Frogmarch. I would like to believe that the news that Time Magazine is handing over notes related to the Plame case has certain members of Bushco crapping their pants.

But let's ask Tom Cruise what he thinks. Tom?

I've never agreed with frogmarching, ever. Before I was a Scientologist I never agreed with frogmarching. And when I started studying the history of frogmarching, I understood more and more why I didn't believe in frogmarching.

You don't even — you're glib. You don't even know what frogmarching is. Here's the problem. You don't know the history of frogmarching. I do.

Thanks, Tom.

Worst Halftime Show Ever. Funny. Kudos to the Klintster for passing this one along.

"Mr. Scorpio says productivity is up 2% and it's all because of my motivational techniques, like donuts and the possibility of more donuts to come."

While being allowed to enjoy defecating in their pants, eat the finest chicken dinners, and soak up the fine tropical weather, it seems that the detainees at Gitmo have been subjected to interrogation methods far worse than anyone could have ever imagined:

far from torturing prisoners, ice cream and candy bars are sometimes used to induce them to give up information, as "part of a rapport-building effort on the part of interrogators."

See? It's all good. Nothing to worry about. Sure, you might be detained for three years without being charged and then released without even a parting gift. But shit, you got ice cream and candy!

Has anyone considered that maybe it isn't that they are holding detainees without charge, but rather it's such a swanky place that the detainees just won't leave? Bet you didn't consider that one.

Shrub-a-dub-dub. As planned, I didn't watch Shrub's pep rally. From what I hear, it doesn't seem like I missed much. No surprise there. The over/under for mentions of 9/11 was four, so congratulations to those of you who bet on the over.

In addition to quoting Osama bin Forgotten calling the war on terra "World War III" (following the old saying--if you can't catch him, quote him) and again trying to connect 9/11 with Iraq, Shrub finally asked for Americans to do their part. He called on Murkans to fly the flag on July 4th to show their support for the troops. What a novel idea.

Shrub also plugged a DOD website, America Supports You where people can leave messages thanking the military. Of the 81,000 messages received, only 26,000 have actually been posted. Not sure what that's about. But there might be some screening going on. The messages are searchable by keyword. A search for "Bush" returned 266 hits. Of those 266, only three were critical of dear leader:

"I go to every peace demonstration to get the troops
the hell out of that mess. Mr. Bush lied to us."

"I don't support President Bush, but I certainly
support all our service men and women who put their
lives on the line for us every day."

"I support your effort I fully apreciate you serving
our country I just don't agree with Bush sending you
all over there."

And then doing a search for "Kerry" yielded these two gems:

"We are voting and keeping the liberal pacifists from
giving aid the enemy the way John Kerry and Jane Fonda
did during Vietnam."

"While the rest of the pessimistic world stands idly
by, and as the enemies of freedom: Ted Kennedy,
Cameron Diaz, Ted Turner, John Kerry, Al Gore, Star
Jones, Bon Jovi, Barbara Boxer, Matt Damon, Ben
Affleck, Bono, Phil Donahue, Bruce Springsteen, Dixie
Chicks and other Anti-War, Pro-Saddam personalities
make their opinions loudly heard..."

Damn that Jon Bon Jovi!!! It's his fault that the military is bogged down in a war started under false pretenses, the troops are overextended and don't have sufficient body armor of armor on humvees, and there is no exit strategy.

Other searches and number of hits: president (649), commander in chief (46), liberal media (12), lesbian (1), pack of lies (0).

Exercise Update. Week three completed. No major injuries to report. Though my right knee is feeling like I may have messed it up a bit. Perhaps I should have eased into this a bit more. Perhaps I should have gotten new shoes. Perhaps I should have continued with my sedentary lifestyle and embraced pants with a flexible waistband. But no. I had to go and do something stoopid. Exercise didn't save the dinosaurs. And those fuckers were in shape, I tell you what.

More chickenshit. These accounts from two moles at the College Republican National Convention alternate between being hilarious and infuriating.

And what's this? Bush and Blair actually started the war in Iraq in the summer of 2002, when they were claiming that no decisions had been made? I'm shocked. Shocked, I say.

Shrub is giving some speech tomorrow night down at Ft.Bragg in North Carolina with soldiers as his backdrop. He's suckered the networks into covering the charade even though there will likely be nothing new said (freedom, hard work, 9/11, blah blah blah). All part of the new and improved "you're with me, or you're against the troops" campaign. Maybe they should try the flightsuit gimmick again, this time with fireworks and a dancing pig. I will not be watching.

Not much to say. My legal counsel is watching "Silence of the Lambs" on television. But she says that it's on Spike TV, the first ever television channel for men, and so she feels like she shouldn't be watching.

But really, I don't have a whole lot to offer right now. Not that I ever do really other than a brief diversion from work and the occasional story about bullballs or the occasional obese cat or two-headed turtle.

And I haven't been getting nearly as worked up over Bushco these days. Though I did have one of those dreams last night where I was screaming at some stranger, listing all the ways that Bushco has been effing up the world. Why can't I just have the dream where I'm playing drums for Led Zeppelin, and I realize mid-set that I have no idea what I'm doing.

Yep.

Chickenhawks: The Next Generation. Morons is about right. These are the people who in thirty years will be questioning the patriotism of others who did serve.

Mess-o-potamia. Remember back in 2003 when Iraqi museums in Baghdad were looted, and thousands of priceless artifacts dating back 5000 years were taken? Rumsfeld was so incredibly concerned about the potential loss that he quipped,

My goodness, were there that many vases? Is it possible there were that many vases in the whole country?

Even back then, it was the media's fault for anything bad that was happening in Iraq. Well, it turns out that yes, there really were that many vases. And the money from the sale of those stolen vases (and other artifacts) are being used to fund the terrorists:

Donny George [director of Iraq's National Museum] told cultural experts at a UNESCO meeting that 15,000 objects had been stolen from the museum and only 4,000 had been returned.

"Rich people are buying stolen material ... Money is going to Iraq and they're buying weapons to use against Iraqi police and U.S. forces," George said during a meeting to assess the state of Iraq's cultural heritage.

Oops. And KKKarl Rove says that it's liberals who are to blame for the continuing violence in Iraq. Pig.

Another one bites the dust. And another one gone, and another one gone; another one bites the dust. Sadly, I must report that almost a year to the day that it started, Procfreak has been shut down. The operation was aborted after the blogger's cover was blown. And as this article shows, people in academia can get burned by the blogs they keep.

I've tried to maintain a certain level of anonymity here, but I certainly haven't taken every measure possible. It wouldn't take too much effort to figure out my true identity. But most people who read this regularly know who I am anyway. And it's not like I've ever said anything inflammatory.

So we'll pour a 40 for you, Procfreak.

Happy Birthday, Coco! Three years old today.
She's a butterbean; she's butterbeany.

Saddam hearts Saint Ronnie. It isn't just the Doritos he longs for.

The jailed former Iraqi leader described how Reagan, who was president during the time of Iraq's 1980-88 war with Iran, sold him planes and helicopters. "Reagan and me, good,"' Saddam said, according to the article by Lisa DePaulo in the July issue that goes on sale June 28.

"He said, 'I wish things were like when Ronald Reagan was still president,'" said one of the soldiers who guarded him.

Good times. If Saddam signed Reagan's yearbook, he'd be like, "Hey Ron, don't go changing! Thanks for hooking me up with the weapons, bro. Tell that crazy bastard Rummy to give me a call. We'll chill at one of the palaces and fire off rifles. Best friends 4 ever! Saddam."

So the next time you hear someone talking about how Reagan was the best, just say, "You know who else loved Reagan? Saddam Hussein."

Exercise Update. Two weeks completed. No injuries to report. On to week three. Kudos to the six of you who believed that I'd at least get past the first two weeks. To the eight of you who didn't think I'd get to this point...you know me well.

Item! If you've never read Jesus' General, there's no better time than now to start.

Item! Serving a detainee a fancy meal doesn't make up for torture, especially when that detainee is a U.S. soldier posing as a detainee.

Item! I'm almost finished peeling. I'm really sorry now that I didn't take my legal counsel's advice and photodocument the whole episode. I'm very relieved though. It feels like I stopped the rot with a sixer off a googly.

Item! If you got here via an internet search for Joel Osteen, just know that that dude is a crackhead.

Item! How could I have forgotten? June 4th was the one year anniversary of the announcement that Creed broke up.

Item! "Oz: Season 5" releases on DVD Tuesday. I'm giddy just thinking about the murder, prison rape, and male nudity.

Saturday Lemur Blogging

Mongoose Lemur

Porn and Republicans. This is too funny. Mary Carey, porn star and GOP fundraiser, on Countdown with Keith Olbermann.

God and Guns, Part 3. Saturday I went out on the James River with Mike, he in a pontoon and me in a kayak. Like the idiot that I am, I didn't put on any sunscreen before we left. This would prove to be a painful mistake.

We brought along a couple of fishing rods to do some fishing while floating down the river, and we got out a few times and stood in the river to fish in a couple of spots. The first time we stopped, I started to tell Mike about one time my Dad was practicing casting his ocean fishing rod. The first time he cast the line, he caught a fish. He hadn't planned on catching anything, and he didn't plan on keeping what he caught. So, he took it off the hook and released it. He cast it out again, and again he caught another fish. Reeled it in, took it off the hook, and let it go. Third time, same thing happened. There were other people around who were also fishing and began to take notice. A couple of people came over to ask him why he was letting the fish go, and he said that he was just practicing and didn't have anything to take them home in. They told him to keep catching them, and they'd take them from him. So, he cast the line again and caught another fish. He reeled it in, and one of the persons went over to the fish and started clubbing it with something. He was a little shocked by this but figured what the hell and caught a few more for them. As it turns out, he was casting right in the middle of a school of smaller fish that the bigger fish were feeding on, and his lure looked just like the smaller fish.

So as I'm telling Mike this story, I catch a fish with my first try. And then another. And a third in a row. The third was the biggest horny head chub that Mike had ever seen in his 25 years of fishing. I rule.

By the end of the trip, I knew that I was toast. It was a true redneck weekend. But I didn't realize just how badly I had burned. Sunday, my chest, biceps, and shoulders were all red. Not pink, but red. Though the hairier parts of my chest and belly were somewhat protected. Too much information? By Monday evening, I had blisters on my shoulders. From what I read on the internets, it probably wouldn't have been a bad idea to go see a doctor. But it was bad decision making that got me into this mess, so why change now, right? Tuesday, I took the afternoon off from work because the pain was just too much. If I could have gone topless at work, it would've been alright.

Now, the redness is receding, and the blistering has died down. I might actually be able to sleep through the night. I have to give much praise and thanks to my legal counsel who always comes through when I'm acting like a big baby. She readied and applied cold compresses, sprayed on the solarcaine, rubbed on the aloe, changed my diaper, and put up with my extra pissy mood. She deserves far more than what she charges as my legal counsel. Coco and Tibbs were not quite as helpful.

So let this be a lesson to you all. Don't be like me. Don't be an idiot.

On the upside, there are people who pay good money for a skin peel. I'm getting it for free. Mmm...peeling epidermis....

Write your own joke. It's the one-handed keyboard.

God and Guns, Part 2. After the failed attempt to find something tolerable on the radio, I popped in one of my own CDs and continued trucking on down I-81 at a good 80-85 mph clip with at least two pace cars ahead of me to draw out any fuzz. Because my Moms wouldn't be home until the evening, I had decided to stop by my friend Mike's house in Buchanan to mooch some grub and school him in foosball. You might remember Mike from last year's post about fishing with bullballs which turned out not to be a brand of fish bait.

After eating some gourmet Kraft macaroni and cheese and watching a little bit of Season 2 of Chappelle's Show, Mike suggested that we bring out the gimp guns and blow away some bunny rabbits plastic bottles. I was down with that.

Growing up, I never had a bb gun or a pellet gun. That was something that Mom didn't approve of, and for good reason. Enough damage was done among we siblings with household items turned into weapons without having access to manufactured goods. A punch to the nads is one thing, a bb to the face is another. And so I grew up with a healthy respect for firearms and never fired a gun until a few years ago. But when in Rome, do as the Romans. And when in Buchanan, shoot some guns. Anyway, if I am ever called on to fulfill my duty to defend the Constitution from America's enemies, or when the end times come, I need to be prepared.

We set up some 20 oz bottles, an orange juice jug, and a bullseye, did a couple of 8-balls, and let the good times roll. After emptying a couple clips in the .22, we switched to the 9 mm and taught those bottles a thing or two. Next, we moved to the bolt action rifle, and I shot off a bottle cap from 65 yards. So if things don't work out with the sociology gig, I hear that the military is looking to hire.

I also got a burn on my arm from a hot shell. But that's nothing from the sunburn I got the next day.

Tune in later for Part 3 of my redneck weekend in which I catch the largest horny head ever and learn an important and painful lesson about always wearing sunscreen.

God and Guns, Part 1. It can only mean one thing...a weekend in Virginia. I had Friday off thanks to the alternative work schedule offered to certain federal employees, so I decided to pack a bag and head on down to the Star City of the South for a couple of nights. Driving down late Friday morning, once I hit I-81, I decided to switch over to the radio for a while just to see what I could find. And right on cue, the deejay of the one rock station I could pick up announces that continuing with the forty minute rock block, ZZ Top would be up next. I have never been a proponent of playing ZZ Top anywhere at anytime. Okay, you've got beards (well, two and one moustache) and sunglasses, and you twirl around your guitars. Very cute. We get it. Before I could find out whether it would be "Sharp Dressed Man" or "Gimme All Your Lovin," I hit search on the radio.

Around mile marker 271, the radio dial stopped on a station called "The Cross," and it was the all-request hour. And what came next was something I was completely unprepared for. It was Southpaw with "Baby Got Book." Watch the video here. Christian rap set to the tune of Sir Mixx-a-lot's "Baby Got Back." It's as awful/awesome as it sounds. For example:

Oh baby, I wanna read witcha
Cause your Bible's got pictures
My minister tried to console me
But that Book you got makes ("M-m-me so holy")

Don't say I never did anything for you. It was the strangest radio experience since riding back from a spring break trip to Florida with Dr.Schoolboy in 1995 and hearing the Rednex "Cottoneye Joe" at 4 a.m. just outside of Charlotte. Shortly thereafter, Dr.Schoolboy proclaimed, "Best Western...they have the best food." But he didn't have a monopoly on wisdom for earlier in the day I observed, "You know, there are beaches along the coast," which led to a two hour search for Vero Beach.

Tune back in later for God and Guns, Part 2 in which James plays with safely and respectfully handles firearms.

Exercise Update. Week 1 completed. On to Week 2.

Friday Lemur Blogging.


Golden Bamboo Lemur

Falafel O'Reilly. "He's a horrible, horrible human being." Here's why. Video here.

Mad Money. It's a show on CNBC. I have always just clicked right on by but for some reason tonight, I stopped and watched for a few minutes. I can only describe it as an MTV set taken over by a crazy man who seems to be in the middle of a four-day coke binge. And he's giving stock tips. To people who watch CNBC for financial advice. And the advice tonight centered around how to be a good war profiteer by investing in companies cashing in with the Departments of Defense and Homeland Security. I learned that if you want to strike it rich, you need to invest in LLL, not LDNX. Because good lord, can you imagine if you made the mistake of investing in LDNX thinking it was LLL? Crazy! It was fascinating for all of about five minutes.

Justice Department Hearts Big Tobacco.

This is what you voted for, America, when you put Shrub back in office. A dirty, tar-ridden, cancerous lung. Way 2 go. Ridiculous.

Summertime Television. It's the worst. And I am weak. Like Kristin, I watched "Hell's Kitchen" last night. Seeing the British chef dude (who the contestants must address like a drill sergeant) tell customers to "fuck off" is a pleasure for anyone who has ever worked in food service. But I imagine that as the show progresses, fewer customers will called "fuckers," and so my interest will wane.

Tonight, it was "Fire Me, Please," a show in which contestants have to--you guessed it--try and get fired. I'll bet this show is a hoot for all the unemployed. But what else are they going to do, right? So CBS is providing a valuable service for all those people whose unemployment insurance has run out and not been extended thanks to compassionate conservativism. The show was funny enough but the novelty will wear off faster than the stickiness of a wacky wall-walker. And no amount of warm water will make it better. But if you can catch the "Queer Eye" with the Red Sox, it's worth a watch.

Shows that I'll not be watching a single minute of...any show involving a dance or singing competition; shows centering on the uber-rich or people who are famous for no reason other than being rich; Big Brother 6.

Let's see...what else is there to share....I started to exercise tonight. While keeping my heartrate below 100 bpm for most of the last year has been relaxing, it hasn't done much to keep me fitting comfortably in my pants. So I'm doing a nine week couch-to-5K plan. And I've put a poll on the right where you can express your lack of confidence in my ability to follow through. Your vote might not count in federal elections, but it will always count here.

What took you so long, America? It would seem that a majority of the country come to realize what you and I have known all along--Shrub is doing a shit job as president, he doesn't care about you and me, and the war in Iraq isn't worth it and hasn't made anyone any safer. Oh well. We only have 1322 more days left until Republicans decide that we don't need elections anymore, and the Shrubs are annointed our very own royal family. Neil Bush (you remember Neil--he's the one who likes Thai hookers) can be the royal jester.

Six Feet Under. Anyone out there planning on watching the new (and final) season that starts Monday night at 9:00 who could tape it for me? I'll reimburse for tapes and shipping.

Who would Jesus scam? I'll bet it's because I never actually sent back in my prayer handkerchief. But maybe my Miracle Power of God Cross will find its way into my life soon enough. This one goes so far as to instruct the lost soul to send in a $20 bill. Maybe I'll be saved yet.

Saturday Lemur Blogging


Aye-Aye Lemur

Security threat. Yesterday, there was a carbomb threat somewhere at another federal building. I was ready to put on my cape and fulfill my oath to defend America from its enemies, but a message came over the intercom telling everyone to leave the building and head home early for the day. So that's what I did.

June. From the Despair.com calendar for this month, "Consulting: If you're not a part of the solution, there's good money to be made in prolonging the problem."

I don't think I'll be doing much blogging at work. Government computers and stuff like that. One thing I can tell you that the government isn't wasting your tax dollars on is toiletpaper. Cheap, cheap, cheap.

I know a few people who also work for The Man and have probably also taken the oath to defend the Constitution. We should start our own superhero action team, minus the action, and minus the superpowers. Just capes.