Bush singing Sunday Bloody Sunday?  Brilliant Bloody Brilliant!
  

Why?  Because it’s my blog and you will listen to every. damn. word. I have to say! 

I’m a busy guy.  Between finishing my Ph.D., lecturing, grading papers, writing, and web design, I typically put in about 70-80 hours of work every single week.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining because I do love every single thing I do.  But I need to emphasize here that my free time is at an absolute premium.  Basically, I have two sources of pure, work-independent amusement in my life: this blog and a swing dance class my wife and I attend every Monday night.  These days particularly, dancing is my one night a week to get my blood going, groove to some tunes, and have a bit of guilt-free fun. 

Yesterday, we had a guest instructor from the States.  Austin, in fact.  Being from the greatest city in this planet or any other in the known universe, I was actually looking forward to the experience.  For about five minutes.  Shortly after class began, the instructor interrupted the entire class to yell at me.  Seriously.  In a class that I, a grown man, paid for, I am being mocked and shamed for, get this … dancing!  Yes, there shall be none of that here, swinging is for serious folks only and how dare you enjoy yourself. 

It didn’t end there.  During the course of the hour, as the class looked on in astonishment, I was yelled at several more times, and at one point was literally told to separate from my wife since we obviously couldn’t behave ourselves.  When that didn’t seem to satisfy the guy, he literally brought me up to the front of the class where he engaged in what could only be described as a very physical, testosterone driven pissing contest over who would reign supreme in control over his class. 

At this point, I’m having flashbacks of High School misery and can’t wait to leave.  Right on cue, the guy gets into a rant about how he was a High School teacher for 20 years and he sees everything and I won’t be able to get away with my nonsense on his watch. 

I’m in my own personal hell. 

For a while, I was just pissed off and imagining ways in which I could extricate myself from the unnecessary stress.  But it wasn’t long before I was awash with pity for the guy.  Being an adult educator, I have no personal experience with rowdy classrooms.  But after 20 years of dealing with a failing, apathetic, and pathetic school system, this poor guy has been rendered completely incapable of engaging with adults on any level.  The only tools he knows are control, intimidation, and shame. 

Following my Gandhi-esque moment, I returned to anger once again, this time at the country of my birth.  We live in a land literally saturated with affluence and yet wholly incapable of managing a school system that falls within even the same neighborhood of quality with Any. Single. Other. Industrialized nation.  I can’t find a new link, but the last I checked, we were not even in the top 25%.  For me, High School was a joke.  I never studied.  Never.  And yet I squeaked through along with every other nimrod who could barely tie his own shoes.  I actually performed better than our president!  Just plain shameful. 

Why is it that we have never managed to prioritize education?  Why do we pay our professional teachers a pittance, shove them in a class intentionally dumbed down to the lowest common denominator leaving them bitter and jaded?  Why can’t we manage some level of equal funding so that we are not perpetuating educational gaps?  Why are we leaving our children behind? 

The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if we enjoy having an underclass.  The rich are in charge and want to stay that way and don’t need the competition from all those brilliant but poor folks.  But I suspect the truth is somewhat blander.  That we have too long entwined politics and business with our education system.  Too long have we allowed political winds to influence what can or can’t be taught.  Too long have we allowed businesses to dictate what gets printed in our textbooks.  And too long have we neglected teaching independent and abstract thought in favor of the more quantifiable assessment systems based on facts and dates. 

I’m 32 years old, am mere months away from completing my Ph.D., have traveled the world over, and am financially comfortable.  Yet STILL experience a physical reaction in the pit of my stomach whenever anything brings me back to those High School daze.  What a mess. 

Rove insists that Bush will use his first veto to stop stem cell research. Really really, with double super secret no takebacksies. Which means Bush is going to do everything he can to make sure that we fall behind the rest of the world in medical research. ‘Cuz science is dead, ain’t ya heard?

I’m not particularly surprised that the zealot-in-chief is huffing and puffing about vetoing this one. Because no matter what the lip service, he no likee the culture of life. Of course, he’s made similar threats in the past, only to back down when it comes down to the wire. Then he calls it a compromise with the GOP leadership - ergo another sweet victory.

Bush has never vetoed anything because thus far there has simply been no reason to. Remember when he couldn’t stop that pesky torture bill? Well it passed and the veto never materialized, because he simply issued a signing statement that says he plans to simply ignore the law if and when he sees fit. However, this one may be different because it is not a law in which he has any say in implementation. Allowing stem cell research falls under the purvey of demonic scientists, not politicians, so he may have to break his streak.

In any case, his bullying may have been enough in the past to keep these things from reaching his desk, but we can only hope that with approval ratings in the 20’s, election year Repugs may prove a bit more wary of falling in step.

Chimpy’s new ‘plan’ for NOLA is a joke. 

Why oh why won’t journalists report all the good news in Iraq?  Well, you can’t report what isn’t there.  Unless you’re the Bush dissembistration of course. 

Great post from AJ at AmericaBlog on the death of neoconservatism here.  “The greatest problem -- among many -- with neoconservative foreign policy is the insistence upon dealing with the world as neocons would like it to be, rather than what it is. This ideology-based approach has been an unmitigated failure.” 

Congress isn’t above the law?  Wha-fuh?  If you smell something funny it’s because me head is about to explode. 

Check out this interesting exchange with Bush over North Korea.  Is this guy just plain clueless?  Never mind, don’t answer that.

C & L has started a well-deserved sh*t firestorm over the racist sheriff: 

My name is Annie Spell and I am a proud member of the Greater Covington Branch of the NAACP. It is my privilege and honor to serve as the President of that branch and in light of Sheriff Jack Strain’s comments; I am compelled, by the duties of my office and my obligations to the membership to respond to the shameful policies of the St. Tammany Parish Sheriff’s Office.

Because of Sheriff Strain’s comments, we the citizens of St. Tammany Parish are now burdened with a national symbol of intolerance and abuse of power in the person of our chief law enforcement officer.

Sheriff Jack Strain is openly and publicly engaging in racial profiling in a crass illustration of political grandstanding. In his appeal to the lowest common denominator, the Sheriff has admitted to targeting people of color on the basis of his misguided suggestion that people of color are more likely to be engaged in criminal activity in St. Tammany Parish than are his white constituency.

Coulter called in to a radio show an hour and a frakkin’ half late and then whined about being tight on time.  So the host told her to ‘get lost; and hung up on her mid-sentence.  I suppose he must hate America!  And he's gay.  I'll bet he eats enchiladas too.

The Great Society provides a rough transcript: 

ADAM CAROLLA: Ann Coulter, who was suppose to be on the show about an hour and a half ago, is now on the phone, as well. Ann?

ANN COULTER: Hello.

CAROLLA: Hi Ann. You’re late, babydoll.

COULTER: Uh, somebody gave me the wrong number.

CAROLLA: Mmm… how did you get the right number? Just dialed randomly — eventually got to our show? (Laughter in background)

COULTER: Um, no. My publicist e-mailed it to me, I guess, after checking with you.

CAROLLA: Ahh, I see.

COULTER: But I am really tight on time right now because I already had a —

CAROLLA: Alright, well, get lost. 

Audio from C & L.

From Ezra:

It Just Seems Right

I don't know, reacting to North Korea's missiles that don't fly with a missile defense system that doesn't function seems somehow fitting to me. A return to symmetrical, if incompetent, warfare.

While our soldiers are out fighting for freedom of religion, the VA refuses to hold a memorial for a dead soldier because he’s Wiccan. 

Great article from the prophetic Molly Ivans on Rove’s upcoming immigrant bashing bonanza.  I believe Mexicans are the new fags for the GOP strategists. 

Looks like C & L’s post about the dillweed racist sheriff is starting to gain traction! 

But, but … I thought that the majority of American’s didn’t support withdrawal.  Ann Coulter told me so and she wouldn’t fib! 

And looks like at least one illegal government program wasn’t disclosed to congress.  Not that the president would lie or anything.  Ann coulter told me so and she wouldn’t fib.  Really.

When you argue within the framework and using the terms selected by your opponent, you will always lose in the end. Even if you make a stronger case about one particular issue, your opponent still wins the larger battle -- because you have permitted the underlying assumptions and the general perspective to remain unchallenged. 

One: The war in Iraq has been "bungled" and executed "incompetently." It remains a matter of considerable astonishment to me that even very strong opponents of the invasion and occupation of Iraq still make the argument in this form. This entirely avoids the fundamental and most critical point: Iraq was no threat to us, and our leaders knew it. Therefore, the war and invasion were and are immoral and absolutely unjustified.

I repeat: the entire war and occupation are immoral. If you criticize the Bush administration on the grounds that it "bungled" the war, this leaves one, and only one, inevitable implication: if they had prosecuted the war and occupation "competently," then you would have no complaints whatsoever. That is: you think the invasion and occupation of Iraq were justified and moral. If that's what you actually think, you belong in the Bush camp. You're arguing over managerial style, and about issues that are entirely trivial 

The article goes on to cover several interesting points.  It’s really worth a full read.