Author Archives: Kyle Kimberlin

resistance is futile?

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WASHINGTON – In the standoff between President Bush and Democrats in Congress led by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi over funding the Iraq war, it was the Democrats who finally blinked Tuesday, at least for now.

It’s as if we’ve been invaded by some insurmountable, unyielding alien force. No, not the Mexicans. This isn’t the Lou Dobbs site. I mean the Bushies. Have they got a Vulcan mind lock on Washington? Nah, it’s worse than that. It’s like puppies; as if Bush waived an old sock around until they finally flopped over like puppies, for tummy rubs.

Maybe a feline analogy is better: maybe the Democrats are just a bunch of pussies. Except, real cats know when they’ve got a bird by its wing.

Congress should keep sending the spending bill that is right for America, for Iraq, and for the military, not the bill that the Shrub wants to sign. Just do the right thing: Print it up, send it to the White House, again and again, until Bush understands that he has to sign it. After all, he didn’t veto a single bill until the Democrats took power. Now he’s yanking his veto out like a shootin iron. It’s high time he was informed there’s a new sheriff in town.

really?

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ABOARD USS JOHN C. STENNIS (Reuters) – Nine U.S. warships carrying 17,000 personnel entered the Gulf on Wednesday in a show of force off Iran’s coast that navy officials said was the largest daytime assembly of ships since the 2003 Iraq war. [Y! News]

They’re really crazy you know. Bound and determined for hell, in a bucket.

Water Melts Sugar

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Water melts sugar. Sunlight
in February melts the dull fog
in the bald canal. We are
dissolved, standing on the bank
searching the dark water for gar.

They drift away.

Fog dulls the hearing. There –
is that dog barking ahead of us
or behind? No matter, we have
no need of dogs now, or fish.

We have everything.

You know, sugar is good in our coffee
and on berries when the summer comes.

And look – I think I see one
swimming in the swift, cold deep.

let’s be reasonable

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I received a mass e-mail from Al Gore this morning. He’s promoting his new book, The Assault on Reason. It looks interesting. I would read such a book, but I’m not going to rush out to buy it right now, only because I’ve got several books stacked up ahead of it, including Carter’s Our Endangered Values. But these lines from the e-mail struck me:

One pattern that has held true since 2001 is that this White House is less interested in openness and truth than any previous administration.

We are facing so many long-term challenges, from the climate crisis and the war in Iraq to health care and social welfare. To solve these problems and move forward we need to reverse the damage done to our democracy. We have little time to waste.

Gore and Carter are right, you know. The Bush years have been a watershed of narrow minded, fundamentalist thought, a modern day dark age. The cabal has fostered paranoia and attacked science. They’ve called The Almighty down on the side of war, torture, intrusion, and deceit. And don’t even get me started on what they’ve done to the enconomy and the environment. Maybe Bush can clear brush, but he can’t tend a garden.

Check out Al Gore’s Web site. I like the design. Cool.

life lessons

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My email this morning includes one from a friend. It’s the story of a veterinarian called to the home of a wolfhound dying of cancer, to put the dog to sleep.

The dog’s owners wanted their 4-year-old son to be with them as their pet was sent ahead, in order that he learn from the experience.

Afterwards, the vet and the couple were discussing the heartrending difference in life spans of humans and pets. Why are their lives so much shorter than ours?

The little boy offered this:

People are born so that they can learn how to live a good life — like loving everybody all the time and being nice, right? Well, dogs already know how to do that, so they don’t have to stay as long.

I don’t know, but I’ve known many wonderful dogs, cats, a few birds, some rats, a turtle, a I’ve met some horses. And I’ll say this about them: they all seemed smarter and wiser than humans. I sense older souls; a deeper, truer participation in the spirit of life, and a greater joy in living. They seem to know something I don’t know. Maybe it has something to do with Now.

Perhaps the little boy is wrong. It’s not that they know how to love everybody and be nice, but that it’s something unknowable. They don’t know it, they just do it.

the worst ever

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The evil that men do lives after them,
The good is oft interréd with their bones,
So let it be with Carter…. The noble Bush
Hath told you Carter was irrelevant:
If it were so, it was a grievous fault,
And grievously hath Carter answered it….
Here, under leave of Bush and the rest,
(For Bush is an honourable man;
So are they all; all honourable men)
Come I to speak on Carter’s relevance….
He was our friend, faithful and just to us:
But Bush says he was irrelevant;
And Bush is an honourable man….

Well now we have Jimmy Carter, former president of the United States, opining that halting reign of Bush the Lesser is the worst in history. The weight of truth and candor borne in these words is almost staggering:

“I think as far as the adverse impact on the nation around the world, this administration has been the worst in history,” …

“The overt reversal of America’s basic values as expressed by previous administrations, including those of George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and others, has been the most disturbing to me.”

He said this about the Iraq war:

“We now have endorsed the concept of pre-emptive war where we go to war with another nation militarily, even though our own security is not directly threatened, if we want to change the regime there or if we fear that some time in the future our security might be endangered,” he said. “But that’s been a radical departure from all previous administration policies.”

Wow. But my favorite is what Carter said about Tony Blair:

“Abominable. Loyal. Blind. Apparently subservient.”
…
“And I think the almost undeviating support by Great Britain for the ill-advised policies of President Bush in Iraq have been a major tragedy for the world.”

Now comes Brutus, I mean Bush, stooping to argument ad hominem:

White House spokesman Tony Fratto shot back Sunday from Crawford, Texas, where Bush spent the weekend.

“I think it’s sad that President Carter’s reckless personal criticism is out there,” said Fratto. “I think it’s unfortunate. And I think he is proving to be increasingly irrelevant with these kinds of comments.”

I’ll you what’s relevant, gentle reader:

3422 Americans, dead (more than in 9/11 attacks)
148 British, dead
127 Other coalition of the Wasted, dead
3697 dead dead dead
Does that count the 15 killed over weekend? I don’t know.

Then we add in the Iraqi casualties. Oh yes, we really must. Iraqbodycount.org has them between 63929 and 70023. And of course, we’ve all seen other sources, such as the British medical journal The Lancet, that put the number much higher. Perhaps a quarter of a million people have died in Iraq because of this war. That’s approaching 4% of the pre-war population. Which would translate to roughly 12 million in the United States. Put them numbers in your wood chipper, George.

What’s relevant is the wave of resolutions to impeach Bush and Cheney, which is sweeping across the land. No kidding, here’s a list. And here’s the text of my favorite of all the resolutions of impeachment I found online. It’s a dandy.

What’s relevant is that Jimmy Carter is hardly an ambitious man. He is a thoughtful, deliberate and stable intellect, compared to any among the loyal bushies. He’s hardly rash, ever. Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize. He is an elder statesman, which has largely gone out of fashion in modern times.

What’s relevant, and immensely ironic, is that George W Bush and Dick Cheney are the epitome of the bald and reckless imperial ambition of which Caesar was accused.

Impeach.