Dick Cheney will have told you so
Feb 4, 2009 What's Going On
Dick Cheney is wasting no time making sure that he’s proven right. According to Politico.com, Cheney warned in an interview yesterday that there is a high probability of another large-scale attack on the U.S. “Whether or not they can pull it off depends whether or not we keep in place policies that have allowed us to defeat all further attempts, since 9/11, to launch mass-casualty attacks against the United States.”
Forget about the way he and Finally Former President Bush pissed off the world with their thuggish diplomacy and with-us-or-against-us attitude (nuance was not that administration’s strong suit). Forget about the fact that their policies likely created terrorists and America haters out of people who didn’t start that way. No, all he’s concerned with is covering his ass.
Listen, Dick. May I call you that? Because it sounds no natural, so fitting. You screwed up. And you’re screwing up further by not admitting that you screwed up. I see what you’re trying to do. If there’s an attack, instead of worrying about the country and trying to help, you will be shouting from the rooftops about how you saw this coming (unlike in 2001). You will have positioned yourself to hit the talk circuit and point fingers. Congratulations. You have the foresight to set yourself up as a hot interview in the face of unbelievable tragedy.
And if no attack comes, will you congratulate President Obama on a job well done? No, I’m sure you’ll find a way to congratulate yourself – some bullshit about how the hard stance you took during the Bush years carried forward and kept us safe. But you probably won’t need to worry about that part. The sad fact is there probably will be another attack. Terrorists tried under Clinton with some success, and tried under Bush with much more success, and I’m sure they’re in a cave somewhere planning a welcoming party for Obama. But the important thing is, you will have been right. Dick.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: Barack Obama, Dick Cheney, George Bush
Barack Obama is a genius
Dec 26, 2008 What's Going On
OK, for the past week I’ve listened to my friends – staunch Obama supporters all – complain about President-Elect Obama’s choice of conservative pastor Rick Warren to give the invocation at his inauguration. (I’m not even going to discuss why there’s an invocation in the first place – that’s just a waste of time.)
I can understand why they’re pissed. They campaigned for Obama, they voted for him, they drove others to the polls on election day, some even worked directly for the campaign. And then he turns around and gives a big, public, virtual hug to a guy who believes the opposite of them when it comes to gay marriage, abortion rights, evolution, and a bunch of other issues.
In 2004 Rick Warren had this to say to his congregation about whom they should vote for (I found it on his Wikipedia page):
Despite Warren’s progressive image and focus on social issues, he is closely aligned with conservative evangelical viewpoints. On the eve of the 2004 presidential election, Warren sent an email[11] to his Saddleback congregation telling them that there were five non-negotiable issues that should determine their vote.
- What does each candidate believe about abortion and protecting the lives of unborn children?
- What does each candidate believe about using unborn babies for stem-cell harvesting?
- What does each candidate believe about homosexual marriage?
- What does each candidate believe about human cloning?
- What does each candidate believe about euthanasia—the killing of elderly and invalids?
Warren chose not to overtly endorse a candidate, however the message clearly was an encouragement to vote for George W. Bush.
Let’s start with the fact that the country would be in a much, much better place right now if ALL voters in 2004 had concentrated on what the candidates would do for the economy, what the candidates would do about Iraq and Afghanistan, what the candidates thought about the handling of emergencies and crises…but I digress. Rick Warren is obviously against some things that I think are very important. And it’s safe to assume that most of the people who like him and listen to him and buy his books are also on what I would absolutely consider to be the wrong side of many issues. But that’s all obvious. My initial reaction when I heard about Rick Warren taking part in the inauguration was the same as my friends: WTF?
Then I started thinking about Barack Obama, and what he claims to be about. And now I realize the genius of this plan. The country is not doing well. Here in my crunchy Brooklyn neighborhood everybody seems to be on the same page about a lot of issues, and it’s easy to forget that the country is so very divided about abortion, about the wars, about stem cell research, about gay marriage, and about many other things that determine who people vote for. So what happens in four years? Conservatives lick their wounds for a while, and then regroup and get people pissed off and fired up and Republicans win back the White House in 2012.
Or, we do something different. We don’t just talk about working together, we actually do it. And believe me, the thought of working together with people like Rick Warren repulses me. But the alternative is worse. Isolating conservatives for the next four years will not achieve anything productive. It will just reinforce what they already believe about liberals. But by bringing people like Rick Warren into the fold, people who would have ignored the inauguration may watch for Rick Warren but stay and hear what Obama has to say. People who are against gay marriage may start talking to people who are for it, instead of yelling at them, and some minds may be changed.
What we’re doing now isn’t working. It’s time for something different. And Obama is walking the walk. His supporters have to get used to it, and trust him, and remember why they voted for him in the first place.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: abortion, Afghanistan, Barack Obama, gay marriage, Iraq, Rick Warren
The post-election let down
Nov 7, 2008 What's Going On
So here we are, three days after the big election. And reality is setting in. First of all, the world didn’t magically change the moment that the election was called. I’m not sure what I expected to happen, but whatever it was it didn’t.
Then, it hit me that Bush still has more than two months in office. I mean really, couldn’t we just speed things up? Obama has had twenty-one months to think about staffing and to plan. I bet he could roll a U-Haul into the ellipse at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue tomorrow and things would still run better next week than they have been for the past eight years. But no, we have to wait.
I also didn’t realize that losing the election wouldn’t mean the end of Sarah Palin. She’s not going anywhere. And maybe that’s a good thing. A friend of mine started a Facebook group, Palin 2012, with the idea that the best way to get Obama re-elected is to have him running against Palin. Makes sense.
I also forgot about all of the other stuff going on in this election. Proposition 8 passed in California. This could mean that my sister and her new wife are not married anymore. I can’t even imagine what that must feel like for them. So much thought and planning and hoping and feeling went into their wedding, and they’re so happy, and now the voters in California have decided that they shouldn’t be. I don’t understand this kind of thinking. I don’t get why people are threatened by gay marriage. There are things happening every day that I don’t agree with, but that’s life in a complicated world. Live and let live, love and let love.
Elizabeth Dole lost her senate seat in North Carolina. Good. Some say it had a lot to do with her running a despicable ad showing her opponent, Kay Hagan, at a fundraiser with a group that advocates for the rights of people who don’t believe in God. The ad seemed to show Hagan saying that there is no God, despite the fact that she’s a former Sunday school teacher. I myself am an agnostic, and would have even more respect for Kay Hagan if she didn’t believe in God. But if she does, then trying to get votes by saying that she doesn’t is just wrong. And it didn’t work. Good.
The Al Franken Minnesota senate race still hasn’t been called, and won’t be for several weeks at least. The count was so close (just a few hundred apart) that it triggered an automatic recount. I’ve read several of Al Franken’s books, and while they were meant as comedy, he makes a lot of sense.
My friend’s mom won the position of supervisor in her Florida county. It took two days to count all of the ballots, because the current supervisor – the one she was running against – was so disorganized. So it’s especially sweet that after running an incredibly chaotic election, he lost the position of running elections. This reminded me of a video I saw before the election of the supervisor in Philadelphia. For those “Friends” fans out there, the Philadelphia election was basically being run by Joey’s agent Estelle. Take a look.
Scary on several levels.
I also am realizing that I missed out on huge celebrations in my neighborhood on Tuesday night. Apparently there were big, spontaneous street parties in several locations just a few blocks away. I was asleep at 10:30, half an hour before the election was even called for Obama. I’m not sure I would have even gone out if I had known what was going on, but it didn’t even occur to me that people would be taking to the streets. This was such an emotional event for so many people, I guess I should have assumed that the neighborhood would be partying.
And last, I’m confused about something. It’s completely inconsequential, but it has me puzzled none the less. Barack Obama is being called our first black president, but actually he’s our first interracial president. It’s as though we’ve gone back to the “one drop rule” of the Old South, where if a person had any black ancestors at all he or she was considered black. Obama is such a great man, with so much potential for being a fantastic president, that I guess we all just want to claim a part of him. But he’s not the first black president. His mother was a white woman from Kansas. And his father was an African man. He’s a walking classification buster. He’s white, black, foreign, American, and I’m sure lots of other things. But I guess the most important thing is that he won, however you want to classify him.
UPDATE: President-Elect Obama just referred to himself as a “mutt” during his press conference. I love him.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: Al Franken, Barack Obama, California, Elizabeth Dole, Kay Hagan, Proposition 8
Randomosity
Nov 3, 2008 Randomosity
A quick note first: I’m running a giveaway for a great prize, and it isn’t getting a lot of attention in comparison to the phone that I gave away last week. Please go here and enter. Even if you don’t have small kids, anyone with a child still in a stroller would love to get this as a gift. Please spread the word!
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This is what’s been floating around in my head for the past week. I need to clear it out to make room for more.
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This Fark headline from last week is in honor of my relatives in San Francisco, including my not-yet-living-in-San-Francisco mom:
Crime spree in SF-area cemetery – thousands dead.
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Ode to a Butter Bell:
I don’t know why every home in America doesn’t have one of these. I hate trying to put cold, hard butter on toast or English Muffins, and when I make grilled cheese I need soft butter to spread on the bread. I don’t remember exactly when I discovered these, I think it was in college. I saw them in a catalog, and didn’t really believe that they would work, but I bought one and have been using it for about 15 years, the same one.
You put softened butter (it fits one whole stick) in the top part, put cold water in the bottom part, and turn the butter over onto the water. It forms a seal and keeps the butter from spoiling. Supposedly it will keep butter fresh for 30 days with no refrigeration, but a stick of butter has never lasted a month in my house so I’ve never been able to test that out. I do routinely use the same stick for a couple of weeks though. I change the water every other day or so, except in very hot weather when I usually change it every day and sometimes even toss an ice cube in there (our current kitchen doesn’t have AC and gets beastly hot).
It works great! I hate staying with other people who don’t have soft butter. I’ve given these as gifts over the years – friends don’t let friends have hard butter.
While we’re on the subject of, I don’t know what to call it, things to hold things you spread on bagels and toast maybe? Here’s what I’ve been putting my cream cheese in since college. It keeps it from getting those crusty bits it gets if you leave it in the wrapper. My husband made fun of this one for years but I think he’s finally come to accept the fact that it’s better this way.
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I recently introduced Munchkin to Ramen Noodles, and she’s addicted. She wants it day and night, for every meal. She’ll survive well when she goes off to college. Pasta Boy, who hates trying new things, finally tasted some after watching Munchkin eat it for a week, and now he loves it too. I may never have to spend more than five minutes making dinner again.
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I don’t watch all that many commercials. I’m usually fast forwarding through them. But I spotted this one a few months ago even on fast forward. And every time I see it I have to stop and watch it.
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Hopefully by tomorrow night the enemies of science, education, and thoughtfulness will be going to sleep knowing that they lost a big election, and deservedly so. But here’s one more reason in a pile of reasons not to vote for the McCain/Palin ticket. Sarah Palin’s War On Science.
I remember the last two presidential elections, sitting on my couch in disbelief as the realization came over me that the Republicans had won, despite so much evidence that they simply did not have the best candidate for the job. George W. Bush scares me, but in a head-shaking, what a moron way. McCain and Palin scare me in a very different way. Where W.’s biggest failing was his willingness to give himself over to whatever those pulling the puppet strings wanted him to do, it’s Sarah Palin’s own ideas that terrify me. With no help from anyone, her ideas are so obnoxious, so uninformed, and so backwards, that I literally shudder to think what she would do with real power if she got a hold of it. I rolled my eyes when friends threatened to move to Canada if Bush won (it’s worth noting that they’re all still here). But with the probability that the next president will appoint more than one Supreme Court Justice, the possibility of a McCain/Palin win keeps me up at night. Not to make light of past elections, but this one is no joke. This is going to shape things for decades to come.
Here’s a report card from a group of economists. It’s not even close. McCain as president would be bad for women. I think it would also be bad for men, children, fish, the air, bicycles, the economy, and my marriage (my husband would be near suicidal), but it would be especially bad for women.
One more day…
GObama!
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Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: Barack Obama, Butter Bell, John McCain, Ramen Noodles, Sarah Palin
Best Obama Video EVAR!
Oct 28, 2008 What's Going On
Frequent reader/commenter Tracy brought this awesome video to my attention. For the three of you out there who have not seen the original “Wassup” commercial, it’s posted first.
Original “Wassup” commercial:
“Wassup 2008″
What makes this video even more interesting is that Cindy McCain is heir to one of the largest distributors of Anheuser-Busch beer in the country.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: Anheuser-Busch, Barack Obama, Cindy McCain, Wassup
Surprise Dancing with the Stars Winners!
Oct 22, 2008 What's Going On
My sister Cara just sent this to me. Hilarious! I guess my video message was way off base, I guess Palin was able to bridge the gap after all.
Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Sarcastic, Big-City Moms For Obama
Oct 22, 2008 What's Going On
Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: Barack Obama, Brooklyn, John McCain, Sarah Palin
Randomosity
Oct 20, 2008 Randomosity
This is what’s been floating around in my head for the past week. I need to clear it out to make room for more.
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I just saw a commercial on TV for K-Mart’s layaway program. I didn’t know that layaway existed anymore. That is truly a scary sign of the times.
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There’s been a lot of talk lately about the Bradley Effect, the theory that some white people tell pollsters that they’re undecided or that they’re voting for a black candidate, when they actually plan to vote for the white candidate. I don’t quite believe that this supposed phenomenon is real, but just in case, remember what David Allen Grier said: “Just vote for the white half.”
DAG said that on his new show Chocolate News, which is hilarious. Kind of like The Colbert Report crossed with In Living Color and Chappelle’s Show.
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Jim Cramer (the nutjob who hosts Mad Money on CNBC) was on The Colbert Report a couple weeks ago, after the Dow had dropped hundreds of points. Stephen Colbert made a joke about Cramer liking roller coasters, and this is what Jim Cramer said:
Right, and when they- you go up, go down, hopefully you end up in the same place, sometimes you don’t.
Hmmm. Ummm, correct me if I’m wrong, but if you get on a roller coaster, and you DON’T end up in the same place, didn’t the ride break? I mean, either the ride ends up at the beginning and you get safely off, or something goes terribly wrong and it breaks. The best case scenario is that there will be some sort of rescue (bailout) and you will end up safely on the ground after your adventure, hopefully not hurt. The worst case scenario is that the car breaks free from the tracks, and you smash to the ground. So either Jim Cramer was making a very bad analogy, or he’s pondering the possibility of a financial catastrophe the likes of which we’ve never seen. Or, he’s just had really bad luck on roller coasters.
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As a blogger I get lots of stuff, and since my blog has the word “mom” in the title I get lots of stuff for kids. For some reason, I’m usually not given trucks or firemen, I’m given dolls and girlie toys. For months my son has reacted with grace and patience every time I’ve come home from an event with something for his sister and not for him. Sure, I could stop at the store and get him something, but life isn’t always fair and I’ve made it clear to both of them that these aren’t gifts from me, that they’re from companies trying to buy their love and my blog space. So the other day, when I came home with a video game that he would absolutely love and his sister would have no interest in, I felt like I was evening things out. Well, she threw a tantrum like I’ve never seen. We had to leave the house an hour after it started, and she was still crying. OK, so at least one of my kids gets it.
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This is the earliest I’ve ever gotten the kids Halloween costumes, and we even got to put up some decorations. But here’s the problem: the kids messed up the fake spiderwebs. Our neighbor’s kids came over and “helped” too so it was a free-for-all of eight hands grabbing for the cotton-candy-like stuff and clumping it onto the stair railings. It looks terrible! I was soooo tempted to go out after they went to sleep and fix it. I thought maybe I could fool them into thinking that they had done a better job than they actually had. But in the end I decided to leave it and try to relax. Next year, though, I’m going to hold a little seminar on how to string fake spiderwebs, and nobody gets to decorate until they pass.
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I’ve gotten several emails from friends and family members in the past few weeks trying to persuade me to vote for McCain. I haven’t answered any of them. I’m not going to be able to convince them any more than they’re going to be able to convince me. But all of the people who sent me these emails are intelligent people whom I respect very much, so it bothers me that we are on opposite ends of the political spectrum. Arguments about whether Hillary or Barack should be the candidate were kind-of pointless, because they were very similar and even though I ended up 100% behind Obama, I understood why people would vote for Clinton. But this is different. I cannot fathom why in the world people I like would vote for any Republican at this point. Are they seeing the same news I am? Probably not. I tend to watch shows and read websites that like Obama, and they probably watch shows and read websites that tend to like McCain. It’s difficult to wade through the spin and the crap and get to cold hard facts sometimes, on both sides.
So here’s the conclusion that I’ve come to, the only way that I can wrap my head around it: Republicans vote with their emotions, and Democrats vote with their heads. Now, before you write nasty comments, I am not saying that Republicans are stupid any more than I am saying that Democrats are unfeeling. What I’m saying is the Republican strategists are geniuses at getting their constituents to vote based what they feel is right, not what will get results.
I don’t like a lot of the ideas being thrown around by Democrats right now. But they tend to be based on what history and experts both say are likely to work to solve the problems we’re facing. On the other hand, the Republicans aren’t throwing around too many ideas at all. They’re spending their energy focusing on painting Obama as a bad person, someone who isn’t proud of his country, who wants to take your money and give it to somebody else. They know at this point that they can’t win talking about issues, so they’re appealing to emotions, to subconscious, nagging feelings people have that Obama is too foreign, too exotic, too Socialist, too black, a well-educated wimp who is friends with bad people. And my big fear is that people will fall for it. That in the last moments they’ll let their emotions overpower their brains, and say “Hey, I may not like McCain much, but he’s white, he was a soldier, he’s more like me.”
Yesterday morning, on “Meet the Press”, General Colin Powell, Vietnam veteran, former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, former National Security Adviser, former Secretary of State, and a Republican, endorsed Barack Obama. He did it by appealing to both emotions and intelligence, without hysterics or insults or spin. So, to the people who sent me emails, I read them. And in exchange, I just want you to watch this video. Seven minutes out of your lives.
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Bill Maher speaking about ACORN allegedly registering dead people to vote: “And also, let’s be honest: dead people are overwhelmingly supportive of McCain.”
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Originally posted on Selfish Mom
Tags: Barack Obama, Bradley Effect, Chappelle's Show, Chocolate News, CNBC, Colin Powell, David Allen Grier, George Bush, Halloween, Hillary Clinton, In Living Color, Jim Cramer, John McCain, Mad Money, Meet the Press, Stephen Colbert, The Colbert Report, The Daily Show
