blackjax29

Now, About that Rant...

One’s coming. Let me goad it a bit...

Nah. Dry. Same amount of hypocrisy and reality avoidance from the 1600 Crowd. I mean, you got to love the fact that Snow actually said "I'm Not Sure Anything Went Wrong" in Iraq. I mean... wha..?

So the response is: Do you think that things are going right? Isn’t this the problem of a ‘No Second Option’ type of thinking that’s going on there?

Isn’t this a problem when you’re constantly listening to those Braniacs at the A.E.I. when it comes to Foreign Policy? BarbinMD on Daily Kos has an article that explains itself.

And a quick read tells me that the A.E.I. is suffering from something besides a blind adherence to idiotic dogma. They’ve seen too many movies,

Here’s some of the highlights from the A.E.I. crowd...

        *  Whether Wether Osama bin Laden was involved in Tuesday's terrorist assault remains to be seen. Yet if that proves to be so, it is extremely unlikely that he acted on his own. It is far more likely that he operated in conjunction with a state--the state with which the U.S. remains at war, namely Iraq. - 9/13/2001

That is the Saddam as Dr. Eric Vornoff of ‘Bride of the Atom’ fame, chucking with his Nuclear Mujahadeen, trying to create a race of atomic supermen and rule the world.

        * If there's an emerging conventional wisdom uniting many of the pundits, military analysts, and former government officials who have taken to the airwaves and op-ed pages in recent weeks, it's that the United States can overthrow Saddam, but it will be messy and painful...But there's reason to believe that these predictions...are too pessimistic. For one thing, the United States can't bog down in protracted warfare in Baghdad unless a significant number of Iraqi troops are willing to fight us there.  While newspaper leaks have featured sobering assessments of the number of U.S. troops needed for an Iraq war, such numbers can be deceiving. - 9/9/2002

The Usual cakewalk, Sweets and flowers scenario. I remember Patton when they beat Montgomery to Messina. Flowers. Kisses. Sweets.

        * Instead of providing support for the terrorists, the Iraqi people would support allied forces, and create a model for the war against terrorism throughout the region: Free countries don't support terrorism. They fight it. - 2/21/2003

Yea, the subservient race of dark skinned guys like Gunga Din. No agendas of their own, always willing to die for the white man’s cause. Right...

        * And when we finally smash his evil regime suddenly those countries that doubt us will have their eyes opened. Meanwhile UN weapons inspectors are being seriously deceived. - 2/23/2003

Back to Eric Vornoff. Eeevvviiilll.....

        * This was a war worth fighting. It ended quickly with few civilian casualties and with little damage to Iraq's cities, towns or infrastructure. It ended without the Arab world rising up against us, as the war's critics feared, without the quagmire they predicted, without the heavy losses in house-to-house fighting they warned us to expect. - 5/2/2003

Who’s to say where this came from. At least in ‘Things To Come’, Raymond Massey’s people had an agenda to actually save the world, but these nitwits..? 

        * Eight American troops died in Baghdad, as fighting erupted between Coalition troops and followers of Muqtada al-Sadr. Hearing the news, Senator Edward Kennedy (D., Mass.) declared Iraq to be "George Bush's Vietnam." Evening-news anchors question whether this weekend's violence marked the start of a Shii revolt. Quite the contrary...The sky is not falling. The decision to confront the Muqtada al-Sadr's challenge to rule-of-law and liberty will cause a short-term spike in violence, but lead to long-term improvement.  - 4/6/2004

No movie references to dig up, but ain’t it sad? I mean, THEY’RE in charge? Well, them and the Armegeddonist Nutcases.

Well, thank God we have all of this ready history to dig up and use agains them, right? I mean, the Media is awash in the past utterances of these guys and are constantly playing them back to be rebutted, right...

Anyone?

How about the whole Bill Kristol quote mentioning that a civil war in Iraq is hogwash and  pop psychology....

Anyone?

Dawn in the Land of the Styrofoam-Brained...

...as in mine...

I’m back off the meds, but this time I’m airbraking (medbraking?) with St. John’s Wort. A lot of St. John’s Wort it seems since my brain currently feels like it’s been left high and dry, brittle and crunchy.

But I’m feeling, period, and that’s a plus.

I just got tired of the mood swings, the drifting through the day in a vat of body temperature blue Jell-O. Serene, calm, but the void between thought and word was getting harder and harder to cross.

I was drowning. Daily and constantly.

I had stopped struggling. I had started to drift. I had started to die.

I had made it to a point where crossing from here and not was soooo simple. A matter of degrees. A matter of flipping a switch, pulling a chain, yanking a cord.

Simple. Easy. Effortless.

Wasteful. Useless. Selfish. Angry.

So I stopped it.

And I’m slowly getting my brain back online now. I can actually feel it shorting out and staggering a bit, but all’s good. A lot of tea. Liquids. Rest.

And the world is scarier and louder, but I’m feeling it...

And I’m angrier and seeking solutions now...

And I’m funnier now...

And I’m more vocal now....

I’m sleeping the sleep of the dead...

I’m tasting food again.

I’m, oddly enough, feeling something akin to sadness when I think of my father’s death. That, I’ll wager, is something.

As per the rest of it?

Still scrambling...

Still goading the Agent...

Still waiting for word from anyone about a slew of topics...

And still. Scratchy, crunchy brain and all, I prefer this.

Thursday...

And I’m, as usual, appalled...

Firstly by the whole attempt by this Administration to paint Iran as the scapegoat for a truly asinine policy. I won’t even grace it with the term War Policy, just... a theme. Or maybe gist. Zeitgeist

Whatever.

The whole house of cards have collapsed there and they’re looking for another boogieman, another war to boost profits and polls and get us back to the good old glory days of total media capitulation and a cowed populace...

It ain’t gonna happen. The Reality Train’s on the roll. No amount of dead blondes, JonBenet confessors or sabre rattling will deter that feeling in the gut that a rapidly growing section of this country is feeling. And that is the distinct notion that the wheelhouse of the ship of state is empty, that the Captain is looking for a life raft, that is if he could get someone to untie it for him and paddle it away to South America, that all of the bluster and faux gravidas is just smoke and brimstone.

Evidently, way back in 2002, Gen. Franks gave a nifty powerpoint presentation that stated the usual cakewalk scenario, wrapping up with the boffo notion that they’ll just have 5000 troops in Iraq in Dec. 2006...

Yea. Reality Train. Get on board.

I guess this explains a lot. The whole notion that by this time a Jeffersonian (I guess they meant George Jefferson, not the other one) democracy blooming across Iran, Syria and those wacky stragglers called Palestinians. That they’ll either be put to rights by a righteous bombing campaign or from within by Capitalistic citizens...

So, anyway. It’s all fallen apart in Iraq and Afghanistan (remember that OTHER cakewalk?), so we need someone to blame. Someone who...

Right. The Non-Reality Train from the Administration, the one from the Non-Reality Based World. “If the Reality Train left Chicago at 11:30 a.m. And was heading for Washington D.C. at a steady clip of 75 M.P.H., and the Non-Reality Train left D.C. at Sponge Cake Rocket fuel monkey car....”

Yea. The whooollleee Pooch-screwed up Iraq isn’t the Administration's fault, it isn’t the Pundits fault, it isn’t the ones who planned it against all data and realistic expectations and history’s fault, it’s... Iran’s fault.

And I love, just love the whole “Trust Us” meum that the Administration is tossing up at the Press Briefings and Hearings, the same one that stated that the lack of evidence equates the presence of a threat.

Congress? Please, please, please laugh Condi Rice out of the room when she mentions Iran’s involvement there, when she brings up evidence-less evidence, or when Pace or Snow or any other Nitwit Pundit alludes the whole Iran Boogieman scarecrow without anything resembling, oh, evidence and proof in hand, just laugh, shake your heads, remind them that the Reality Train will, run their asses over come ‘08. And for the foreseeable future. With that, remind them that if they do start bombing Iran trying to get them to respond (they haven’t yet with all the petty seizing of posts and personnel in Iraq sofar. I think that they know that they have International Law on their side. That and a lot of oil to bribe world Politico opinion.) Remind them that they’ve failed on so many levels, so much strata of unreality to dig through that needs to be unearthed and revealed...Remind them that the track record sofar isn't promising. That all of the purported "Tests" and "Trials" that this Administration has gone through sofar are over. He's getting a non-passing grade and is going home without his lunch money.

Tuesday...

In the Northern South...
And I survived another haircut. The Redhead is semi-pleased. If she had her druthers I’d be shagged out as Fabio and that ain’t gonna happen. Ever(ish).

I’m currently camped out at a cafe called The Dripolator. Free WiFi, large enough to be anonymous, small enough to be cozy.

I’m currently pooling together all of the intel on the Film Community here in this slumbering ‘burg. An Interior Designer/Set Designer I schlep for occasionally had tried to pool together the same people I’m attempting to and she’s still filled with anger and frustration about it all coming to 9’s, but...

It seems this place is chock filled with Chiefs and a minimum of Indians. And the Chiefs are, so I’ve heard, not a truly honest bunch to boot when it comes to capabilities and resumés, but still... I had a long conversation with the delightful head of the Theatre Department at the local J.C. (As they have no stage they’ve got to perform minimal plays in the cafeteria, sort of the Catskills without the mosquitoes and with Formica) and he’s seconding the whole nightmare the I.D. went through. Chiefs. Indians. Wigwams...

Egos and bad blood. Snubs and snipes. But still...

Small, single companies are producing small, dull films. But they’re one-offs. Others are scamming L.A. cash and not being able to finish anything here. And there’s Blue Ridge Motion Pictures. They’re not, to the best of my knowledge, actually Producing Motion Pictures, but I guess Blue Ridge Soundstages doesn’t have that sexy of a ring to it. There’s money here. There’s talent here. There’s enough scenery here. It’s been done here, it’s just... what? Pernicious ego I guess. I’m just guessing.

I can see a table of 5 or so Pros, those that want to get something going. Then having said Pros do a open pitch session, take 3 scripts that they agree on to the local investors to be invested in, then hire from the pools of actors swimming about...

Create product. God knows it doesn’t have to be Sundance every time. There’s a million channels that it could land on from Hallmark to Lifetime, to Sci-Fi to the Horror Channel...

Create an Engine, create a Studio. Create Product. Pull in cash... Call it Cinéngine. Get gigs here.
It could happen. Just as long as the egos are set aside long enough to see the bigger picture. Anyway, I got a call tonight with a N.Y. company seeking writers for smaller projects.

We’ll see. Miss you all.  

Missed...

I should’ve mentioned that the day was a shot as Harry Whittington...

Monday...

And the day’s already shot. In a way. But who’s to say.

I've got to get to a meeting with the Cheese/Wine cohorts and also fill out paper to see if I can become a cashier (I need 40 Hours, have 32 and    Health Care, but still)

I mean, in the N.Y. Times, prominently displayed on page 14 or so is the mention that Cheney MIGHT be compelled to testify at the Scooter Libby Trial, and hey, here’s the possibility that the Vice President would have, could have... oh, let’s just say for the sake of argument, did commit a federal crime on the same par with treason just so he and his associates could lurch this nation into a pointless war for a pie in the sky neocon political theory and, well, to make a lot of money.

A lot of money. What was that visual? 17 tractor trailer trucks filled with 100 dollar bills, over 300 tons of cash, just to be dropped into a war zone.

And that’s just the one time that we’ve heard of. Not to mention the overbilling, the graft, the out and out breathless corruption...

And that’s just what’s been uncovered nationally in the first weeks of the Dems in power. But hey, the Media would cover it, but they’re too busy discussing Pelosi’s plane (Basic math: Chicago is a little less than half the distance to D.C. than S.F. is, ergo, she needs a larger plane. I think she’s being pilloried for suggesting that she also carpool <Planepool?> with other California pols to save a few bucks) and the eventual death of a talent-less blonde.

Christ. We already had a drunken Cheney shoot a man in the face, but hey, that wasn’t news, right? Blip in the radar, noting to see here...

He SHOT a MAN in the FACE and... NOTHING. If it was Gore...

Yea. Anyway.

But now, with the Libby trial, we can see what was painfully obvious years ago. Ambassador Wilson was about to upset the whole Iraq War Gravy Train fueled by stovepiped intel so he had to go. So out his wife, muddy the waters. Commit a federal crime and keep the media from making it a federal crime. Keep the dust down. Walk away.

But now, hey, the Dems are in power, and wouldn’t you know it, but they don’t need to make crap up (back to Pelosi’s plane, et al) to have paint the Repubs in scandal hues. Just print the truth. Over and over again.

The Nation got it in 2006. The Repubs and the Media are just the last to know.

Time for a new slogan. Bring the Real Adults Back to Power.

Personally I’m up for a petition, a movement, something of a gesture, to present to the (dwindling) owners of media: We’ll stop watching the News, stop buying the Papers and Mags, stop it all until there’s a few changes.

Diversification. You have specialty channels (The Bass Channel, Cowboy Movie Channel, et al..), why now just continue the trends...

A) Label Commentary as such. Separate it all onto another channel. Call it Blather or somesuch. If you want talking heads yelling at each other or bloated nitwits chuckling as they unleash their inner bigots, go for it.

B) Toss all fluff onto another channel called, well, Fluff. Have the logo be a Kitten. It’ll be great. All the People Mag crap, all the ‘Dead Blonde, candle in the wind, ignore that she was a waste of space and carbon’ filler.

C) Bring back the Fairness Doctrine.

D) Yank the chains of all owners and remind them that they’re renting, not owning, the airwaves. That they’re there to provide a service. Info equals news equals historical perspective. Drill it into them that a well informed population is patriotic, does us all a world of good.

I, The Half-Orphan...

My father passed away Friday night after a long illness. He went slowly but peacefully in his bed with his dogs and wife at home. At this writing he’d be buried in a white suit somewhere on the upper coastline of Honduras.

I’m, yea, still a little conflicted. He seemed to be a nice guy and all, but... I was raised without him. I spent years, from the ages 3 to 11 mourning him, then it was a few more years feeling nothing, then anger, then...

I’m done with it. Way done.

The Redhead mentioned that once a person passes they get to experience what you looked like through all the lives of all of those people you knew or crossed paths with. Personally that sounds exhausting and would make me run screaming into the void if I were faced with that notion on the other side. I mean, is it a screening room or some kind of full-on Sense-Surround - Cinemascope thing? Is there popcorn with Peanut M&M’s mixed in to get that sweet/salty/buttery flavor? Heaven indeed...

On the other hand I’d rather feel, hope, whatnot, the possibility that I’ll see him again, sit with him and have a long chat unencumbered by history, language and the rest of it all. Some braised pork thing, potatoes and wine along with it, but still... He could have a cigar.

Having been there, on the other side, at one time in my life I can see the possibility of it.

S.F In The News or ‘Roll - Em - Ouch’

In the past week I’ve read that Kink.com has bought the long abandoned Armory on Mission street, and that there is a School of Cheese. Both are unrelated (or are they..? Kink Le Fromagé?)

As per Kink.com? It’s time to tell the protesters to fuck off. That place has been abandoned for years, it’ll never be turned into Low Income Housing, and it’ll be perfect as a soundstage for kink-smut. Evidently there are cells, showers and stables in the basement and that just screams... Well, just screams might be enough.

There was a time when some Dot-Com was going to buy it, pump out the swamp in the basement and finally make it something useful, but the self-same Protestors nixxed that game. Personally, and hear me out people, if that Dot-Com had bought it, renovated it, and moved in years ago, they’d’ve be long gone by now and it would have long been useful as offices, a theatre, or LOW INCOME HOUSING...

Perspective people. Perspective.

I’m back. 

A Moment of Sanity...

So...

What with this world going understandingly off its collective rocker, we now can rest assured that at least one part of society will be taken care of.

I’m talking about our canine friends.

We now can have beer for dogs. Basically foamy beef tallow, but still. It’s safe for human consumption though, so eventually we’ll have bachelors worldwide saving a step and popping open a can for dinner.

Although at one time there was a drink on our shores called Cock-Ale, which was a combo of chicken soup and beer. Sort of the same time saving idea, I’ll wager. A meal and a buzz.

Me? For a meal in a glass, I’ll take a Guinness.

16 Words...

One thing that the Libby Trial (And aren't you just sick about hearing it on all the media, day after day, dissection after petty dissection...? No?), And now, after all of this, I think the main gist of it is that this proves indisputably that this Administration lied about Niger, about Plutonium, about the mushroom cloud.

Mainly that the time that they slid those words into the S.O.T.U speech they knew it was a lie, and that’s the main point. That the rest of the nation is waking to the fact that they were lied to. Comes the dawn, finally.

And all of this, the exposure of Plame, the lie, the whole maghilla, is now in the lap of the lizard man himself, Cheney.

Speaking of this, it turns out that Cheney’s son in law has been hindering the investigations into Iraq contracts, basically dragging his feet until... When? 2008 I guess. The same strategy that the W is taking in this whole war thing. Just drag your feet, then dump it in the lap of the next president.

I love the fact that Sen. Clinton stated that he has no right to do this, basically stating that he made the mess, he’s got to clean it up.

The same thing with the other hearings into EVERYTHING that’s happened for the past 5 years. Rocks are being overturned, things are starting to scurry. Very scary things.

Hmm. Cheney tossed, Bush impeached... Maybe the first woman president will be Speaker Pelosi. Gotta love it.

I Guess...

As an addendum to the whole Astro-Lust thing is who did the psych-eval on her? Has N.A.S.A. low bidded the whole vetting process? Time will tell..

Remember When Astronauts were just Drunks?

When Office Romance Goes Bad....

Yea, Gus Grissom used the whole ‘Blast-Off’ thing as a chick magnet device, and what red blooded American guy wouldn’t use it to get laid, albeit not that flyin’ Boy Scout John Glenn, but that’s besides the point.

As the old story goes, Boy Meets Girl, Girl gets a crush, crush goes bad, Girl goes a little bit funny in the head, cracks the E-Mail account of the Boy, finds out that the Boy is seeing another Girl, so Girl decides that she’s got to get rid of the competition...

Very Ann Rand, in a way...

So it seems that Navy Captain Lisa Marie Nowak had a crush on Navy Cmdr. William Oefelein. Maybe it was the cramped coziness of Shuttle Discovery that they flew in back in December. I’m guessing it was the whole holidays gist that got under Nowak’s skin.

So, you’re floating around in 0-G, sharing meals and that crazy bathroom setup with your hearts desire, and things might have taken a different course. And if they did, maybe Nowak wouldn’t be wearing a ankle bracelet tonight. Not gold and sexy, but one that beeps. All night.

Nowak was, after all, married. 3 kids. I’m guessing that Oefelein saw that and decided to pull back. Maybe he pushed the boundaries, shared some squeeze bottle of goo or another, but he probably pulled back.

Then again, ‘What Happens in Space Stays in Space’ and all of that.

So, two months later, Oefelein is dating an earthling named Colleen Shipman. Both are single, above the age of consent, and are now feeling gravity’s comforting suck.

Nowak, however, snaps and puts her Navy training to the test. She hacks Oefelein’s e-mail, discovers Shipman’s letters and address and travel plans. Shipman was to fly from Houston to Orlando to meet with Oefelein, so Nowak devises her cunning plan.

Nowak was to drive from Houston to Orlando non-stop, so, as her N.A.S.A. training dictated, she donned a diaper for the trip.

Now, as a seasoned road tripper, I can attest to some of the appalling conditions of some truck-stops and gas stations, but come on. You got to get gas sometime, so unload one tank while refilling another. Saves time.

Dressed in a wig and a trench coat, Nowak was going to meet Shipman at the Orlando Airport. After that is pure speculation, but when Nowak was caught, she had a new steel mallet, knife, rubber tubing and large garbage bags in her car.

Meanwhile, Shipman arrived at Orlando and boarded the Parking Shuttle. It was then that she noticed something odd. Perhaps it was the woman in a Payless wig and overcoat?  Shipman hurried to her car and locked the doors. Nowak knocked on the window after trying to open the door. Foiled, she then asked for a ride, then burst into tears.

They never do that in the Robert Ludlum novels, but when in Orlando...

As Shipman cracked the car window, Nowak sprayed a chemical into Shipman's car, but Shipman accelerated and found the security Guard.

When they found Nowak she was ditching the wig, now in a bag with a BB gun, steel mallet, a 4-inch folding knife, rubber tubing, $600 and garbage bags.

Yea, it’s sad. All around.

And I’m wondering what her husband is feeling tonight.

The father to her 3 kids.

I mean, he did the right thing, or so he thought. Married Nowak, supported her dream of Space Flight, probably played stay-at-home dad, had to hear her scream ‘Reaching Terminal Velocity” in the sack...

And now this.

Anyway, here’s to moments of insanity. Of following your dream, wherever it may lead.