Blog Box

September 1, 2005
Compiled by Delilah Boyd, A Scrivener's Lament

Who's Who

Who's AWOL? Who's MIA? Who's still a traitor? Who's God's favorite? Better yet, who's the media's favorite? Who's dumber than dirt? Who's "scommenting" the blogosphere? And who wrote The Book of Love?

President AWOL: Let Them Eat Cake Beignets

D�j� D'Oh

Once again George W. Bush flies westward out of harm's way during a national crisis. Bush took one minute out of his vacation's vacation to read a prepared comment on Hurricane Katrina's devastation. AmericaBlog, in an open letter to the president, writes:

In the face of this tragedy, rather than call off your vacation days ago and head back home to coordinate the relief, but even more importantly, to show the American people that you care and are in charge, you did not fly east to Washington. You flew west to Arizona and to California. While New Orleans and the south were in the process of being destroyed yesterday, you flew west and devoted the day to Medicare. While the death toll for the hurricane increases by the hour, and even FOX News has just now cut away from your live WWII speech in order to return their coverage to New Orleans, you continue to babble on about WWII and Iraq.

WWII? Frankly, I've lost count of the changing reasons excuses for invading and occupying Iraq. I addressed the latest (Bin Laden & Zarqawi will take over Iraqi oil fields!) on my blog A Scrivener's Lament this week; however, Bateman365 has posted a real video blast from the past: "Actual Excerpts From The President's Speech of 2/6/03." Bateman vows to post a new video each day for a year.

Hey, Bateman! How about creating a video history of the ever-changing excuses for the Iraq war?

Speaking of Iraq, Gen. Wesley Clark is guest-blogging this week at Talking Points Memo's TPMCafe. Here's an excerpt:

But one thing is absolutely clear: we need action from the President, right now, while we still have the opportunity to bring peace and lasting stability to the Iraqi people. Only the man in charge, the Commander in Chief, can make it happen, though, and it is up to all of us to make our options heard and clearly articulate our ideas.

Aftermath

Well, what do you know? Our corporate-owned media-whores actually found an attractive white family to showcase while less fortunate survivors braved rising waters filled with debris, poisonous snakes, and amphibious fire ants to find shelter. Live Journal blogger missvn posts:

Wooo.... let the media jump all over the privileged, wealthy and attractive family that managed to get out. By hiring a limo. Bravely driving past train stations and airports all the fucking way back to Chicago. Lets all highlight their story... just so it can be more apparent that no doubt, scores of people who lacked the means to get out of NO are going to be greatly affected by the hurricane. Highlight the pretty white people...

The attractive white family reports 80 requests for interviews, including Larry King, "The Today Show," and CBS's "The Early Show." Tucker Carlson scored an exclusive with the family (via satellite) for his Monday night show.

For those of us without limo access, the best real-time blog for Hurricane Katrina updates, The Irish Trojan's Blog, offers news, links to the Missing Persons Board, and info on relief efforts. Democratic Underground has a list of ways you can help. And civil rights blogger, Prometheus6, writes the best description of the current heartbreaking racial issues in New Orleans.

MIA Dems

The meek might well inherit the earth, but do we have to wait that long for elected democrats to speak up? All These Wonderful Things writes: "Memo To Dems: Where The Hell Are You?", citing poll results from the most recent Washington Post/ABC News poll:

Self-identified Democrats were particularly impatient. More than three in four said congressional Democrats have not gone far enough to oppose Bush on Iraq or on administration policies in general.

It's way past time to abandon those famous fence-straddling centrist voters (2%) and register 10 or 20% more Democrats, damn it!

Karl Rove Is Still A Traitor

Water Man Spouts' h20man has the 411 on The Rendon Group: "When Karen Hughes or Karl Rove has needed 'expert' advice on communications, they turned to The Rendon Group." If you remember wondering where all of those smiling, liberated Kuwaitis got those little Dollar Store American flags to wave, read h20man's excellent post on The Rendon Group, which includes their involvement in the Plame affair. Enlightening, to say the least.

On The Fascist Fundie Front

The Questionable Authority has investigated the California creationist lawsuit against the University Of California (UC refuses to accept fundie high school biology course credits) and learned this about their high school biology text book:

From the Introduction: Biology for Christian Schools is a textbook for Bible-believing high-school students. Those who do not believe that the Bible is the inspired, inerrant Word of God will find many points in this book puzzling. This book was not written for them. That's funny. There I was thinking that science is a universal concept, open to anyone who is willing to study the natural world. I had no idea that there are things in science that can only be understood if you believe what these folks do. The people who prepared this book have tried consistently to put the Word of God first and science second...If...at any point God's Word is not put first, the authors apologize. Let's see. What we have here is a "science" textbook, written by people who have made a conscious effort to put science second. Wow. What possible reason could the University of California have for being concerned about the quality of classes using this book?

Wait! There's More!

Pandagon has found another example of Fundie textbook tampering, but this time it's the Texas State Board of Ed rejecting a science book.

What Chiras didn't anticipate, however, was strong opposition from Citizens for a Sound Economy and the Texas Public Policy Foundation, two conservative lobbying groups. Chiras, a visiting professor of environmental studies at Colorado College, said the groups branded him "anti-free enterprise, anti-Christian and anti-American." The groups had several qualms with Chiras'book. They decried his assertion that Americans, only 5 percent of the world�s population, generate 25 percent of the greenhouse gases widely believed to contribute to global warming. They labeled him "anti-free enterprise" for describing American industries' roles in environmental pollution, and they compared him to Osama bin Laden for noting the pollution caused by the country�s airlines. Despite its use in some of the state's most prestigious colleges, including Baylor University, the Texas Board of Education rejected the book by a vote of 10-5. Instead, they used "environmental science" books published by.....the coal-mining industry.

I wish I could say that this shocks me; however, when I started teaching in Texas, Shirley Jackson's The Lottery had been neatly razor-bladed out of every 10th grade literature textbook in the district. Can't allow kids to question authority, can we?

A Little Levity

As Dolly Parton said in Steel Magnolias, "Laughter through tears is my favorite emotion." That being said, there were a few funny moments this week. No More Mister Nice Blog cites Paula Zahn's interview with Leslie Unruh of the National Abstinence Clearinghouse, who's excited about that new "abstinence-related" film, The 40 Year Old Virgin.

Liberal Serving serves up the latest Christian "proof" that God is punishing New Orleans (along with everyone in Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida) because of abortion. The proof? The eye of God's intelligently designed hurricane looks like a 6 week old fetus...

Hm. Looks like an amoeba engulfing a paramecium to me...

Either that or PacMan.

Finally, Fear of Clowns posts: "Some idiot neurosurgeon seems to think he can form a testable hypothesis supporting Intelligent Design ... by studying ... NASCAR drivers."

Blogging News

"Scomments" suck. Leave it to spammers to figure out a way to leave spam comments on individual blog posts! Thankfully, Blogger.com now offers a "Retype the word into the text box" option, which stops computer-generated scomments. Thanks, Blogger.com! Penile enhancement offers won't do anything to help me get rid of George W. Busholini.

All You Need Is Love!

Newbie blogger groundedgroove asks why the media always puts quotation marks around the term gay marriage. Groundedgroove continues: "Here's to hoping the (Washington state) court does the right thing and rules the constitution guarantees equal protection for all citizens."

Good golly, Miss Molly! Those women could've served your hot lunches, taught your kindergarten class, or shushed you in your local public library. What a charming couple! Thanks for the thoughtful post and pic, groundedgroove.

We all feel like we've been "rode hard and put away wet" this week, mainly because of a sense of helplessness. Unlike the freeper who complained that public housing units in New Orleans were "built too strong":

To: mamabadger Honey, the Tragedy is ongoing. I was hoping that the Government Housing was completely destroyed, but we built it too strong, now we have to replace their Bigscreens, Cadillacs and deep pile carpet so they can procreate in the manner that they have been accustomed to. 379 posted on 08/29/2005 9:39:14 PM PDT by TexasTransplant (NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSET)

The rest of us want to help all Katrina survivors, regardless of race, creed, or political party affiliation. If you haven't done so, click the links in the "Aftermath" section above and make little miracles happen. Donate blood if you're able, and share your concerns, prayers, and good wishes with others. Whoever saves one life saves the world entire: we really are a village, and we're all in this together.

Know a hot blog that needs some coverage? Send your recommendations to Delilah.

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