Monday, March 31, 2008

It's our time to shine

Has anyone checked out the new Yahoo! portal for women, Shine? According to the article in Information Week, "Yahoo said the site will have "attitude," "personality," and humor, while providing advice and secret tips like "a friend."

BLEAAAAGH!

Read it, by all means. Check it out. My overwhelming reaction as I flip through the pages is "You don't know me!" I can't figure out if I think this thing is written by actually women, or by men pretending to be women, giving women 'what they want.' It reads like the chick-lit parodical bastard child of those 'Men Seeking Women' ads where the guy claims he looooves 'long moonlit walks on the beach.' I cry shenanigans. It's horrible, complete with fake girl-speak. Hopefully it's just finding it's voice and will improve in time, like Buffy and ST:NG. Or maybe they'll just find some better writers. Preferably human females.

Hey, maybe it's written by fembots?! If that's the case, I may have to reverse my position on this whole thing -- love me some fembots. Loved me some Sarah Corvus, too, but I have to say I missed the old-school fembots on the recent Bionic Woman remake. Less Jamie Sommers, more Sarah Corvus, add some fembots and a dash of Oscar Goldman? TV gold.

Sunday, March 30, 2008

Wigs on fire

MTV has been showing ANTM cycle 4 all day today, so I finally got to catch it early enough to see this moment on my own TV...

Saturday, March 29, 2008

A house is not a home

Been working my way through Friends on DVD lately -- more of my fun Laying-In-Bed-With-A-Bad-Back-Tour. Last night I finally hit end of season 4, and realized that I'd completely blocked an appearance by Hugh Laurie:


I love that, if only because I completely agree with him. I think she is horrible, and they WERE on a break.

In searching for that, though, I found this fun little treasure... enjoy!



And, for the Hugh Laurie trifecta...

Friday, March 28, 2008

Hot barbecue

Humorous Pictures
see more crazy cat pics

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Can you dig it?

I was delighted, as a monkees fan, to discover this piece of footage from HEAD on You Tube. I actually found it while looking for footage of Toni Basil popping and locking... who knew there was a convergence?!?


Wednesday, March 26, 2008

I say a little prayer for you

This couple should be shot... then not treated for the gunshot wounds. Pray your way out of that, assholes.

______

Parents didn't expect daughter to die during prayer

By ROBERT IMRIE

Associated Press Writer

1:20 PM CDT, March 26, 2008

WESTON, Wis.

The mother of an 11-year-old girl who died of untreated diabetes said Wednesday that she did not know her daughter was terminally ill as she prayed for her to get better.

Madeline Neumann died Sunday from a treatable form of diabetes.

Her mother, Leilani Neumann, told The Associated Press that she never expected her daughter, whom she called Kara, to die. The family believes in the Bible, and it says healing comes from God, but they are not crazy, religious people, she said.

The girl's father, Dale Neumann, a former police officer, said he has friends who are doctors. He started CPR "as soon as the breath of life left" his daughter's body, he said.

Other family members called 911 to seek emergency help, Leilani Neumann said.

"We are remaining strong for our children," she said. "Only our faith in God is giving us strength at this time."

The couple has three other children.

Everest Metro Police Chief Dan Vergin has said an autopsy determined Madeline died from diabetic ketoacidosis, an ailment that left her with too little insulin in her body.

She had probably been ill for about 30 days, suffering symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, excessive thirst, loss of appetite and weakness, he said.

But Leilani Neumann said her daughter, a straight A student, was in good health until recently.

"We just noticed a tiredness within the past two weeks," she said. "And then just the day before and that day (she died), it suddenly just went to a more serious situation. We stayed fast in prayer then. We believed that she would recover. We saw signs that to us, it looked like she was recovering."

Her daughter had no fever and there was warmth in her body, she explained.

The family does not belong to an organized religion or faith, Leilani Neumann said.

"We just believe in the Bible, that's all," she said. "This is our faith."

Her husband added that, "We believe the word of God and live according to its precepts."

Leilani Neumann said the family is not worried about a police investigation into her daughter's death because "our lives are in God's hands. We know we did not do anything criminal. We know we did the best for our daughter we knew how to do."

Vergin said he expect the investigation to wrap up by Friday and the findings to be forwarded to the district attorney to review for possible charges.

The family moved to Weston from California about two years ago to open a coffee shop and be closer to other relatives, the Neumanns said. They live in rural Weston, in a modern, middle class home in the some woods. A basketball hoop is set up in the driveway.

Officers went to the home after a relative in California asked police to check on the girl. She was taken to a hospital where she was pronounced dead.

According to Vergin, the parents told investigators Madeline last saw a doctor when she was 3 to get some shots. The girl had attended public school during the first semester but didn't return for the second semester, he said.

Mrs. Neumann said she deeply loves all her children and has nurtured them spiritually, emotionally and physically.

"Our lives are in God's hands and whatever we go through we are just going to trust him," she said. "We need healing. We are going through the healing process."

Tuesday, March 25, 2008

Harry, you're a beast

Dear John Caponera:

Congrats on your syndicated commercial for AT&T Cable. You're a douchebag. Choke on your fake-ass Harry Caray wig.

Besos, K

Money doesn't mean a thing

So today the feds announced, with little fanfare, that the Social Security trust fund will be wiped out by 2041, and Medicare is projected to be belly-up by 2019. Terrifying. Specifically, they also stated that, beginning this year for Medicare and in 2017 for Social Security, benefits withdrawn will be more than taxes collected via payroll (as a greater number of people hit retirement age than are in the workforce). So basically when I am 47, Social Security will be out of money (because it loaned its surplus to the federal government), and when I hit 71, there will be no money left.

Pretty sweet, huh? Guess I'd better take the $15 in my pocket right now and hide it in my mattress.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Turn to the left... Fashion

I am now totally fascinated with Polyvore.com, this website that enables you to channel your inner Rachel Zoe. Or someone who eats. Mix, match, create looks for your secret model self. It's like shopping without the Visa bills. Wish I could figure out which blog I found it on. Maybe on Fashonista?

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Don't be the bunny


















Happy Easter, everyone!

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Hungry freaks, daddy

Now I can still sing 90% of the Schoolhouse Rock songs, but perhaps I should have paid a skosh more attention to these instead...






After all, do thin people *really* need to know the Preamble to the Constitution?

Friday, March 21, 2008

Lotta lotta women

The Women (1939) is one of my all-time favorites. Delightful dialogue, amazing cast, and a technicolor fashion show. Yup, you read me right. I had the luck of seeing this movie in about 1988 or so, when it ran at The Ken (San Diego's artsy-fartsy movie house) in a double feature with Mommie Dearest. Me, a couple of friends, and seemingly the entire contingent of San Diego gays turned out for the showing -- can you blame them/us? Wicked fun.

Well, according to imdb, the long-threatened remake of The Women is to be foisted upon us this year. I still hold out hope that it will be delightful and worth the effort. Does anyone know if they're still using the Clare Boothe Luce script/dialogue? From the stills, it seems to be in color, which means no technicolor fashion
show, so it already suffers by comparison, IMHO. I am a little concerned about Meg Ryan's now-terrifying mug bringing life to the Mary Haines character. I like Eva Mendes, so I'm okay with her as Crystal Allen, but I don't know if she can be wicked enough. I am outright worried about Bette Midler as the Countess DeLave -- Mary Boland hit all the right notes in the original, retaining a sense of realism in her portrayal of such and absurd and over-the-top character, with a certain wisdom in her foolishness. With Bette, there's a risk she'll make the character too much of a caricature. I'm no Rue McClanahan fan, but she did a better job in the PBS broadcast of the 2002 stage version than I think Bette will do.

Then there's the poster art. The original properly conveys the arch playfulness of the film, and is a nice match for the dialogue. The remake is too Sex & The City to me. It actually looks like it could be a poster for some '60s sex farce -- soooo NOT Clare Boothe Luce.

Concerned, worried, cautious. But I will be there in theatres opening weekend to see it.

Thursday, March 20, 2008

First you make a stone of your heart

http://www.alife4sale.com/

Watching LOST tonight, something (I now know not what) made me think of the recent news story about Ian Usher, the Australian man who is selling his life. I think it's brilliant. Who hasn't had a moment when they wished they could walk away from their life and start over? On LOST, I think really only Locke could get away with it, since everyone else has someone back home that remembers them and/or would look for them. Sure, Locke has co-workers, and nurses that treated him, but anyone who would really care? Nope. Not that we know of.

It reminds me of my 11th grade English teacher. Some years after I graduated from HS, his wife went missing. Her car was found in a local shopping mall parking lot, but no note, no remains, no ransom request. Allegedly they did find a copy of some book (in her lingerie drawer or some such) about leaving your spouse without a trace, or How To Disappear From Your Current Life. Passages were underlined. I can't find any online stories about the disappearance, so I don't know if she was ever found.

And now we have Drew Peterson. Whether or not the man did it, he's an A-grade, #1 tool. He's been under investigation by his police department on multiple occasions... for no reason? Doubtful. His fourth wife goes missing and his third wife was a homicide victim found dead in her home bathtub? He may not have done it, but I'd bet dollars to donuts he knows more than he's letting on.

Murder, death, disappearance... cheery post! Maybe this is better...

Wednesday, March 19, 2008

All your life is Channel 13

He'd never go for it (based on this clip), but (based on this clip) Billy Joel needs a reality tv show PRONTO.

Tuesday, March 18, 2008

To ourselves and our posterity

"A More Perfect Union" speech by Barack Obama
Constitution Center
Tuesday, March 18th, 2008
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

"We the people, in order to form a more perfect union."

Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787.

The document they produced was eventually signed but ultimately unfinished. It was stained by this nation's original sin of slavery, a question that divided the colonies and brought the convention to a stalemate until the founders chose to allow the slave trade to continue for at least twenty more years, and to leave any final resolution to future generations.

Of course, the answer to the slavery question was already embedded within our Constitution – a Constitution that had at is very core the ideal of equal citizenship under the law; a Constitution that promised its people liberty, and justice, and a union that could be and should be perfected over time.

And yet words on a parchment would not be enough to deliver slaves from bondage, or provide men and women of every color and creed their full rights and obligations as citizens of the United States. What would be needed were Americans in successive generations who were willing to do their part – through protests and struggle, on the streets and in the courts, through a civil war and civil disobedience and always at great risk - to narrow that gap between the promise of our ideals and the reality of their time.

This was one of the tasks we set forth at the beginning of this campaign – to continue the long march of those who came before us, a march for a more just, more equal, more free, more caring and more prosperous America. I chose to run for the presidency at this moment in history because I believe deeply that we cannot solve the challenges of our time unless we solve them together – unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have different stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction – towards a better future for of children and our grandchildren.

This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people. But it also comes from my own American story.

I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton's Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I've gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world's poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.

It's a story that hasn't made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts – that out of many, we are truly one.

Throughout the first year of this campaign, against all predictions to the contrary, we saw how hungry the American people were for this message of unity. Despite the temptation to view my candidacy through a purely racial lens, we won commanding victories in states with some of the whitest populations in the country. In South Carolina, where the Confederate Flag still flies, we built a powerful coalition of African Americans and white Americans.

This is not to say that race has not been an issue in the campaign. At various stages in the campaign, some commentators have deemed me either "too black" or "not black enough." We saw racial tensions bubble to the surface during the week before the South Carolina primary. The press has scoured every exit poll for the latest evidence of racial polarization, not just in terms of white and black, but black and brown as well.

And yet, it has only been in the last couple of weeks that the discussion of race in this campaign has taken a particularly divisive turn.

On one end of the spectrum, we've heard the implication that my candidacy is somehow an exercise in affirmative action; that it's based solely on the desire of wide-eyed liberals to purchase racial reconciliation on the cheap. On the other end, we've heard my former pastor, Reverend Jeremiah Wright, use incendiary language to express views that have the potential not only to widen the racial divide, but views that denigrate both the greatness and the goodness of our nation; that rightly offend white and black alike.

I have already condemned, in unequivocal terms, the statements of Reverend Wright that have caused such controversy. For some, nagging questions remain. Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely – just as I'm sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors, priests, or rabbis with which you strongly disagreed.

But the remarks that have caused this recent firestorm weren't simply controversial. They weren't simply a religious leader's effort to speak out against perceived injustice. Instead, they expressed a profoundly distorted view of this country – a view that sees white racism as endemic, and that elevates what is wrong with America above all that we know is right with America; a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam.

As such, Reverend Wright's comments were not only wrong but divisive, divisive at a time when we need unity; racially charged at a time when we need to come together to solve a set of monumental problems – two wars, a terrorist threat, a falling economy, a chronic health care crisis and potentially devastating climate change; problems that are neither black or white or Latino or Asian, but rather problems that confront us all.

Given my background, my politics, and my professed values and ideals, there will no doubt be those for whom my statements of condemnation are not enough. Why associate myself with Reverend Wright in the first place, they may ask? Why not join another church? And I confess that if all that I knew of Reverend Wright were the snippets of those sermons that have run in an endless loop on the television and You Tube, or if Trinity United Church of Christ conformed to the caricatures being peddled by some commentators, there is no doubt that I would react in much the same way

But the truth is, that isn't all that I know of the man. The man I met more than twenty years ago is a man who helped introduce me to my Christian faith, a man who spoke to me about our obligations to love one another; to care for the sick and lift up the poor. He is a man who served his country as a U.S. Marine; who has studied and lectured at some of the finest universities and seminaries in the country, and who for over thirty years led a church that serves the community by doing God's work here on Earth – by housing the homeless, ministering to the needy, providing day care services and scholarships and prison ministries, and reaching out to those suffering from HIV/AIDS.

In my first book, Dreams From My Father, I described the experience of my first service at Trinity:

"People began to shout, to rise from their seats and clap and cry out, a forceful wind carrying the reverend's voice up into the rafters….And in that single note – hope! – I heard something else; at the foot of that cross, inside the thousands of churches across the city, I imagined the stories of ordinary black people merging with the stories of David and Goliath, Moses and Pharaoh, the Christians in the lion's den, Ezekiel's field of dry bones. Those stories – of survival, and freedom, and hope – became our story, my story; the blood that had spilled was our blood, the tears our tears; until this black church, on this bright day, seemed once more a vessel carrying the story of a people into future generations and into a larger world. Our trials and triumphs became at once unique and universal, black and more than black; in chronicling our journey, the stories and songs gave us a means to reclaim memories that we didn't need to feel shame about…memories that all people might study and cherish – and with which we could start to rebuild."

That has been my experience at Trinity. Like other predominantly black churches across the country, Trinity embodies the black community in its entirety – the doctor and the welfare mom, the model student and the former gang-banger. Like other black churches, Trinity's services are full of raucous laughter and sometimes bawdy humor. They are full of dancing, clapping, screaming and shouting that may seem jarring to the untrained ear. The church contains in full the kindness and cruelty, the fierce intelligence and the shocking ignorance, the struggles and successes, the love and yes, the bitterness and bias that make up the black experience in America.

And this helps explain, perhaps, my relationship with Reverend Wright. As imperfect as he may be, he has been like family to me. He strengthened my faith, officiated my wedding, and baptized my children. Not once in my conversations with him have I heard him talk about any ethnic group in derogatory terms, or treat whites with whom he interacted with anything but courtesy and respect. He contains within him the contradictions – the good and the bad – of the community that he has served diligently for so many years.

I can no more disown him than I can disown the black community. I can no more disown him than I can my white grandmother – a woman who helped raise me, a woman who sacrificed again and again for me, a woman who loves me as much as she loves anything in this world, but a woman who once confessed her fear of black men who passed by her on the street, and who on more than one occasion has uttered racial or ethnic stereotypes that made me cringe.

These people are a part of me. And they are a part of America, this country that I love.

Some will see this as an attempt to justify or excuse comments that are simply inexcusable. I can assure you it is not. I suppose the politically safe thing would be to move on from this episode and just hope that it fades into the woodwork. We can dismiss Reverend Wright as a crank or a demagogue, just as some have dismissed Geraldine Ferraro, in the aftermath of her recent statements, as harboring some deep-seated racial bias.

But race is an issue that I believe this nation cannot afford to ignore right now. We would be making the same mistake that Reverend Wright made in his offending sermons about America – to simplify and stereotype and amplify the negative to the point that it distorts reality.

The fact is that the comments that have been made and the issues that have surfaced over the last few weeks reflect the complexities of race in this country that we've never really worked through – a part of our union that we have yet to perfect. And if we walk away now, if we simply retreat into our respective corners, we will never be able to come together and solve challenges like health care, or education, or the need to find good jobs for every American.

Understanding this reality requires a reminder of how we arrived at this point. As William Faulkner once wrote, "The past isn't dead and buried. In fact, it isn't even past." We do not need to recite here the history of racial injustice in this country. But we do need to remind ourselves that so many of the disparities that exist in the African-American community today can be directly traced to inequalities passed on from an earlier generation that suffered under the brutal legacy of slavery and Jim Crow.

Segregated schools were, and are, inferior schools; we still haven't fixed them, fifty years after Brown v. Board of Education, and the inferior education they provided, then and now, helps explain the pervasive achievement gap between today's black and white students.

Legalized discrimination - where blacks were prevented, often through violence, from owning property, or loans were not granted to African-American business owners, or black homeowners could not access FHA mortgages, or blacks were excluded from unions, or the police force, or fire departments – meant that black families could not amass any meaningful wealth to bequeath to future generations. That history helps explain the wealth and income gap between black and white, and the concentrated pockets of poverty that persists in so many of today's urban and rural communities.

A lack of economic opportunity among black men, and the shame and frustration that came from not being able to provide for one's family, contributed to the erosion of black families – a problem that welfare policies for many years may have worsened. And the lack of basic services in so many urban black neighborhoods – parks for kids to play in, police walking the beat, regular garbage pick-up and building code enforcement – all helped create a cycle of violence, blight and neglect that continue to haunt us.

This is the reality in which Reverend Wright and other African-Americans of his generation grew up. They came of age in the late fifties and early sixties, a time when segregation was still the law of the land and opportunity was systematically constricted. What's remarkable is not how many failed in the face of discrimination, but rather how many men and women overcame the odds; how many were able to make a way out of no way for those like me who would come after them.

But for all those who scratched and clawed their way to get a piece of the American Dream, there were many who didn't make it – those who were ultimately defeated, in one way or another, by discrimination. That legacy of defeat was passed on to future generations – those young men and increasingly young women who we see standing on street corners or languishing in our prisons, without hope or prospects for the future. Even for those blacks who did make it, questions of race, and racism, continue to define their worldview in fundamental ways. For the men and women of Reverend Wright's generation, the memories of humiliation and doubt and fear have not gone away; nor has the anger and the bitterness of those years. That anger may not get expressed in public, in front of white co-workers or white friends. But it does find voice in the barbershop or around the kitchen table. At times, that anger is exploited by politicians, to gin up votes along racial lines, or to make up for a politician's own failings.

And occasionally it finds voice in the church on Sunday morning, in the pulpit and in the pews. The fact that so many people are surprised to hear that anger in some of Reverend Wright's sermons simply reminds us of the old truism that the most segregated hour in American life occurs on Sunday morning. That anger is not always productive; indeed, all too often it distracts attention from solving real problems; it keeps us from squarely facing our own complicity in our condition, and prevents the African-American community from forging the alliances it needs to bring about real change. But the anger is real; it is powerful; and to simply wish it away, to condemn it without understanding its roots, only serves to widen the chasm of misunderstanding that exists between the races.

In fact, a similar anger exists within segments of the white community. Most working- and middle-class white Americans don't feel that they have been particularly privileged by their race. Their experience is the immigrant experience – as far as they're concerned, no one's handed them anything, they've built it from scratch. They've worked hard all their lives, many times only to see their jobs shipped overseas or their pension dumped after a lifetime of labor. They are anxious about their futures, and feel their dreams slipping away; in an era of stagnant wages and global competition, opportunity comes to be seen as a zero sum game, in which your dreams come at my expense. So when they are told to bus their children to a school across town; when they hear that an African American is getting an advantage in landing a good job or a spot in a good college because of an injustice that they themselves never committed; when they're told that their fears about crime in urban neighborhoods are somehow prejudiced, resentment builds over time.

Like the anger within the black community, these resentments aren't always expressed in polite company. But they have helped shape the political landscape for at least a generation. Anger over welfare and affirmative action helped forge the Reagan Coalition. Politicians routinely exploited fears of crime for their own electoral ends. Talk show hosts and conservative commentators built entire careers unmasking bogus claims of racism while dismissing legitimate discussions of racial injustice and inequality as mere political correctness or reverse racism.

Just as black anger often proved counterproductive, so have these white resentments distracted attention from the real culprits of the middle class squeeze – a corporate culture rife with inside dealing, questionable accounting practices, and short-term greed; a Washington dominated by lobbyists and special interests; economic policies that favor the few over the many. And yet, to wish away the resentments of white Americans, to label them as misguided or even racist, without recognizing they are grounded in legitimate concerns – this too widens the racial divide, and blocks the path to understanding.

This is where we are right now. It's a racial stalemate we've been stuck in for years. Contrary to the claims of some of my critics, black and white, I have never been so naïve as to believe that we can get beyond our racial divisions in a single election cycle, or with a single candidacy – particularly a candidacy as imperfect as my own.

But I have asserted a firm conviction – a conviction rooted in my faith in God and my faith in the American people – that working together we can move beyond some of our old racial wounds, and that in fact we have no choice is we are to continue on the path of a more perfect union.

For the African-American community, that path means embracing the burdens of our past without becoming victims of our past. It means continuing to insist on a full measure of justice in every aspect of American life. But it also means binding our particular grievances – for better health care, and better schools, and better jobs - to the larger aspirations of all Americans -- the white woman struggling to break the glass ceiling, the white man whose been laid off, the immigrant trying to feed his family. And it means taking full responsibility for own lives – by demanding more from our fathers, and spending more time with our children, and reading to them, and teaching them that while they may face challenges and discrimination in their own lives, they must never succumb to despair or cynicism; they must always believe that they can write their own destiny.

Ironically, this quintessentially American – and yes, conservative – notion of self-help found frequent expression in Reverend Wright's sermons. But what my former pastor too often failed to understand is that embarking on a program of self-help also requires a belief that society can change.

The profound mistake of Reverend Wright's sermons is not that he spoke about racism in our society. It's that he spoke as if our society was static; as if no progress has been made; as if this country – a country that has made it possible for one of his own members to run for the highest office in the land and build a coalition of white and black; Latino and Asian, rich and poor, young and old -- is still irrevocably bound to a tragic past. But what we know -- what we have seen – is that America can change. That is true genius of this nation. What we have already achieved gives us hope – the audacity to hope – for what we can and must achieve tomorrow.

In the white community, the path to a more perfect union means acknowledging that what ails the African-American community does not just exist in the minds of black people; that the legacy of discrimination - and current incidents of discrimination, while less overt than in the past - are real and must be addressed. Not just with words, but with deeds – by investing in our schools and our communities; by enforcing our civil rights laws and ensuring fairness in our criminal justice system; by providing this generation with ladders of opportunity that were unavailable for previous generations. It requires all Americans to realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams; that investing in the health, welfare, and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

In the end, then, what is called for is nothing more, and nothing less, than what all the world's great religions demand – that we do unto others as we would have them do unto us. Let us be our brother's keeper, Scripture tells us. Let us be our sister's keeper. Let us find that common stake we all have in one another, and let our politics reflect that spirit as well.

For we have a choice in this country. We can accept a politics that breeds division, and conflict, and cynicism. We can tackle race only as spectacle – as we did in the OJ trial – or in the wake of tragedy, as we did in the aftermath of Katrina - or as fodder for the nightly news. We can play Reverend Wright's sermons on every channel, every day and talk about them from now until the election, and make the only question in this campaign whether or not the American people think that I somehow believe or sympathize with his most offensive words. We can pounce on some gaffe by a Hillary supporter as evidence that she's playing the race card, or we can speculate on whether white men will all flock to John McCain in the general election regardless of his policies.

We can do that.

But if we do, I can tell you that in the next election, we'll be talking about some other distraction. And then another one. And then another one. And nothing will change.

That is one option. Or, at this moment, in this election, we can come together and say, "Not this time." This time we want to talk about the crumbling schools that are stealing the future of black children and white children and Asian children and Hispanic children and Native American children. This time we want to reject the cynicism that tells us that these kids can't learn; that those kids who don't look like us are somebody else's problem. The children of America are not those kids, they are our kids, and we will not let them fall behind in a 21st century economy. Not this time.

This time we want to talk about how the lines in the Emergency Room are filled with whites and blacks and Hispanics who do not have health care; who don't have the power on their own to overcome the special interests in Washington, but who can take them on if we do it together.

This time we want to talk about the shuttered mills that once provided a decent life for men and women of every race, and the homes for sale that once belonged to Americans from every religion, every region, every walk of life. This time we want to talk about the fact that the real problem is not that someone who doesn't look like you might take your job; it's that the corporation you work for will ship it overseas for nothing more than a profit.

This time we want to talk about the men and women of every color and creed who serve together, and fight together, and bleed together under the same proud flag. We want to talk about how to bring them home from a war that never should've been authorized and never should've been waged, and we want to talk about how we'll show our patriotism by caring for them, and their families, and giving them the benefits they have earned.

I would not be running for President if I didn't believe with all my heart that this is what the vast majority of Americans want for this country. This union may never be perfect, but generation after generation has shown that it can always be perfected. And today, whenever I find myself feeling doubtful or cynical about this possibility, what gives me the most hope is the next generation – the young people whose attitudes and beliefs and openness to change have already made history in this election.

There is one story in particularly that I'd like to leave you with today – a story I told when I had the great honor of speaking on Dr. King's birthday at his home church, Ebenezer Baptist, in Atlanta.

There is a young, twenty-three year old white woman named Ashley Baia who organized for our campaign in Florence, South Carolina. She had been working to organize a mostly African-American community since the beginning of this campaign, and one day she was at a roundtable discussion where everyone went around telling their story and why they were there.

And Ashley said that when she was nine years old, her mother got cancer. And because she had to miss days of work, she was let go and lost her health care. They had to file for bankruptcy, and that's when Ashley decided that she had to do something to help her mom.

She knew that food was one of their most expensive costs, and so Ashley convinced her mother that what she really liked and really wanted to eat more than anything else was mustard and relish sandwiches. Because that was the cheapest way to eat.

She did this for a year until her mom got better, and she told everyone at the roundtable that the reason she joined our campaign was so that she could help the millions of other children in the country who want and need to help their parents too.

Now Ashley might have made a different choice. Perhaps somebody told her along the way that the source of her mother's problems were blacks who were on welfare and too lazy to work, or Hispanics who were coming into the country illegally. But she didn't. She sought out allies in her fight against injustice.

Anyway, Ashley finishes her story and then goes around the room and asks everyone else why they're supporting the campaign. They all have different stories and reasons. Many bring up a specific issue. And finally they come to this elderly black man who's been sitting there quietly the entire time. And Ashley asks him why he's there. And he does not bring up a specific issue. He does not say health care or the economy. He does not say education or the war. He does not say that he was there because of Barack Obama. He simply says to everyone in the room, "I am here because of Ashley."

"I'm here because of Ashley." By itself, that single moment of recognition between that young white girl and that old black man is not enough. It is not enough to give health care to the sick, or jobs to the jobless, or education to our children.

But it is where we start. It is where our union grows stronger. And as so many generations have come to realize over the course of the two-hundred and twenty one years since a band of patriots signed that document in Philadelphia, that is where the perfection begins.

Monday, March 17, 2008

Roll me through the night

I always knew I loved Dlisted, but this is exactly why. And yes, I wholeheartedly agree: Michael Stipe IS gayer than the (extremely gay) Billy Squier video for "Rock Me Tonight." Heck, to save everyone the multiple clicks, here you go. The proof's in the pudding -- or in this case, the flashdance-y cut tshirt.


In fact, let me live-blog this video for you:

0:01 - Satin sheets?!? Gay much?
0:09 - He has a vase with tall reedy things next to his bed? Who has this in 1987? The gays (and my mom).
0:25 - Seriously, no shirts around with an intact shoulder? Is it laundry day?
0:31 - His upper arms seem to be stuck to his torso, but not even that can squelch his irrepressibly gay snapping.
0:50 - Okay, he just sashayed over to his pink (!!!) elevator, fluffed up his man-perm, and is now crawling on his floor. Billy, you minx!! Freeze it at 0:52 for big gay O-face.
1:08 - Somewhere in his hissy fit, he found his camisole. *Whew!*
1:16 - More gay frolicking, while a close up is soft-focused over the top, like some Olan Mills portrait gone horribly wrong. And gay(er).
1:20 - Invisible jumprope.
1:26 - Money shot: Billy tears his tee in a fit of pique. Missed it? Oh look -- instant replay!
1:34 - I think I wore this same tank combo to Jazzercise in. Nothing says straight like the knots at the waist, except maybe more of the gay forearm snapping.
1:46 - Rwawrr! I'm a caged animal!!!
1:50 - More gay dancing, in the window this time -- what will his neighbors think!?! And c'mon Billy -- man up and slide down your big red pole instead of that weird half-plie you just did.
2:00 - Giant. Gay. Backbend.
2:03 - What, don't you have a hairbrush you can pretend to sing into, Sandra Dee?
2:09 through 2:43 - This looks like some sort of sponsored fit. Who choreographed this?! I guarantee, if I went to my local grocery store and repeated this "dance" they'd put me in a padded cell tout de suite.
2:47 - Exhausted! Fall on bed! He rolled off too soon -- I would have preferred the slightly gayer choice of rolling and writhing like Madonna in the "Material Girl" video ("a material... a material... a material... a material WORLD.") Side Note: Fun new improv game, 'New (Gay) Choice' -- each choice has to be progressively gayer.
3:03 - Who is he singing to? This is the butchest he's been all video.
3:22 - Wait, I may stand to be corrected! He just grabbed his axe, and got in the pink (!!!) elevator! I smell some butchness about to happen!
3:41 - Or... not. Why the neckerchief? And why is his band suddenly dressed and coiffed like A-Ha?
4:16 - I swear this video ended his career. Now he's running in place trying to catch it.
4:39 - Okay, he just leaned provocatively on the drummer, now the keyboardist and drummer are hugging while Billy leans on his guitarist while his bassist strips.

In summation: I love me some gay, but Rip Taylor is embarrassed by this video. Fin.


Sunday, March 16, 2008

I just adore her so I can't ignore her

Looks like hulu.com went public right in time for my injury -- lots more time to lie abed and watch movies and whatnot. They've really added a lot to their queue, especially in the Movies category. I got all excited before noticing that many of the best selections were just clips, but there was still plenty of mediocre crap left in the feature film category to keep me occupied while doped up on Flexaril and Vicodin.

One such movie was The Girl Next Door, which definitely falls into the Probably-Wouldn't-Have-Bothered-If-It-Weren't-Free category of selections. However, it was surprisingly good. Not a masterpiece by any stretch, but much smarter and better written/cast/directed than I expected given its teen sex comedy marketing strategy. Definitely worth spending a couple of hours on when you're sick and stranded.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

Friday, March 14, 2008

They're picking at their fingers with their knives

I used to love to go to Spike & Mike's Festival of Animation -- they started in San Diego, and used to show at the La Jolla Museum of Art. The regular festival shows were great, but best was the Sick & Twisted shows. Nothing was too puerile or demented, for either me or their selection committee, it seemed. A short entitled "Wrong Hole"? Check. Smell-o-vision cards, where you would scratch and sniff fart or vomit smells to go with the animated shorts? Done. Weird Al live and in person presenting his clay-mation video for "Jurassic Park"? You betcha.

Below are
two classics, first seen by me courtesy of Spike and Mike. Thanks guys. :)



Thursday, March 13, 2008

And I'm mopping, mopping, mopping

Four words: Kevin. Johnson. My. Ass.

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

They are women without any faults

This is one of those '80s songs that just can't seem to locate on MP3, and I adore it!! If you have, or know where to find, please send!!!

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

No one told you life was gonna be this way

Working my way through Friends on DVD right now - the perfect show to zone out to while on Flexaril while stuck at home for a week. It's interesting how, years later, I find Schwimmer's physical humor pretty amazing, and how much I hate the Rachel character. Kind of like the hating of Carrie Bradshaw -- I used to love the characters because I totally know people like that, whereas now I realize that I don't like the people I know that are like that.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Avalanche or roadblock

39%
In other news, I have been instructed to stay home this week because of my back. Flexaril, Vicodin, and bed rest, with a MRI chaser next week. Boo yah!

Sunday, March 09, 2008

Everybody wash!

My results:
I am Wash (Ship Pilot)

















I am a pilot with a good
if not silly sense of humor.
I take pride in my collection of toys.
I love my significant other.

Click here to take the Serenity Firefly Personality Test

Saturday, March 08, 2008

I just want to be your one-man band

So, many friends know that my favorite "game" is 'Band Name or Album Title?' -- many prefer the standby 'Gay or European?' and many improviser buddies view everything as a potential Team Name, but being a music junkie I view unique turns-of-phrase as potential band names or album titles. For example, when one of the facilities managers I used to work talked about the "new-style turners" he was going to install, in my mind I said "band name." By contrast, the phrase "All New Sunday" at the bottom of my TV screen right now seems more like an Album Title. Maybe even the new album by the New-Style Turners -- too many 'new's there, though. Save that album for another band.

Knowing all this, you can then imagine my delight when I stumbled across this:

Let's Make a Band (Meme)


1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first article title on the page is the name of your band.

2. http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four words of the very last quote is the title of your album.

3. http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/
The third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.


My results?

Band Name: North Humberside
AlbumTitle: Every Ill-Judged Outlay
Cover image:












The album:













I love love love this! If I was feeling really retento, and had come up with a particularly good combination of Band Name and Album Title, I would sometimes try to think of what the song titles were for that album (or at least the hit single), and try to pinpoint what the band's sound was. To me, "North Humberside" seems kind of Guster-y -- you? What do you think their sound is? Suggested track names?

How do you catch a moonbeam in your hand?

Blasphemously delicious.

Do me a favor, open the door

Why is Blogger not letting me manage my posts? Was it something I said?

Friday, March 07, 2008

Get back to where you once belonged

So last night I got into bed, and could not get out. Back started spasming, and I could not even make it to the bathroom without assistance. Good times. Not at all embarrassing. Am now semi-mobile, but can still barely move.

Since this is the second time that I've had back problems in the past month, I am a bit concerned. Just went to the podatrist on Monday -- the theory now is that this is all interrelated. Now if they can just figure out what they're doing about our insurance at work, I can see the spine guy I have been referred to. Until they do, though, I am reluctant to create any pre-existing conditions -- don't want to see him on this insurance, then have them switch carriers and get denied for coverage.

Ah, the joys of non-socialized medicine. Speaking of which, check out this entry at Stuff White People Like. Brilliant.

Thursday, March 06, 2008

That's what's going on


Brilliant and worth watching til the end. Most people have seen the low-budget version of this already, but I think this version is cool as hell.

Wednesday, March 05, 2008

Hey, hell, I pay the price

Two big stories going on today (besides Barack and Hillary): David Hernandez's pre-American Idol turn as a gay lapdancer, and Margaret B. Jones' fake memoir Love and Consequences. IMHO, they're the same story -- it's 2008, and everybody knows everything about you. And if they don't, they soon will.

The power of the internets/tubes/highway and the immediate availability of information thereupon/therein makes it pretty much a lock that, if you used to be a gay stripper, someone's got a photo of you starkers. Or that they can at least hunt down a text message or email or blog entry you sent them about how much it chafes when dudes stuff their soggy $1s in your ass crack. Then they forward that to Gawker or TMZ.com, and voila -- your privates are public. Or better yet, in the case of Margaret Jones (real name: Margaret Seltzer), your own family rats you out.

The fake memoir thing is very interesting in and of itself. Beyond just wishing to oneself "I hope they don't find out all my dark dirty secrets!" the huevos involved in promoting a fake memoir/identity seems, well, a tad pathological. You're basically asking for it -- instead of just letting it be, Seltzer did interviews as "Jones" and trotted out fake foster siblings as "proof" of her existence. An L.A. Times article references a similar inner-city fake memoir situation in 1983, and how differently the revelation was handled 16 years ago, but the situations are NOT the same -- as my husband would say, it's like the difference between shooting a bullet and throwing it. There's an inherent deception in Margaret Seltzer going out on the circuit saying "I am Margaret Jones -- these things happened to me" versus simply developing a nom de plume.

The best thing? To just be. The internet found your secrets? Just be. You used to strip? Just be. You're writing a fake memoir? Just be. You already did the thing -- now just be still with it.

Oh, and side note to David Hernandez: Dick's?!? Happy you're a gay stripper, but find a place with more panache, will ya?

Tuesday, March 04, 2008

The beast and dragon, adored

So many jokes here, I'm just sure of it...

Dungeons & Dragons Co-Creator Dies at 69

MILWAUKEE (AP) — Gary Gygax, who co-created the fantasy game Dungeons & Dragons and helped start the role-playing phenomenon, died Tuesday morning at his home in Lake Geneva. He was 69.

He had been suffering from health problems for several years, including an abdominal aneurysm, said his wife, Gail Gygax.

Gygax and Dave Arneson developed Dungeons & Dragons in 1974 using medieval characters and mythical creatures. The game known for its oddly shaped dice became a hit, particularly among teenage boys, and eventually was turned into video games, books and movies.

Gygax always enjoyed hearing from the game's legion of devoted fans, many of whom would stop by the family's home in Lake Geneva, about 55 miles southwest of Milwaukee, his wife said. Despite his declining health, he hosted weekly games of Dungeons & Dragons as recently as January, she said.

"It really meant a lot to him to hear from people from over the years about how he helped them become a doctor, a lawyer, a policeman, what he gave them," Gygax said. "He really enjoyed that."

Dungeons & Dragons players create fictional characters and carry out their adventures with the help of complicated rules. The quintessential geek pastime, it spawned a wealth of copycat games and later inspired a whole genre of computer games that's still growing in popularity.

Funeral arrangements are pending. Besides his wife, Gygax is survived by six children.

Monday, March 03, 2008

Broken hearts are for assholes

I felt the need to repost this because it makes me sad -- not so much sad at the loss of Healey himself, but sad that I and others do not do more with our lives. Who knows, Healey could have been a big asshole, but he's an asshole that overcame adversity to teach himself to create art as best he knew how, spent his whole life battling cancer, and still had a "wicked sense of humor." And I get depressed when there's no dessert in the house, and feel crippled by my debt (of my own ill-doing). Now who's the asshole?


Blind Guitarist Jeff Healey Dies at 41

TORONTO (AP) — Blind rock and jazz musician Jeff Healey has died after a lifelong battle against cancer. He was 41.

Healey died Sunday evening in a Toronto hospital, said bandmate Colin Bray, who was in the room with Healey's family when the guitarist died.

The Grammy-nominated Healey rose to stardom as the leader of the Jeff Healey Band, a rock-oriented trio that gained international acclaim and platinum record sales with the 1988 album "See the Light." The album included the hit single "Angel Eyes."

Healey had battled cancer since age 1, when a rare form of retinal cancer known as Retinoblastoma claimed his eyesight.

Due to his blindness, Healey taught himself to play guitar by laying the instrument across his lap.

His unique playing style, combined with his blues-oriented vocals, earned him a reputation as a teenage musical prodigy. He shared stages with George Harrison, B.B. King and Stevie Ray Vaughan.

Bray said he and many others expected the guitarist to rally from this latest illness.

"I don't think any of us thought this was going to happen," Bray said. "We just thought he was going to bounce back as he always does."

Healey had undergone numerous operations in recent years to remove tumors from his lungs and leg.

Bray and fellow bandmate Gary Scriven remembered their frontman as a musician of rare abilities with a generous nature and wicked sense of humor.

Healey's true love was jazz, the genre that dominated his three most recent albums.

His love of jazz led him to host radio shows in Canada where he spun long-forgotten numbers from his personal collection of over 30,000 vinyl records.

His death came weeks before the release of his first rock album in eight years.

"Mess of Blues" is slated for a North American release on April 22.

He is survived by his wife, Christie, and two children.

Sunday, March 02, 2008

This town is haunted by Hans Gruber













Managed to catch Die Hard today just as the 20th Century Fox searchlights were cycling... fought a brief temptation to surf on and decided to watch it, spend some time with an old cinematic friend.

I have long held that this movie was groundbreaking, and changed audience expectations for the genre forever -- a quick googling assured me I am not the only one. Its clever mix of action and suspense and humor was unique for its time, the writing was incredibly tight, and the charm of Bruce Willis and then-relatively-unknown-in-America Alan Rickman sold this film. Rickman, in particular, was incredible -- I am still amazed that this film did not make him into a huge star.

Rickman's ability to be sinister, smart and funny all at the same time delighted me as a moviegoer -- again today I clapped my hands in delight when Rickman's Gruber stated "
Mr. Takagi, I could talk about men's fashion and industrialization all day but I'm afraid work must intrude...." Most all the 'bad guys' are smart and have a sense of humor to them, especially computer whiz Theo (played by Clarence Gilyard Jr). In fact, the 'twist' of having the black bad guy be the smart techie while other Eurotrash baddies wave guns around? Delightful.

So my new mission is to track down the 1979 novel Nothing Lasts Forever by Roderick Thorp -- not only is it the basis for this film, it allegedly is followed closely in dialogue/scenes/characters by the film that it spawned. Should be a good time.

Saturday, March 01, 2008

It's the freakiest show

I'm kind of fascinated by this, much like the Sissy Spacek video...