"The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street"

The Twilight Zone episode Keith Olbermann mentioned in last night's Countdown -- you can see his entire commentary at the bottom of my most previous posting here -- is really worth examining in more detail as cogent and timely.

You can read the Wiki, but it's probably best if you go down to your local video store -- not Blockbuster -- and get a copy to watch.

First a nostalgic digression: two of the stars of this masterpiece were Claude Akins and Jack Weston, hard-working and known-to-you character actors from the Fifties through the Eighties.

Claude Akins had a nearly immortal television career as a bit player. With a face like a stop sign (that had been hit a few times with a baseball bat), Akins was a staple of my adolescent teevee diet. He actually made appearances in two of the greatest movies ever made prior to his cameo in a George Reeves-Superman episode two years before I was born. He was a Western regular as both Indian and white man and a beat cop often, a detective occasionally, and a bad guy frequently. He appeared three times each in "My Friend Flicka", "The Rifleman", and "Tales of Wells Fargo". The same year he filmed "Monsters", 1960, he played Rev. Jeremiah Brown in Inherit the Wind. He was in "The Untouchables", Laramie, Rawhide, Laredo, and "Gunsmoke." He made the rounds to "Love, American Style", "Mission: Impossible", Barnaby Jones, Marcus Welby MD, McCloud, Mannix, Cannon, "Streets of San Francisco" and "Police Story". But his starring role came in a spinoff from "BJ and the Bear" -- "The Misadventures of Sheriff Lobo", in 1979. This review of the show is priceless:

...without a doubt the worst television series to be renewed for a second season. Critics said that Lobo must be short for lobotomy. To admit to have watched Sheriff Lobo is to admit that you watched way too much television back then. However, Sheriff Lobo had the clout to get Playboy's 25th Anniversary Playmate Candy Loving as guest star, but even she couldn't save it from cancellation.

I was in lust with Candy Loving back in the day (warning: not employer-safe).

Jack Weston played a host of neurotic characters, from "Perry Mason" to Please Don't Eat the Daisies to Bob Hope's Chrysler Theatre. I remember him best in Dirty Dancing as Catskills resort owner Max Kellerman, and in The Four Seasons as dentist Danny Zimmer, whose prized Mercedes falls through a frozen lake when his wife, played by Rita Moreno (completely imponderable), drives out on it to save him.

This was perhaps the beginning of the TV trend that saw fat balding jerks married to ultra-hotties (first wives, not trophy wives). Ever noticed?

And now back to George Bush's Twilight Zone.

If you haven't already deciphered the subtext of "Monsters", allow me to quote the aliens on the hill, who have manipulated the appliances on Maple Street and created the panic:

"Understand the procedure now? Just stop a few of their machines...throw them into darkness for a few hours and then sit back and watch the pattern. They pick the most dangerous enemy they can find and it's themselves."

And the closing narration by Rod Serling:

"The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices, to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill and suspicion can destroy, and a thoughtless, frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own -- for the children, and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that these things cannot be confined to the Twilight Zone."

Yeah, Dick Cheney as Alfred Hitchcock. The real terrorists are in the White House.

Gitmo prisoner discovered at Disneyland

When we arrived last Wednesday in the Emerald City, we caught a limo to dinner at this place, which was renowned for the view but not so much the food. My halibut crowned with crabmeat (hold the bearnaise) was excellent however, as was Sue's alderwood-planked salmon. Some small asparagus spears sliced half-inch size mingled with the garlic-smashed potatoes underneath my fish, and that was scrumptious as well.

My reading on the plane was Greg Palast -- in the previous post I told his joke -- and here's a little more from Armed Madhouse:

I'm going to tell you something which is straight-up heresy: America is not under attack by terrorists. There is no war on terror because, except for one day five years ago, al-Qaeda has pretty much left us alone.

That's because Osama got what he wanted. There's no mystery about what al-Qaeda was after. Like everyone from the Girl Scouts to Bono, Osama put his wish on his website. He had a single demand: "Crusaders out of the land of the two Holy Places." To translate: get US troops out of Saudi Arabia.

And George Bush gave it to him. On April 29, 2003, two days before landing on the aircraft carrier Lincoln, our self-described "War President" quietly put out a notice that he was withdrawing our troops from Saudi soil. In other words, our cowering cowboy gave in whimpering to Osama's demand.

The press took no note. They were all wiggie over Bush's waddling around the carrier deck in a disco-aged jumpsuit announcing, "MISSION ACCOMPLISHED." But it wasn't America’s mission that was accomplished, it was Osama's.

Am I saying there's no danger, no threat? Sure there is: 46 million Americans don't have health insurance. IBM is legally stealing from its employees’ pension plan and United Airlines has dumped its pensions altogether. Four million three hundred thousand Americans were injured, made sick or killed by their jobs last year. TXU Corporation is right now building four monster-sized power plants in Texas that will burn skuzzy gunk called "lignite." The filth it will pour into the sky will snuff a heck of a lot more Americans than some goofy group of fanatics with bottles of hydrogen peroxide.

But Americans don't ask for real protection from what's killing us. The War on Terror is the Weapon of Mass Distraction. Instead of demanding health insurance, we have 59 million of our fellow citizens pooping in their pants with fear of al-Qaeda, waddling to the polls crying, "Georgie save us!"

On Thursday we went to Mount Rainier, took a nice hike to see the glacier, had a salmon burger and drank a Moose Drool. Friday we bumped around at the Pike Place Market and watched the fellas sling the fresh catch, and Saturday we went to see the Rangers play the Mariners at Safeco Field. The game went extra innings but we had long gone to eat sushi, not having lost our appetites over the UT-OSU debacle.

That's it for our little anniversary trip.

Still wondering about the headline of this post? ABC/Disney really showed their ass. Go watch some Keith Olbermann telling the truth instead...

So Osama goes into this bar, see...

... and Dubya, who's tending, says, "Whaddle ya have?"

And Osama says: "Well, moron, what's on tap today?"

"FEAR," Dubya says, and Osama yells, "FEAR beer for everybody!" and the crowd cheers and rushes the bar as George starts pulling the tap.

After everyone gets served the presidential bartender walks down to Osama and says, "Hey ... who's payin' for this?" And Osama hooks a thumb over his shoulder and says, "They are."

And both men laugh.

(Yes, I'll find time to write more here. Soon.)

See you from Seattle

... but perhaps not until Friday. Tomorrow's travel day and our anniversary dinner in the evening; Thursday's an all-day outing to Mt. Rainier.

Postpourri: Nellie Connally, the killing of GWB, and the cracks showing in the TDP

There's still a few things to talk about before I get busy in town and out ...

Nellie Connally passed away yesterday. She was the last person left who survived the limosine ride through Dealey Plaza in November of 1963. The phrase "blood and roses" had a singularly stark meaning to her:

"It's the image of yellow roses and red roses and blood all over the car ... all over us," she told the Associated Press.

"I'll never forget it. ... It was so quick and so short, so potent."

(I have previously mentioned here that when we attended the state Democratic convention in Fort Worth earlier in the summer, we stayed in the same hotel where JFK slept on the last night of his life. We also, last summer, stood on the hill in the Texas State Cemetery where she will be buried, next to her husband.)

Speaking of the deceased, a British producer wll release next month a docudrama of the assassination of George W. Bush, to take place in 2007.

Expect (what else) Republican outrage.

Some recent discussions elsewhere point to a fissure developing in the Texas Democratic Party (specifically, between Democratic activists). Essentially the question is: should the organization spend the money it has recently been given by trial attorney Fred Baron on electing Democrats now or later?

Read those discussions and leave your thoughts on this question here (or there).

There's more video of Bush -- and also his wife this time -- talking about his alcohol consumption. Again, it seems obvious to me that the White House is falling down on the job of trying to conceal Bush's drinking problems.

Politics this weekend, grunge the next

This afternoon I will be the brisket judge at the Harris County AFL-CIO Barbecue Cookoff in Pasadena, and despite posting this information a handful of times online, have not yet been tempted to influence the contest in any way. (Rats.)

This evening in what used to be DeLay Country, the Fort Bend Democrats, together with many of our statewide slate of candidates, will flex their muscles in advance of the real competition in November. No county in the state more accurately demonstrates the possibility of flipping Texas from red to blue than this one. Republicans in Fort Bend remain sleepily complacent or actively depressed; Democrats are engaged, active, and working it hard.

Tomorrow, La Marcha, then the Impeachment Town Hall with Ann Wright, and the Clear Lake HQ grand opening.

Next week and through the weekend, Mrs. Diddie and I will be in Seattle celebrating our twentieth wedding anniversary, and I'll post a bit from there.

Happy Labor Day

I'll be in Fort Bend County on Sunday and in Clear Lake on Monday, but the Friday afternoon news dump has me apoplectic:

President Bush this afternoon made another backdoor appointment to his administration. He used a recess appointment to install a lawyer who represented Wal-Mart with a long record of urging restrictions to the Fair Labor Standard Act’s (FLSA’s) overtime pay and other provisions to head up the U.S. Department of Labor’s Wage and Hour Division.

Paul DeCamp, who was grilled at an August Senate confirmation hearing, backed the Bush administration’s move to gut the FLSA’s overtime pay protections saying it presented:

... a window of opportunity, particularly in light of the federal elections of 2002, for the business community to achieve positive results that can bring the FLSA into the 21st century.

He even warned that if the overtime laws were not changed, millions more workers could become eligible for overtime. Strangely enough, he also said that it would not be “in the interest” of the workers who might earn overtime eligibility.

It is time to bring the FLSA into line with current notions of public policy. If reform does not come, then the risk and expense of collective and class action litigation may compel employers to reclassify millions of workers as non-exempt [i.e., eligible for overtime], a change that is in the interest of neither the employees nor their employers.

Enjoy your long weekend, and be sure to thank a union member for their forebearers, who fought to give us the 40-hour work week, paid vacation and holidays, health care, safe working conditions, and all the other things the corporations are now busy trying to take away by paying off the Republicans.

The GOP has found a new word

An old word, but new to them, of course. It's only the latest Rovian strategy to define the terms according to his own warped ideology:

President* Bush in recent days has recast the global war on terror into a "war against Islamic fascism." Fascism, in fact, seems to be the new buzz word for Republicans in an election season dominated by an unpopular war in Iraq.

Bush used the term earlier this month in talking about the arrest of suspected terrorists in Britain, and spoke of "Islamic fascists" in a later speech in Green Bay, Wisconsin. Spokesman Tony Snow has used variations on the phrase at White House press briefings. Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., in a tough re-election fight, drew parallels on Monday between World War II and the current war against "Islamic fascism," saying they both require fighting a common foe in multiple countries. It's a phrase Santorum has been using for months.

And Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld on Tuesday took it a step further in a speech to an American Legion convention in Salt Lake City, accusing critics of the administration's Iraq and anti-terrorism policies of trying to appease "a new type of fascism."

These men are obviously confused about the word. Merriam-Webster defines fascism as "a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition".

A recent definition is that by Robert O. Paxton:

"Fascism may be defined as a form of political behavior marked by obsessive preoccupation with community decline, humiliation, or victim-hood and by compensatory cults of unity, energy, and purity, in which a mass-based party of committed nationalist militants, working in uneasy but effective collaboration with traditional elites, abandons democratic liberties and pursues with redemptive violence and without ethical or legal restraints goals of internal cleansing and external expansion."

So essentially you can't be a fascist unless you have a country and an economy. You can, however, be a religious fundamentalist/extremist without a nation, but you still must be able to finance your revolution.

But the Republican party, its own hoary alliance with Christian fundamentalists -- and yes, extremists -- together with the billions in US corporate largesse, fits the definition perfectly. And believe it: Bush knows a fascist when he hosts one.

Simply put (for you conservatives still having trouble understanding), the Islamic fundamentalists attack us because they want us out of the Middle East. It's not just about oil or money or power; they reject our commercialism because they fear Islam losing its influence to the siren song of Western fashion, electronic gadgets, cinema, music, and vices. And because they want revenge for what (they perceive) we have done to the region and the religion.

But back to the Fascists. I know; let's ask someone who actually was a Fascist for his definition. Hey, Benito Mussolini:

"Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power."

What do you have to say about this, Sinclair Lewis?

"When fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying the cross."

Here's more from the AP:

Dennis Ross, a Mideast adviser to both the first Bush and Clinton administrations and now the director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said he would have chosen different words.

"The 'war on terror' has always been a misnomer, because terrorism is an instrument, it's not an ideology. So I would always have preferred it to be called the 'war with radical Islam,' not with Islam but with 'radical Islam,'" Ross said.

Why even mention the religion? "Because that's who they are," Ross said. "Fascism had a certain definition. Whether they meet this or not, one thing is clear: They're radical. They represent a completely radical and intolerant interpretation of Islam."

While "fascism" once referred to the rigid nationalistic one-party dictatorship first instituted in Italy, it has "been used very loosely in all kinds of ways for a long time," said Wayne Fields, a specialist in presidential rhetoric at Washington University in St. Louis.

"Typically, the Bush administration finds its vocabulary someplace in the middle ground of popular culture. It seems to me that they're trying to find something that resonates, without any effort to really define what they mean," Fields said.

Naah, that can't be true, Mr. Fields. (Can it?) So how long has this been going on, Mr. President?

"The real truth of the matter is, as you and I know, that a financial element in the large centers has owned the government of the U.S. since the days of Andrew Jackson."

That was FDR, not GWB. Another US president:

"I hope we shall... crush in its birth the aristocracy of our moneyed corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial of strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country."

Thomas Jefferson said that. In 1816. Once more from the original source:

Stephen J. Wayne, a professor of government at Georgetown University, suggested White House strategists "probably had a focus group and they found the word 'fascist.'

"Most people are against fascists of whatever form. By definition, fascists are bad. If you're going to demonize, you might as well use the toughest words you can," Wayne said.

Remember who the real fascists are as you hear this phrase repeated over and over again in the coming days and weeks.

Fixing the vote (and then fixing that)

Stephen Pizzo writes:

If you can watch this entire video and still use an electronic voting machine, you deserve the government you get. If your state or district has decided to use electronic voting machines this November demand an absentee ballot today. Watch this video. Then join those of us who have decided that since paper was good enough for our Constitution, it's good enough for our vote too.

Oh, and when you're done watching the whole video... pass it along. November is only a few weeks off and the last thing Republicans want to see is either house returned to Democratic control. Because if that happens, hearings happen. And if hearings happen... well, who knows - someone(s) could go to jail. So demand a paper ballot or an absentee ballot in Nov. and leave the cheaters with a pocket full of worthless Diebold electrons.

Here's a partial transcript if you don't have time to watch right now...

Are there computer programs that can be used to secretly fix elections?

Yes.

How do you know that to be the case?

Because in October of 2000, I wrote a prototype for Congressman Tom Feeney [R-FL]...

It would rig an election?

It would flip the vote, 51-49. Whoever you wanted it to go to and whichever race you wanted to win.

And would that program that you designed, be something that elections officials... could detect?

They'd never see it.

Two recent Houston Chronicle editorials detailed the concerns of fraudulent vote processing associated with Hart Intercivic's e-Slates, the DRE voting machines in use in Harris County and throughout the state. First, Stan Merriman wrote:

When the Hart voting systems were acquired in 2001, voters in Harris County thought they were being treated to the "latest and greatest" in voting system technology. This electronic system replaced a punch card system (remember hanging chads?) with the belief that we needed to enter the electronic age in the electoral process while also meeting emerging federal guidelines to simplify the voting process for our disabled citizens. ...

In the 2002 election some strange "vote flipping" incidents occurred that actually resulted in the temporary sequestering of machines reported as malfunctioning. The problem occurred with votes cast for senatorial candidates Ron Kirk and John Cornyn "flipping" to both rival party candidates. Lawyers were dispatched to scratch their heads over the cause and effect. No resolution of the situation was achieved.

This same anomaly occurred in the Kerry/Bush presidential election in 2004 in Harris County. Once again, the matter was dismissed as a "glitch" of no consequence and blamed on improper voter use. ...

In all, 1,218 voting machine complaints were filed in Texas in the 2004 general election with People For The American Way's Election Protection Division. In Harris County, 2,400 voting machine complaints were filed with a national voting advocacy group during that election.

In addition to these complaints, others were filed in Collin, Travis, Bexar and Wichita counties. Complaints included vote "transfers" (Kerry/Bush evidenced the same phenomenon reported in the 2002 and 2004 election in Harris County), lost votes, and machine and memory card failures. For the 2004 election, the Electronic Frontier Foundation and the Verified Voting Foundation received more complaints from Harris County than from any other voting jurisdiction in the nation.

And the Chronicle editorial board wrote:

"If folks can hack the Pentagon," Harris County Democratic Chairman Gerry Birnberg said, "they can certainly hack a machine in Harris County."

County Clerk Beverly Kaufman, a Republican, says such concerns are unfounded. "There's this kind of cavalier attitude on these folks' part that all you've got to do is just bolt on a printer and there it is," said Kaufman, who estimates that it would cost up to $8 million to buy equipment and reprogram the system with the capability to print ballots in three languages. "We're just not at a point here where we're able to do it if we wanted to, which we don't."

Well, we're just going to have to fix this, Bev. And we're going to do so first by replacing you with someone who does.

Hola, Ernesto

No esta bienvenido aqui. Vaya se.

Update (8/27): "There will be probably be a restrengthening after it leaves the Cuban coast to a Category 2, and Wednesday night it will be west of Fort Myers as Category 3. That's the current thinking," (Ron) Goodman (a forecaster at the National Hurricane Center) said.

Update (8/28): Ernesto has heeded my warnings; he has veered so far to the east, away from Houston and New Orleans, that his dirty side appears ready to deliver an upper cut to Miami. He now poses a greater threat to the eastern US seaboard than to anything in the Gulf. With so much of the Florida peninsula to traverse, his impact will (hopefully) be greatly and quickly diminished.

Next?