Saturday, October 23, 2004

Download the mp3 of Takin' My Country Back here.

Maybe this is just wishful thinking, but...

ASHEVILLE - U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor slightly trails challenger Patsy Keever in a poll released Friday.

The survey conducted by the Asheville Center for Social Research at UNC Asheville found that 41.2 percent of residents polled support Taylor, 43.5 percent would vote for Keever, and 15.3 percent were undecided.

The poll involved 493 residents of Buncombe, Henderson, Haywood and Transylvania counties contacted by telephone between Oct. 11 and 21. With a margin of error of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points, the two candidates are in a statistical tie, said Mark West, director of the center and a professor of mass communication at the university.

"All we can say is it's a dead heat," he said. "The surprising thing is we can't predict a winner at this point. I don't think anyone predicted it would be a tight campaign."

That's because in eight years the center has been conducting the poll, Taylor has always led his opponents by substantial margins, West said. In the election two years ago, the congressman received 55 percent of the vote to 43 percent for his challenger, Sam Neill.

"In past years it's been clear that Taylor was going to win at this point," West said.

I've got a feeling that my folks, who live in Taylor's district, would be almost as excited over a Taylor defeat as they would with a Kerry victory over Bush.

Dad, give me my five dollars!

Mercifully, they have this weekend off. Forget about job pressure - don't you know that setting yet another record low for defensive performance has got to be killing an old linebacker like Bunting.  Almost 700 yards against us last Saturday - that's just pathetic.

I want my five dollars!

So in evaluating the coach's job performance, how far do you look beyond the record? Say we beat Wake and Dook (neither have conference wins yet) and wind up 5-6. That's certainly an improvement over the last couple of years and would include wins over all three in-state rivals. But you've still got one of the worst defenses in the country for the second straight year and you've still got a losing record. Is that mixed record enough improvement for Bunting to keep his job? In Dick Crum's 4th season, we were ranked in the top 5 for part of the season and finished 10-2 and won our third bowl game in a row. In Mack Brown's 4th season, we finished 7-4 for our second straight winning season after two 1-win seasons - clear improvement. So I supposed the question is, does anybody out there think that John Bunting is the guy to coach a Carolina team on an equal footing with Florida State, Miami, Virginia Tech, NC State and Virginia?  I've seen nothing yet to convince me that he is.  Is UNC such a basketball school that not enough people care?  Don't think I know the answer to that one, either.

Friday, October 22, 2004

Via Josh Marshall, the Bush/Cheney campaign has a new ad out in the states they're still trying to sway (as well as on their website) called, simply, "Wolves".  It is clearly intended to scare the bejeezus out of folks, but I gotta admit that my reaction was more like "Oooh, lookit the pretty wolves!" until the very end, when that jug-eared nincompoop comes on to say that he approves of the message.  Now seeing that jackass will definitely put some fear into me.  No more years!

Aren't they adorable??

Thursday, October 21, 2004

Speaking of Lex (see previous post), his "Cat Haiku" caused me to rummage through my pile of old Usenet posts that I've saved and I found this, which I present in honor of the thirteenth birthday of a pup named Damien:

I love my master;

Thus I perfume myself with

This long-rotten squirrel.

 

I lie belly-up

In the sunshine, happier than

You ever will be

 

I sound the alarm!

Paper boy-come to kill us

Look! Look! Look! Look! Look!

 

I sound the alarm!

Garbage man-come to kill us

Look! Look! Look! Look! Look!

 

I lift my leg and

Whiz on each bush. Hello, Spot-

Sniff this and weep.  Heh.

 

How do I love thee?

The ways are numberless as

My hairs on the rug.

 

My human is home!

I am so ecstatic I

Have made a puddle

 

I Hate my choke chain

Look, world, they strangle me! Ack

Ack Ack Ack Ack Ack!

 

Sleeping here, my chin

On your foot-no greater bliss-well,

Maybe catching rats

 

Look in my eyes and

Deny it. No human could

Love you as I do

 

The cat is not all

Bad-she fills the litter box

With Tootsie Rolls

 

Dig under fence-why?

Because it's there. Because it's

There. Because it's there.

 

I am your best friend,

Now, always, and especially

When you are eating.

 

My owners' mood is

Romantic-I lie near their

Feet. I fart for joy.

I haven't wasted much bandwidth on Sinclair Broadcasting since every other blogger in the country has covered it better than I can.  Instead I'm going to point you to Lex's N&R blog entry - nobody else that I've read has done nearly as thorough a job.  Go read it - scary shit.

Wednesday, October 20, 2004

Dick Cheney: "The biggest threat we face now as a nation,'' he said, "is the possibility of terrorists' ending up in the middle of one of our cities with deadlier weapons than have ever before been used against us - biological agents or a nuclear weapon or a chemical weapon of some kind - to be able to threaten the lives of hundreds of thousands of Americans.''

"You have to get your mind around that concept," he added." - NYTimes Oct. 20, 2004

William Safire: "...the Fear Room at Kerry campaign headquarters is on a hair trigger to turn any breaking news into a personal threat." - NYTimes Oct. 20, 2004

Wha..??

Tuesday, October 19, 2004

Oh my goodness, Mary Cheney is a lesbian? Who knew? Uh, just about everyone. So what's the big deal? Alan Keyes calls her a "selfish hedonist" and there's nary a rumble.  John Edwards mentions it in a debate with the Veep (rather awkwardly, I might add) and gets a thank you from her father.  Then John Kerry mentions it TOTALLY IN CONTEXT OF THE DEBATE and that's all anyone can talk about.  Sorry, but the only reason I can think that anyone would have a problem with what Kerry said is if they think that homosexuality is wrong.

Now, had Kerry said something like:

Let me remind you that those weapons systems that the President keeps bringing up as having been opposed by me were also opposed by Vice President Cheney, who also has a flaming gay homosexual lesbian daughter.

that would be wrong. But he didn't.

But say instead that Dick Cheney had another daughter who was paralyzed and confined to a wheelchair. And it was no secret, in fact she'd done an outreach program with Coors to help them improve handicap access in their facilities and was actively involved in her father's campaign, having appeared at events in her wheelchair. And the debate went something like this:

Moderator:  Mr. President, this one is for you. There has been a lot of discussion during this campaign about whether the Americans with Disabilities act is being interpreted in a way that unfairly burdens businesses.  Do you believe that handicapped Americans do have a right to full access to public places?

Bush:  Gosh, Bob, uh, I don't know.  I'm a man of faith.  Strong faith.  And God has a reason and a plan for why these people are the way they are.  But I've got an education plan - a good strong education plan that will help people overcome their handicappedness and disabilosity and get them good jobs.  As long as they can climb the stairs to their office.

Moderator:  Senator Kerry?

Kerry:  We're all God's children.  And I think if you were to talk to Dick Cheney's daughter, who is confined to a wheelchair, she would tell you that she's got a right to the same access to public places that non-handicapped people do.  We have a long history in this country of moving ever more towards equal opportunity and equal access and frankly we haven't gone nearly far enough.

Do you think Dick Cheney would be talking about being "a pretty angry father" after that?  What's the difference?

(For anyone that might stumble across this blog after googling 'Mary Cheney', let me state the obvious - the italicized comments above are NOT QUOTES - they are HYPOTHETICAL. So hush.)

Monday, October 18, 2004

Two extremely cool ways to be immortalized, both laid on us via BoingBoing (still the Internet's best source for cool shit):

The first is a chance to be the 1,000th ghost at Disneyland's Haunted Mansion (as you should know, the Haunted Mansion is home to "999 happy haunts ... but there's always room for one more!").  To quote Cory Doctorow, "Holy crap, I think my brains just exploded. This is the best thing ever. I mean, EVER."

In an effort to raise funds for The Boys and Girls Clubs of America, DisneyAuctions.com is holding a "spirited" event that will allow the winning bidder to receive a personalized "tombstone" in the finale graveyard scene of the attraction with a humorous epitaph (inspired by the lucky bidder's interests and hobbies) written by the team at Walt Disney Imagineering.

But wait. There's more. The winning bidder will also receive a one-of-a-kind miniature replica of the tombstone and a certificate officially recognizing him/her as an Honorary resident of the Haunted Mansion; and the successful bidder and a guest will be spirited away from his or her hometown to Disneyland in time for a midnight "burial" ceremony on Thursday, October 28, officially placing the tombstone in the graveyard of the Haunted Mansion.

Also (and maybe even cooler), Will Shetterly is holding a free drawing for the prize of appearing in his forthcoming novel:

I'm very grateful to the people who are bidding on eBay for two chances to be a character in the book, and three chances to be its patron. But I realize a lot of people can't afford to bid. So I'm offering a drawing: You or a character of your choice, a person or a pet, now have the chance to appear for free in a cameo in the novel.

I've read a couple of Shetterly's novels - Dogland is one that you owe it to yourself to read (yes, PC, this is one I was bugging you about a year ago).  I don't think I can afford to bid but I can sure as hell afford a postcard!