On October 17, 1989, my view of earthquakes changed dramatically: I was at Candlestick Park, sitting in Bob Uecker seats (about ten rows from the top; Bob, oddly enough, was nowhere to be seen), awaiting the start of Game 3 of the World Series, when the Loma Prieta temblor hit. Over sixty people were killed, a freeway collapsed, fires raged in San Francisco, a portion of the Bay Bridge gave way, and my second wife left me six months later. (She said it was my fault, but it was obviously the quake's.) During the interminable fifteen seconds the massive concrete overhangs swayed above and the park convulsed every which way below, I really thought I was about to die. (I didn't, though.)

Being a native Californian, I'd felt my share of shakers, but, until then, they'd all been of the ha-ha, did-you-feel-that, what-a-hoot variety. This was a wholly different animal, generating within me newfound respect for the jolting beasts. But I noticed another change about myself, too (in addition to my now-automatic dive under the nearest table upon feeling the slightest vibration under my feet): Something I’d always taken for granted—the "knowledge" of the earth remaining forever solid and unmoving beneath me—was no longer a given. It was an indescribably unsettling feeling, sort of like when I discover I’m speaking with someone who believes Dick Cheney has a soul.

The reason I relate this, other than to both try to set the record for longest opening segue ever and also highlight my harrowing, living-on-the-edge attendance of ballgames (I'll be trying out for the Extreme Sports-Watching Olympics next year), is because I’ve discerned a spate of other similar upheavals in my belief system, all within the last three years or so. Interestingly enough, this period coincides exactly with the length of time President Bush has been on the throne—uh, in office—and even more amazingly (can you feel the chills?), every one of these involves him in some way--sort of like sick degrees of George Bush. Forthwith, in no particular order:

Suspending the U.S. election: This breathtakingly anti-democratic idea is supposedly the (lame)brainchild of DeForest B. Soaries, Jr., the Chairman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. I was apparently mistaken about USEAC's purpose, naively figuring the body (created in the wake of the 2000 Bush appointment) was supposed to help U.S. elections run smoother, not cancel them altogether. (I think I was misled by the "assistance" part.) However, I strongly suspect, as does undoubtedly most of the rest of the civilized world (along with other intelligent life forms that may observe our electoral process from afar, although if that's how they spend their time in their neck of the cosmos, they can't be all that advanced), that in the face of plummeting poll numbers and in an effort to play the fear card yet again (how many are in that loose deck anyway?), the real impetus for the floated delay-the-vote plan came from the White House.

My, how quickly the worms turn in Bushworld. The American right threw big-time conniption fits when the good people of Spain had the audacity to actually practice democracy when they adiosed staunch Iraq war and Bush backer then-Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar days after the Madrid train bombings. Never mind Spaniards had been overwhelmingly against the war from before its beginning and were also incensed their government was quick to blame the Madrid atrocities on ETA instead of the real perpetrators, Al-Qaida. Now the U.S. might not even vote because we're big scaredy-cats? This obvious inconsistency was too apparent for even the Bushies to ignore, as one of my occasionally reliable sauces (not a typo) assures me the president recently tried to make nice at a Spanish American town hall meeting. True to form, he botched it by proclaiming: "Yo soy un spaniel." I think he was trying to say, "I am a Spaniard," but in my book, he was Spot on. (Bush’s handlers should know by now to leave to native speakers languages he doesn’t know, like Spanish and English.)

Final note: Has anyone else noticed “DeForest B. Soaries, Jr.” is an anagram for "job: stress dire fear"? (I tossed the comma and got the colon by stacking the periods.) Didn't think so.

Richard Nixon moves up a notch: Did you ever think you'd see the day when Nixon would not be considered our all-time worst president? It’s further proof of the old saying: Records are meant to be broken--even criminal ones. (For those sure to point out that Mr. "I am not a crook" was never convicted of anything, that's only because he was pardoned by the trendsetter in appointed presidencies, Gerald Ford.) And get this: Bush's current veep has even amazingly managed to put a better light on Nixon's second banana, the splenetic Spiro Agnew, who WAS convicted (of tax evasion), resigning his sidekick duties immediately after pleading nolo contendre (Latin for “I'm guilty as hell, but too much of a weasel to admit it”). Thus, today's White House denizens have done double duty by outdoing that decidedly dirty duo. This alliterative allusion is in honor of Agnew, who was quite fond of castigating his critics with phrases like "pusillanimous pussyfooting," "hopeless, hysterical hypochondriacs of history" and, of course, his classic characterization of the media as "nattering nabobs of negativism." Natterers like myself live for such priceless fodder. But what do we get from Cheney? Dick, of course. Time after time, to invitation-only crowds, he gives the same snarly speech with the same snarly sneer that could easily be summed up with just a few spat-out words: "Terrorists are evil, we are good, you should be scared, and we will continue to do whatever we damn well please. Leave your checks on the table." Everything about this current administration is just so joyless. At least Nixon TRIED to be funny when he appeared on a certain comedy show in the 60s, but the repeated grim schtick from Bush, and especially Cheney, is no Laugh-In matter. Come November, it's time to say goodbye, Dick, and dere go da George.

One last indication of how bizarre this all is: Actually starting a sentence with: "At least Nixon..."

Bush's press conference: My jaw hit the floor so hard as I watched this faux performance art unfold it took four stitches to close the wound and two weeks for the bruise to heal. Bush's meltdown was so complete, I was half-waiting for him to stick his fingers in his ears and wiggle them while making faces. (Perhaps he did, and I missed it during one of the times I turned from the set to catch my breath.) The capper, really, was when I clicked to Dan Rather afterward, thinking for sure even the network non-newscasts couldn't hide that Bush had finally, incontrovertibly exposed himself as the dangerous boob he is, only to find Dan the Corporate Media Man instead describing the funny fest we'd just witnessed with words along the lines of "strong," "decisive," and "sincere," instead of "weird," "inexplicable," and "ach-splrgrblggh."* Obviously, Rather (or someone else, rather), had written the "analysis" ahead of time, and would have dutifully read the same damn thing even had Bush, while gazing skyward and saying "um" for the umteenth time, suddenly pulled out a slingshot, exclaimed, "I got yer answers right here!" and excitedly picked off a couple of reporters with giant spitwads. Of course, this might have actually done the scribes a long-needed collective favor and knocked some journalistic sense into them, prompting slightly tougher questions than, "Sorry, Mr. President, but are you sorry you're not sorry?"

U.N. monitoring of the U.S. election: One of the funniest signs I saw at the anti-war marches said: “U.N. monitoring for 2004 U.S. election.” I laughed and thought, “Thank goodness it hasn’t gotten to that point.” As I sit here, my thoughts have done a “John Kerry” (also known as a “flip-flop,” “180 degree turn,” or “George Bush”): Bizarrely, it’s now a proposal worth considering--and decidedly unamusing. One hundred sixty-one U.S. Representatives favor U.N. assistance, too: According to Edward Epstein of the San Francisco Chronicle, that’s how many of them unsuccessfully voted against a GOP-sponsored amendment to a recently-passed bill “that [bans] using federal funds to request U.N. monitors.” The Republicans were a little steamed that twelve House Dems had written a letter to the U.N. in July asking it to provide overseers for our charade—excuse me, election. The amendment debate was a tad hot, too, with Democratic Florida Rep. Corrine Brown saying the 2000 ignominy was a “United States coup d’etat” and the GOP “stole the election,” remarks for which she was ruled out of order by the Republican chair, Rep. Mac Thornberry of Texas, who said: “Members should not accuse other members of committing a crime such as, quote, stealing, end quote, an election.” I get it now: It’s OK to do, but tacky to mention. Rep. Diane Watson, a California Democrat, said, “We need the world to see how our elections run because Florida cheated, and we are not going to allow it to cheat again.” With all due respect, this is well known about Florida, and I quit playing cards with it years ago because it was always looking at my hand. However, probably only Republicans--and Diebold--think everything’s just lame-ducky with America’s electoral system, while everyone else is justifiably concerned. There’s even a possibility an Iraqi delegation, scheduled to observe the U.S. election as an example for Iraq’s own upcoming balloting but now having second thoughts, has sent its regrets, mentioning something about washing its hair in November. Of course, it’s also possible this is a complete fabrication, but according to the “Rumsfeld Doctrine” of “the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence,” who’s to say?

(http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0802-01.htm0)

Ersatz news "reports": According to a March 2004 Chronicle editorial, “In order to sell the complicated and skimpy [Medicare prescription drug] plan to seniors, the Department of Health and Human Services is paying actors to pose as journalists in bogus TV ‘news’ reports. Videos have been sent to TV stations, along with government-prepared scripts for news anchors to read.”

I realize newscasts haven't presented real news in, oh, about eight centuries now, but doesn't this seem, well, slightly wrong? As I recall, there's a term from the old country for this sort of thing (the old country being Stalinist Russia): state-issued propaganda. I just don’t get the deception: Bush has touted this bill as the greatest thing since our golden era of English-speaking presidents. You’d think he’d be eager to share its glorious process from start to finish with his subjects—I mean, the American people. You know, like how Speaker Dennis Hastert held the bill's vote open for three hours while on the House floor, bribes were made--I'm sorry, arms were twisted (by Guido and "Little" Louie)--to secure enough GOP votes to pass it by a margin thinner’n an O. J. Simpson alibi; or how the White House ordered information withheld from Congress about the bill’s true cost until after the vote; or how the bill precludes the feds from exercising their huge massive buying leverage to get the best deal for seniors (allegedly, the legislation was originally titled the "Pharmaceutical Companies Unconscionable Profit Margins Assurance Bill" before it was decided this might be somewhat controversial); or how five or six trillion dollars must now be spent to explain to seniors the drug price discounts they won't be getting--that is, of course, as soon as someone cracks the bill's code and becomes the first human being to actually understand it. (I hear Stephen Hawking may be free; he could tackle that problem and also work on a new black hole theory about why taxpayer money disappears so fast in the GOP’s alternate universe.)

So why hasn’t Bush bragged on this? Well, he has said God talks to him (http://slate.msn.com/id/2099698). Maybe this time the Big Guy (or Gal) sayeth: “George, shut up.”

I could go on, of course, but I'm already at 2200 words; I bought a whole case over at Costco and want to use 'em up before they get stale. (I'm also eating one of the twelve dozen, or gross, Mondo Monster Muffins we got.) Anyway, if there's a clamor for another column on the same theme, or even just a comment like, "Hey, Drolette, that flying pig piece--it's the first thing you did I could get through," then I might put together a part II in the future. Or, if I just can't think of another topic, the odds are you may be a-seein’ part II anyway, wanted or not.

Just remember, though: If you espy creatures winged and porcine, it does not mean you are crazy. (You still may be, but this would not be the indicator). It only means it is not yet November 2, the day those pigs quit flying and a Bush spontaneously combusts.

* An email to CBSNews.com asking for a transcript of Rather’s remarks (so I could quote him directly) went unheeded, causing me to use words like “unresponsive,” “corporate,” and “#@&*!s”

(Thanks to liesofbush.com for access to the second link.)

but there is one question.

' the real perpetrators, Al-Qaida.'- I can't seem to understand how these 'terrorists were able to plant bombs in the under carriage of the train ( as evidenced by the blast having LIFTED the floors into the roof) as they were being intensely observed.

Maybe al CIAduh again are using their invisible cloaks like they did to get on board the hijacked a/c on 9-11.

Maybe things are as they seem, and you fellows are fuckin' whackjobs in dire need of mental help and medications.

A 30 billion $ a year budget and our intelligence agencies couldn't stop a man in a cave from orchestrating the hijacking of four commercial a/c and for 1 1/2 hours suppressed all the national defense systems after the government had ample warnings.

'Maybe things are as they seem, and you fellows are fuckin' whackjobs in dire need of mental help and medications.'

^Of course, that follows.

A 30 billion $ a year budget and our intelligence agencies couldn't stop a man in a cave from orchestrating the hijacking of four commercial a/c and for 1 1/2 hours suppressed all the national defense systems after the government had ample warnings.

---That's what we get for tolerating anti-military appeasement demoshits in positions of national security. keeping the clintons' crimes secret was a 36 hour a day job.

---And the "man in a cave" is a billionaire with a cult of cowardly millions hiding in hs skirts. not exactly a lone mcveigh.

---A free society is easier to attack than a worthless islamic dictatorship.

---remember, it's the phony "tolerance" that's going to get more Americans killed by not "racially profiling" sandimals at every stop.

because your butt plug came out and sprayed on the keyboard.

Let me see, who was it that created the al CIAdah?

Oh yeah, it was your hero Raygun.

Sure the Democrates are shitheads. Just like the Republicans.

This is not news.

because your butt plug came out and sprayed on the keyboard.

OMFG! You're SO clever! Who writes your material? Whoever it is, FIRE them.

Let me see, who was it that created the al CIAdah?

Oh yeah, it was your hero Raygun.

Oh yes, I forgot, the CIA and their mind control/tornado machines rule your paradigm.

For those of us in the real world with a basic understanding of why things are the way they are, it's not such a scary world.

Sure the Democrates are shitheads. Just like the Republicans.

This is not news.

R's are less shithead than D's. As for sandimals, let them hate so long as they fear.

' R's are less shithead than D's.'

That's like saying that lice are worse than scabies. Cancer worse than a heart attack or murder with a knife is worse than poison.

And yes, your al CIAduh is and was a creation of our Criminal Intelligence Agency. Deal with the truth, if possible.

...for the compliment.

With due respect, though, as I'm sure you know, I don't believe 9/11 or the Madrid train bombings were perpetrated by anyone else other than Al-Qaeda. I'd say the evidence is damningly overwhelming that Al-Qaeda is a real and dire threat to this country and the world. Certainly, our intelligence agencies have done many awful things (along with some valuable intelligence work, too; the trick is to keep the intelligence and jettison the crap), but they're not the only bad actors on this planet--not by an extremely long shot.

"al CIAduh is and was a creation of our Criminal Intelligence Agency. "

Do you honestly beleive the trip you spew?

That we funded a bunch of mujahadeen against the Russians who later turned their back on us and morphed into Al Queda is the fact.

Al Queda is hardly a CIA creation.

Statements like that illustrate a severe lack of critical thinking and a very juvenile outlook.

Besides, you categorically don't belive that Al Queda is responsible for ANY act of terrorism so why would you damn the CIA for the creation of such an innefectual, misunderstood and benign group?

the evidence is there, undisputed about the CIA, the ISI and the creation of our new bogeyman to replace the commies.

I can't help it if you are -

A. in denial

B, like fercsa, a mouth piece for the JDL

We didn't just fund them. We trained them. (That's probably a little accounting trick. Give them $50,000, then have them hire our spooks to train them for $50,000. Repeat over and over, with arms, vehicles, etc. War is good for the war business, and it's the taxpayers who foot the bill.)

So, to some degree, they would not be what they are today without some prior access to CIA knowledge. But this knowledge is balanced off against other kinds of knowledge they develop internally, and from other countries as well as terrorist groups.

BTW, I think Osama is a millionaire, not a billionaire. Some sites report $250 million. Probably, some of that is from the US government funding the mujahedeen.

Besides, you categorically don't belive that Al Queda is responsible for ANY act of terrorism so why would you damn the CIA for the creation of such an innefectual, misunderstood and benign group?

There is definitely no discounting the "blowback" factor, an almost inevitable consequence of U.S. interventionism which certainly reared its ugly head once again with Al-Qaida. This was just one more reason I was aghast when Bush left Afghanistan in the lurch to pursue the neocons' dream war in Iraq: We needed to finish the job in Afghanistan (as well as humanly possible; this also included rebuilding the country) AND seriously revisit our foreign policy to prevent (again, as well as humanly possible) creating yet more circumstances that would haunt us again in the future.

Well, you know the rest of THATstory...

'Blow back' is a contrived back drop for state terror upon its own citizens. Blow back doesn't explain a host of anomalies such as the SEC withholding information as to who exactly made all the put options (1200% of normal ) on airline stock of the two involved in the event, the missing black boxes, the curious stand down of air defenses, the lack of 'terrorists' on the passenger lists, the demolition of WTC 1, 2 and 7 ad nausium. Please.

Oh yes, the old "we've attcked ourselves" fantasy.

Lending even more import to the previous query.

"Besides, you categorically don't belive that Al Queda is responsible for ANY act of terrorism so why would you damn the CIA for the creation of such an innefectual, misunderstood and benign group? "

So which is it sheep?

Your mental illness is fascinating.

It's not "we've attacked ourselves" but that the elite have attacked the general population.

To some extent, it is totally true: Osama Bin Ladin is an elite. He's probably met some of the Bush family on a social level, at a dinner or party of some kind. I sure haven't, and neither have all but tiny fraction of a percentage point of Americans.

Did Bush allow it to happen? Beats me. I think it'll be controversial for the next half century or so, though. Perhaps even longer.

View the situation from any angle, and it looks like "Oil Wars" played out between oil interests. That's how it'll probably be written up in the history books.

(Look back at the age of imperialism. It's almost weird how fruit plantations figure as a significant factor, right alongside geopolitical advantage between nations, trade routes, and natural resources. Today, oil is the fruit.)

View the situation from any angle, and it looks like "Oil Wars" played out between oil interests. That's how it'll probably be written up in the history books.

Only in liberal history books. One more reason to abolish public schools. Leftist indoctrination is a terrible handicap when you live in the real world.

idiot: "One more reason to abolish public schools."



Geez, don't blame all public schools just because you turned out to be such a wretched failure...

...but it's those LIBERALS who made you an idiot, right?

The right wing assholes are saying 70-85 IQs.

The IQ tests are biased. Take one and see.

))) Left wing assholes live in denial. Their bread and butter is blaxploitation, so no surprises there.

The IQ tests are biased. Take one and see.

))) Yeah, they're biased against the stupid.

))) The tests were declared "culturally biased" even though the highest scores were to be found on THOSE parts of the test.

))) After eliminating all the suspected "cultural bias" from the test the same groups STILL scored low.

"We'll support 2 + 2 = 3 as long we keep control over their communities"

--Al Gore

idiot: "Their bread and butter is blaxploitation."



Ya mean like "Blacula"?

I didn't know that it was boffo at the B.O.

"It's not "we've attacked ourselves" but that the elite have attacked the general population. "



Uh, no. Sheepdog has categorically stated on numerous occasions that WE meaning the US government and it's henchmen in it's "shadow government" brought down the WTC and hit the pentagon with REMOTE CONTROLLED aircraft.

Furthermore he has also stated on many posts that he does not beleive that we have ever been attacked on any level by arab/ islamic terrorists and that AL Queda defineitely DID NOT have anything to do with 9-11.

Simply put. He's insane.

I never mentioned Remote Controlled Aircraft, unless you're talking about the Pentagon hit, of course. Are you a liar or a nitwit?

You know how she gets. She was quoting more rational and thought it was you.

"She was quoting more rational and thought it was you."

More rational was referring a comment I made to sheep earlier.

Now don't you feel stupid?

And sheep has clearly mentioned remote controlled aircraft, shadow governments, chemtrails, and every other internet conspiracy plot he's stumbled across, in his fantasy of the attacks of the US government on it's own people.

And by the way, I haven't touched a drop or had a speedball in years.

Speed would explain much in the way of brain damage.

The main problem of course is that it also would reach them even in their estates.

our leadership, the stewards of our kleptocratic economic structure of waste production, made a huge mistake in the production of nuclear weapons. They can't be used.

We are not protected by our ability to overwhelmingly destroy all human life many times over.

If they are ever used in this world of already fragile systems under stress, it would mean a future of misery and death for the funny monkeys that used to kill each other.

The earth is hardly fragile.

And only the sandy nations will feel the heat. We could use the discount glass.

Arabs to ashes, dust to dust.

This just proves my point at post Wednesday August 11, 2004 11:21 PM.

Sheesh

Cowering simpletons who assume a false mantle of righteousness never won anything, not land, not resources, nor respect from other lands, not freedom, nothing.

The 'sheep' believes in whacko theories involving the CIA at every turn, that only our government attacks US citizens.

The sheep refuses to believe there are any real enemies of America out there, including Arab homicide bombers, Chinese spies and at one time, a Soviet Union.

No one the world over would weep for the Arabs were they all to evaporate tomorrow. That 's the truth.

.

One morning the mother woke up and seeing the family cow outside dead with its feet sticking up in the air. In despair over the loss of milk in hard times in a poor family, she hung herself from the rafters. Coming down stairs the father saw the dead cow in the yard, the mother, handing from the rafters and in desperation hung himself. The older brother coming downstairs saw the Mom, Dad and cow deciding to take himself to the river and drown himself.

On the way he met a magical mermaid who said

'I will make all right with you if you grant me a request.'

“ You'll make Mom and Dad alive? You'll give us our cow back?”

'Yes I will'

“ what do you want?', he asked.

'You must make love to me ten times', she answered.

He was young healthy and desperate but even he couldn't comply and after number seven, she threw him into the river to drown.

The youngest son came downstairs, saw the cow, Mon and Dad and went out to find his big brother. He was washed up beside the mermaid. What is going on he cried, what has happened?

She saw he was entering adolescence and decided to make the offer to him. “ Ten times? Have you lost your mind?” He wailed.

Then glancing sideways at her, he said “Okay but let's do it fifteen no twenty- no!- fifty times and it's a deal.” She reluctantly agreed. But as she was bending to kiss him, he blurted out- “ Hey! Wait a minute; how do I know what happened to the cow wont happen to you?

And who are you calling a democrat?

Also I don't think you know what hard work is. Or any kind of real labor. I think paper hanging or pencil whiping is your longsuit.