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schwarz v fink
3:00 AM - Ken Burns Presents: Professional Wrestling (part 10) Nothing really expresses the repressed homosexual longing at the heart of the American experience quite like the sight of beefy men in mustaches and tights groaning and grimacing as they gallop and heave against each other for an audience of young men who put their posters on their walls. How many professional wrestling characters would look out of place in the Village People? (Answer: zero.) Ken Burns brings this uniquely American activity to life in his own inimitable style. Today’s episode: Koko B. Ware breaks the parrot barrier, and ushers in a new era in wrestling pets.
9:00 PM - Ken Burns Presents: Strat-O-Matic Baseball (Episode 4) Perhaps nothing expresses the repetitive, soulless horror of the American experience quite like Strat-O-Matic Baseball, which is a baseball game you can play with dice, a crap load of cards and pieces of paper, and a rule book the size of Detroit. Big big nerds like George Will relive their favorite Strat-O-Matic memories, like that one time the bases were loaded with two out in the ninth and Gary Carter was up against Bob Stanley, and he rolled a 6-2-3 and hit a homerun and it was awesome! Peter Gammons lives in a baseball-shaped house, his bed is shaped like home plate, and he has a scrapbook of his most memorable Strat-O-Matic box scores. You think I’m kidding, but if you think about it for a minute and you’ll know it’s true. In tonight’s episode, the lefty vs. righty advantage is factored in to the rules. But will switch hitting be properly balanced?
in a nutshell :
The story on the Rove-Novak connection recalls what happened to Rove during Bush I's campaign in 1992. It turns out that Rove was fired from that campaign for leaking information to Novak to undermine another person working on the campaign. It was that one event that has led to the disaster known as W.
When Rove was fired from Bush Sr's campaign, he vowed to show him what a mistake he had made. He would take the president's alcoholic, coke snorting, business failure of a son, and make him president. He would show Poppy that it didn't matter who was the candidate, Rove could get him elected.
So Rove's first step was to get Bush elected governor of Texas. Way behind a popular incumbent in the polls just prior to election day, Bush somehow got elected. Maybe it was creative campaigning, who knows, but Ann Richards was out and the decider was in. End of phase I.
The next step was to create the image of a "compassionate conservative", which, we all know by now, was nothing but a phrase. There has been no compassion in the Bush Administration, and he has even abandoned conservative principles. This false image made Bush appealing to moderates who just wanted tax cuts.
To get Bush elected, Rove had to assemble the most amazing coalition of supporters and keep them happy. He knew his financial base would be the oil industry, so being from Texas that was a natural. Adding Cheney to the team was a stroke of genius.
Rove also needed the support of fundamentalist Christians, so he gave their leadership a starring role in defining social policy. The oil industry didn't care, their main concern was the supply of oil, at high prices. What would be great for the U.S. oil industry would be U.S. military bases surrounding a large oil field, or what Iraq looks like today. The oil industry would support bush if he would find a way to invade Iraq, which was the stated goal of his administration even before he took office.
To get support for invading a country that presented no threat to America, Rove needed political cover, and the neoconservatives provided that. They weren't all religious fanatics, and they weren't all oil whores. Alot of them actually believed invading a country of relgious fanatics, being run by a secular dictator, would actually embrace American democracy. But that didn't matter, the neocons gave the Bush administration the air of respectability, so that people wouldn't think they were just crazy (although that would eventually happen).
So there's the oil industry, the Christian right wing, and the neoconservatives who believe war can overcome religious fanaticism (not including their own fanaticism). There would still be alot of skeptics within the Reublican party. So Rove resorted to that old standby, tax cuts. Even with massive government spending, Republicans could be counted on to ignore their principles in exchange for tax cuts. Works every time.
Throw in manipulation of the news, friendly state republican voting officials, and not only does Rove get the alcoholic, drug addicted, business failure of a son to the White House (he didn't get him elected, but appointed is just as good), but he gets him re-installed for a second term, which is something Bush Sr. couldn't do without Rove on board.
So Rove really showed GHWB. And now we are all paying for his mistake of firing Rove. Thanks alot.
- kgofsb, 05.25.2006
Cate Blanchett will play Bob Dylan in his "androgenous phase" in a [tod haynes] biopic of the great poet-songwriter's life, it was announced, as Dylan turned 65.
had some blueberry infused mead (in honor of beowulf) yesterday at spuyten duyvil in williamsburg. little bit of a hole in the wall but has a garden out back and a great beer selection.
Winelog. Haven't had a chance to look too closely at this, but might be interesting. Seems like a moderated group wine tasting wiki type thing behind a modern web 2.0 interface.
"say, [fill in secretaries name here] does our HR have a bloging policy?"
The Tom DeLay Legal Expense Trust is currently featuring a Stephen Colbert clip on the front page of their website in which Colbert "defends" Tom DeLay. QED. LOL.
tom moody or kenny scharf on the wall / found on curbed. looks like a ks.
"Every war becomes a proving ground for new tactics and new technologies. Battleships rose to prominence in World War I; tanks and bombers determined the course of World War II; Vietnam brought air power definitively into the Jet Age. The current conflict is no different. The Pentagon began this war believing its new, networked technologies would help make U.S. ground forces practically unstoppable in Iraq. Slow-moving, unwired armies like Saddam Hussein’s were the kind of foe network-centric warriors were designed to carve up quickly. During the invasion in March 2003, that proved to be largely the case—despite most of the soldiers not being wired up at all. It was enough that their commanders had systems like BFT, which let them march to Baghdad faster than anyone imagined possible, with half the troops it took to fight the Gulf War in 1991. But now, more than three years into sectarian conflict and a violent insurgency that has cost nearly 2,400 American lives, an investigation of the current state of network-centric warfare reveals that frontline troops have a critical need for networked gear—gear that hasn’t come yet. “There is a connectivity gap,” states a recent Army War College report. “Information is not reaching the lowest levels.”"
Space shuttle launch photo.
OV-105 Launch of Space Shuttle Endeavour from Pad 39B on mission STS-97. This is a five minute exposure taken from the Causeway (about 7 miles away from the pad). Taken with a borrowed all-manual Nikomat camera, 24 mm lens, f/16, Kodak Royal Gold 100 film. When the exposure was stopped in this shot, the shuttle was approximately 229 statute miles downrange.
the history channel in running da vinci code related programing this week. last night they ran a great mysteries of the freemasons doc that was awesome and will be replayed saturday 6pm. do i really need to see dc the movie? ive avoided the book pretty successfully.
hayden hearing on wnyc.
likely on cspan as well but The Washington Notes steve clemons is supposed to appear on wnyc.
likely on cspan as well but The Washington Notes steve clemons is supposed to appear on wnyc.
theres always a defense contract lurking behind any bush foreign policy initiative.
Seems like most people don't trust Wayne Madsen. I don't know enough to judge, but it seems to me like he at least sometimes gets a scoop. Especially on insider DC stuff. Anyway, he says tomorrow is Fitzmas.
I'm not saying I believe (or trust) her, but this is interesting:
...Judy Miller tells Rory O'Connor and William Scott Malone about the story she'll regret for the rest of her life -- the fact that an anonymous White House source told her in July 2001 that an NSA intelligence report predicted a large al Qaeda attack, possibly on the continental United States...Or maybe she'll just say anything to get back into the spotlight.
Ned Lamont commercials, the first featuring Kos.
something weird going on with the crooksandliars home page.
Tom "6 months" Friedman. LOL. (Did I get this from one of you? Sorry if it's a dupe.)
bill maher : new rules
malcolm gladwell has a blog. does that mean weve reached a tipping point?
