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.