Utopia 2025All you Bush apologists may have absolutely no problem that the President wipes his ass with the Constitution. You may even be there in the bathroom to hand it to him – gladly.
But aren’t you the least bit concerned about the contents of the Presidential bathroom when it’s occupied by, say, Hillary Clinton?
The pendulum swings.
“…and I would like to thank my predecessor, George W. Bush, for establishing once and for all that in America, the President *is* the state. In these uncertain times, our great nation needs a benevolent leader who knows what is best for all her citizens. I want to assure the American people here and now that I will be using my absolute power only for good.”
“If I believed in burning books, I’d have a perfect prospect for the bonfire!”
–Rhianna, frequent commenter at Rosemary Esmay’s “Queen of All Evil” site
It reminded me of one of my favorite quotes from the actually-evil Connie du Toit (no longer blogging, apparently): “I would never read Hillary Clinton’s book, because I am 100 percent certain it is full of lies.”
Watching Bill O’Reilly on David Letterman last night was, to say the least, a bittersweet experience. Each made sort of a fool of himself, but each also did just well enough that partisans on both sides predictably declared their guy the winner of the skirmish. Ho hum.
I was quite disappointed, though, that Dave didn’t debunk Bill when Bill pulled out the fully discredited story about the “Silent Night” lyrics at a school in Dodgeville. Dave, that could have started the segment out with a slam-dunk. Try preparing for interviews next time, OK?
But mainly, I have a message for Bill. Hey Bill: if I want to change the lyrics to fucking “Silent Night,” or fucking “Good King Wenceslas,” or whatever, I’m going to fucking do it. If I want to have an “Atheist Holiday Solstice Pageant” like on South Park, where the cute moppets run around in grey jumpsuits holding up cardboard face masks of Noam Chomsky wearing a Santa hat, I’m going to fucking do it.
(now there’s an idea!)
People keep writing amazing stuff, while my brain slumbers (hopefully not for much longer). But in the meantime, I have to repost this comment from Balloon Juice on the domestic spying scandal:
Bush now stands in contempt of the Constitution, both in deed and declared intent. That is the astonishing thing—he does not even try to hide his villainy. He has declared himself an enemy of the constitution. This means that we all now have an affirmative moral obligation to see to it that he is removed. At least those of us who have sworn similar oaths (lawyers, other public officials) have that obligation, ordinary citizens need to examine their consciences to see if they prefer a man who claims to be a benevolent monarch to their own freedom.
The general populace of America has already made that choice, more than once. And they chose the monarch.
UPDATE: More on the Imperial Presidency in this Salon article.
This is an e-mail I just sent to Bill O’Reilly. I’m not a “premium member” of his site, so I’m not sure he or anyone else will see it. (It’s kind of like sending back a Publisher’s Clearinghouse entry without subscribing to any magazines.) But I thought I would give it a try anyway.
Bill:
I’m an agnostic, but I love Christmas. For me it’s about the traditions: the tree, the gifts, Christmas music. Obviously, there’s a lot about Christmas that’s secular and not religious.
I’m not the least bit offended when someone wishes me “Merry Christmas.” So why should a devout Catholic or Protestant be offended when someone wishes them “Happy Holidays”? Is that really an insult?
What puzzles me the most is why you want to require retail establishments to celebrate your religious holiday. Seems to me Christmas for Christians should be a lot more about what happens in church and a lot less about what happens inside a Wal-Mart.
-Thomas More
Madison, WI
I did the “podcast” post below simply as a test for a client who wants to start a podcast on his site. So I figured I had to learn how it all works for myself. And I must say, it’s fascinating. I was even able to add the Utopia podcast to the Apple iTunes Music Store. (Search for “utopia” under podcasts, and it should come up. Or, Apple says this link will work.) That’s cool. Who knows – I may even do a few podcasts, even though I can’t stand the sound of my voice.
The good news is that a federal judge has ruled that teaching “Intelligent Design” in the Dover, PA schools is unconstitutional, and further, that ID is not science.
That’s great.
The bad news is that we even have to endure a case like this. Why are we even questioning whether it’s OK to torture prisoners, or secretly spy on U.S. citizens? Why is there a question about the definition of science in the year 2005? Why are we forced to cheer whenever basic common sense and the values we thought we shared are upheld? And why must we be disappointed so often when this doesn’t happen?
Our society is completely upside-down. That’s scarier than I can express. All I can think of is, what’s next?
For those like me who greatly mourn the loss of Henry Quinn’s wonderful site “Sweet Jesus, I Hate Bill O’Reilly,” why not try “The Anti-Bill O’Reilly Blog.” It’s a great resource for cataloging all the reasons to loathe Billy.
This is a test of using Blogger for podcasting. The file linked here isn’t actually a Utopia podcast, but that could come in the future. Just testing for now.