Why the War on Terror is Like the March of Dimes

A long time ago, the favored charity of the land was “The March of Dimes,” which was a charitable organization like the American Cancer Society, or the National Arthritis Foundation, or the Muscular Distrophy Association, the Lou Gehrig’s Disease Foundation or the American Heart Association.

No Posting Today

While it’s important to know what you do know, ofttimes it’s important to know what you don’t know (no Rumsfeldian allusion implied or acknowledged).

In the same manner, while it’s important to speak out, sometimes it’s important to know that you have nothing to say. Generally, I write about what presents itself, but, thus far, today there are a thousand kinda sorta things to say, but nothing definite.

What you don’t say is often as important as what you DO say.

So there you are.

Courage.

Henry Hydes For The Last Time

Henry Hyde, the Republican congressman from Illinois, who chaired the House Judiciary Committee that impeached President William Jefferson Clinton over the infamous blow job, only to have his own long-term, family-wrecking affair in the Illinois legislature come out and then to infamously characterize as a ‘youthful indiscretion’ has died.

Services will be held.

Et cetera.

As Mark Anthony said, I come here not to praise Henry Hyde, but to bury him.

Republican Law & Order

“You must be mistaken. I’m a sheep.”

The law only applies to what Republicans WANT it to, not what it actually says, evidently. You might recall this little bit from last month’s “Love and Kisses from the Land of the Freed Balloons” (it was right below Sean Hannity’s raging against the ‘socialist’ underpinnings of Halloween

Castles Made of Sand

Jimi Hendrix would have been 65 years old today.

He would be eligible for Social Security, had he not died in September of 1970.

Belief

 

Nasruddin’s neighbor came over to his house one day to ask if he could borrow Nasruddin’s donkey.

Nasruddin — not wishing to lend his donkey — said, “I would most pleased to loan you my donkey, esteemed neighbor, but, alas,

‘This Tumor Of The Soul …’

You’re about to lose the most precious possession that you own, and you don’t even know it. And, yes, they are truly deserving of contempt: those who’ve quietly done this to you.

So, where do we begin?

Let’s start with that party of “limited government” and “freedom,” Ronnie Ray-gun’s GOP.

Black Friday Update

 

That whole “Black Friday” thing kept bugging me, and then, while reading a biography, it suddenly hit me: “Black Friday” was one of the biggest scandals of the Grant Administration, and set the tone, in many ways, for the excesses of the Gilded Age.

Black Friday

We live our lives at more than a literal level.

There is a metaphorical component that we ignore at our own peril. We are not merely our own lives, but we are our own myths, as well. Belief is a very important thing, as economists, forecasters, voodoo witch doctors and telephone psychics all know.

The Fifth Freedom

Many are familiar with FDR’s “Four Freedoms“* [*Freedom of speech and expression; Freedom of every person to worship in his own way; Freedom from want; Freedom from fear]. This year we have a FIFTH freedom to celebrate. Ain’t we got fun?

click for larger image

Tomorrow Is Thanksgiving

I used to think that history is what it was. Period. But I now realize that I was wrong:

History is what it IS, period.

What do I mean about that?

Well, let’s take Thanksgiving. We were all taught as wee tots