though. So. You know.

I was just checking out Orcinus, one of many blogs with which I'm unfamiliar, and noticed that he has written quite a bit about a certain Michelle Malkin.

Since I've chased away my reader, now is probably a bad time to ask this, but I must: who the fuck is Michelle Malkin? I mean, beyond being a conservative TV show guest (that much I gathered). I've seen her name mentioned all over lefty blogs for the last few months and am forced to wonder if she is really a big deal or if she is, in fact, a small deal being talked big by hyperventillating lefty bloggers. Is she a looming threat to all that is good and proper? Is she corrupting the utes? Or is she simply another in the seemingly endless line of TV Nazi fembots and this is much ado about nothing?


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It seems that a fellow I grew up near and went to school with from 1st through 12th grade has killed himself. These things happen, of course, but this guy is a bit of a special case for me. Long story short, he was my town/milieu/gang/grade's Jeremy (in the Pearl Jam sense). I probably could have helped him avoid trouble but didn't and I participated a bit in making his life more unpleasant than it had to be (although I was also, I think, one of his friends).

To the extent that the unhappiness he must have felt before killing himself was in any way influenced by my action/inaction, I am mortified.

(A proper thing to do would be to mention his name at this point, but since Mr. Google is short on references to the fellow I'll not do so. I wouldn't want to go spreading what, it appears, is something of a secret.)

I’ve been waiting for some time now and it appears that, finally, the traffic to this blog has died down. See, I have a (self-diagnosed) fear of success. If you knew enough about me you would know that I have a tendency to hit the brakes right before I get to the top of a mountain. Like, there was that time when I . . . well. Ok. Maybe not. I never have been near the top of a mountain. I DO, however, have a fear of doing things just because they are expected of me, like keeping up with the blog.

But bloggable things have crossed my mind.

I didn’t blog about the super-bloggable Harriet Meiereseres nomination. Reckon why?

I didn’t blog about the firey uprising in France, which you may as well call the “Citroen/Renault/Peugeot Bailout Burnout Act of 2005” (because it does represent a lot of new cars being bought soon).

I didn’t blog about my imprisioned sibling.

I didn’t blog about the recent US election.

I didn’t finish my German election update blogging. Germany still exists, by the way, and seems not to need much of a government.

I didn’t blog about recent acts of the Intelligent Designer.

I didn’t blog, in short, about the month of October (and some of September and November).

And the world continues to turn.