I love my city

The front page of today's LA Times:

If you've gotta have a birth defect...

I think I'm with this kid--twelve fingers might not be so bad. Frankly anything that could help me type faster at this point would be welcome.

Wow

Bill Bennett Wednesday on Morning in America:

But I do know that it's true that if you wanted to reduce crime, you could, if that were your sole purpose, you could abort every black baby in this country, and your crime rate would go down.

You know, my first reaction is just "wow." And I was going to leave it simply at that. But then I thought, in fairness to Bennett, I should explain that he claims he was merely giving an example of a bad argument for abortion and being quoted out of context, as I have above, makes it seem as though he supports such a "morally reprehensible" idea.

And so, in the interests of balanced reporting, I'd like to just make it clear that Bill Bennett is not a racist. From his own lips on yesterday's Hannity and Colmes:

I'll not take instruction from Teddy Kennedy. A young woman likely drowned because of his negligence. I'll take no moral instruction with him. That's much worse than legal gambling what Teddy Kennedy did....

When I was drug czar, you bet, we were working on the issue of black crime, Alan and Sean, because there was a lot of crime in the black community.... We got the bad guys. And drug use went down. And we raised the price and lowered the purity of cocaine.... [W]hen we went into the inner city black community, the people said to me, Mr. Czar, or Czar, or Mr. Bennett, you get those people off the street and protect us. And we did our best to do it.

. . .

my wife's program, best friends, has kept more young women from having abortions...than the entire black caucus. She has done more for inner city black girls than the entire black caucus. So I will not bow my head to any of these people. I will not give up the ground of compassion and sympathy.

. . .

All day I've been reading reports and statements by people about me, Sean, and it's interesting, some use the whole quote and are fair, some don't. And that tells you something. But the problem, I think, on the liberal side, the democratic side is they attitudinize

Far be it for me to attitudinize, Bill. For a minute there I thought you might be racist but that was before I read that your wife has done more for urban black girls than the whole black caucus. I stand corrected.

(Our younger readers may not recognize Bennett as Reagan's Ed Secretary and Bush Sr.'s Director of Drug Control Policy--aka Drug Czar.)

A new friend

So I had a new commenter opine about my tone below, and so I took a look at his page (which has an ad from Fox News Gear btw), and what do I see, but this. Gosh that sort of thing so totally makes my day. I can't tell you.

Still burning

The view from my balcony

More roosting chickens

It seems like harvest time for the crop of greed and barbarism the Repubs have been sowing. Frist, DeLay, the fabulous showing the administration gave during Katrina and now today's ruling that more Abu Ghraib photos and videos must be released (link via AMERICAblog):

[R]eporter Seymour Hersh, who helped uncover the scandal, said in a speech before an ACLU convention: "Some of the worse that happened that you don't know about, ok? Videos, there are women there. Some of you may have read they were passing letters, communications out to their men.... The women were passing messages saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened.'

"Basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys/children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. The worst about all of them is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror it's going to come out."

They ought to be in terror. Do I dare to hope that this repulsive administration is finally being brought down and that my country will finally wake up to the atrocities being conducted in the name of liberty?

Front seats to the apocalypse

From Mark (one of our New Zealand correspondents) come pics of the fire from the roof of the Woodland Hills Marriott.

So cute it makes my teeth hurt

We're having a sort of Tale of Two Cities image day here at NMTE. Pictures from the fires to follow, but in the meantime, here are Tom and his grandkids, who are so cute it's almost painful ("it was the most adorable of times; it was the most apocalyptic of times..."). He bought them those unicorn outfits that slip over their shoulders as if they needed any help looking ungodly sweet.


Does this family look Irish or what??

Who to thank

So we have a new Supreme Court Justice. I for one, plan to write Boxer and Feinstein to thank them for volleying their dissent into the abyss. Here's the vote and the 22 nays:
Akaka (D-HI)
Bayh (D-IN)
Biden (D-DE)
Boxer (D-CA)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Clinton (D-NY)
Corzine (D-NJ)
Dayton (D-MN)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Harkin (D-IA)
Inouye (D-HI)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Obama (D-IL)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Schumer (D-NY)
Stabenow (D-MI)

Okay, maybe I was wrong

Maybe there aren't militarized dolphins roaming the high seas. That's what I get for trusting the Observer.

Tis the season

Fire season, that is.

The view from my office window today:




The view from the parking lot at work:

Beautiful

My hat is off to Shakespeare's Sister for what I'm calling the post of the month.

And congrats to Sis for being (according to PubSub) one of "the most consistently influential sites that publish feeds." (Maybe you should buy that lottery ticket, huh?)

Couldn't happen to a nicer guy

Good news at last.

I was so cheered today to hear that DeLay was indicted. Between Brown's finger pointing yesterday and DeLay's insistence that he's innocent, the Repubs, to my ears, just sound more and more pathetic. In fact, reading DeLay's apologist spokesman's quote, "This indictment is nothing more than prosecutorial retribution by a partisan Democrat," reminded me of nothing so much as Marion Barry's cry upon arrest: "The bitch set me up!"

At the time, I was living in DC and "The bitch set me up" tee-shirts were the tourist item of the season. I'm thinking we ought to resurrect them. Maybe a little cartoon elephant with a "the bitch set me up" talk bubble over top. Stupid fucking criminals.

Plus ça change

So Sunday night I went to the Hollywood Bowl for the first time to see Dead Can Dance. It was an amazing performance, one of those concerts where you literally feel transported. I wouldn't have been surprised to leave the bowl and encounter Stonehenge right outside (instead of traffic).

And here's one thing about being 40, when you're cool, you're really so much cooler than, say, a 25-year-old. I'm sorry, but that's just how it is. Because when you're 40, you've got a track record of coolness. I first saw Dead Can Dance 15 years ago at Georgetown University's Gaston Hall (capacity 750). I'm just sayin'... Don't get me wrong; I'm glad when a band I like becomes popular. I do not think artists have to languish in obscurity to be authentic in some way. But I'm also glad I got to see them in a more close up and personal sort of way. And Gaston Hall is the perfect setting for a goth concert, given the stained glass and all that.

I was pretty much the only woman there who didn't look like she was part of Morticia Addams' wedding party.


So it was a strange sort of thing to be 15 years and 3000 miles from there seeing the same band. Talk about worlds apart.


Continuing in the "the more things change" theme, Nouvelle Vague opened for DCD. Let me take this moment to give my unequivocal hearty endorsement. If you haven't heard them, click the link above and give a listen. Nouvelle Vague means "new wave" in French and "bossanova" in Brazilian. And so the band takes punk and new wave classics and performs them in a bossanova style. Sublime really. How can you not love a band that rocks out on a kazoo solo during a cover of "Human Fly" at the Hollywood Bowl, I ask you?

Final observation: During the "please give an encore" applause at the end (they gave two), all of these folks held up their illuminated cell phones, lighter-style. Please tell me this is just an LA thing. People don't do this in other places, do they?

David Foster Wallace for AP

Apparently 36 "militarized dolphins" (as Becky calls them) have gone missing following Katrina:

Leo Sheridan, 72, a respected accident investigator who has worked for government and industry, said he had received intelligence from sources close to the US government's marine fisheries service confirming dolphins had escaped.

"My concern is that they have learnt to shoot at divers in wetsuits who have simulated terrorists in exercises. If divers or windsurfers are mistaken for a spy or suicide bomber and if equipped with special harnesses carrying toxic darts, they could fire," he said. "The darts are designed to put the target to sleep so they can be interrogated later, but what happens if the victim is not found for hours?"

Frankly, I can't think of a story that better epitomizes the incompetence and perversity of this administration. Let's arm Flipper with poisonous dart guns and then fail to rescue him during a hurricane so that what was previously a sweet animal, loved by almost everyone can be transformed into a potentially life threatening out of control menace. What a great idea.

After School Snack calls it Hitchhikers' Guide meets Austin Powers, but I'm really thinking Don Delillo meets Tom Clancy. Two great novelists together at last.

Intermission

We interrupt today's program of depressing news to bring you Cows with Guns.

Unhappy juxtaposition

These headlines from Yahoo!News' politics section:

Senators Cast an Eye Toward Next Nominee

The Senate on Tuesday concentrated on who will be President Bush's next pick for the Supreme Court, signifying just how much of a lock chief justice nominee John Roberts has on the job.

Supreme Court May Hear Abortion Case

The Bush administration is asking the Supreme Court to reinstate a national ban on a type of late-term abortion, a case that could thrust the president's first court picks into an early tie-breaking role on a divisive and emotional issue.

I know this isn't a shocker or anything. I just find it depressing that's all. So many people wandering around who are pro-war and anti-abortion. And they vote.

Fox nominated for hen house post

In his latest "like a parody only not funny" nomination, Bush has fingered Edwin Foulke for OSHA's Assistant Secretary of Labor. Foulke is a partner in Jackson Lewis, a major union busting law firm. But fear not, his practice area isn't union busting; it's workplace safety compliance:

When a business is subjected to an OSHA inspection, Jackson Lewis provides the necessary representation to ensure the rights of the client are fully protected. In cases where an employer is subject to criminal or civil legal action based on alleged violations, we provide the expertise to defend the allegations.

We have extensive agency experience at the national and regional levels to enter into settlement negotiations, and the expertise to contest citations before the Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, all state safety and health commissions, and in federal and state court review proceedings.

You can't make this shit up really. The guy Bush is nominating for an OSHA spot has dedicated his career to battling OSHA. I can only shake my head and sigh. Molly Ivins has more on Bush's "petulant pique appointments" and Confined Space, a fine blog on labor issues, has more on Foulke himself.

Sharon Olds

I've never been a big fan of Sharon Olds--in fact, she really gets under my skin--but her letter to Laura Bush turning down an invitation to the National Book Festival is quite eloquent.

I could not face the idea of breaking bread with you. . . . I thought of the clean linens at your table, the shining knives and the flames of the candles, and I could not stomach it.

The Nation has it online.

Get your war on

New strips about Katrina.