LOST IN A SEA

2012-01-16T13:57:00.000-08:00

NOW THAT THE FUROR IS OVER . . . FOR NOW ?

The "Tim Tebow Story" gripped sports and culture for a double handful of crazy weeks in this years NFL season. Tebow is, at first blush almost athletic cliche. A Heisman Trophy winner, small-but-agile, a collegiate star, but seemingly not good enough to make it to the big show, just like so many Heisman winners before him.

When this year's Denver Broncos season started (predictably) poorly, Tebow was given the shot at the starting job. He responded with a Season reminiscent of the late great George Blanda's last full season in the League, although not possessed of Blanda's advanced age "handicap." Nonetheless, as Tebow's string of improbable comebacks and sensational wins grew, more attention began to be paid to his contemplative kneel after a touchdown play, his prayerful salute to his Creator. Some saw this as an apostolic gesture, while others ridiculed it as religious grandstanding. Still, others focused on the athlete's off-field exploits. Again, there were divergences. Liberal thinkers who may trend away from religious yearnings pointed to Tebow's (and his mother's) participation in a pro-life advertorial a few years ago which was used as a GOP convention side dish. Others focused on Tebow's exploits visiting sick and disabled children, and striving to bring some fleeting happiness into kids who were and are struggling. Saturday Night Live and Jimmy Fallon got into the act as well, with some irreverent spoofs and satires of Tebow, including the former's visit of Jesus himself to the Bronco locker room, and the latter's merging of Tebow and David Bowie in a song parody. Still, the controversy raged, and some commentators labeled Tebow a polarizing figure. Why?

From this perspective, it seems less about Tebow himself, and more about the religion he is overtly professing. Too many progressives are themselves beyond apathetic or disinterested in faith, but openly hostile toward it. They see overt religious displays as intensely sanctimonious, pseudo-pious demonstrations which ought to be ignored, and these anti-religious progressives show great intolerance - which is ironic. The reasons underpinning the aversion are fair - there have been innumerable examples of religious hypocrisy on display in the television age, and you don't have to be named Baker or Swaggart (or Haggard - or even "his Eminence" for that matter) to acknowledge it . Yet the reality is that religious displays have been a part of the football post game ritual for decades now - whether the networks choose to show that demonstration or not - and usually they have opted for the latter.

Some of the Tebow scorn is heaped in the direction of his presumed politics - the partisan participation in the Republican convention comes to mind; yet that ignores the fact that sports in general - and football particularly, tend toward a generally conservative/traditional crowd and mind set.

In fairness, Tim Tebow the person seems like a decent sort of person, whose outward actions - at least the ones best publicized, track with one who practices what he professes. And, politics and faith aside, he's the runt - the underdog, the guy who couldn't make it, gaining on the establishment, and proving them wrong. In short, there are reasons to like the man, and admire the perseverance against tough odds, and the achievement. Isn't better to hear about athletes who brighten sick and disadvantaged kids lives, rather than ones whose exploits belong on a police blotter? Does the previous question really need a lot of thought before it is answered? Yes, that doesn't mean that there won't be something ugly discovered below the surface - it could always happen in this story, too - but recognizing that possibility, and hoping for it to occur, are decidedly different responses, too. For now, it's just nice to see an affable underdog acting responsibly in the limelight, whether or not it includes outward displays of piety.

2011-12-20T07:29:00.000-08:00

SHOULDA, COULDA, WOULDA

"What's happening?" I can almost hear you saying it still, through the receiver, your typical greeting. My gawd, you were funny. You could pick out something in a person and go on for hours about it, and have everyone within ear shot spitting out their noses in hysterics. You were smart, to a point where you aggravated your best family friend by making school look/seem "so easy." You impressed your peers - and rankled them, by coming in as a senior and making the varsity team at the local Catholic football factory without having played the preceding 3 seasons. You spoke Spanish like a native. You loved this time of year. Yeah, you got crotchety and you couldn't leave the 60s behind, and that Bill O'Reilly stuff got old in those last years, man, really old. But you were a good guy. You made people laugh, and laughter eases stress better than anything made by Pfizer or Upjohn. You were loved. And you are missed. Wish you could have been here today, for number 65. It looks like another keeper from this vantage point. God Bless you my brother.

2011-11-24T06:37:00.000-08:00

THANKFULNESS

There is an abundance of reasons to be grateful this year . . . full time employment, a great family, a talented Mrs. LOST, a home, a beautiful state, despite its troubles, health (mostly, time to get off that couch more, though), sanity (okay, let's not push it, right?), a sense of humor, the lifting of a great burden, and the prospect of a better near and intermediate future, the time to spend recharging batteries in a college town (twice this Fall, once courtesy of each kid), the opportunity to reconnect with an energetic, spirited Faith. All of this, and so much more. Thank You, God, for the good fortune. May all be so blessed.

2011-11-05T13:43:00.000-07:00

WHY THE RELIGIOUS RIGHT IS OH SO WRONG - A CASE STUDY

One of my friends - my "rightie" friends, loves him some e-mail. He loves him some political e-mail, and he loves him some Christian e-mail, too. All too often, he sends both out with deliciously odd timing. Case in point, last night, he proudly forwarded this one:

"Finally, a way to accurately describe our Nation's current status...

Ineptocracy (in-ep-toc’-ra-cy) - a system of government where the least capable to lead are elected by the least capable of producing, and where the members of society least likely to sustain themselves or succeed, are rewarded with goods and services paid for by the confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers."

This morning, he sent this one:

HAD
A
FRIEND VISIT THIS MORNING.
HE
ARRIVED
EARLY,

SAT DOWN WITH ME AND CHATTED FOR A WHILE ABOUT
HOW THINGS WERE CURRENTLY GOING FOR ME IN MY
LIFE.
AFTER VERY CAREFULLY AND
COMPASSIONATELY
LISTENING TO ALL THAT I HAD TO SAY,
HE STOOD UP,
WALKED OVER TO ME,
LEANED OVER AND GENTLY HELD ME
FOR AWHILE.
THEN,
AFTER REASSURING ME NOT TO WORRY,
THAT EVERYTHING WOULD WORK OUT FOR ME AND BE
JUST FINE,
HE ASKED ME IF I KNEW OF ANYONE ELSE THAT
COULD USE A VISIT FROM HIM.
I IMMEDIATELY
THOUGHT OF YOU MY FRIEND.
I GAVE HIM YOUR NAME AND HE KNEW WHERE YOU LIVED.
HE GAVE ME ANOTHER REASSURING HUG, THANKED ME AND
I WALKED WITH HIM TO MY FRONT DOOR.
HE TOLD ME THAT
HE WAS ON HIS
WAY TO
YOUR PLACE.

When He gets to your PC, escort Him to the next
stop.
Please don't allow Him to sleep on your PC.
The message He is
carrying is very
important.

I asked
Him to bless you and yours with peace, happiness
and abundance.
Say a prayer and then pass Him on to bless others as I sent him on to bless you. Our assignment is to
spread love,
respect and kindness throughout the world.
Have a blessed day and
touch somebody's
life today as hopefully I have touched your life.

He's walking around
the world via e-mail!!
Please pass it on so He can get there....

As to the first e-mail, I pounded out the following, but decided not to hit the "send" button:

Oh, the ways to tear this one apart.

In the first place, everyone with a pulse rate and 18 years under their belt gets to vote. The well-heeled (those whose "wealth" is being "confiscated") can spend limitless sums of $$ blaring ads which pimp their favorite candidates and causes and tear down the ones they dislike or distrust.

Secondly, the Rewards of "goods and Services" showered upon the impliedly unworthy have been pared down considerably over where they were even 10 years ago, from a point where they did not provide a sustainable wage to begin with to a bare bones point. It is at this point where I paused, debated whether to remind my Christian-rightie friend of his 2-plus year stint on Unemployment benefits - extended mainly because of "liberal socialists" who would rather see people sustained than swept into the gutter - and I decide not to included it (after all, during the drafting, I haven't yet made the decision to "send" or "not to send.")

The "diminishing number" of producers includes GE - which paid no taxes last year at all. It includes the Walton family (heirs of Sam Walton) whose "Producing" consisted of being born into the right family. What happens to the American dream chance of those born into families like yours and mine (meaning people not named "Walton, or "Trump" or "Buffet" or "Perot" or "Gates") if all of this wealth stays firmly in the hands of families for generation after generation, including groups of those who "make" it into the charmed circle in each current generation ("Zuckerbergs" or "Jobs") The end result is oligarchy - wealth and power concentrated into the hands of a relative few. The middle class disappears.

I think the President's greatest ineptitude - maybe his only ineptitude, was to be too trusting in the idea that his adversaries would put aside politics and work collaboratively with him. This includes retaining "insiders" like Bernanke and Geitner to run the financial show. These guys "produced" nothing but sham paper (Deriviatives, Collateralized Debt Obligations, Credit Default Swaps) that pumped up the bubble until it exploded, and splattered all over the rest of us. This includes Republican "leaders" like McConnell, who repeatedly stated his main goal was to keep this President to one term. People like that are telling you they won't compromise. People like that are daring you to spit in their face and say "elections have consequences - so since you won't lead or follow, get out of the way." And that is what Obama should have done.

We should have gotten the hell out of Iraq in 09. They don't want us there.
We should have left Afghanistan - in a big giant parade - after he got bin Laden.
We should have enacted single payer Health Care Reform.
The stimulus should have been bigger than it was. That's the extent of the ineptitude, my friend . . . giving negative people and forces the benefit of many doubts.

I don't even know where to begin on the first one, other than to say that the messages are contradictory - the Creator I believe in doesn't wring his hands over Randian nonsense of "confiscated wealth of a diminishing number of producers." Funny how these types of e-mails sanitize all mention of the Scriptures dealing with how to treat neighbors, the poor, the disenfranchised, out of these encounters with the Head of the Christian faith. Matthew 25 comes to mind, for one. Were a response in order to the first one, it would have to include something like this:

When you talk with Jesus,
do you ask him what He thinks about
what we should do to help the poor?
How about what help should be offered to
developing countries?
Ever seek his opinions on the age old debate
between Guns and Butter?
Asked Him how to differentiate between those poor who are "lazy" and those whose lot was randomness writ large, or just being in the wrong place at the right time?
Ever thought about asking the Lord
about Capital Punishment?
Spending more money on Prisons than
on Schoolchildren?
Building more bombs than rebuilding hospitals?
And if you haven't asked Him those questions, Why not?
Would not the answers guide you in your "assignment to spread love, respect and kindness throughout the world" - or is that only a mandate to do among our "friends?" I don't remember being told "Love Thy Friends" over and over again on Sundays and in between.

Who's opinion matters most in such matters?
That of Your favorite candidate, or
that of your Personal Savior?

Perchance the fear in asking comes from not wanting to hear the answers . . .
If I'm wrong about that, at least I'll be in Hell with people who think like me . . . .

2011-11-05T12:00:00.001-07:00

NONSTOP NUTTINESS CONTINUES

Every week it happens, cataclysmic recession or not. The come-ons keep a-coming. Maybe we ought to be grateful that somebody is still using the Postal Service, and quietly thankful that our e-mail addresses haven't been tapped - okay, well, they have too, its just that it is still kind of fun deleting the ads for cheap Rx, "wonder bras," and linguistically-challenged Nigerians whom we've never met promising us seven figure rewards for the mere privilege of borrowing our bank account wire transfer numbers for a few moments.

I'm talking about the nuttiness of credit card come-ons. Every week, like clockwork, they roll in. Sometimes they're the product of existing bank relationships. Sometimes they sneak in, cloaked in the guise of an organization we've belonged to in the past (or still do belong to); sometimes they're from the existing accounts we hold - little checks we can use - 'like real money" to pay off our bills!"

All suffer the same fate. Meet the shredder, prep yourself for the long ride to the landfill. That is our approach anyway, but its hard not to wonder about what happens everywhere else, and why are these things stil being sent. It isn't like someone turned the lights out in the junk mail machine room at CHASE (yeah, let's pick on them) without throwing the "OFF" switch. No, this stuff is still being sent because it works. Because, despite the recession, the people who have lost homes, cars, retirements, etc. from the orgy of overconsumption and spending like there is no tomorrow (sad, self-fulfilling prophecy that this is), people are still using more credit than they should be - and that is why the amoral institutions are stil behaving like the proverbial pimp - handing out free samples of his wares until one gets hooked. Yeah, it's not just the banks' fault - like the drug situation, somebody on the other end of the transaction is just saying "Yes" (actually a whole lot of somebodies, hence the volume of the unsolicited invitations), but it is ensuring that the damage will continue, the debts will continue to pile up, until there is nothing left to squeeze out of people. It's sickening, its' wasteful as hell, and it is and remains dangerous for too many people with not enough impulse control. Just like drugs, nicotine, gambling, alcohol, name your vice. Sometimes it seems like this blast of junk mail is the only reward for maintaining a so-called "high" FICO score, or credit rating. Hosanna and Hallelujah for the god of Wall Street, the great invisible hand of Capitalism.

Time to go fire up the shredder for this week's landfill installment . . .

2011-08-05T06:05:00.000-07:00

ODE TO A GIANT STINKER

Two more weeks,

and it will be time to say

our good-byes

again.

This time

there is this dull, empty ache

that says this one’s for real

Twice before I knew or felt

you’d be back

with your laugh and smile in tow

Not now, for the time has come

and you’re ready to go and

grab your place among

the hopefuls at the starting line.

I’ll miss the

grand ideas and youthful

thoughts inside that giant frame

I’ll miss the insights

and the ways you’ve shown

others how they matter

I’ll miss the volume

and the humor and banter

I’ll even miss the mess

Mostly, I’m gonna miss you

hanging around, always being “down”

for whatever might come along

and bring some light.

2011-07-24T10:00:00.000-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

. . . "Maybe shoulda gone to rehab, 'stead of 'no, no, no!" . . . now the Congress wants to appoint a "Super Congress" to do what it can't - agree on a way to raise the debt ceiling. Why would any elected official think that creating a new layer of government - consisting of members from the layer whose job it is do decide the issue to begin with - is a good idea on any level? Maybe the government should default and shut down, if its legislative body is this incompetent . . . when can 'victory' be declared in Afghanistan and Iraq, so everyone can come home? What's the wait for, Mr. President? . . . how do you tell a family member who has stopped speaking to you that you heard about their misfortune, and you feel terrible about it, and wish and hope for the best, and will keep eyes out for any potential solution? Here's hoping LOST just did that . . .what is worse, a church choir that sings really well and knows it - so much that it tries to dominate the service, or a choir that sounds awful but keeps enthusiastically, repetitively, trying? Not sure on that one . . . the country needs a month where Christians don't tell people they are Christian, they show people that they are Christian; there is a big difference . . .in a perfect world, the inventor of the 44oz. fast food beverage cup would still be in prison for that act . . . If Motel 6 will "leave the light on for you," but has lots of vacancies - meaning that "the light is on but nobody is home" doesn't that make Tom Bodette Norman Bates . . . Americans should not have to work past 70, but the trade off is that no one but the truly exceptional - the extreme upper end of the wealth pyramid, or tremendously successful entrepreneurs, should be able to afford retirement at 50, either . . . a college education shouldn't cost someone $100,000 for a State University . . . there is nothing wrong with California's Public Education system that couldn't be fixed by greater parental commitment, and some streamlined means of terminating faculty deadweight . . .

2011-06-15T05:59:00.000-07:00

COCKROACHES

When LOST was in college, there were many compromises, and a whole lot of benefits. Among the latter was a vastly shorter list of monthly obligations - most apartments came with utilities during the college years, so beyond school, books and food - expensive but not "monthly," per se, there was rent, and a phone bill to pay. Those were the days.

Among the compromises on the west side of Los Angeles were cockroaches. They were everywhere in those years. The only satisfaction LOST derived out of the plague was confidence in the belief that every one of those Holmby Hills/Westwood/Brentwood/Bel-Air mansions ringing the campus suffered the same affliction. Nothing eradicates them. They can live in sewer environments, thick with hydrogen sulfide and all sorts of other unspeakables too disgusting to contemplate. They are impervious to microwave radiation, and - rumor has it- can survive nuclear blasts. And they breed, my how they breed.

There is one thing they loathe. Light. It will send them scattering back to their corners and crevices quicker than a garlic flavored crucifix would eradicate Dracula. Not dead, just contained. Not gone, but restrained.

The State of Ohio had a large cockroach a few years ago, named Kenneth Blackwell. He was the Secretary of State for Ohio, and the state chairman of the Bush Re-election campaign in 2004. The same year that there were innumerable anomalies in Ohio's elections - all the way down to the precinct levels - long lines in urban areas caused by fewer voting machines, Diebold voting machines with serious reliability problems, and magical precincts with more votes than voters. All overseen by the Secretary of State who chaired the re-election campaign for one of the candidates - nope, no conflict there.

Flash forward to 2011. Blackwell is not gone. But he needs a little light to shine upon him. At the recent "Faith and Freedom Coalition Conference," put on by Ralph Reed and blathering toe-fetishist Dick Morris, Blackwell appeared and spoke to supporters, as he is eyeing a Senate run. In a piece run by Slate.com http://www.slate.com/id/2296313/pagenum/all/ , here's what Blackwell had to say,

" On Saturday, former Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell spent a little time away from the podium to meet activists and talk to reporters. He runs Reed's affiliate in Ohio; he's thinking about running for U.S. Senate. He was the only Republican in that position who said what the social conservatives believe.

'Clean water is important to us,' said Blackwell. 'Decent housing is important to us. But they're not rights. And we have to begin to say that what's important is that we in a rational way are able to reform these programs in a way to save them. And, yes, if it means that somewhere down the line individuals have to make sacrifices, because the rationalization of the system means we save it, but we are also doing it in a more efficient way. … I don't think too many Americans will object to that. At the end of the day we're going to get back to making sure we're in a position to finance the wars in which we engage. Does that mean we can do that without sacrificing? No. We have to make sacrifices. But what's more important? Our freedom and security or the gluttony of the federal government?'

The world according to Cockroach Blackwell. We don't need no stinking regulations to protect Americans from polluted water or unscrupulous lenders or landlords - those gluttonous bureaucrats be damned! We do need cash for wars. Lots of cash, for any wars to promote "freedom and security." Shine the light people, Shine the light.

2011-06-04T20:28:00.000-07:00

FORTY THREE YEARS AGO . . . REMEMBER

June 5, 1968, just after midnight, one of the brightest stars in the progressive spectrum was senselessly snuffed out and taken from our country, from our society, from our government.
(reprinted and updated from 2009)
Robert Kennedy is almost a forgotten man in mainstream America now, a footnote on a page about his brother's presidency for some, a cameo appearance in a TV movie about Hoffa or McCarthy, or the Cuban Missile Crisis for others. He's been gone almost as long as he was here, only for a time, among his bretheren. Even this horrific anniversary has been obscured to some degree by the death of the conservative's modern day icon, Ronald Reagan.

Robert Kennedy was a real-life story of redemption, a real-life, modern day Ebeneezer Scrooge. He was himself transformed from a ruthless pursuer of perceived wrong doers and those who would attack or antagonize his brother, to a statesman who cared about the poor, the impoverished, the hopeless in ways that few politicians have since. He made enemies among the more vocal of progressives of his time for declining to immediately challenge LBJ for the 1968 nomination and on the disastrous course in Vietnam, only to jump in after McCarthy showed Johnson's vulnerability in New Hampshire; vulnerability that was itself the product of the American public's disgust with the Vietnam war. But he made up for lost time, and ultimately paid the dearest of prices for his efforts.

Given what happened to his brother, his campaigning was absolutely fearless. Many of his campaign events featured him standing on the back of open cars, riding slowly through neighborhoods of exuberant people, eager to touch him and shake his hand. So many seem convinced that his spirit and drive, and energy and charisma would help carry this country out of the Southeast Asian .quagmire, and on to better things and greater prosperity.

To watch the footage of that somber funeral train snaking from New York to Washington that funereal day, and view the sea of humanity in silent witness, was profoundly poignant. Thousands of ordinary-honorary pallbearers showed no regard for individual differences, and instead were united solely by the depth of their collective grief. In their sense of loss they showed appreciation for what the man was able to inspire in millions - an ability to emphasize common goals over specific differences. Scant few national leaders have succeeded in this effort to any significant degree since; President Obama has tried to scale this peak, but has not yet shown the depth of the wit, wisdom, and willingness to inspire people to emphasize unity over division.

Tonight, if you are so inclined, say a prayer for the soul of this decent man who was ripped away from us. Say one for our Nation, so that we will one day soon be blessed with a batch of public servants with Robert Kennedy's sense of social justice and yearning to improve our country as a whole. And most of all, let us all make sure that we will recognize such people when they enter the public arena, and support them as fervently as humanly possible.

2011-05-22T19:14:00.000-07:00

FUN'S FUN, NOW BACK TO WORK

Okay, truth be told. It ain't easy being green, like the famous faux frog sez. Lived on the Left most of what passes for an adult life- more than 30 years now, and counting. Practiced my Catholic faith for longer than that - despite feeling a great deal of angst, anger, frustration - indeed rage, at the so-called "leaders" of the Religion, for their acts and omissions over the period of time that happens to coincide with LOSTs lifetime. Still, felt that enough about the faith - particularly the importance of works and faith, Matthew 25, and the "two greatest commandments" - were worth passing on to the next generation that we incorporated same into our child raising efforts. Along with that effort has been to acknowledge that all people are creations of the creator - irrespective of color, race, ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation.

It just gets a little sickening to be part of the progressive "movement" and yet at times feel every bit as much an outsider as LOST would be at a Concerned Women for America Rally. All Progressive/Liberal folks are not atheist. That also doesn't mean that all progressives with a Faith think less of any atheist or agnostics. Well, maybe the agnostics. After all, they are, to paraphrase Dante, preserving their neutrality in times of moral crisis.

At Saturday night Mass this past week, our visiting presider spoke of the gospel reading which contained the fairly straightforward "I am the way, the truth, and the Life" passage, and effectively turned it upon its ear. That is to say, he dared, in a very conservative venue (these are red-State wannabes, most of 'em) that the meaning of that passage isn't the requirement to accept a Personal Savior as the key to salvation but to believe in the works of the Savior. In that one bit of oratory, this admittedly flawed old man acknowledged that the goal was to try to "right wrongs that one sees," to "sow love where one sees hatred," and to bring "joy to those in sorrow." There is nothing wrong with those sentiments. They are, in plain fact, a call to act by the Golden Rule, which itself devolves from New Testament scripture, and is as altruistic, and as laudable a goal as anything the Progressive/liberal element in American society has ever advocated.

So can the left grow up - just a bit, at least - and acknowledge room in its decidedly bigger-than-the-alternative-element's "tent," for progressive/liberal folks who still work to practice a Faith in a higher power, an unmoved mover who supports a Greater Good? It's not too much to ask.

2011-05-20T06:14:00.000-07:00

JUST A FEW WORDS . . .

I love the fierce advocacy you often displayed for each of us. Camping in the dealership showroom, demanding “justice” for your oldest son, when he was taken advantage of, with a squirming, screaming 4 year old me in tow. I love your resolve, and the desire to go back to school at 40+, finish college and join the workforce, when the seventh kid hit kindergarten. I love the fact that you got on the roof at 50 and helped put up Christmas lights. I love the willingness to try to make almost anything in the kitchen – at least once. I love the pizza that your kitchen put out like clockwork on so many Fridays, same as the mountains of cookies that poured forth every December.

I love and share your political passions. I love the care you gave to a declining Dad for those seemingly interminable final years. I love the happy tone in your voice when you recognize the caller - even if the cellphone takes away some of the surprise. I love that you still practice your Faith, and you’re still willing to call out the flaws within the structure that tries to govern It.

I love the relationship you’ve cultivated with your grandsons – and all your grandkids. I love that you’re editing a newsletter in your community. I love that you took the plunge and found love again in your 80s. I love being a part of your “extended “ family. I love that you’re still making an effort to bridge gaps. I love (despite the embarrassment) that you tell people I’m a writer because I write this blog.

Mostly, I love you, Mom.

2011-05-15T16:41:00.000-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Don't know if the "cellphones are killing the bees" theory is accurate, but just saw a very subtle weapon in the fight against the theory. AT&T has a new commercial where it depicts it's "ever expanding coverage area" as blooming green-and-orange growth all over buildings, entire cities,and ultimately the country. The underlying message is that AT&T is somehow compatible with plant life - which means it couldn't be harming the bees, could it? Sure, and its coverage area really is 97%, LOST and family just happen to perpetually dwell and travel in the 3% non-coverage bubble . . . Newt Gingrich, standard bearer of family values? According to which of his three wives . . . most Americans seem alarmingly calm considering the "end" is approaching in a mere 6 days. This is not at all the panic depicted in "Armageddon," or "The Day After Tomorrow;" such apathy . . . "Water for Elephants" was great - right up until the time that Christoph Waltz nearly ends the picture by strangling another attractive blonde - will Tarantino scream copyright infringement . . . homemade cookies taste better when there are more people at home to enjoy them (thanks, cousin Bonnie for that recipe) . . .

2011-05-12T07:31:00.000-07:00

ALLELUJIA, THERE ARE STILL PROGRESSIVES IN THE CATHOLIC FAITH!!!!

At a time when the faithful's loudest voices seem to be the hypocrites - 5 non-negotiable screamers, serial-groom-and-noted-family-values-expert Newt Gingrich - at last there is a ray of hope, or maybe even a green shoot or two in the trough of regressive retrenchment within the Church: From today's Springfield News Sun (http://www.springfieldnewssun.com)

WASHINGTON — A group of leading Catholics assailed House Speaker John Boehner Wednesday for backing a budget plan that is “particularly cruel to pregnant women and children,’’ while “radically’’ cutting Medicaid and “effectively’’ ending Medicare.

In a letter to Boehner, R-West Chester, signed by more than 70 Catholic university professors, priests and sisters from across the country, the Catholic leaders charged that Boehner’s “voting record is at variance from one of the Church’s most ancient moral teachings’’ – to help the poor.’’

“Your record in support of legislation to address the desperate needs of the poor is among the worst in Congress,’’ the authors wrote. “This fundamental concern should have great urgency for Catholic policy makers. Yet, even now, you work in opposition to it.’’

The sharply worded letter to Boehner, a Catholic from Greater Cincinnati, is one of the most intense attacks on his efforts to slash trillions of dollars from the budget in an effort to dramatically reduce the federal deficit. Among those who signed the letter were faculty members from the University of Dayton and Xavier University – where Boehner attended college.

The letter was sent on the eve of Boehner’s commencement address Saturday at the Catholic University of America in Washington. Boehner will receive an honorary doctorate in law at the commencement.

And this nugget, after the obligatory self-exoneration attempt by a Boehner toady - er, staffer:

But in a direct swipe at Boehner, the authors of the letter wrote that “it is good for Catholic universities to host and engage the thoughts of powerful public figures, even Catholics such as yourself who fail to recognize ... important aspects of Catholic teaching.’’

Huzzah you wonderful bunch of pinko radical liberation theology freaks, you! Just when a kick was needed to get through the week, and you delivered. The Faith isn't dead or even damaged, the religion is what needs to be tweaked, tinkered and transformed. Please, don't anyone expect Boehner to shed any tears over this rebuke, either.

2011-05-11T20:57:00.000-07:00

TIME FOR A CHANGE

Okay, the truth. It wasn't that staring at Peter Billingsley's forever youthful mug grew tiresome, or that a constant reminder of the best time of any year became dull. It wasn't because so many cathartic moments have happened of late - the running of the birthers out of town, the swan song of Osama at the hands of the Kenyan socialista and its accompanying cacaphony of Winger angst and teeth-gnashing which followed - worse than what normally hits 'em by the mere mention of the name "Clinton," but that's a digression. The main reason for finally uncorking the bottle and pouring it onto these pages was simply the need to vent. To recalibrate, lower the pressure, burn off a tad. There. Already better.

Turning half a century quelled some of the rage. Resigning a lifetime rank-and-file commission in the Party of Roosevelt removed some of the partisan irascibility, no doubt. Yeah, the conviction is still there - Boehner and buddies are still wrong about nearly everything, nothing but crazies are standing at the 2012 sweepstakes start line to run the race for Second place. Unfortunately, though, the California economy is still in the dumper, same as the national one, people are still out of work or underemployed, and those who are not are looking 'round every corner for the pink slip monster, or are they checking their FaceBook Status? Don't know which. Oh, and just because it ain't being talked about anymore, rest assured plenty of isotopes are still flowing out of Fukushima and into the Pacific, just like all of BP's presents to the Gulf last year are still lingering about. Are all the bees dead yet? If the Rapture really does come on May 21, 2011, will the saved do us all a favor and strap a Mormon and a Jehovah's Witness under each arm before they whoosh away? Do I really need to see a doctor for an erection lasting 4 hours, or should I work that visit in between "encounters," or just call the Guinness people - the record books folks, not the brewers I mean. Although, doesn't a frosty cold stout sound particularly good right, about . . . now? Sure beats the crap out of a marathon of "Sarah Palin's Alaska" episodes, now, doesn't it . . .more later over most of these NBC stations.

2010-12-19T14:00:00.001-08:00

THE LETTER WHICH CAN'T BE SENT

Beyond the common sounds, sights and scents of the Holidays - calamitously beautiful light displays, music both schmaltzy and sacred, and pine/cinnamon/mint in varying degrees of intensity, there are other subtle tones. The houses so gaudily decorated actually seem to move closer - at least for a moment or two. Despite the press of completing the task list, people are - in person at least, a shade or two more likely to exchange a grin, a clasp, a friendly remark. The California sky never looks like this in the other eleven months. Clear weather brings feathery clouds with a stunning backlight, provided by a Sun lower on the horizon than any other time of the rolling year. And with all of these signs and indicators, comes the excuse to look at pictures and watch films seen repeatedly, noting nuance after nuance not previously observed, with a reverence. It is time for other annual traditions, too. Is the tree straight or crooked? Who is the greatest Carol-Crooner of all time? Cole? Williams? Crosby? Sinatra? Surely not the King? It is a time for great joy and reflection. Is your favorite memory "reading" the Sears Wish Book from cover to cover in covetous desire for all of the joys within? Is it the appearance of a particular iconic Seasonal display? Is it reading the Inscription on Clarence's Book - the greatest unspoken line in a movie ever, and welling up like a 3 year old with a freshly-skinned knee? Is it who you hope to see, to touch, to share a laugh (or a toast) with as the grand day approaches? Reflection can lead to sadness, for the "people and things that went before." Tomorrow would have notched number 64 for LOST's brother the Christmas Nut. His laugh, his silly jokes, his propensity for blurting out pop culture lines from commercials, films, or even corny TV ads so terribly missed right now. His midwifery passed the sense of humor from our father to all of the siblings, and his passing has, despite the troubles in his life, left a huge void that is impossible to ignore that this otherwise festive time. So please, wherever you are, raise a glass, or a glance to the heavens, and toast or benediction to someone who has supplied you with great lightness at this Season, living or deceased. And if they are still among us, use the phone. They'd love to hear you say it, and I promise you that if you do, you will feel wonderfully light and airy.

2010-09-12T08:11:00.001-07:00

NO WORDS NECESSARY . . . 'cept for UGLY

2010-09-05T09:41:00.000-07:00

A YEAR WITHOUT

Silence. The quiet of the house this morning is a reminder, a metaphor for the quiet experienced these last 12 months. Fifty two weeks ago today, in a phone call with another brother, word was passed that our two brothers were gone. One, our oldest, was irrefutably, irrevocably crossed over, and not coming back. Sixty two years was all he had, and if truth were told the last thirty five of those years were a crap-shoot, a roller coaster ride of a strand of bare avoidance of an earlier departure. The other, was a pronouncement by the brother that this one "had been dead for a long time" no emotion, no hesitation, no compassion whatsoever. Too much to take at the time.

The year that has ensued has not been without its joys - many of them vicariously enjoyed. Great accomplishments by other family members, great gatherings with friends - by the shore, around the Christmas tree, at the church, at the ball games, at the track. But all the while, the silence is there, and its stinging darkness waits for when the revelry dies down, and the guests have gone home, and it crawls in and stays there, saying nothing, hearing nothing, doing nothing.

Lingering questions. Was it intentional or an accident? Was it all about fear of the future? Was it conscious cowardice or chemically induced impulse? Was there something - or something more that could have been done to stave it off? None of these are settled within LOST's own head, these questions that cannot be posed to the one who is gone. Nor can these issues be discussed with the one who won't speak - who in the process confirms the diagnosis of the other brother.

2010-07-28T09:41:00.000-07:00

THE OLDTIMERS' GAME

Growing up in LA in the 70s, the Dodgers (hell, most MLB teams did this) every year had a special Sunday event called the Oldtimer's Game - teams of former players - some long retired (Satchell Paige, Minnie Minoso), some not so long gone (Ron Fairly, hell even Sandy Koufax once in awhile) would show up and "play a game" against each other for an inning or two, before the real game got started. Yeah, they couldn't play it like they used to - nobody expected that, it was just fun to see some of these guys in uniform again and think about the old days. Magical for a kid.

And it was included in the price of the game ticket.

Paul McCartney's incessant tours make me think of the Oldtimers' games. Sir Paul still has great musical talent beyond performing - always has. He's also a billionaire, a mature billionaire. After spending the better part of the first decade of his solor career running from his Beatles catalog, he reversed field and embraced it. He's released close to a dozen different "live" albums, and sadly but not surprisingly, each one chronicles his declining vocal talents - some of the tracks on the later ones are downright awful.

Yes, perhaps this is leftover vitriol from missing my one and only chance to see "Wings Over America" at the Forum in 1976 - a bandmember's broken arm pushed the tour out 3 months, and the ticket my sister had purchased "for me" went used by someone else - and all I got was this lousy t-shirt. And the "Wings Over America" album -released that Christmas - was decent but it substantially over-emphasized the bass-playing of Sir Paul. Virtually every Live album since - possibly excepting the "unplugged" CD - have been lesser efforts. As an aside, please, Sir Paul, Please stop performing "Live and Let Die" live.

If Sir Paul "needs" to tour for his own musical release, great. He doesn't need to charge 250 bucks a seat from people even less equipped to afford that steep cost now than they were when he was in his "prime" - and no, I wouldn't have paid that kind of coin for it back then, either. Those were "Scalper prices" in 1976, if I do recall correctly. Sorry Paul, I'm cranking up Rubber Soul or Revolver, or Band on the Run. At this point, doing so costs me as much as my Oldtimers Day ticket did back in the day.

2010-07-26T07:22:00.000-07:00

THINGS I DON'T WANNA HEAR ANYMORE

Don't wanna hear "Prayer warrior" in Church anymore. Despite humanity's best attempts to convince itself otherwise, neither the Almighty nor His son are fans of war, or war analogies when it comes to matters of Faith.

2010-05-02T17:30:00.001-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Never made it to Nawlins for a shrimp po'boy, have to wait until the next life now . . . why do those F*ckers from BP sound like they have no frickin' clue how to stanch the viscous bleeding from the sea floor? Is it, perhaps, because they don't? And if they don't what business does anyone have drilling in open seawater for oil? For as crappy a President as he was, if we had only listened to Carter in '79 we'd be thirty one years further ahead in the effort to kick our Petro-habits, right? Where's the comely Alaskan Moron MILF now, as regards her one time mantra, "Drill Baby Drill?" Nothing to say, perhaps because Frank Luntz and Karl Rove haven't sent out the fax yet . . . if I was Albert Pujols, would I make the road trip the first time the Saint Louis Cardinals go to play the D-bags in Phoenix? Ahh, no. Hey, Mr. President, can we stop talking about bi-partisanship now? They've been so cooperative up to this point. Show us all that elections have consequences, please. That includes ending the stupid wars started by your predecessor. Reality TV's Warholian fifteen minutes were up years ago, please heed the call program directors! At last night's movie night, LOST and the Mrs. were treated to 5 previews and yes, every one of them had an EXPLOSION in them. A Movie version of "The A-Team?" A re-make of "Red Dawn?" They're calling us stupid without words and we just sit there and drool into super sized popcorn tubs. Hey, Pope Ratzo, every day you stay in power, you hurt your Mother. Go away already, and take the rest of the collared fascists with you on the way out the door

2010-02-06T10:48:00.000-08:00

LAB COAT SALES PITCH

It has been fewer than 24 hours since LOST was unceremoniously hung up upon by the endocrinologist for LOST's youngest son, a giant of a young man in more ways than most, really in every way but vertical, physical stature. The Endocrinologist LOST would like to say, was shrieking at the end, but in fairness it was simply and elevated, exasperated tone, rapid fire speak, telling LOST that "it is not my fault that your insurance doesn't cover the treatment. My job is to diagnose conditions and offer treatment. I did my job. There's no malpractice here. I'm done with you, I don't want to see you or your family again. You have harassed my staff for several days now. I'm hanging up now." This was the second phone conversation LOST had been involved with the endocrinologists office in 18 hours - not several days, and neither conversation involved yelling, or screaming or harassment of any kind. The calls were occasioned by the revelation - never shared by the endocrinologist or her staff in the two months of time preceding, that "covered by insurance" in the context of a regimen of growth hormone therapy meant on a 70-30 basis, and that the cost of the regiment was almost $60,000 annually, hence a co-payment that is roughly akin to a second mortgage payment.

Flash backward three weeks to the last appointment in the endocrinologist's office. LOST, the Mrs. and the giant, armed with questions, "is this necessary?" "Is this safe?" "What are the side-effects?" "How much does this cost?" "What if we opt against it?" All of these handled with buzz-saw enthusiasm and rapid-fire cadence delivery. No down-side, side-effects very rare and very noticeable very quickly. NOBODY ever says no to this, and ta-da this is COVERED by INSURANCE? In short, no reason to stay short. This mah friends will cure all that ails ya, yew will feel more energy, lose weight, git taller, and , and, and , HISTORICAL flashback alert,obscured by the exuberance and youth and the beauty of the marble-paneled surroundings, seduced by the promise of get-tall quick life riches. A Viagra pitch for the almost post-pubescent.

It was the 21st Century's traveling medicine show, putting down its roots in a massive San Diego medical complex, because now the people were coming to the show, instead of the other way around.

"Nobody ever refuses."

Perhaps the only thing missing was the guy in the long sleeve shirt with the ornate cufflinks, smelling of excessive-but-elegant cologne and speaking with a hint of an accent, ready to close the deal for your very own Vacation resort in the Lake of the Ozarks, or buildable lots in Western Washington, or whatever boondoggle du jour.

The maddening thing is not recognizing it. Not preparing the youngest LOST for the notion, and instead exposing him to it. Listening to the sweet siren call of the doc, promising the world, and the achievement of new heights, all from the comfort and safety of no obligation and no risk land. Why, my gosh, they'll even send you the first month of the drug freefree, FREE!

Just sign here.

G*dd*mn the Pusher-man, indeed.

NO, there is no magic elixir. The little giant will still be a giant - already is one. No need for a second mortgage, more grist for the big-pharma mill - and it doesn't matter that nobody ever refuses. The giant went home and wrote his congressman, a do-nothing praiser of the status quo, no less, but it made the giant feel better. He was now a living example, a part of the fight to change the healthcare landscape. He recognized that "covered by insurance" in this context provided about as much comfort as a half parachute given to a sky-diver in the minute before he is to jump out of the plane at 10,000 feet.

The rotten thing is that marketing is everywhere - now even in the doctor's office, where human beings are often at their most vulnerable.

2010-01-26T07:24:00.000-08:00

COMPULSORY SECESSION ANYONE?

Sometimes the yahoo.com news is even better than "The Onion". Witness today's example, all about why South Carolina wasn't clamoring to oust Mark Sanford:

COLUMBIA, S.C. – When things looked their darkest for Gov. Mark Sanford — when he was in danger of being impeached for running off to Argentina to see his mistress — his best insurance policy may well have been South Carolina's lieutenant governor, Andre Bauer.

Lawmakers knew if they removed Sanford, they would end up with Bauer, a fiercely ambitious Republican with a reputation for reckless and immature behavior.

Now Bauer has folks shaking their heads again, after he likened government assistance to the poor to feeding stray animals.

At a town hall meeting Thursday, Bauer, who is running for governor in his own right now that Sanford is term-limited, said: "My grandmother was not a highly educated woman, but she told me as a small child to quit feeding stray animals. You know why? Because they breed! You're facilitating the problem if you give an animal or a person ample food supply. They will reproduce, especially ones that don't think too much further than that."

(See. "them people" are vermin, like rats.)

Democrats and others railed at him.

"I am disgusted by these comments. They show an unbelievable lack of compassion toward the unemployed workers in our state who are hurting during these hard times," said state Sen. Vincent Sheheen, a Democrat who is also running for governor. "His comments were immoral and out of line."

South Carolina schools Superintendent Jim Rex, another Democratic candidate for governor, called Bauer's comments "reprehensible" and said he should apologize.

Bauer said Monday that he regrets his choice of words

(How NICE of him! What a guy!)

but that government should expect welfare recipients to try to better themselves. He wants to require them to take drug tests and attend parent-teacher conferences if they have children in school.

A child of divorce who benefited from free lunches himself, Bauer insisted he wasn't bad-mouthing people laid off from work in the recession or advocating taking food from children, but rather emphasizing the need to break the cycle of dependency.

(Typical - the loudest shouters against something are usually shouting at themselves in some way, right, Senator Vitter? Reverend Haggard, anything to add here?)

"Do I wish I'd used a different metaphor? Of course I do," the 40-year-old said. "I didn't intend to offend anyone."

(You'll be sure to let us know when you are intending, now, right?)

Bauer has long been a love-him-or-hate-him figure in South Carolina politics. A nonstop campaigner and self-described workaholic, he was the youngest elected lieutenant governor in the country when he first won the No. 2 spot in 2002 at age 33.

Before his 2006 re-election, he shattered his heel when the single-engine plane he was piloting ran into power lines, crashed and caught fire. Bauer's office said the maintenance company that overhauled the engine botched the job. Court records show that a federal administrative law judge in June fined the company for returning the plane with incorrect bolts.

(hmm, wonder if Mr. Conservative values filed a civil lawsuit. Any guesses?)

During the campaign, it was also disclosed that Bauer had been stopped for speeding twice, but not ticketed, even though in one instance he was going 101 mph in a 70 mph zone. He said he didn't realize how fast he was going and never asked for preferential treatment.

(The speedometer in most cars is less than 18" away from the tip of the driver's nose. And he didn't know and couldn't tell the difference between 70 and 100 mph. Having received a CHP chit for a lesser discrepancy years ago on a deserted freeway at 3:30 a.m. these statements seem, ahem, disingenuous?)

Bauer almost ascended to the top office last summer, after Sanford disappeared from the state for five days to be with his mistress. But the Legislature stopped short of impeachment.

Politicians who had gubernatorial ambitions of their own, or were backing other candidates, knew that replacing Sanford with Bauer would have given the lieutenant governor a year-and-a-half tryout for the job and the benefit of running as an incumbent.

At least three other Republicans and five Democrats have said they are running for governor.

Neal Thigpen, a political scientist at Francis Marion University, said Bauer tends to speak so fast and enthusiastically ("It's almost like a Gatling gun") that he sometimes "gets his mouth in place quicker than his head."

(bless his white-pointy-cap-wearing little ditto-head)

Thigpen said the lieutenant governor's latest remarks could hurt him in the general election in the fall by allowing Democrats to portray him as "insensitive and downright cruel."

But as for the June Republican primary, "don't count him out. The kid's got a fanatical following,"

(as Gomer used to say "Surprise surprise!")

Thigpen said. "They're going to forgive him almost anything and stick to him like glue."

Similarly, Winthrop University political scientist Scott Huffmon said Bauer's words "came out as condescending and insulting," but his overall message about government dependency and personal responsibility will appeal to his evangelical Republican base.

"Evangelical Republican" Is that someone who accepted Rush Reagan as his personal Savior?

2010-01-24T08:05:00.001-08:00

REALLY? THAT'S HOW DISJOINTED WE ARE?

LOST has, as most people do, several friends in the community of Righties. Everybody eats, breathes and bleeds, so why would mere political disagreements keep us from reveling in common interests and cultivating friendships, right? You know, despite the fact that one of us would be disillusioned by the Massachusetts Special Election last Tuesday, and the other would be gleefully jumping up and down and chortling as if John the Baptist had just texted that the Second Coming was imminent, so everybody look happy and busy? But LOST digresses.

Yes, with the election of Scott Brown to the last 2 years of Ted Kennedy's seat - a move which ranks right up there with hiring Paul Reubens to film the final scenes of Lawrence Olivier's last, and sadly unfinished film - the mirth meter spiked among all of LOST's Righty friends, each doing the dance of liberation. Liberation from what? From any chance of passing even a horribly diluted bill to deal with the inequities of health care access? Enthralled by the continuation of the insurance carriers' unfettered right to double digit annual premium increases, or the unchecked ability to herd off the insurable populace into the ranks of the functionally uninsured - thanks to the scarlet letter "P" (as in Pre-existing Condition?) Was it nothing more than a vicarious chance to dance once more on the grave of the last Kennedy? What?

Then, as if by infernal Kismet, the Supremes released their latest single last week, and no, it was not a Motown 2:30 in length. Try "novella" on for size. The majority opinion alone flirted with the 100 page mark, the dissent exceeded it, and the whole thing tossed in at just under 190 pages. One court opinion, conferring the right upon corporations to spend lavishly on any and every political campaign of their choosing - so long as they don't give the $$ directly to a candidate. In this Teevee age, does it really matter? What seems to win is the slickest ad campaign; at least this is true far more often than not, which is why everyone should be pissed and frightened over the holding of "Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission." At its worst, it clears the way for functional representation; no longer will Senators "hail" from and "represent" States - they will represent economic sectors, or even individual companies. Since most of those larger players tend to favor the Republican side of things, rest assured that the already-gawky distance between progressive liberal thinking people and the Democratic party will only get more ponderous, as the Dems lurch further rightward in the forlorn hope of courting campaign coffer cash.

Which brings LOST back to his righty friends. One of LOST's Fox News watchin' pals loves to forward e-mails. Political diatribes mainly - although they are often times mixed and mingled with glurgy Christian ones, too. Offensive on occasion because of the intermingling - suggesting that Jesus was the #1 man in the GOP or the Good Teabag Shepherd, or something like that. But LOST digresses. This week, the buddy sent over a political e-mail; it wasn't rejoicing over the Brown victory, or in praise of "Citizens United," though. Here it is, in all its glory.

Subject: ANYBODY HERE LOOK FAMILIAR??

According to Snopes this is TRUE http://www.snopes.com/politics/obama/photos/crashers.asp

-----ANYBODY HERE LOOK FAMILIAR?
I knew there had to be a “Paul Harvey” version to this story. See the white guy in the white suit? Now see the blond in the white dress? See the guy in the middle…hmmm-m-m. This picture was taken June 9, 2005.. It seems Obama has known these two phonies for awhile, at least from the time he was a Senator. They’re getting all the press now as being “party crashers” and the secret service is taking the fall. Funny how this hasn't come out in the press, don'tcha think?

No wonder the couple who crashed Obama’s State dinner last week keep insisting they were invited guests. They know Barry from way back when he was still an Illinois Senator. Is Obama trying to throw the Secret Service under the bus?
Tareq and Michaele Salahi snapped the pic above with Obama at a “Rock The Vote” event on June 9, 2005 (also attended by John McCain…with whom the Salahi’s also took a pic). McCain won an award for his work on campaign finance reform. Obama won an award for “forming a multiracial coalition in winning his seat.”
Michaele Salahi is getting quite a ribbing in the press for lying about being a Redskins cheerleader, but Tareq is the more interesting of the two to me. He has ties to Palestinian terrorists. Tareq is a board member of the ATFP- American Task Force on Palestine , which has quickly scrubbed it’s site of the fact. Thank the Lord for Google cache.

And just who are the ATFP? The ATFP has ties to Chicago , ties to Muslim radicals, ties to Hamas, and ties to Saudi Wahhabists. It is arguably the American wing of Hamas. The group’s co-founder is Rashid Khalidi, the guy purported to have helped finance Obama’s Harvard education and who was also instrumental in getting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to speak at Columbia University . During the Beruit war, Khalidi was a PLO spokesperson. After the war, he came back to teach at the University of Chicago . He is a virulent critic of Israel, and [was] a strong supporter of Fatah terrorist Yassar Arafat. Obama has referred to Khalidi as someone who challenges his “own biases.”

Why do the same dubious tentacles seem to continually surround Obama?
The fact that the ATFP is scrubbing information on Salahi from their website suggests possible damage control coordination between the ATFP and the White House. If the ATFP was acting independently, there would be no reason to scrub Salahi’s name from their site. It looks like Salahi was an invited guest to the dinner, that he was “outed,” and the administration had to come up with a rational excuse for his presence. Now the Salahis want to sell their story…they’re a little broke these days, but they still live VERY high on the hog.

The Secret Service has already apologized for the incident, but they may clear their names if the Salahis start singing... If someone with ties to the American wing of Hamas can get face to face with the President without the Secret Service realizing it…that is a major security lapse. However, if Obama’s people knowingly allowed Salahi in and are now throwing the Secret Service under the bus to cover themselves, that would be a major scandal. Some in Congress are calling for an investigation.
Something is VERY fishy in this White House, AND THE SMELL GETS WORSE EVERY DAY!

The points from this are legion. NO criticism of the President about policies. Nothing about continuing the wars, flagging stimulus, or watering down the healthcare bill. Nothing about the continued velvet glove treatment for the banks and Wall Street. No, we're still talking about him being a Chicago Gangsta terraist, and now a basher of the Secret service, because the same two D.C. wannabes crashed another event in 2005, and got a photo snapped with then Senator Obama. Stupid? Beyond argument.

What's even funnier is that the very attempt to cloak this one with legitimacy - the reference to snopes.com at the outset. Yes, snopes says the picture is legit, and then goes on to point out who else is in the picture - as in music industry people at a "Rock the Vote" event in 2005. Hence, Randy Jackson, and the Black-eyed Peas are surrounding the Senator, with the Hamas-tied Salaheis on the periphery. Undaunted, the author of the original e-mail is convinced this photo means (1) Obama has ties to Hamas - beause Salahei does. and (2) he threw the Secret Service under the bus because the same couple - one he obviously knew well - "crashed" a State Dinner last Fall.

So, what's the funniest? What's the real Paul Harvey moment? Look at the other picture from the same snopes.com entry. Using the same astute logic as the e-mail originator, this picture - taken from the same event (see the outfits on the "crashers"), was obviously snapped to show the Salahei's cavorting and conspiring with Hamas' #1 mole in the U.S.

You can't make this stuff up. This is the histrionics of the nutty right embodied in one e-mail that has no doubt dropped into millions of tea-bagger inboxes this week. This is what the right was focused on this week.

2009-12-10T22:42:00.000-08:00

A HOLIDAY OBVIOUSERVATION

Year after year, the same ornaments, the same smells, the same music, the same weather, the same anticipation, and then . . . suddenly . . . one careless glance in the mirror and its "Holy Crap where'd this OLD dude come from?" Thank God the house smells of pine, and pulsates in twinkling C-7 color. Slowly, the blood pressure returns to normal . . .

2009-11-09T07:08:00.000-08:00

> TIME TO MOVE ON

Hello, old blog. Haven't been here much, haven't written much. Life is being written nonetheless; it is time to push the numbness away. Not because it is fully dissipated; no, it is still present, just as surely as my brother is still gone. But everything else has gone on anyway. Couldn't help but think about him while the Dodgers were in the playoffs, while the Rams were winless, and while the teabaggers were screaming incoherently at the President. But the football season is on, Halloween has come and gone, and soon it will be Christmas once again.

The younger LOST's continue to grow like weeds - leaps and bounds in some respects, and the oldest LOST from his perch in the high tower of academia is extending his wings and striving to fly, soaring and sometimes faltering, all the while learning. The younger one works on padding his resume - not in a bad way, but simply trying to add layers to his identity - in pursuit of his blue and gold goal - and beyond.

Mrs. LOST emerges slowly from the funk of the illness-no-one-had-previously-heard-of, and promptly learns that returning to full activity after downtime is not as easy now, as it was even 5 years ago. Kneebraces and Advil. Icepacks and elevation. Huzzah.

The house ages, not always gracefully, and in its worse moments cries out for TLC that it tougher to give at almost fifty, but no less necessary. Dirt flies, curses fly - whose idea was this anyway (Mrs. LOST?)?, and ultimately the old is gone, soon to be replaced by some as-yet undefined "new."

Joy and relaxation beckon only eleven days away, but with much to accomplish between now and then - chief among the achievements must remain avoidance of H1N1. Traveling and that kind of illness do not mix at all.

Can't pay as much attention to the big world. Seems like its stuck in neutral. Not angry with the Pres, but losing some patience. Move faster toward the things you campaigned for. End the war, get people back to work, cover the uninsured. Sigh,0 at least were not eating Mooseburgers and bombing Tehran.

Faces - familiar but more weathered. Older, some cases grayer, more gaunt and more rounded, but all testifying to the same thing. Moving. Moving, ever forward.

2009-09-06T18:07:00.000-07:00

NUMB

This one was easy pickins for Death. It had been coming for so very long, so visible that so many prognositicated how it might arrive, and feared what other damage it might inflict. In the end, it was solitary, alone, undiscovered perhaps for days. Still, the finality of it all seared, indelibly etched on the chalkboard of life. Too soon, so much left to do, so much more to see, so much that could have been, but now, will never be.

There are great memories, sure. Sitting in the Forum rafters, staring at balloons that will never fall, as a large chunk of the NBA Hall of Fame battle it out below - Havlicek, Russell, Baylor, Chamberlain, West, Jones, unbelievable. Watching those "Bums" from the nosebleeds. Having someone in "my" corner when the 7th grade teacher went a little crazy, or when the Freshman football coach was a bit exclusive. Magical Christmastimes - much of which were authored by his deceased bride. These endure, the unpleasant memories have a way of fading as the stark reality of the passing settles coldly in.

Still, the sense of loss is not stark - owing, no doubt, so much to the anticipation of it all. Could something have been done to prevent or postpone this? Not really. This was a course set decades ago, and choice was its captain. Is there a good outcome form all of this? Surely, if God is Merciful and forgiving, and in the same measure as powerful and knowing, then a good outcome is all there could be - it is the only option. Is there a lesson to be learned from this? Can we all - thank you Rodney King, just get along? No clue, not without recognition and reconciliation. In some cases, not without recognition and treatment of the wounds, deep and ugly and no less real simply because they are of the spirit, of the psyche. Could he teach us all that, by his death, we finally, simply, utterly recognize to accept each other, to admit to each other our shortcomings, rather than walking these square corners of "I'm OK but you're a mess?" or "you're already dead" or "you've been screwed up for a long time?" At last, the source of the numbness is identified. Treatment, its form, duration and modality, there's a matter of a different sort.

2009-09-05T10:41:00.000-07:00

IGNORANCE IS TREATABLE; STUPIDITY IS A CONSTANT

The President is not welcome to speak to schools. LOST can't get his head around these people who see the President as this Evil Force ready to entrance impressionable young minds with buzzwords and catchphrases that will send them home, zombie-like, requesting their own personal copy of Chairman Mao's Little Red Book, or humming the Al Qaida Fight Song (whatever that is!) This mind set is being fanned by all of the usual suspects (Fox News, the AM Radio talk show chorus, and certain sectarian denominations), to a point where anything this President does is immediately suspect - if not nefarious. It transcends ridiculous in and of itself; it is funny in a "Pulp Fiction" sort of way (laughing but you're not sure why) when one realizes that so many of the same people so concerned right now about a speech to school kids universally wore blank stares while the drumbeat to invade Iraq - on illegitimate claims of weapons stockpiles - was ramped up to Rumba tempo.

Imagine how much less onerous the current fiscal crisis would be without the waste of nearly a trillion dollars that was the Iraq war - and without the billions more that palliative care and treatment of thousands of young servicemen and women wounded and maimed in an elective war will ultimately cost this nation. But, no, let's prevent the President from speaking to kids. That's the fight, the hill where we will plant our flag or die trying. Disgustingly shallow, and oh, so stupid.

2009-08-30T20:02:00.000-07:00

FAREWELL HAIKU

Ev'ry one loved you
That Smile we could not forget
Sorely you'll be missed

2009-08-30T10:35:00.000-07:00

GOOD-BYE, "GRAN FROMAGE"

The week could not end without a few words - maybe more than a few - about Teddy Kennedy. LOST has been awash in emotion since the expected announcement that the lion has roared for the last time; it was imminent, it seemed, when he was unable to attend the rites for his sister Eunice Shriver - no way the man misses that unless he was physically unable to do so. So many others have already weighed in, some far more eloquently than LOST could, and some with the gritted teeth that could only be sported by the likes of George Will - who couldn't say one nice thing without tossing out at least one accompanying slam or two. Enough about the negative, though. Teddy was a man who lived his life in service to those who would never have it as good as he did. Like many affluent people, he could have turned his back, or stayed within his ornate circle, and never ventured beyond the walls of the family compound. He could have elected for this in 1963, or in 1968, or in the 1980s after losing a presidential bid, and ending his first marriage, and no one would have questioned at all. He fell down publicly and repeatedly. But he got back up, each time, dusted himself off and kept moving forward, advocating for those who had no influence, limited means, and scant opportunity.

Listing his legislative accomplishments would take hours; but courtesy of "the Rude Pundit" here's a few highlights worth noting:

Do you like your state and not the federal government controlling the curriculum of your kids' schools? Thank Ted Kennedy.

Do you like being able to vote starting at age 18? Thank Ted Kennedy.

Do you think low-income people should get help with heating their homes in the winter? Thank the man.

Do you think the federal government should fund cancer research? Yep.

Do you believe that Meals on Wheels is a good thing? Ditto.

Does your daughter (or you, if you're female) like playing soccer or basketball or softball at school? That'd be because of Ted Kennedy.

Do you think that disabled people should be able to go to school? Have access to buildings? Not be discriminated against for housing and loads of other things? Kennedy, big time.

You like your cheap airfares? You know the answer.

You think people on welfare oughta get jobs? So did Kennedy.

You think mental institutions should treat people humanely? Yeah, so did your new friend, Ted Kennedy.

You believe that the Defense Department should provide child care for the kids of soldiers? Kennedy did.

You think a woman shouldn't lose her job if she gets pregnant? You think 100,000 more cops on the street's a good idea? You think poor kids should have health care? You think soldiers in Iraq should have the proper armor? Just tick those things off the list. Some of them would have been accomplished without him; many would not have been.

Even in this flaming red pustle in the midst of a blue state - one which burns at any mention of "illegal immigration" and yearns to do the dance of the teabag, there were islands of sane, rational remembrances of the man and his accomplishments. Several local businesses, and a couple of neighbors who have full sized flagpoles on their property flew their flags at half mast for Senator Ted. After hearing from his sons at yesterday's Mass - each one sounding so much like his father, and painting a portrait that the amateur artist himself would be proud to claim as as own, and then hearing all those grandchildren pray the intercessions - for the causes which he fought for and believed in, LOST once again felt that there was a place within the Catholic faith for progressive thought and action. God Bless you Teddy. Say hello to Fran, Kareen, Frank, and LOST's dad for us all.

2009-08-21T06:09:00.000-07:00

TIME FOR GOOD-BYES

Today we say farewell to Frank. You never went anywhere without that smile
it seemed.
You never said anything bad about anyone
not that I heard.
Never raised your voice in anger
Never got down on people who
were negative

Some thought you moved too slow
Or didn't emphasize their issue
or that you should have been
more like
someone else.

But you handled it
took it all in stride
past the negativity
always
Always in the direction
of the best
for the kids

That should be your parting shot
your challenge to all who
come along behind you

what are you doing
what will you do
how did you benefit
the kids?

Today begins a journey
that started awhile ago
the road to independence
and a path to chase after dreams

More cheerfulness, and a booming voice
unafraid of failure
to be set free into the world
to chase after dreams

You've been a giant
all your life
even though, and only for a time
you were quiet and reserved
not spoiling for a fight
or conquest.

And though you're often cluttered
and disheveled
you're unfazed by such shallow measures
not bowed before the cynics
and eager to face the challenges
that lay in the days and miles ahead

We've tried to keep you grounded
focused - there's a fight
we've strived to set some boundaries
help you sort between wrong and right

Mostly we've worked to make you honest
to show compassion and care
and now we have to let you go
for its you we have to share

And now the days arrived
where unshackled by shame
not hidden by pretext
you are set upon the roadway
to chase after dreams.

2009-08-20T06:10:00.000-07:00

THE FOUR WORDS

With all courtesies extended to the late George Carlin - he of the seven words (really now, only six, because "piss" has wormed it's way in to the lexicon-airwaves) you can't say on television, there are four words that nobody wants to hear - and certainly not in person.

"We found a spot."

It doesn't matter when they're uttered. There's no good time for those words. Not the sixteenth birthday of your youngest child, not within days of your oldest child's departure for the adventure of a young lifetime that is the collegiate experience, certainly not when you feel like you are nearing the peak of physical fitness, except for a little tightness and pressure on inhaling.

Not when the surrounding world is in turmoil either. Who is ill this week? Who else is out of work? Who has passed away suddenly? Who lost their home?

The temptation is to take a seat and bury the head and try desperately, selfishly and in vain, to wish it all away. But wishing is the stuff of talking crickets, and fairy godmothers and all things Disney, isn't it?

So the best thing that can be done, really, is to press onward and forward, stick with the routine. Especially when the ominous is not the only alternative - even if you've never heard of "San Joaquin Valley Fever" before, though the doctor seems to know all about it. Even if you can't imagine life any other way than you've known it for nearly three decades. Onward and forward. Faith and trust. Optimism and hope. Even if the only difference is that the latter choice means keeping one's head up.

Okay, break's over, back to work.

2009-08-15T17:48:00.000-07:00

YEA, THOUGH I WALK THROUGH THE VALLEY . . .

Fran passed away in the company of his entire family, seven days after LOST's post about him. The memorial service was a simple expression of great love and admiration for a quiet genius in the art of parenting. A week later, LOST was at another such service, this time for a mom of another great brood, but also a woman who dedicated her life to looking after others - be that as a nurse, a volunteer in bereavement ministry, a classroom docent, a parish library worker, a quiet supporter of progressive causes, and a mom of six greatly accomplished children who enjoy each other's company. An impressive list of meaningful accomplishments over nearly nine decades of life, strongly evidenced by the size of the crowd in attendance at LOST's childhood venue.

And now this one. Fifty five, less than five weeks after being diagnosed with cancer. A quiet, jovial, but dogged man, a dedicated educator, and a father to three young adult sons. A lover of the surf and an aficianado of the open road, who wanted nothing from his children beyond the special gift of time well spent together. Gone in a flash, and a gaping hole left behind. Another funeral. Another venue full of dampened vision cracking voices all around, struggling to hit the notes of "Amazing Grace," or sobbing gently to the strains of "Ave Maria." These reminders of mortality are no longer necessary.

2009-07-19T20:32:00.000-07:00

THIS IS FOR MY FRIEND FRAN

This is no day for political ranting, or religious ranting, or social ranting or any other sort. This LOST weekend was a celebration of the reasons why life has meaning at all. For those of us who lack the greatness to bend or shape human history - and we are many - the depth of meaning in our lives is measured by the lives we touch and those who have touched us.

This LOST weekend saw Mrs. LOST and I hosting a dear - maybe our best - friends, while their daughter was down for a "friendly little" basketball tournament. Times like these inevitably lead to raucous and uncontrolled laughter of immeasurable pitch, as we poke fun at our past, engage with and yes, even vicariously live the future of the children we have respectively raised. Only Steph made the trip this time, Jim stayed with the rest of the fam, as they were attending to a most important and far more challenging task, that of dealing with a parent's serious illness.

LOST met Jim the Hillbilly almost 30 years ago on the 8th floor of a dormitory hi-rise. He had to be a hillbilly - who else sported a ZZ-top like beard, a trucker's ball cap and a flannel shirt on an LA September afternoon? From that strange meeting way back then an enduring friendship was born. It would be a few years before I met Jim's dad, Fran, for the first time; however, the Crown Victoria "FBI car" that he had sold to his son provided some insights.

Fran's first face to face meeting with LOST came in 1983; down from the East Bay with the daughters, he was taking in a ball game, and would be coming over to join us for dinner. In those heady days of being just out of school, the housing situation was not so much; three twenty somethings sharing a 1 - bedroom apartment across from a cemetery, with open holes in the walls which guaranteed an ample supply of both rodents and roaches, and monthly checks written to something called "Westwood 23." As luck or maybe fate would have it, the day Fran and his daughters would be coming over for dinner, the sink in the kitchen backed up,and as usual there were a stack of dishes needing to be cleaned before he next dinner could be prepared. What to do?

The solution was obvious, clean the tub, and use it as the building's largest wash-basin, that's what. It seemed like a flawless idea, and one that might work. In fact it was working just perfectly when the door opened a little earlier than usual, and in walked Fran and his girls with LOST carrying an armload of dishes out from the bathroom and back into the kitchen. At that moment, the dinner plan had been suddenly, irrevocably changed to "we have got to catch a flight home." Only later was it revealed that Fran, at the time an airline manager, took a flight attendant's "jump seat" to get out of that apartment and get home and away from a perceived hygenic nightmare, and an enduring legend had been born.

A couple of years later LOST met Fran's Jean - a health professional with a heart of gold and a colorful vocabulary to, ahh, coordinate. Jean loved her MTV - for real, fancying the hair-bands of the day. She indeed could tell the difference between Quiet Riot and Twisted Sister. Amazing. LOST one day would, as one of Jim's groomsmen, dance to metal with Jean at Jim and Steph's wedding reception, and they would swap many a colorful joke - usually of the salty nun-type.

Fran and Jean raised four other kids besides Jim - including the polar opposites of twin girls - which LOST quickly dubbed "good and evil" - a moniker which has persisted to this date. The family is full of characters, to be sure, but each one is successful, most are outspoken, and running through them all is a common, durable thread of family loyalty and closeness the like of which LOST had never personally experienced.

Fran left the airline industry and became an investment counselor/planner. LOST would, with his help, set up the accounts which would help defray the cost of educating the younger LOSTS - a process which begins in earnest this Fall. Fran was continuing to work into his eighth decade - long after Jean had put down her nursing togs, and the two seemed content to collect grandchildren and the happy experiences which come with each.

That is, until the letter arrived a few weeks ago. Fran would be stepping away from work for awhile, due to a family illness. Turns out it is his, and it is serious, and it looks daunting - even for a career Navy man who raised a bunch of savvy and accomplished kids who all like each other and get along well, and most of which have gone on to raise kids of their own.

So it was that LOST didn't care how the basketball games came out. Fun to watch for sure - even if the favored team didn't fare so well (and even if LOST started to feel like a living jinx of sorts). LOST was cheering for the patriarch to emerge a victor over his opponent, in a contest which is much more meaningful, and wishing and hoping and - yes, praying for Fran and his family to find comfort and peace. Please feel free to add your good wishes and prayers and warm thoughts, too, for a good group of people who need the extra help right about now.

2009-07-11T10:32:00.001-07:00

FROM THE 'KIDS, DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME" DEPARTMENTT

Yesterday, LOST did something really crazy and unhealthy . . . no, there were no Tequila shooters or unrestrained carnival rides involved. No LOST risked soul-rot, by tuning into about 1/2 hour each of the demigods of AM Radio. First, the morning drive time found local Rush Limbaugh wannabe Rick Roberts, railing about "bums rushes" and the Obama plan to horde 90% of the stimulus money until needed for marinating electoral districts during the mid-term elections. Over and over the message was the the vast majority of the stimulus money 80-90 percent hasn't been used yet. "It's being horded for the campaign coffers." It went to a point where he'd completely blurred the distinction between spending stimulus money in areas were Dems were trolling for votes, to using stimulus money to pay for campaigns. All the while there were references to "Chicago," "Socialism" "fascism" one goofball called in and wanted to press RICO charges against the President for this "taking public money and spending it on campaigns" The swelling pride in the callers voice as he shared his brilliant idea with Rick Roberts and the rest of his intellectually-challenged listeners was unmistakable. Strangely there was no agreement from Roberts, himself purportedly trained as a lawyer in Texas, yet there was also no rebuke about what was a plainly nutty idea, either. It was simply yeah yeah, harumph, the nerve of this guy ramming this bill through then not spending the money.

Over on Planet Hanitwit, it was a different story. There was the hair-helmeted blustery one, railing on about how President Obama had killed the auto industry Destroyed it, peppered with Tourette's-like outbursts of "Ronald Reagan SAVED THE AUTO INDUSTRY" and it occurred to LOST that neither of these radio nuts were on the same page - for Roberts was saying the Stimulus hasn't happened yet because the money's being horded, while Hanitwit was saying it had failed, and that President Obama - not the Vega, Pinto, Pontiac Aztek, the continuous whining about "burdensome" mileage standards, bad labor agreements - had killed the auto industry. Six months on the job and Obama had destroyed an economic sector which is responsible for nearly 10% of the jobs in this country. Neat trick. But it was soon time to change the subject in the land of the ADFDs (Attention Deficit Factually Disordered) and move on to ridiculous bidness taxes in LA. Actually it was a shame to leave, because this story - IF accurately told by Hanitwit (big IF, yes yes) had some intrigue about it - a syndication business beating the City of LA in an adinistrative hearing 20 years earlier on the classification of its business (for tax purposes) now facing a renewed claim by the City - coupled with the assertion that the previous finding was not binding on the city. Ah, but time to go, and the headache was back. Besides, all those commercials? Time to get new Auto insurance - 'cause there's no way LOST is staying with AAA as it's a proud sponsor of this Drivel. Better put Farmers on the list, too, there was one of their commercials, too.

Which brings us to the Savage Wiener. Yep, a fat gravelly voiced jewish guy who isn't Harvey Fierstein but who is most likely every bit as gay, is in mid rant about Obama when he abruptly shifts gears to kvetch about Michael Jackson. His music was awful, he was a molester, he had no real talent, he meant nothing to anyone important - on and on. Oh, but to "prove" that he wasn't a bigot, Weiner Savage played some "real music" snippets - John Coltrane, Duke Ellington - real "Black" music, you know, from a time when things were kinder and gentler, and you could always find your own drinking fountain. LOST was no fan of Jacko - ever since he went solo it was kind of "huh?" But it is impossible to deny his resonance with generations of people all over the world. And it was clear that the Savage Weiner was pining for that time when "those people" knew their place.

Listening to this pond of bile and ichor day after day - like Pavlov's bells, little wonder why there are 20% of the population so angrily animated about things which they neither know or understand clearly. And why the need to dance to the razors edge of racism each time, too? Each of these microphonies gleefully gets right to edge of screaming "beaner-loving darkie" at the top of his lungs, and then sits back and smirks while the callers push it just that much further. Reminiscent of those close up, stream-of-consciousness racial rants in Spike Lee's "Do the Right Thing." Only that's just a movie. From almost 20 years ago. Why aren't we beyond this? Why aren't we better than this? And since we're not, why are so many unashamed - instead so proud of their ignorance and stupidity on these points? Like LOST was saying, Kids, don't try this at home.

2009-06-28T18:32:00.000-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

He's still dead, can we please stop talking about Michael Jackson? Human beings are not pharmaceutical disposal units . . . The heat is back in San Diego County, after a June Gloom good enough for 2 years . . . it's gonna be a long, hot one, even with the nascent talk about an El Nino brewing for the Winter . . . another epic visit with the in-law extended wing of the family, a bunch more fun and an obligatory return to the nagging question of what the hell is wrong with LOST's brood that they can't do this, too . . . 2 months and counting before the oldest of the LOST sons heads off to college, and he's landed a real job, too . . . back to the world/nation, leave the President alone . . . not six months in office and people are actually pissed that everything isn't fixed yet . . . eight years of Claudius and Caligula take some time to clean up . . .

2009-06-13T10:29:00.001-07:00

OH GOOD LORD, WHAT NEXT?

Both sides of the political spectrum have those elements . . .groups that are like the relative you know you have to invite to the party, but always stays too long and says too much, and adds little to the event. For the righties, their uglies have really been stomping it up since the inauguration, fanned by the inflammatory rhetoric of AM radio bastards, they've been swept into a torrent of rage over fears that the Kenyan Muslim from Chicago is coming to take their precious guns away, so they're using them on long hated targets. It is unspeakably disgusting.

However the lefties are not without their pariahs - and while their offenses may pale in comparison to the neo-nazi and anti-abortion doctor killers of the right, their rhetoric is more than a tad embarrassing. LOST speaks of course, of PETA, the acronym standing for "People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals."

On its face, not such a big deal. Humans should not subject pets to wanton, destructive behaviors. Animal testing should be humane, and for a definable, worthwhile scientific purpose. All good, all true, end of discussion, right?

Not quite.

According to this morning's L.A. Times> PETA is speaking out in the hope of ending a practice which in its fevered collective consciousness is horrifying. The targets of PETA's profound condemnation are the fish flingers of Seattle's famed Pike Place Market. A sample:

PETA Director Sarah King said the flying fish demonstration represents callous disregard for the suffering the creatures undergo before they come to the table.

"There is more than enough scientific evidence to prove that fish feel pain and that they do not die well at the hands of the fishing industry," she said, citing numerous studies that show fish have intelligence as well as sophisticated social structures.

Can't wait for their celeb-studded CD release, featuring such hits as "My Martyred Mackerel" and "King Crab Nation." For Pete's sake, the fish are dead. If PETA wanted some credibility on the issue, they'd sidle up next to the Greenpeace folks, and raise more awareness about ocean water dumping of . . . well, everything. Personnifying fish, trying to equate their "feelings" with human sensations tracks on the wrong side of sane - perhaps far enough away to claim its own ZIP Code.

2009-06-07T12:18:00.000-07:00

YES, YOU WILL WANT ONE

This is a great commemorative of the historic events of November 2008 - January 2009, and you can acquire yours at the website of the artist, John Mavroudis, The original artwork was featured on the cover of "The Nation" magazine, but Mavroudis has laboured on it since, adding several other historical figures, including LOST's personal historical favorite in the back row with brother Ted.

2009-06-05T08:00:00.000-07:00

FORTY ONE YEARS AGO TODAY

June 5, 1968, after midnight, one of the brightest stars in the progressive spectrum was senselessly snuffed out and taken from our country, from our society, from our government.
(reprinted and updated from 2006)
Robert Kennedy is almost a forgotten man in mainstream America now, a footnote on a page about his brother's presidency for some, a cameo appearance in a TV movie about Hoffa or McCarthy, or the Cuban Missile Crisis for others. He's been gone almost as long as he was here, only for a time, among his bretheren. Even this horrific anniversary has been obscured to some degree by the death of the conservative's modern day icon, Ronald Reagan.

Robert Kennedy was a real-life story of redemption, a non-fiction, modern day Ebeneezer Scrooge. He was himself transformed from a ruthless pursuer of perceived wrong doers and those who would attack or antagonize his brother, to a statesman who cared about the poor, the impoverished, the hopeless in ways that few politicians have since. He made enemies among the more vocal of progressives of his time for declining to immediately challenge LBJ for the 1968 nomination and on the disastrous course in Vietnam, then jumping in only after McCarthy showed Johnson's vulnerability in New Hampshire - and the American public's disgust with the war. But he made up for lost time, and ultimately paid the dearest of prices for his efforts. Given what happened to his brother, his campaigning was absolutely fearless. Many of his campaign events featured him standing on the back of open cars, riding slowly through neighborhoods of exuberant people, eager to touch him and shake his hand. So many seem convinced that his spirit and drive, and energy and charisma would help carry this country out of the Vietnam quagmire, and on to better things and greater prosperity.

To watch the footage of that somber funeral train snaking from New York to Washington that funereal day, and view the sea of humanity in silent witness, was profoundly poignant. The thousands of ordinary pallbearers showed no regard for individual differences, and instead were united solely by the depth of their collective grief. In their sense of loss they showed appreciation for what the man was able to inspire in millions - an ability to emphasize common goals over specific differences. Scant few national leaders have succeeded in this effort to any significant degree since; hopefully President Obama will prove to have this kind of charisma and ability to inspire people to emphasize unity over division.

Tonight, if you are so inclined, say a prayer for the soul of this decent man who was ripped away from us. Say one for our Nation, so that we will one day soon be blessed with a batch of public servants with Robert Kennedy's sense of social justice and yearning to improve our country as a whole. And most of all, let us all make sure that we will recognize such people when they enter the public arena, and support them as fervently as humanly possible.

2009-05-17T10:31:00.000-07:00

ENOUGH ALREADY WITH THE FAUX PIETY!

As pointed out eloquently-yet-without-the-usual, ahem, adornments, the rude pundit highlights the recent history of the commencement speakers/honorary degree recipients at the University named in honor of Our Lady:

In 1980, the commencement speaker was Carter administration Attorney General Benjamin Civiletti, a supporter of abortion rights.

In 1987, an honorary degrees were given to the pro-choice Coretta Scott King, Alan Simpson, and Rosalyn Carter.

In 1991, an honorary degree was given to Jane Pauley, a pro-choice supporter.

In 1992, protesters lined up as pro-choice Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan was given the university's Laetare Medal, "the oldest and most prestigious honor awarded an American Catholic," according to the Washington Post. President George H.W. Bush, giving the commencement keynote, went out of his way to praise Moynihan.

In 1993, an honorary degree was given to pro-choice judge Alan C. Page.

In 2000, the commencement speaker was then-U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, who supports all kinds of family planning programs, including those where abortion is allowed.

Now would somebody please turn off the cameras and ignore Alan Keyes, William "Archie" Donohue, the handful of Shiite bishops who are desparately trying to change the subject from their own scandalous behavior vis-a-vis the scandal, or simply trying to crack the whip and go back to the good-old-days of "trust us, and don't think for yourself - that's too dangerous?"

2009-05-02T07:11:00.000-07:00

A LITTLE DERBY DAY CHUCKLE

You want Revenge, too? You'll have to wait; this year's favorite ("I Want Revenge") has been scratched from the Run for the Roses.
And Danny Gans has gone on to the great beyond; he'll have to explain himself to George Burns, Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis Jr and several others. Only 52, damn . . .

Anyway, enjoy this timely retelling of an old childhood favorite . . .

2009-04-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

HELP WANTED: LESS THAN COMPLEAT IDIOT; APPLY WHITE HOUSE MILITARY OFFICE

WASHINGTON – An administration official says a presidential Boeing 747 and a fighter jet flew low near ground zero in New York City Monday because the White House Military Office wanted to update its file photo of the president's plane near the Statue of Liberty.
This official said the White House Military Office told the Federal Aviation Administration that it periodically updates file photos of Air Force One near national landmarks, like the statute in New York harbor and the Grand Canyon.
The official requested anonymity to give more details than the official White House announcement that took the blame.

Can somebody say "Adobe FREAKIN' PhotoShop?" Mrs. LOST has a standing offer to do the work next time for half the cost of the jet fuel used for this Brownie-worthy stunt. Speakin' of Brownie, is HE working in the White House Military Office currently?

2009-04-26T08:11:00.000-07:00

LEST WE FORGET DEPARTMENT

News this week from the "Supermax" Federal prison, as domestically produced wingnut terrorist Terry Nichols has filed papers seeking to upgrade his prison-provided diet. While the whole article plus the petition can be accessed here, the following snipped was quite revealing:

As seen on the following pages, the complaint filed by Nichols--who is imprisoned at the "Supermax" lockup in Florence, Colorado--contends that "God created mankind to consume unrefined whole foods" that work "in a synergistic way to keep one's body (i.e. God's holy temple) in good health to ward off various diseases." Nichols, who stresses that he is "not a terrorist," helpfully included a proposed diet that prison officials should serve (or make available at the Florence commissary). The mass murderer, it seems, is a big fan of Kellogg's bran products. To support his legal claim, Nichols has rounded up declarations from six fellow Florence inmates, each of whom is supposedly beset with assorted digestive issues. Eric Rudolph, whose bombs killed victims at abortion clinics and the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, reports that the "refined and highly processed" food served to killers like him causes "constipation, gas, and stomach cramps." Like Nichols, Rudolph believes "our bodies" are "sacred and should be treated as such."

Ah, Terry? Something tells LOST that God also created mankind to nurture its young and to care for each other, not blow one another to bits, too.

2009-04-21T22:07:00.000-07:00

SO THERE YOU HAVE IT!

From the Now it can be told Department. Waterboarding was used to find a post-invasion link between Al Qaida and Iraq. The f*ckups in charge compromised our principles to find *ss covering. Why in the name of Roger Ailes would anyone listen to this jerk ever again?

The use of abusive interrogation — widely considered torture — as part of Bush's quest for a rationale to invade Iraq came to light as the Senate issued a major report tracing the origin of the abuses and President Barack Obama opened the door to prosecuting former U.S. officials for approving them.
Former Vice President Dick Cheney and others who advocated the use of sleep deprivation, isolation and stress positions and waterboarding, which simulates drowning, insist that they were legal.
A former senior U.S. intelligence official familiar with the interrogation issue said that Cheney and former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld demanded that the interrogators find evidence of al Qaida-Iraq collaboration.
"There were two reasons why these interrogations were so persistent, and why extreme methods were used," the former senior intelligence official said on condition of anonymity because of the issue's sensitivity.
"The main one is that everyone was worried about some kind of follow-up attack (after 9/11). But for most of 2002 and into 2003, Cheney and Rumsfeld, especially, were also demanding proof of the links between al Qaida and Iraq that (former Iraqi exile leader Ahmed) Chalabi and others had told them were there."
It was during this period that CIA interrogators waterboarded two alleged top al Qaida detainees repeatedly — Abu Zubeida at least 83 times in August 2002 and Khalid Sheik Mohammed 183 times in March 2003 — according to a newly released Justice Department document.
"There was constant pressure on the intelligence agencies and the interrogators to do whatever it took to get that information out of the detainees, especially the few high-value ones we had, and when people kept coming up empty, they were told by Cheney's and Rumsfeld's people to push harder," he continued.

2009-04-12T20:34:00.000-07:00

MORE EASTER

Can't help but notice a little mirth at the the "resignation" or "farewell address" of Mr. Focus-on-the-Family. Seems Mr. Dobson is lamenting the "loss of the culture war." . LOST is lamenting the adulteration of the faith of LOST's Father by nutty 5 issue, Shiite-Catholics. The people who think that your faith is the sum total of your answer to the questions of abortion, stem cells, euthanasia, same-sex marriage and, wait for it . . . . human cloning. They've taken over all of the local parishes. Those who disagree with them are being squeezed out or cowed into silence. It is true that there are some enlightened catholics in each of the local parishes - there is no other way to explain how Ayatollah Perozich in the next parish over could get his wrist slapped by the Diocese for bulletinizing his fatwa on the President ("one Hundred Days or End of days" - essentially labeling Obama as the antichrist. Nitwitted, collared b*st*rd). But as Truman said, there's loud shouting in the Amen corner these days, and its the 5 issue crowd. So it is that abortion abortion abortion is the issue. Nothing else matters. Our local Deacon said as much a few weeks ago, when he blithely dismissed Iraq war casualties as being less than one day's worth of the slaughter of the unborn. Thanks, Deacon. War is okay, got it. Just gotta criminalize abortions and all will be well. These extremists operate from a fantasyland perspective that abortions never happened before Roe v. Wade and that somehow, magically they'll all disappear within minutes of Roe's overturning. Well, what then? Imprison doctors? Why stop there, why not the abortion demanders - the women and men who seek them? Will police departments have unborn crimes units - and detectives investigating miscarriages?

Seriously, Abortion is an important moral issue. LOST believes that it is morally wrong to use it as a means of dispensing with unwanted pregnancies. But LOST believes that no-fault divorce at the drop of a hat is morally wrong, too, yet it exists; and it exists without so much as a whisper from the Shiite catholics, despite their vitriolic family-values-and-we-must-defend-marriage-by-keeping-Chuck-and-Ted-apart (or at least in the closet). LOST does believe that greater forms of contraception deserve to be accepted or at least "decriminalized" by the Vatican's impure thought police, instead of running around Africa claiming that condoms cause AIDS. LOST also believes that the immorality of abortion must yield to the immorality of disproportionate consequences which would be occasioned by a denial of access to abortion to those victims of rape or incest, or those whose own life is jeopardized by unanticipated labor and childbirth. An organization so easily painted with the multi-millenial stain of misogyny ought to readily realize this and be more open-minded on the issues. At the very least it should be tolerant of those in the faith who recognize these issues are complex beyond zebra shades of black and white.

LOST doesn't think the Messiah died and was resurrected to maximize opportunities for a reactionary partnership between laity and clergy to condemn others, or read edicts into the Faith that seek to divide by fostering blind obedience. The days of blindly following the collared ended in 2002, when the scandals broke, and we were all shown-through the magic of television that large sectors of the clergy and hierarchy were more about protecting and preserving their own than they were about continuing the business of the Good Shepherd. That's an Easter message that all should embrace, and the Ratzinger pope should lead, follow, or get out of the way.

2009-04-11T14:52:00.000-07:00

EASTER SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Easter. Never the biggie of Catholic Holidays for LOST. Oh sure, there was candy, usually several pounds of it, waiting to be lathered over tooth enamel, all to the delight of dentists everywhere. Nobody decorates their house for Easter - nothing like Christmas, at least. No giant peeps on the lawn, or inflatable ones. Good lord, thank heaven for that. The ones people put on their lawns at Christmas look like - when deflated, some giant got a "safe" quickie and left the bag laying on the porch after staggering away . . .
But LOST digresses. There are no great Easter shows, either. S'pose you can count "Ben Hur" but it ain't Its a Wonderful Life, that's for sure. About 30 years ago (dang, THAT long?) Franco Zefferelli did "Jesus of Nazareth" as a mini-series, and it was pretty good, but it goes close to 8 hours by the time its done - and of course it covers Christmas in the beginning, too.
No, Easter is kind of a golf-clap Holiday, even if it comemorates the most amazing feat of the Namesake of the Christian faith. Perhaps its because of the timing - the whole weekend together is a roller coaster of emotions - the ugliness of "Good Friday" and its despair, followed two days later by the (okay, no lawsuit from Robert Schuller) Glory of Easter? Don't know for sure. Is it the universalist Christians and the liberal Christians who have recently reached the conclusion that the Resurrection was more metaphoric than realistic? Perhaps that is part of it too, who knows. Perhaps from the other end of the spectrum its the influence of fundamentalists who have equated Jesus with the GOP platform, and decided that the effigy of science should be burned at the stake wherever it diverges with Genesis et seq., right down to assuming that despite its literal truth, the Old Testament surely meant to mention that Triceratops and T-Rex were peacefully coexisting in Eden with Adam and Eve before the serpent showed up? Speaking of animals, maybe its because the secular myth sold to kids about Easter - the friendly candy-mongering Rabbit icon - is so implausible that even pre-schoolers can debunk it before 1st grade - at least the crimson suited fat guy looks and seems human, even if the deer DO fly?

Maybe growing up Easter is more about a Holiday that has to get out of the way of the kids who are striving to plunge headlong into Summer, and it needs to be enjoyed in a random, drive-through fashion on the way to June?

For whatever reason, Easter for LOST does not now, nor has it ever really captured the same brightness that its precedent Holiday, Christmas, does and has for LOST.

2009-03-30T06:44:00.001-07:00

IT'S MINOR SURGERY WHEN IT'S SOMEONE ELSE'S . . .

. . . and it's only "lawsuit abuse" when you're not the one suing.

2009-03-29T10:29:00.000-07:00

OF FAITH, PRACTICE AND LITMUS PAPER

“Comes a Time when your driftin,
Comes a time when you settle down
Comes a life, feelings liftin’
Lift that baby right up off the ground

O- ohh, this old world keeps spinnin round
It’s a wonder tall trees ain’t layin’ down
There comes a time.
Comes a time - Neil Young

"To everything (turn turn turn)
There is a a season (turn turn turn)
And a time for every purpose
Under heaven" – Pete Seeger

"And they’ll know we are Christians
By our love, by our love
Yes they’ll know we are Christians
By our love' – Peter Scholtes

LOST continues to slowly simmer over the devolution of the Catholic Church, and the coup attempt of its current leadership to highjack it from a simply articulated adherence to <“the two greatest commandments>, and turn it into a 5-question litmus test of belief, with one question – the “abortion” question – leading the pack.

Once again, at this morning’s liturgy, another droned delivery of the “impassioned plea” for the faithful to symbolically gesture to the hated (yes, the contempt for the current President is concealed, albeit barely) President Obama, by sending him empty Red envelopes – hopefully one for “each of the 58 million unborn children lost to abortion since the passage of Roe v. Wade.”

As if abortions never took place in pre-Roe v. Wade America;
As if our country did a masterful job of seeing to the basic needs of poor children, or the unwanted children;
As if (and this time the esteemed deacon even said as much – “more children are aborted each day in this country than troops killed in the whole Iraq war) governmental policies which promote or cause death in other contexts don’t matter or aren’t important issues of morality and faith.

Well, other policies promoting violence and death are important issues of morality and faith – or at least they should be. Clearly, the Catholic faithful have far important work to be done than fomenting unrest over the invitation of the President to speak at Notre Dame’s commencement ceremony>.

LOST longs for the return of Church leadership which emphasizes social justice over conformity, compassionate activism over control, and one which encourages and venerates the divine gift of thought over unquestioned adherence to newly articulated regulations and rules – as can be seen in the brick by brick dismantling of the outcome of the Second Vatican Council, by the current Pope and his ideological co-conspirators. To seek anything less is to stand by and watch helplessly as one-issue (or 5) zealotry rips the faithful apart, and in the process cheapens and denigrates the Faith.

2009-03-20T06:32:00.000-07:00

PRIDE UNDAUNTED BY REJECTION

“you can’t always get what you want . . . but if you try sometimes . . . you might find . . . you get what you need”

Oh how LOST wishes that were true. The eldest LOST kid got some distasteful news this week. He was not accepted to the family U – as in UCLA. The kid knew in his great heart that his odds were long; not because of poor grades – his were 4.22 out of 5.00 – good enough for 17th in a class of over 500. Not because of a lack of outside activities – the kid was spread thinner than the butter on the bread at the Cratchit family Christmas table – doing all manner of school/sports/performing arts/charitable works activities. No, the kid’s long time dream has been in the performing arts arena. Since 5th grade and the first time on a stage he’s been enamored of performing, connecting through characters with his audiences. Singing, telling jokes, making people laugh. It was his little league, it was his creative outlet, and since high school he has only expanded it, becoming enthralled by graphic arts like those obtainable through PhotoShop (self taught after his mom took off the “training wheels”), or through video production. No, the eldest of the young LOST’s narrowed his chances by setting his sites higher – trying to become one of 60 entering students in the UCLA theater program.

LOST remembers being the first one to greet the lad when he existed his February audition at Academia's Magic Kingdom . He had an ear-to-ear grin that wouldn’t cease. He had no advanced knowledge of the outcome; no fix was in, nor had he experienced a Hurkos moment of future clarity. He simply felt the relief that comes with knowing that, when under pressure he put his best foot forward and delivered what he had to give. He was also very grounded – steadied by the information that he was among the 2,000 hopefuls looking for one of those 60 golden tickets, and rocked by the revelation that “not getting into the Theater program means you will not get into the school.” Both LOST and the kid were okay with that one. Despite the love for all things blue and gold – devolving as it did in part from a distaste for “Cardinal and Gold” (thanks Dad, thanks “Sandy”), despite the many trips to Pasadena and to Pauley, and the visits to the hallowed campus “home,” LOST has never overtly pressured or lobbied or instilled in the kids this requirement to enroll there. However, LOST was no less pleased that the oldest developed an interest, and an appreciation for the beauty and the bustle that is the campus, and that he ultimately decided to apply there.

And so it was that it was painful to experience the sting of foreseeable rejection; not because it was unexpected, or even based on “unfairness.” Who knew what degree or caliber the competition, as the auditions were all individualized and outside the presence of all? Who knew of what political/social pressures could be brought to bear? What role was played by those with access to greater coaching/mentoring resources, etc.? Being told “sorry, not enough” hurts, regardless. LOST felt this pain for the son. Knowing how hard the kid had worked – clearly much harder than LOST did to get into the same university 3 decades earlier. Late nights, multiple projects, commitments and involvements, still “no.”

LOST also knows the measure of the kid. This does not diminish him in any way. It changes not his character, it carves nothing from his integrity, and it charges nil against the breadth and depth of his wit. The kid that is still part of LOST is upset at the alma mater – for its failure to recognize the content of character that is readily visible through LOST’s biased but not jaundiced eyes.

Today, LOST wishes that his son had experienced the wit and wisdom of LOST’s senior year English Teacher, the humbly terrific Violet Klessig, who had the courage and insight to remind LOST in a “Senior” moment of despair that “Sometimes pain is the only thing that reminds us that we’re alive.” On its face, its not an inspiring message, but it’s a human one, a reminder that such events are occasional (“sometimes”), significant (“only thing”), yet strangely reassuring (“we’re alive.”).
Sonny boy, I give you the great wisdom of Ms. Klessig, and I wish you only the most infrequent visits from this irritating visitor named pain.

2009-03-14T09:05:00.000-07:00

THE WAY IT USED TO SHOULD BE

Time it was that the swindlers, snake oil salesmen and the fraudsters feared the cleansing light of publicity, and waited for the comfort of darkness and obscurity to hide their greedy, wicked ways. If you're no younger than LOST you remember watching snippets of 60 Minutes when people ran away from Mike Wallace and Morley Safer, desperate to get a door or a large security guard between them and the probing Teevee muckraker. Sometime around the time that Al Cowlings leisurely drove his White Ford Bronco down I-405 South in SoCal 15 years ago, that kind of journalistic digging went on life support, and in the circus that followed it flat-lined, someone having anonymously signed its DNR paperwork. Since then, we get Matt Lauer badgering people about pot photos, or the latest titillating story of the camera-hungry creeper cop whose first 3 wives all disappeared, and now number 4 is gone and he's crying croc(k) tears again, but no one, and LOST means nobody on network TV asks tough probing questions while demanding real, responsive answers. Sheeyit, even The Governor in Waiting - Moonbeam 2.0 is now into the act, going live talking about Anna Nicole's enablers. Yo, Jerry, LOST thought about voting for ya in 2010, but not anymore! Even you got into this inane act?

Which brings up Jon Stewart's beatdown of Jim Cramer - the latter's servile, groveling and slouched persona whimpering "please don't hurt me, I'm hurting too" - earlier this week. Jon Stewart is a comedian. He's supposed to make people laugh, but he's always done it by poking fun at the real world and the supposedly serious things in the world. His interview with Cramer wasn't funny. He asked the huckster, whose network had touted as the one we could "Trust" on investments, the kinds of questions that the DOJ, members of Congress, the President, and Treasury Department should be asking all of the so-called captains of industry, and Cramer caved, and twisted and dissembled and fell on himself in televised contrition. These people destroyed the notion of retirement for the multitudes, and damaged the ability of countless others to contribute to their children's college educations. However, all of the networks give 'em a pass, all but Stewart. Sure, and the humor works - it is strategically disarming ("what a strange world, here we're watching Jim Cramer on Martha Stewart's show. Martha Stewart is the one who did time for securities fraud).

Stewart's interview, available here in full (flash player required) usage of scathingly incriminating videotape of a very non-contrite, cockure Cramer was of a type that another, now deceased scion of the NBC family was lauded for - yet Saint Timmeh Russert never did it anywhere proximate to the sharpness and brilliance of Stewart's use in skewering this frontman for a snakeoil teevee channel. In a more perfect world, in a more honest world, in a world where keeping regular people informed of the important things that are really going on around us, Jon Stewart would be doing someone's anchorjob at a major news desk. All of us need to question why he isn't and how we get the networks to stop feeding us digital pablum and fluff, and go back to handing over the real, unvarnished fact.

2009-01-18T16:09:00.000-08:00

MOMENTS OF “DOUBT” IN FAITH

LOST and the Mrs. Have seen two current films that are busily racking up the viewership and jostling for Oscar position among the years’ best. Both feature the Church prominently – woven in throughout their stories and in the lives of the main characters.
In “Doubt” the Church is really the Central character in the story. As in what is the church, and does anyone really own it, or claim entitlement to do so? what is or should be its role in confronting society’s wrongs, and can it effectively do so if it is besieged by its own wrongdoers? Can anyone know someone else’s heart for certain, or is the realm of the conscience too inherently and deeply personal to be susceptible to the probing of a third party – even one as single mindedly insistent as Sister Aloysius?

The film is a terrific period peace for any one who came of age in the Church in the 1960’s and 70’s, and watched its elder clergy struggle with the changing focus away from pray,pay and obey to trying to deal with more abstract notions like racial equality and enduring prejudice, or sexuality, or even the gender inequality inherent within the Church’s clergy. All are addressed or at least examined in part by the film, and its terrible beauty is that it compels viewers to look at all sides of the story, with the understandable potential for two close people to reach starkly different conclusions about the central fight in the plot – is or is not there something unseemly going on?

The other film, “Gran Torino” is a sad affair for many reasons. First, it is obvious that this will – or certainly should be – Clint Eastwood’s last film in front of a camera. The man whose career has personified the “vigilante justice” strand of American thought is looking every bit of his seven plus decades these days, and despite his sveltness, he’s no longer a dashing leading man. (Are you paying attention, Stallone? No more “Rocky’s, please). Secondly, the story line is about redemption and atonement – neither of which could be too far away in a film which opens with the audience meeting “Walt Kowalsky” in the middle of a Catholic Mass.

The neighborhood that Walt lives in is another cause for sadness. Older homes, only a few taken care of, the rest left to fester and display their advancing age. The disconnect between Walt and his own sons, and between Walt and his spoiled grandchildren is also cause for some sad reflection, if not a little introspection, as well.

What is most fascinating about the film is not Walt’s similarity to someone each of us probably knows well (LOST’s older brother comes to mind for some, for others its another relative or friend), or his gradual acceptance and warming to his neighbors; what is fascinating is the interplay between Walt and the young “padre” – and the corresponding growth each experiences, as well as the shallowness of Walt’s “confession” when compared with the real festering sore in the depth of his conscience, or how he chooses his own act of penance and contrition for it. Predictably sad as the ending may be, there is cause for uplifting thought, too. All longstanding wounds do not putrify, they can be, with deliberate and sustained effort, cleansed and healed.

Ignore any critic who says otherwise. See them both, and do it in close proximity.

2008-12-24T04:57:00.000-08:00

SO THIS IS CHRISTMAS . . .

Another year older, a new one just begun

The sights, sounds and smells are all familiar, and each plays a role. The people are a different - in appearance at least. The children are not so wide eyed, having reached sizes never really contemplated. One on the verge of collegian status in a few months . . . the other itching to drive.

The lights remain beautiful, beckoning as they do to a gentler time, an innocent era where deadlines were non existent, worries were few and aches and pains both sparse and fleeting. Both George Bailey's realization of his value, and Scrooge's redemption still bring the same welled up emotional reactions. The card design discussion and creation evokes spirited discussions and eager anticipation to see if the idea works as well in the eyes of others as it seemed to in our collective minds' eyes. The list of recipients grows, like some list of the "nice" kids must surely do so in the nether reaches of the North.

There is a sense though, this Christmas, of a reckoning to Come; that this is a last hurrah of sorts to the kind of temporal excess that has come to typify the Holiday for this household, and define it for so many others. It carries with it the feeling that there are many others this year whose want is keenly felt, fewer who are in the throes of rejoicing abundance, and that next year will find that trend expanded. So the lesson is that it doesn't have to be about stuff, things, consumption, excess. RIght? It should be about finding ways to intervene in human affairs for good, before each one of us loses that power.

Have yourself a Merry Merry Christmas,
Have yourself a good time,
just remember the kids who got nothin',
while you're drinking down your wine

Here's hoping that the new team in D.C. can throw all the right switches, and pull the right levers to get the country and all of its reaches back on its feet. Here's to people figuring out how to cover their needs, better manage their wants, and control their more counterproductive impulses. Raise a toast to a lessening of avarice and greed, and a dawning of the time of lasting compassion for one another. The BIrthday Boy would be proud of us all for that effort.

Merry Christmas

2008-11-12T07:39:00.000-08:00

PRAY FOR GREELEY

(From the Sun-Times) The Rev. Andrew Greeley got stuck in a traffic jam on the Kennedy Expy. for 90 minutes recently, and the hassle persuaded the best-selling novelist to take the L next time.

He tried to do just that after giving a lecture in Rosemont on Friday (11/7), but his jacket got stuck in a taxi door when he was dropped off at the Rosemont CTA station.

Father Andrew Greeley, best-selling author and Sun-Times columnist, fractured his skull yesterday in an accident. He is in critical condition at Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge.

As the cab began to pull away, the 80-year-old priest fell to the ground and hit his head, fracturing his skull. He was taken to Advocate Lutheran General Hospital in Park Ridge, where he was in critical condition, friends and family said Saturday afternoon.

"Right now he's critical but stable, very stable," niece Laura Durkin said. "Doctors are hopeful and pleased with his progress from [Friday] to [Saturday]."

Greeley, who was wearing a Barack Obama baseball cap when he fell, suffered bleeding on the brain.

Doctors installed a monitor in his skull to gauge pressure on his brain, said his friend and attorney Terry Goggin.

How about this one for starters: "Lord, we need Greeley right now more than You do, so if You wouldn't mind, let him keep his wits and stay with us a little longer, please?"

2008-11-09T14:32:00.000-08:00

A WORD ABOUT ‘TEH GAY’ AND THE SERMON THAT SHOULDA BEEN GIVEN

LOST is a practicing-yet-battered Catholic. LOST and Mrs. LOST (24 years, married in the church) and the two, not-so-little-anymore LOSTs watched in dismay here in southern California as the odd coalition of Mormons and Knights of Columbus collectively whipped up a frenzy of "support" for prop 8, using their children as props at intersection sign-waving campaigns, and using the most base and untrue of arguments (e.g. failure of the initiative will expose churches to "discrimination" lawsuits by gay couples - forcing churches to perform same-sex marriages, that kids will be taught in primary grades that same sex marriage is on equal dignity with heterosexual marriage, that forced "field trips" to gay weddings will become a staple of first grade classes everywhere, and the like). Each of these arguments were insipid and apocryphal, but echoed loudly throughout the landscape. Ask a devout "Christian" about Christ's express condemnation of homosexuals in any of the 4 Gospels; LOST did this several times during the Fall's "Silly Season." Sometimes there was no answer, often, Paul's letter to the Romans was mentioned. LOST was quick to remind those so responding that Paul was not Jesus, and in fact was the quintissential convert, making up for a multitude of past transgressions following his transformation on the Road to Damascus. Indeed, in today's liturgy, we found Paul telling the Corinthians that "those who destroy the temple (of their bodies) will be destroyed." Quiver, Twinkie lovers. The LORD wants you to eat broccoli and run some windsprints before doing some heavy ab-work - the core must stay strong; okay, okay, LOST digresses.

LOST's favorite extrapolated answer came from one who cited, "Jesus tells his disciples that 'that is why a man shall leave his parents and cling to HIS WIFE and the two shall become one flesh' - that this infers that Jesus - well chronicled as a Savior willing and able to verbally dress down of his time so deserving (ask the Pharisees). was implicitly condemning same sex marriage since "man" and "wife" were used.' Sounds a lot like the Scriptural equivalent of activist judges, "legislating from the pulpit" instead of the bench. Surely the Almighty has greater aspirations for our efforts - fighting poverty, disease, suffering, ignorance, war, torture, greed, dishonesty to name a few, rather than spending millions of dollars in a duplicitous campaign that divides people, and seeks to keep another group of His creations ensconced in the status of second class beings. LOST don't believe the God of his father, the one LOST was raised to revere, praise, worship and give thanks to, seeks that of anyone, anymore than LOST believe that He seeks our compliance with any one of dozens of arcane dictates of the Old Testament.

Which of course, brings up the other half of the matter. At today’s Sunday Mass festivities (okay, being a bit facetious because the mood of the congregation resembled bingo hour at the K of C Hall 45 minutes after the bar ran dry), one of our Deacons – not quite priests who get to do many but not all of the priest-y stuff – delivered the post-election homily. It was expected that this one – already on LOST’s s-list for obliquely referring to litigating molestation victims as “those who unjustly took advantage of the situation (hear hear, how do I turn my forced buggery at 9 into a pile of cash at 35? There’s an informercial opportunity worthy of Guthy-Renker or Ron Popeil isn’t it?). Anyway Deacon twisted tries to exhort the worn out faithful by bringing up the election, multiple times, and exhorting them at least once with “we have to try to remain upbeat . . . .” Remain? LOST is sitting in the back benches with the ghost of LOST’s Dad, and thinking to himself hell, I’m ecstatic, and why the hell aren’t you? The country has a Catholic Vice-President. Now, Halley’s Comet’s been around earth more times in the last 225 than that has happened. And the new President is black, or at least partially so. That alone is not cause for celebration? America has grown up enough to permit an African American to sit in the big chair at the head of the table, and run the big train set. Ignore the fact that the last guy in that chair tore up the tracks and wrecked three or four of the best train cars; we’ve grown considerably. Oh, but as always in the sick demented minds of the Shiite Catholics, it comes down to abortions, doesn’t it? Even there, there is cause for optimism. Despite President Obama’s express rejection of banning abortions – the only plank that is apparently acceptable from a Democrat by the mullahs of the rightwing Episcopacy, he has publicly stated over and over that an agreeable goal can and should be limiting the number of abortions performed in our country. When one considers that the McCain of his first 71 years on the planet – and certainly the McCain of the 2000 run - - was essentially a pro-choice guy, Obama’s stated goal should be cause for something more than mere polite golf claps from the kneeling rank and file. That notion, coupled with the fact that America may finally push to get itself out of Iraq and lessen the destruction in the Mid East, restore its own infrastructure and get idle people back to work, and emphasize taking care of those already here with medical care and increased economic opportunities, there was ample reason for the good Deacon to express at the very least, joyful optimism, rather than the gloomily repeated “let’s pick ourselves up and try to be positive, losers” refrain that was opted for. That would be change worth pushing for in anyone’s house of worship.

2008-11-07T18:49:00.000-08:00

ANOTHER REASON WHY IT ALL MATTERS

Yes, the hype over the hope is dissipating, and some in the media seem anxious to blow past the honeymoon and demand a cabinet, staff and a program though inauguration is 2 1/2 months from now. History has been made, and the hysterical cries of “socialism” and “Commie” have been, if only for a short while, stilled or stalled.

But in this context it is important to recall an equally important reason why this result is so important, so meaningful, and so necessary:

IN 2004 a senior, unnamed aide to the Bush Administration told the New York Times writer Ron Suskind that guys such as Suskind were "in what we call the reality-based community". The aide defined this as comprising people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality".

"That's not the way the world really works any more," the aide continued. "We are an empire now,

and when we act, we create our own reality.

And while you are studying reality judiciously, as you will,

we'll act again, creating new realities,

which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out.

We are history's actors,

and you, all of you, will be left to study what we do."

Yeah, and you might have gotten away with too,

if it hadn’t a been for them meddlin’ kids.

2008-11-02T18:57:00.000-08:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS, ‘TOP OF THE LANE’ EDITION

Two days away from the big day and it can’t get here too soon. The polls all scream that change is in the works, and President Obama may find himself in that “be careful what you wish for” place we’ve all been allegorically cautioned about, but better him than an embittered old man with a hair-trigger temper, backed up by a complete air-head, right . . . Football season sucks, can’t even root root root for the Bruins, ‘cause this just ain’t quite their year . . . funny how the religion to most recently give up polygamy as an acceptable lifestyle is out on the forefront to “protect” and “restore” marriage – almost as funny as the fact that the old guys who dress like pirates and have to pee to sit down (Yep, that’s YOU, Knights of Columbus) are acting as willing sidemen in that effort, urged on by the clergy and hierarchy of the universal church. LOST thinks that handing out annulments to well-connected donors to obliterate their twenty-year old marriages is a greater threat to his quarter century union than any pair of Bob & Jims who want to pick out curtains and tie the knot, but LOST and his straight-but-not-narrow brood seem to be in the minority in this neck of the red woods . . . should not falling for the b-grade radio version of “Punk’d” not sound the political death knell for a Vice presidential candidate? LOST thinks so . . . but then that ballot’s already been mailed in . . . all children under thirty should read (or have read to them) “The Last Campaign” by Thurston Clarke, it’s a great history lesson, even if you know the hero dies in the end . . . it was 90 degrees yesterday in San Diego on All Saints’ Day, and it rained today (70 degrees) but the jury is still out on human impacted climate change? Only for repubtards, I’ll wager . . . does anyone else think that if the John McCain who appeared on SNL and the Al Smith Foundation dinner and David Letterman had showed up to the debates that he might still have a chance in this race? . . . NBA basketball season is too long – ditto the MLB Season, but at least they get Christmas time off . . . speaking of Christmas, is anyone in the mood for these commercials yet? At the moment, with the stock market forcing the adjustment of LOST’s retirement age up to the same level as the octane rating for the primary ride (“87”), apparently not. This is gonna be a lean one ‘round these parts, for sure . . .

2008-09-02T20:24:00.000-07:00

WHERE ARE THEY NOW?

Yes, the floor of the RNC this evening and its a sea of red; hey, wait a minute, the seats are Red? Where's all the people gone? Are they all canvassing for the Commander in Chief of that greatest fighting force north of the Canadian border, the Alaskan National Guard (Screw YOU, Dudley Do-right and the horse you rode in on)? Did they all have a synchronus urge to have a gang toidy with Larry "I am NOT gay" Craig at the airport mens' room? Were they out baby shower shopping for Bristol (WTF kinda name is that anyway? If there had been a "Bristol" Kerry and/or a "Trig" Gore the Hanitwits of the AM dial would still be talking about it)? Could they simply not bear seeing their beloved Fred Thompson deliver another down home hatchet job speech of one liners, yet who himself was too lazy to actually run much of a campaign. By the way, Fred, aren't you from Tennessee? How 'bout singing a little "Rocky Top" today for ol' blue and gold LOST, eh? Maybe it was that guttural sound that both Pickles and Fred-o kept making after delivering each line. You know that noise - unmistakably similar to the gagging sound made my someone desperately trying to stifle the gag reflex.

Shambles, people. This bunch is in shambles, and the debates haven't even started. Maverick my left glute.

2008-08-25T20:29:00.000-07:00

REUNION CONVENTION

A month of anticipation,
The thought of all that time
Passed between then and this
Batman to Watergate we witnessed
And then went our separate ways

Hours of drive time
Consumed by chaotic litanies
Of meandering thought
Will I recognize anyone?
Who’ll first say “your Dad” ?

Will any of it be the same
And really, can it be
Almost 35 years for some
A decade and a half for the rest?

And would the dimples
Still be there, and
Would the smile still
Touch those grey blue eyes?

They are, and it does.

2008-07-13T21:45:00.001-07:00

FAMILY STYLE FEAR AND LOATHING IN LV

Its more than just the 2-lane sojourn up the spleen of California; its beyond the anticipation of all of the sights sounds, and yes, the smells that make the sensory assault of the place. It is not merely a state of mind, or the fact that the whole place is like an eternal adolescent – never quite sure what it wants to be when it grows up. It is more than the oddball nexus of the washed up, the once something big (Bill Cosby playing at Stateline? STATE LINE? Et Tu, Ringo? George and John are spinning below ground) desperately seeking relevance. It is Vegas, and bringing the kids along in this post-Family-Friendly experiment phase is quite a character builder.

The LOST kids have been fascinated for years by the travel channel’s send ups of Sin City. The gaming, the glitz, the gulches that bridge the gap between all that silicone and saline (yep, they are after all, teenaged males). But they’re coming along, and their laundry list of things to see and ground to cover is daunting for the couple wanting to act 25-but-much-closer-to-fifty. The cultural shock is blunted by the presence of another family making the pilgrimage with us. Theirs is very similar – also two boys yearning for a real-life Pleasure Island – but one with no arthropodic conscience or creepy puppeteer involved. The trek starts at nearly dawn, and proceeds inconsequentially up the spine, until we reach Baker – named that no doubt because it’s the perfect year round adjective in these woods. The first interesting omen is the car in the rest-stop parking lot. Utah plates, but with an intriguingly counter-intuitive bumper sticker “No One is Born a Bigot.” Fantastic statement, and appropriate complements are extended.

The ride continues, until gleaming on the desert floor, spotted while still in the long decline of the Cal-Neva border, the sight of Buffalo Bill’s Casino and Giant Ashtray can be seen lurking across the line. Young men’s fancies now turn from scantily clad girls to thrill rides. Will the coaster be running? Are we there yet? How much further?

2008-07-05T09:41:00.000-07:00

POST 4TH FIREWORKS

Sitting here, typing this entry while the fevered screaming strains of CNN are echoing in the background. The Cable News Network is busily screeching about the lack of significance of Christie Brinkley’s divorce case - for several minutes. This is news. NEWS?

Last evening, The oldest LOST son and I sat watching some game show called “Duel” two people answering “general knowledge” trivia questions on a timed basis for increasing amounts of money. Both contestants knew what color suit Michael Jackson wore on the cover of “Thriller,” but neither knew what war’s battle served as the inspiration for Francis Scott Key’s poem which became the National Anthem. Each was off by a century.

Switch to the local newspaper. The vocal masses in the majority party here in town are all sidling up to the President’s siren song of drill offshore as a the cure all for our petro-dependency. It doesn’t matter that oil from a single tanker rupture is still being cleaned off of shoreline and wildlife in Prince William Sound 20 years after the Exxon Valdez had its little mishap. It doesn’t matter that California is seismic ground zero in this country. It doesn’t matter that the oil recoverable offshore would not begin to even hit the global market and supply for at least 5 more years. Its as if Bush said, it, they believe it, and that settles it. Oh, and one more chance to slap “treehuggers” and “Al Gore” a couple of times. The creeping current of stupidity is nearing knee level of the populace. With enough beers, stupid reality shows and super triple double deep fried sandwiches, the permanent underclass will be cemented into place by the weight of its own inertia and indifference.

2008-06-15T10:44:00.000-07:00

FATHERS DAY EDITION, SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS

So how should it feel, this abrupt passing of Tim Russert at 58 – a much younger age than it ever seemed to be? His everyman appearance and demeanor made him likeable, even charismatic; he didn’t look like he belonged on TV, with its unforgiving insistence on aesthetic perfection. At many points in his career he showed mastery of the dreaded “gotcha” to those who would grab the reins. Other times – and regrettably recently - - he seemed too comfortable in the laps of tyrants. His velvet glove treatment of the DICK was shameful – coming at a time when he could have been most effectual at derailing the momentum for an insipid war that shouldn’t have ever been started. But he was one of a number of people who stood by and said nothing. And everybody can’t be Keith Olbermann – even if years ago there seemed to be more than just one – like the days when people ran from a microphone wielding Mike Wallace, instead of standing toe to toe and verbally vomiting on his grinning eeyjit son . . . Has Big Brown crossed the finish line at the Belmont yet ? . . . will the Celtics finish off the Fakers today or call one in just to have the spectacle of winning at home . . . anyone who tries to tell you that McCain is not really Bush 2.0 should be grabbed by the nose and forced to watch this for a quick primer from the man himself, not that it will make much difference, for sure . . . couldn’t’ think of what to write to mark 40 years since RFK was taken. His legend has grown since his passing, for sure, but who among us could reasonably fathom that he would not have won the nomination, beaten Nixon, and then ended Vietnam much sooner than that which actually occurred? Simply imagining a world without Watergate and with markedly less bloodshed and bitterness over that War is painfully tempting enough to contemplate . . . parenthood flies by in the macro, even if its more difficult moments seem to last forever, they lie. One minute your kids are banshees, “trapped” by a garage door handle they can’t quite reach, and the next minute – after a whirlwind of Christmas and birthday memories that resemble a tornado twister they’re picking colleges to apply to . . . happy Fathers Day to all my male sibs who do and do not read this blog – and especially those who don’t even know this one exists

2008-05-01T19:37:00.000-07:00

HAPPY PHOTO OPPNIVERSARY TO YOU

As the late Molly Ivins said, in the foreword of her collaborative work with Lou DuBose "Bushwhacked": If y'all had read the first one (SHRUB), I wouldna had to write this one.

Today makes it five years to the day that this idiot kicked off his re-election campaign with this photo opp. How much could one mistake cost a country? Don't answer that, its simply too painful.

2008-04-06T21:40:00.000-07:00

ANOTHER TALK DESERVING OF YOUR DEEPEST, SADDEST REFLECTION

Another outstanding speech, one the themes of which remain all too topical today. God, how I miss Bobby Kennedy and his unflagging belief in the possible. From April 5, 1968, In Cleveland, Ohio:
This is a time of shame and sorrow. It is not a day for politics. I have saved this one opportunity, my only event of today, to speak briefly to you about the mindless menace of violence in America which again stains our land and every one of our lives.
It is not the concern of any one race. The victims of the violence are black and white, rich and poor, young and old, famous and unknown. They are, most important of all, human beings whom other human beings loved and needed. No one - no matter where he lives or what he does - can be certain who will suffer from some senseless act of bloodshed. And yet it goes on and on and on in this country of ours.
Why? What has violence ever accomplished? What has it ever created? No martyr's cause has ever been stilled by an assassin's bullet.
No wrongs have ever been righted by riots and civil disorders. A sniper is only a coward, not a hero; and an uncontrolled, uncontrollable mob is only the voice of madness, not the voice of reason.
Whenever any American's life is taken by another American unnecessarily - whether it is done in the name of the law or in the defiance of the law, by one man or a gang, in cold blood or in passion, in an attack of violence or in response to violence - whenever we tear at the fabric of the life which another man has painfully and clumsily woven for himself and his children, the whole nation is degraded.
"Among free men," said Abraham Lincoln, "there can be no successful appeal from the ballot to the bullet; and those who take such appeal are sure to lose their cause and pay the costs."
Yet we seemingly tolerate a rising level of violence that ignores our common humanity and our claims to civilization alike. We calmly accept newspaper reports of civilian slaughter in far-off lands. We glorify killing on movie and television screens and call it entertainment. We make it easy for men of all shades of sanity to acquire whatever weapons and ammunition they desire.
Too often we honor swagger and bluster and wielders of force; too often we excuse those who are willing to build their own lives on the shattered dreams of others. Some Americans who preach non-violence abroad fail to practice it here at home. Some who accuse others of inciting riots have by their own conduct invited them.
Some look for scapegoats, others look for conspiracies, but this much is clear: violence breeds violence, repression brings retaliation, and only a cleansing of our whole society can remove this sickness from our soul.
For there is another kind of violence, slower but just as deadly destructive as the shot or the bomb in the night. This is the violence of institutions; indifference and inaction and slow decay. This is the violence that afflicts the poor, that poisons relations between men because their skin has different colors. This is the slow destruction of a child by hunger, and schools without books and homes without heat in the winter.
This is the breaking of a man's spirit by denying him the chance to stand as a father and as a man among other men. And this too afflicts us all.
I have not come here to propose a set of specific remedies nor is there a single set. For a broad and adequate outline we know what must be done. When you teach a man to hate and fear his brother, when you teach that he is a lesser man because of his color or his beliefs or the policies he pursues, when you teach that those who differ from you threaten your freedom or your job or your family, then you also learn to confront others not as fellow citizens but as enemies, to be met not with cooperation but with conquest; to be subjugated and mastered.
We learn, at the last, to look at our brothers as aliens, men with whom we share a city, but not a community; men bound to us in common dwelling, but not in common effort. We learn to share only a common fear, only a common desire to retreat from each other, only a common impulse to meet disagreement with force. For all this, there are no final answers.
Yet we know what we must do. It is to achieve true justice among our fellow citizens. The question is not what programs we should seek to enact. The question is whether we can find in our own midst and in our own hearts that leadership of humane purpose that will recognize the terrible truths of our existence.
We must admit the vanity of our false distinctions among men and learn to find our own advancement in the search for the advancement of others. We must admit in ourselves that our own children's future cannot be built on the misfortunes of others. We must recognize that this short life can neither be ennobled or enriched by hatred or revenge.
Our lives on this planet are too short and the work to be done too great to let this spirit flourish any longer in our land. Of course we cannot vanquish it with a program, nor with a resolution.
But we can perhaps remember, if only for a time, that those who live with us are our brothers, that they share with us the same short moment of life; that they seek, as do we, nothing but the chance to live out their lives in purpose and in happiness, winning what satisfaction and fulfillment they can.
Surely, this bond of common faith, this bond of common goal, can begin to teach us something. Surely, we can learn, at least, to look at those around us as fellow men, and surely we can begin to work a little harder to bind up the wounds among us and to become in our own hearts brothers and countrymen once again.

2008-03-16T22:03:00.000-07:00

COULD SOMEBODY PLEASE SEND THIS ONE TO HILBAMA?

To those of you who have forgotten, and those of you too young to remember - as LOST almost was, THIS IS WHAT A PRESIDENT IS SUPPOSED TO SOUND LIKE. Where have all the decades gone?

Washington, D.C. March 16, 1968
I am today announcing my candidacy for the presidency of the United States.
I do not run for the presidency merely to oppose any man but to propose new policies. I run because I am convinced that this country is on a perilous course and because I have such strong feelings about what must be done, and I feel that I'm obliged to do all that I can.
I run to seek new policies - policies to end the bloodshed in Vietnam and in our cities, policies to close the gaps that now exist between black and white, between rich and poor, between young and old, in this country and around the rest of the world.
I run for the presidency because I want the Democratic Party and the United States of America to stand for hope instead of despair, for reconciliation of men instead of the growing risk of world war.
I run because it is now unmistakably clear that we can change these disastrous, divisive policies only by changing the men who are now making them. For the reality of recent events in Vietnam has been glossed over with illusions.
The Report of the Riot Commission has been largely ignored.
The crisis in gold, the crisis in our cities, the crisis in our farms and in our ghettos have all been met with too little and too late.
No one knows what I know about the extraordinary demands of the presidency can be certain that any mortal can adequately fill that position.
But my service in the National Security Council during the Cuban Missile Crisis, the Berlin crisis of 1961 and 1962, and later the negotiations on Laos and on the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty have taught me something about both the uses and limitations of military power, about the opportunities and the dangers which await our nation in many corners of the globe in which I have traveled.
As a member of the cabinet and member of the Senate I have seen the inexcusable and ugly deprivation which causes children to starve in Mississippi, black citizens to riot in Watts; young Indians to commit suicide on their reservations because they've lacked all hope and they feel they have no future, and proud and able-bodied families to wait our their lives in empty idleness in eastern Kentucky.
I have traveled and I have listened to the young people of our nation and felt their anger about the war that they are sent to fight and about the world they are about to inherit.
In private talks and in public, I have tried in vain to alter our course in Vietnam before it further saps our spirit and our manpower, further raises the risks of wider war, and further destroys the country and the people it was meant to save.
I cannot stand aside from the contest that will decide our nation's future and our children's future.
The remarkable New Hampshire campaign of Senator Eugene McCarthy has proven how deep are the present divisions within our party and within our country. Until that was publicly clear, my presence in the race would have been seen as a clash of personalities rather than issues.
But now that the fight is on and over policies which I have long been challenging, I must enter the race. The fight is just beginning and I believe that I can win ...
Finally, my decision reflects no personal animosity or disrespect toward President Johnson. He served President Kennedy with the utmost loyalty and was extremely kind to me and members of my family in the difficult months which followed the events of November of 1963.
I have often commended his efforts in health, in education, and in many other areas, and I have the deepest sympathy for the burden that he carries today.
But the issue is not personal. It is our profound differences over where we are heading and what we want to accomplish.
I do not lightly dismiss the dangers and the difficulties of challenging an incumbent President. But these are not ordinary times and this is not an ordinary election.
At stake is not simply the leadership of our party and even our country. It is our right to moral leadership of this planet.

2008-03-15T10:40:00.000-07:00

WHY BEER BUDDIES SHOULDN'T RUN COUNTRIES

Short post today, headache. With the week of bad financial news cascading behind the veneer of much ado about 4 diamond hookers, Two things have become abundantly clear to LOST: 1. Biff the sadistic didn't cause all of our economic ills - these have been in the making for some time in many cases. But, notwithstanding 1, 2. Biff the Sadistic is the wrong guy to have "in charge" in a time of crisis. We've seen it with 9/11 - would somebody else not on a month long vacation and with an unused terror czar have prevented it? We'll never know. Would somebody else have caught bin Laden without pursuing the shiny of Iraq dangled in front of him by frothing neo-cons - eager to exorcise old ghosts of their grandparents' Holocaust experience? Would somebody else have marshalled more resources to New Orleans to mitigate Katrina damages, or at least done more to accelerate repairs there? Have reacted with something other than "why does this stuff always happen when I'm relaxing?" Would somebody else have made jokes in public about not finding the very horrific weapons we were assured existed - which were the crux of why Iraq was invaded? Would somebody else make up crank songs about pardoning felons, or rogue vice presidents who ignore subpoenas and bury/shred/deny the existence of documents? A multiplicity of "yesses." You might let the neighborhood Biff watch your mastiff while you go out of town for an overnight. But you wouldn't leave Biff in charge of your infant. And while you might let Biff play with your trainset - when he's broken it - oh, I mean when it breaks, neither Biff nor his drunken buddies are the ones you want to fix it, either.

2008-03-11T21:58:00.000-07:00

42 + 2 +0 = 12

Its not a math question. Its a matter of synergy, a formula for success that the Wizard's apprentice has concocted. After two consecutive trips to the big table, and a little toying with the chemistry, its looking like the little bears from the Southern Branch are gonna get the dozenth banner. Bring it on home, Bruins. Do it for Coach Wooden!!!

2008-03-10T18:46:00.000-07:00

HEADLINES THAT ARE SPIT-DINNER FUNNY!

From an actual AP story online today, there’s this little beauty

Bush: Cheney to press for Mideast peace

Next they’ll be reporting Britney and Lindsay to Reorganize Women’s Christian Temperance Union, or something equally ridiculous. Maybe David Duke to Lobby for Racial Equality.

2008-03-09T18:43:00.000-07:00

WHY NOT CALL IT “PRESS THE MEAT”

Week after week, General Electric’s Sunday anchor show continues its devolution into a shell of its once and former self; the one time place where the exalted could be humbled and the humble could be exalted has of late become the TV show whose writers went on strike and never came back. How else does one explain the perpetually available seat for the chock-fulla bile Misses Carville and her very own married of convenience dueling banjos boy? Or the obsequious double standard with which punkinhaid Timmeh bashes Democratic politicians with their apparent double speak, while practically fawning and fluffing all that the Right has to offer? Yo, Timmeh, you’re not on Fox yet.

So it dawned on LOST that perhaps the show that won’t die needs a makeover, and what better way to start than with a simple name change? “Press the Meat” – as its deli evocative name implies, will continue to feature what appears to be fresh, pink delights for the mind. Its just that, upon sufficient consideration the viewer will recognize that the content has been boiled down, rendered, packed with fillers and semi-toxic preservatives, guaranteed to leave you thirsting for something more at the end of each less than satisfying episode. And Timmeh can stow the suits, in favor of a white smock and paper Sailor hat, to boot. This could be herald of the return of truth in broadcasting – not the integrity rich days of Murrow, or even Cronkite, but at least as far back as the Family hour, where everyone knew exactly what to expect, instead of anticipating a really hard hitting, put-em-on-the-spot-to explain-themselves. That is just sooooo pre Gulf War 1, now, isn’t it?

2008-02-23T15:56:00.000-08:00

23 x 23

Bob Seger started "Against the Wind" with it seems like yesterday, but it was long ago . . .
and though there are other things to write about today - like the apparent readiness of the clunky echo machine as it churns to life, ready to belch out bile and swill in a rattle-and-hum stream of attack on the patriotism of Barack Hussein (didja hear that middle name, little toadies of all things righty) Obama - but today they pale by comparison to nostalgia.

Twenty three years ago, on a Saturday almost like today - okay, its cooler here now than it was on the first one - but LOST and the Mrs. left behind their broods and the two became one. "Left behind" now there's an interesting notion. LOST could talk of the ways in which the brood should have been left behind - the older bro who went past his 2 drink limit and started shadowing the sister of LOST's sister in law's husband - back then they didn't call it "stalking," and it was only temporary - just that day. But the story filtered back to the brood that "Mrs. LOST's sister had been rude" to the boy. And, the story stuck, for months thereafter, the way such stories do when they're told by sources with impeccable credibility. Even though Mrs. LOST had only one sister, who was in the wedding, and much to her great good fortune never had any contact with said erstwhile stalker wannabe sibling. Aside from the memorial service for LOST's dad seven years ago, the wedding was the last time the entire brood was voluntarily in the same room with one another. Oh, LOST could write volumes about that, but there's so much more.

The beauty of the day - a Santa Ana wind made it much like Summer. The turnout of people from various corners of the world. From the dank recesses of grade school, all the way up the ladder through the college days - they were there. There was Jenny's crooning old bluesy numbers into the mic near the end of the nite, a sound to behold for sure. There was "Myron Dobbs" holding court and swilling champagne like the market was crashing tomorrow. "Old Ed" and his spouse made an appearance, fashionably late as was their custom of the time. There was the infamous cake incident - the sharing which became the smush and run and nearly turned LOST into a victim of Reception Rage. Thankfully, cooler heads prevailed, and instead LOST was awarded the title of "idiot son in law" instead. So much better. Ah, the attempt to bring our Peace Corps friend Paula to the ceremony, by taping it and having mutual friends "talk" to her. A great idea that lasted until 30 minutes before mass time. Oh, the best laid plans . . . There was the money dance and the tossing of garter and bouquet, and the night at the Westgate, the latter of which will not be blogged about, so HA!

There was this agreement between the LOSTs about no presents this year. It's an off year, twenty-three. Not a milestone. That's 2 years away, right? Only looking around the room its apparent that every year of staying together, growing together, comforting each other, bickering at each other and loving each other - each one is its own milestone, one that has been achieved by comparatively few within our own circle. Is it luck, fate, karma, or all/some/none of the above? LOST has no idea. It has to be the combo plate, looking back, across the two decades plus. What a day it was, and what a time it has been.

So here's to you Mrs. LOST, my friend, my lover, my partner in this enterprise of scraping by and moving on. Here's to 37 more just like it, too. Sixty, it has such a nice ring to it, you know?

2008-02-21T07:24:00.000-08:00

'FLOWERS' FOR ELDER-JOHN?

Is there some straight talk for his friends that can clear this one up? Is this the tip of a philanderer's iceberg? Will MIttens "unsuspend" his campaign now? Will the talking point be, "Hey, at least he didn't shoot someone in the face!" or, perhaps this one, "McCain, 72, wife and a broad on the side, American STUD!" Or maybe there's this one, "McCain, He doesn't just TALK straight!"

We all know that the truly innocent always lawyer up as soon as possible - with the highest profile advocate available, right?

Oh, and what does this thousand words say to you? LOST is no expert, but It looks an awful lot like "you promised me the White House, you horny ol' B*st*rd!"

2008-02-02T15:29:00.000-08:00

JOE ISUZU, NEITHER GONE, NOR FORGOTTEN

Yes, it was with some bittersweetness that LOST read that Isuzu was pulling up stakes and leaving the U.S. consumer auto/truck market. The article of course took advantage of the circumstances and mentioned the most notorious non-political spokesperson of last thirty years, Joe Isuzu, as if he was gone and our nation had turned it lowly eyes to him.

Except that this is political season once again. That magical time that used to be confined to June and November is now bled into the Southern California winter as well. And Joe is really just morphed into a thousand different political spokes-icons. How, you say? Well, consider the ballot propositions. In this State, the ballot measure process has become akin to doing ones taxes. There’s a ton of paper that comes in the mail – a sample ballot, an election pamphlet containing the “text of the proposed law” and then well over a dozen postcards from this cadre of believers or that, all screaming at you in living color which ones need “NO,” which ones need “YES,” and the personal new favorite, which initiatives need a “NO” vote to get us what we really want to happen.

So you’re a voter, better than average income and intelligence, and you open the pamphlet. The “text” of the law is in about 5 point type. Incapable of being seen by the middle aged naked eye without a doubt. And its in three columns. And its covering 5 or 6 pages of the pamphlet. The legislature couldn’t get this done on their own. With a staff of full time help. With a crew of helpful lobbyists, who are just aching to buy the requisite amount of beverages necessary to get your Assemblyman primed to understand where he should be and how he should vote. Now its your problem and mine, and oops! Fresh out of staff at home. What’s a voter to do? Simple. Turn on the TV, where, wedged in between at 24 7 365 coverage of everything you always wanted to know about Britney Lohan you’ll find that most helpful of convincers, the 30 second TV spot. This year, we find compelling lists of iconic elements of society both favor and oppose large scale increases in slot machines for 4 indian tribes. So who do you trust?

Who, for that matter, does America trust? Simple. Firemen. For the last decade or so, when it has come to ballot initiatives in California, the most coveted constituent element of the fight on a ballot proposition has been the firefighters. Yep, they do great work putting out fires. They live disjointed lives, just for us, spending ten or more 24hour days away from home and in the firehouse, waiting for that next catastrophe to occur. But now they’re our all-knowing, wise and non-partisan oracles of how to vote. Move over League of Women Voters – or at least admit your personal conflicts and move on. You can’t weigh in on this gambling thing – most of you are already sitting on a stool in front of your favorite “Blazing 7’s “ machine, so we can’t ask you. But why firemen already? Has everybody forgotten what happened the last time we mixed public safety officers and Indian leaders on the same media stage? Depressing. At least bring Joe back for real, and let him handle all of the election ads from now on. At least we could smile while he fed us some of this bullshit, couldn’t we?

2008-01-12T09:46:00.000-08:00

MISSION ACCOMPLISHEDER!!

Another shining example of the Bush Legacy is unveiled in this morning's Washington Post. The Mega embassy built for that permanent U.S. presence in the "Free and Democratic Iraq," is, ahem, a tad askew:

"The firefighting system in the massive $736 million embassy complex in Baghdad has potential safety problems that top U.S. officials dismissed in their rush to declare construction largely completed by the end of last year, according to internal State Department documents, e-mails and interviews.

Some officials assert that in the push to complete the long-delayed project, potentially life-threatening problems have been left untouched. "This is serious enough to get someone killed," said a State Department official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he feared retaliation. "The fire systems are the tip of the iceberg. That is the most visible. But no one has ever inspected the electrical system, the power plant" and other parts of the embassy complex, which will house more than 1,000 people and is vulnerable to mortar attacks."

See, those inspections wouldn't be necessary, because they're gub-ment employees, and gub-ment doesn't work. Ask any devotee of Grover Nordquist. We're soooooo much better off leaving to the private sector, especially those who pursue government contracts, and then want no oversight once the contract is signed

2008-01-06T14:39:00.000-08:00

McGOVERN SAYS IT, WA-PO DARES TO PRINT IT

A great American - one who probably won't be here for the inauguration in 2009 - and never made to his own inauguration, has dared to step up and speak what so many finally realize. The Constitution's personal purge mechanism needs to be used to eliminate dumb and evil, the linchpins of our national decline. And the seemingly dead-to-real-journalism for a decade plus Washington post has dared to put the whole thing in their Sunday paper It's a must read, but here's a good appetizer for the national soul:

Impeachment is unlikely, of course. But we must still urge Congress to act. Impeachment, quite simply, is the procedure written into the Constitution to deal with presidents who violate the Constitution and the laws of the land. It is also a way to signal to the American people and the world that some of us feel strongly enough about the present drift of our country to support the impeachment of the false prophets who have led us astray. This, I believe, is the rightful course for an American patriot.

As former representative Elizabeth Holtzman, who played a key role in the Nixon impeachment proceedings, wrote two years ago, "it wasn't until the most recent revelations that President Bush directed the wiretapping of hundreds, possibly thousands, of Americans, in violation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) -- and argued that, as Commander in Chief, he had the right in the interests of national security to override our country's laws -- that I felt the same sinking feeling in my stomach as I did during Watergate. . . . A President, any President, who maintains that he is above the law -- and repeatedly violates the law -- thereby commits high crimes and misdemeanors."

I believe we have a chance to heal the wounds the nation has suffered in the opening decade of the 21st century. This recovery may take a generation and will depend on the election of a series of rational presidents and Congresses. At age 85, I won't be around to witness the completion of the difficult rebuilding of our sorely damaged country, but I'd like to hold on long enough to see the healing begin.

There has never been a day in my adult life when I would not have sacrificed that life to save the United States from genuine danger, such as the ones we faced when I served as a bomber pilot in World War II. We must be a great nation because from time to time, we make gigantic blunders, but so far, we have survived and recovered.

2007-12-24T13:48:00.000-08:00

MAGICAL?

The day is nearly upon us, once again. The lights went up like clockwork, - actually better than. They went up on the weekend before the Turkey day celebration. But they went up as LED's - the old fashioned C-9 power-eaters have been retired, and the departure is most bittersweet. They'll burn in memory for years to come, but they'll not be missed come utility bill time.

The search for the perfect tree met with a 25% approval rating this year. But the 25% approving was Mrs. LOST, who for the first time in her household had a tree that neither scraped the ceiling, nor fell down, nor was ant infested, nor was sap engorged. It was shorter but perfectly proportioned, and so happiness was achieved. The cards went out - all the thought and creativity is on the front end - it goes into the card design, the letter, and the rest of it feels, at times like cold, impersonal processing.

The gifts were all purchased, and stowed, and hidden in their usual stowage, wrapped in spare moments, then spirited back from their undisclosed location to the garage, awaiting deposit 'neath the tree. Contact was made with several friends and fam members, and good wishes were exchanged.

Bowl Season for this band o' Bruins has already come and gone, and this gets it out of the way and into the memory - where a dismal season of disappointment belongs, so that basketball can burst forth in full vigor when the Holiday trappings are back into their boxes for another 10 plus months.

It was a time for finding oneself a year older, but richer in ways that are poorly measured by the world at large. And there is so much to look toward this year, a full pageant of possibilities for LOST's brood. May the same be said of all people. May this Christmas bring miraculous transformation to all of humanity - at least in some measure - in the way the Savior from Bethlehem might envision. Amen

2007-12-11T19:01:00.000-08:00

WANTED FOR CRIMES AGAINST . . . CHRISTMAS?

One of LOST's good ol' boy buddies - a decent man whose head has been stuffed far too long in the psychic excrement that flows like pressurized pipeline from the fevered brain of Michael Savage and other assorted closed-minders - sent LOST a poem knockoff of "The Night Before Christmas" which recounts the dozen or so absolutely truly apocryphal ways that Christmas is under attack from God-and-America-hating Secular Progressives who love bin Laden, Hitler and Charlie Manson. Fascinating reading it was. LOST had no idea that all those liberals on Wall Street and Madison Avenue had ingeniously conspired to make us helpless Americans salivate at the sound of the sale bell and prostrate ourselves in homage before a giant-sized cast stone replica of a Macy's 20% off coupon, and in so doing throw Jesus Mary and Joseph under the nearest bus. Shame on them godless, queerboy gun hating humanists.

LOST had no idea whatsoever how far that this creeping Godlessness had slithered! Oh my, they weren't callin' 'em Christmas Trees no more! The stores - LOTS of stores - were having Ramadan and Kwanzaa sales, while evil non-breeder Libs danced around in rainbow colored burkhas! SHIT! These Islamofascist bastards are everywhere, destroying our creches and peeing on angels and telling us all how to worship! We gotta stop that, right? RIGHT? And listening to Bill O'Reilly and company is a great way to start, isn't it?

And lord don't the Mainstream churches get into it now, too? My second parish home away from home parish featured a Sunday sermon 2 sundays back about "Elf" the horrendous movie featuring Will Ferrell (stifle - I hear you already, saying "whaddya mean 'THE' horrendous movie . . . ?"), complaining that the baby Jesus hadn't been worked in there somewhere and that this movie, too was part of the insidious march of the Atheistic Sugar Plum demons.

Well, yeah, except for to quote Phil Leotardo "a coupla three things." Or more. The Christmas tree is not mentioned in Matthew, Mark, Luke or John. Not even a line or two in Revelation. Its borrowed from pagan Solstice celebrations; yet there's been at least two of 'em in every Catholic Church LOST has attended in nearly 50 years (yes, FIFTY - since Eisenhower was President) during the Holiday Season. Was there a loud hue and cry of that sacrilege then?

LOST's kids went to their CCD Christmas party and had a gift exchange, with all the presents wrapped in pretty red and green paper. Short of using swaddling clothes for wrapping, what Christian tradition is gift buying again?

What of the music of the Season? For every "Silent Night" there's a "Silver Bells" and a "Sleigh Ride" which speak about those long held Christian Holiday traditions of shopping to you drop, and eating til you burst.

That's it, isn't time to indict Andy Williams on heresy charges - especially since that rascally Nat King Cole "died" and got off scott free? Those Chestnuts weren't being roasted open fire by the Shepherds - or any wise men for that matter.

Or would it be better off if we took a step back and realized that, just like the recently posited, idiotic (yeah that's a fancier way of saying brain-deadly stupid) notion that celebrating Halloween was tantamount to devil worship, this clap trap about Wars on Christmas is a yule log of bullshit, conjured up by religious nutcases who see the Virgin Mary in French Toast and Satan lurking in every record store, and that corporate right wing media has glomed onto it for fun and Seasonal profit, just like Macy's, Target, Nordstroms and Wal-Mart have? "Christmas" is under attack by those who would use Christ for cover of their own seedy doings, not by purveyors of reindeer and snowmen as iconic Seasonal symbols.

2007-11-11T07:59:00.000-08:00

INTO THE MAINSTREAM WITH IT, NOW

It dawned on LOST in the aftermath of intense disgust with the spontaneous spine collapses of Senators Feinstein and Schumer on Michael "I'm-not-sure-waterboarding-IS-torture" Mukasey that the disgust is misplaced. Maybe it was learning about "SWOT" analysis recently. For those who don't know and might care, "SWOT" is an analytical tool acronym, it stands for "Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats." And lawdy lawdy, didja know that frequently "threats and Opportunities are the same thing, just stated a little differently? Neato, huh?

So that whole thing got LOST to thinking. Maybe "waterboarding" is not a threat to American servicemen and women abroad, or Americans serving in any capacity overseas. NOOOOOOOO! Waterboarding - since we're not sure it's torturous, can be like duct tape. It could have a thousand different uses! Got a client or debtor who never seems to have the scratch to pay you back? Simple, All you need is the Ronco Home Waterboarding Kit, and presto, you'll have that guy begging to give you the cash back with interest. Can't get a straight answer from a boss about expectations on an assignment, or a performance review, or a raise? Simple, Ronco to the rescue - you'll get all the straight scoop right away, as soon as the chief stops gagging. Or what about that troublesome little creep at the local Home Depot store that always disappears when you're about to ask about proper bolt sizes or paint colors, or where the furnace filters have been moved to (Again)? simple, lash him down and pour pour pour. Wont' be a few minutes but he'll be percolatin all sorts of useful info about any in store items - and you may even get a few discouns you weren't expecting, too. If it just might be okay by the Attorney General - and most of the United States Senate, then its good enough for you and me. So, move over Tony Robbins, and kick that little runty mensch Richard Simmons to the curb. With Waterboarding as your ally, you won't need selp help - you can just help yourself to whatever you need or want. It's just a pitcher or two away.

2007-10-12T22:24:00.000-07:00

'FRIGID LOVES BERNIE'

Everybody loves it when the old shows make a comeback of sorts. Especially when they're updated with hip new metropolitan, alternative lifestyle type themes and storylines. But which one of 'em is playing the "Meredith Baxter" role? Enquiring minds wanna now. Hey, James Dobson, dontcha just love the visual? This heart-warming story is almost as feel good as that Stanford-U$C final score from last week.

2007-09-23T11:11:00.000-07:00

WHERE (PERCEPTIONS OF) WORLDS COLLIDE

( The color is chosen in honor of my friend CAMOON, whose alma mater venerates that color. Her world is kind of stressed now – more than usual, so she needed the props) Sure, its all still Pasadena. LOST’s three traveling companions on the road to the Rose Bowl are wide eyed and excited and talking of things that 14 year olds talk about – sports, sports, and yes, more sports. LOST thinks about his own days of being that age, and in tow with his brother, to a different venue, for the same purpose. The experiences are similar but different. The smells are similar – there is almost a smell for excitement, a raw energy set in motion by the sheer number of people drawn together for the same globally insignificant but momentarily life-altering experience of watching and cheering a team or school on to victory.

Is it the lighting? Is it the not-so-subtle Fall chill in the air? Is it the steel grayness in the dusk-laden sky? Is it the ambient noise of excitement mingled with the air of fried onions and airborne garlic? It’s all of that, enough to make one feel as though one blink of an eye and it would be 1973 again. A full head of hair, a trim – okay, trimmer waistline, a range of possibilities still stretching out ahead like some highway to everywhere.

Sadly, though, this is different, too. It is different because with adult eyes we can see where the action behind the lines is ongoing, much like when the young adult spies the speakers on a Disney ride for the first time, and what was once thought of as magical trudges toward the ordinary. For this form of entertainment has stratifications to it, which range from the obvious – the chain link fence separating the general admission folk from the “reserved seat” ticket holders, to the sublime. There is an unspoken sadness present here in the faces of those who work behind the counters of the concession stands. What used to be younger people, n many cases more cheerful people, has been replaced by the gentrified and the gray, hopeless. They are moving as fast as their six decade old bodies will let them, but it is not fast at all, and the impatient crowd of those waiting to be served grows ever more disgruntled. This is wrong. Tired and haggard sixty-somethings should not be in a place where their survival depends upon slinging lukewarm six dollar burgers and four dollar hot dogs for seven bucks an hour on a cold Saturday evening to an impatient and wholly unconcerned consumerist rabble.

This same ground is populated by those who seem bent on re-creating their living rooms on grassy spots south of the Bowl – complete with multiple seats, canvas topped cabanas wrapped in faux bamboo fabric, and generator run giant screens. None of this nonsense was around in the 1970’s - hell, there was one or two games on TV in a given Saturday and this was it. Today there is saturation. Today there is a two-pronged clash-mesh hunger to avoid missing out on some important game-of-the-century, while also telegraphing to your parking lot neighbor that you and your state of the art 42 inch flat-screen and RV have arrived.

Finally, there are those whose screams are the loudest in a language that can most expediently be labeled as coarse, cheering for a team for which they feel kinship, but for an institution which is likely as foreign to them as any village in Kandehar. Well, perhaps that assumption should not be made; after all, for these vociferous, off color “fans” are themselves much closer to service age, and who is to say whether one or more of them had ever slogged boot by boot through that war-wrenched region of the world in the past 4 plus years. None of them are uniformed today – in that 70’s world that LOST romanticizes they would have at least gained admission to the game (in uniform) for a measley buck.

There are the grim reminders that 1973 was a long time ago, too. They are in the form of the people in the spectator crowd – souls fortunate enough to have avoided the grim treadmill of service behind the counter, but not so fortunate to avoid the other unkindness of advancing age. These are the folks who, in that magical time past would have bounded up these OSHA-unfriendly steps without a second thought, but who now need the wary assistance of their children and or companions, to aid them in their struggle down the rail-less flights of weathered concrete.

It is, overall, a bittersweet reminder that things change and stay the same. That disparities continue to divide us while teasing us with echoes of continuity lost.
This is supposed to be fun, but it remains so only on the shallowest of thought levels. Contemplating it with any deliberation is cause for sober reflection, if not in some aspects utter despair.

2007-09-23T07:51:00.000-07:00

REVENGE IS . . . .UM, KINDA UGLY

There were nearly a dozen penalties, some of them ticky tack, but all of them very stupid. There was that ugly strut-dancing nonsense after some good-but-not-great plays. There were some great plays - long runs, a Kickoff return for TD to answer back on a Husky touchdown, an interception return for TD that was terrific. For awhile, it felt more than a bit like old-time WAC football. Yet the Bruins are undefeated in Conference play, atop the Pac-10 standings, and have at least temporarily rinsed the bad taste of Salt Lake City out of their mouths in a payback in over Washington. For LOST, this birthday gift comes a year later than hoped for, when the tenacious Huskies ruined #46 with a furious comeback last September in Seattle. All LOST can say is, "Coach Dorrell, you're done with the easy conference games. Get ready for the tought stuff."

2007-09-03T04:59:00.000-07:00

FLINTSTONE TO ENTER '08 RACE

Yabba - Dabba - (Don't) Do (Much)

Time for some bumper sticker slogans, so here goes.

Thompson Won't Tap No Toes
Thompson's Hottie for first Lady
Fred Stands . . . Tall
Thompson, Not as Dumb as he Sounds
Compassionate Conservationists 4 Thompson
Thompson - He's one of OUR Actors!
Thompson . . .Cuz I sed so!
And once he talks neocon Author Bernard Goldberg into being his running mate, we'll get this one.

FRED & BARNEY '08

It's time to go all in, Al - Your job if you want it.

2007-08-26T06:52:00.000-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
Disney theme parks are still loaded full of magical memories, but do they have to suck even the lining out of a visitor's wallet? A hundred fifty bucks for a 3 day pass, and everywhere you turn, something else costs at least three bucks ( a soda, a bottled water) . . . Ted Nugent's recent stupid, violence and sex mixed rant against 2 Democratic presidential frontrunners is neither surprising - Nugent's been a cartoonish simp for more than three decades - nor deserving of censorship per se - in a Democracy even idiotic twits are allowed to express their opinions - but it points up the selectivity of the media outrage machine. Why are the unhinged kooks of the extreme right (Nugent and Coulter come to mind) never taken to task for "suck on my [brandished machine] gun, Obama and Hillary," but Michael Moore goes to Cuba in a film about health care and its " get out pitchforks and torches the evil fat Commie is back?" . . . College Football Season approaches, and every talking head prognosticator has now labeled Virginia Tech as "America's Team" presumably because of the campus tragedy there last Spring. Huh? At the risk of peeing on ESPN's parade, perhaps it should be pointed out that confessed pet-pal Michael Vick played his college 'ball there, too? Maybe the two stories could cancel each other out, and we could get rid of the pseudo patriotic nickname . . . So now Iraq IS like Vietnam after all, at least according to the Nobel Laureate in Chief? Oh wait, it is in the sense that we can't leave early? Sheesh, in the world of "Flip flops" that's a triple summersault 1 1/2 twist that would make Greg Louganis proud . . . aren't you so relieved and happy to have heard - over and over - that Lindsay Lohan will only be charged with misdemeanors? LOST's life is now more complete because of that news

2007-08-16T05:18:00.000-07:00

ALL WE ARE SAYYYYING, IS GIVE SURGE A CHANCE . . .

All this time, since the grand notion of Surginess took the airwaves by storm, and the President's great new idea for Iraq became the direction, all through the debates in the newly-but-barely Democratic-controlled Congress, we've continually heard "give it some time to work," or "wait til the progress report IN SEPTEMBER!!. For months, September's report has been high up in the talking points, along with "progress" - of course that one's been there almost since the day after Mission Accomplished on the Lincoln. It all became clear though, as reported in yesterday's Los Angeles Times how this White House can be so sure that September's report "From General Petraeus" will be a praising of the surge:

Administration and military officials acknowledge that the September report will not show any significant progress on the political benchmarks laid out by Congress. How to deal in the report with the lack of national reconciliation between Iraq's warring sects has created some tension within the White House.

Despite Bush's repeated statements that the report will reflect evaluations by Petraeus and Ryan Crocker, the U.S. ambassador to Iraq, administration officials said it would actually be written by the White House, with inputs from officials throughout the government.

And though Petraeus and Crocker will present their recommendations on Capitol Hill, legislation passed by Congress leaves it to the president to decide how to interpret the report's data.

What a complete farce - except for all the casualties.

2007-08-12T08:35:00.000-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
A frequent feature of the past makes a comeback, of sorts . . . can the Iowa straw poll thin the heard of also rans on the GOP-er side of the Preznit Pageant, 2008? Can we get to the Mittster and the 2 vangelicalistas (Huckabee and Brownback, the Place and Show winners), stat? . . . and how did "none of the above come out in the poll? No mention, and little mention of the 35% decline in participation over the last one of these held in 1999, or of how much formerly- pro-choice-but-now-"pro-Life" Mormon Mitt (sandals anybody?) spent in Iowa for each of those non-binding votes. Does anyone else smell the campaign equivalent of "Vanity publishing" here . . . speaking of the Sport of Kings, Del Mar's been running down here for 3 weeks already, and LOST's tally over 2 visits is, well, a lot of fun spent in the company of good people, but no happy post-race trips to the windows yet . . . time is more fleeting in happy times than sad, but the bad days come to an end just like the good ones do . . . how do you convince rock ribbed conservatives who say things like "all of our innovations in products have come from war?" I mean, where to start with that one? The telephone, invented by General Graham Bell? The Lieutenant's Duryea and their "military automobile?" Commander Edison and his lightbulbs? How about Capt Orville and Major Wilbur and their flying machine? And who could forget major Renaissance era hawk DaVinci, and all of his innovations, or Colonel Ben Franklin and his electricity experiments? Some folks will repeat stuff they heard their fave talkshow or Fox News head say with abandon and absent critical analysis, then stare blindly at you when you point out the fallacy . . . it bears repeating that overstated piety. like the exagerratedly slow, reverent movements of a church deacon coupled with a sermon delivered with dripping condescension is a major distraction from the message. Far too frequently in the past, those with the most perfect pretensions of holiness have been hiding a seediness below the surface . . . High school starts tomorrow TOMORROW? MID-AUGUST? for the locals including the LOST boys . . . talk about time blowin by . . . Is the market tanking, or is it's drop due to mortgage company losses being exacerbated by the flight of the skittish, and does it really matter why? Enquiring minds wanna know, especially those of us starting to think about retirement, that far off light on the horizon which doesn't seem to get closer, despite the increase in wrinkles and hair growth in unwanted locations . . . .

2007-07-30T18:09:00.000-07:00

IT'S BEGINNING TO LOOK A LOT LIKE BULLSH*T

Two more blips of life on the media telemetry screen, showing that the journalism profession has not yet succumbed to Britney NicoleBrown Lohan Syndrome. First is last week's report in the
Los Angeles Times that, since it ain't good news how much actual electricity is now getting (or not getting) to end users in Baghdad, that State Department officials who track the "progress" there for Congress - how DARE they demand oversight -are simply no longer going to include the stat in their weekly reporting.

"Nothing is being hidden. There is no ulterior motive," said David Foley, the department's Middle East spokesman. "We are continuing to provide detailed information and have been completely transparent."

The State Department's new method shows that the national electricity supply is 4% lower than a year ago, according to the July 11 report.

See, 4% down isn't bad - - unless you were only getting 5 to 6 a day anyway in Baghdad, or 11 hours a day in the rest of the country. Ya know, its sort of like watching a baseball game where the home team, sick of being spanked or embarrassed, decides to darken the scoreboard part that shoes runs and hits. Its a feel good move that requires no actual improvement, and it soothes the anxieties of the delusional members of your team's declining fan base. Yeah, I know, the media never talks about the Louisianans who didn't drown, right?

The second story comes from AP today, and yep, you guessed it, the Iraqi Parliament is packing up the family truckster - sure hope for their sakes its a tankster, and blowing out of Baghdodge for the whole month of August. No major enactments, no decisions on the "vital" legislation the Bush administration wants, just skating out. Hey GI's, sleep well in that triple digit heat!!!
You gotta love this line from the story in particular:

The parliament is due to reconvene on September 4, just two weeks before the top U.S. general in Iraq, General David Petraeus, and Washington's envoy to Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, are due to report to Congress on the success of U.S. President George W. Bush's new Iraq strategy and make recommendations.

Why does that disappearing in the heat make LOST think of TV infomercials. Yeah YEAH, that's it. Its Brilliant! The Iraqi Government is not doing nothing or abandoning their leadership role. They've simply adopted the Ron Popeil Method. Just Set it, and forget it!

And who in the Bush White House has standing to raise a stink? Certainly not the guy who crushed the record for Vacation days in office for a two term president in year five of his tenure.

2007-07-12T04:35:00.000-07:00

BUT WERE WINNING, RIGHT? RIGHT?

Looks like another legacy piece for Bush-Cheney. LOST Doesn't want the apology due from all the idiots who voted for these twin poles of stupidity because they'd "like to sit down and have a beer with 'em, but maybe y'all donning your ashes and sackcloth for the next eighteen months isn't a bad idea. Think of it as doing a part of what Scooter should have done. Looks like getting all those "Al Qaeda number 2s and 3s was only half right - from an Adminstration that works in number 2 the way Van Gogh worked in oil. This may cause the President to scale back his August vacation again - only 4 weeks instead of five this year, right?

Al-Qaida Has Rebuilt, U.S. Intel Warns

By MATTHEW LEE and KATHERINE SHRADER
WASHINGTON - A new threat assessment from U.S. counterterrorism analysts says that al-Qaida has used its safe haven along the Afghan-Pakistan border to restore its operating capabilities to a level unseen since the months before Sept. 11, 2001.

A counterterrorism official familiar with a five-page summary of the document _ titled "Al-Qaida better positioned to strike the West" _ called it a stark appraisal. The analysis will be part of a broader meeting at the White House on Thursday about an upcoming National Intelligence Estimate.
The official and others spoke to The Associated Press on condition they not be identified because the report remains classified.
The findings suggests that the network that launched the most devastating terror attack on U.S. soil has been able to regroup despite nearly six years of bombings, war and other tactics aimed at dismantling it.

The threat assessment focuses on the terror group's safe haven in Pakistan and makes a range of observations about the threat posed to the United States and its allies, officials said.

Counterterrorism officials have been increasingly concerned about al-Qaida's recent operations. This week, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said he had a "gut feeling" that the United States faced a heightened risk of attack this summer.

2007-07-03T05:14:00.000-07:00

AND YOU THOUGHT "THE SOPRANOS" HAD FINISHED ITS RUN?

Yesterday's message was clear - screw law and order, screw due process, screw the will of the people, screw determinate sentencing guidlelines, screw "tough on crime," the rule of law, and American jurisprudence. On the fourth anniversary of "Bring 'em on," our very own Blundering-Utterer-in-Chief, no doubt in response to the endless prattling from his cloven-hoofed, mudslide gross VEEP, put on his Decider/Commander Guy hat and told the country, to Fuck Off and Die, because Nothing is above Party Loyalty.

Hey Senator Feinstein! Remember that swell form letter you sent LOST last week - the one where you explained that Impeachment was simply too likely to "divide the country further?" How about this one? Does this act of blatant partisanship in defense of the indefensible get Impeachment back on the table? If not, have you given much thought to what you were gonna do after politics? You too, Boxer. All you so-called Democrats in Congress - who oughta be smart enough to recognize that this latest action is in malevolence magnitude eons beyond lying about one's sexual escapades, what say you? Lying to perpetuate power? Lying to cover up a hit job on a visible, vocal war critic? Lying to protect an abysmal war that was foisted upon us with bogus intelligence claims, and continues to be defended and perpetuated by the most gauzy thin of justifications? Is it enough yet? If not now, when? How many more dead and maimed will make it severe enough?

Cheney first, then Alito, and by then, look for Gonzalez and Bush to be making a run for the Texas border. Quit worrying about the 20% who think things are grand.

2007-06-29T19:06:00.000-07:00

2 YEARS

That's how long the LOST one has been a bloggin. It's been cathartic at times. Snarky, very snarky at others. Mostly, its been a pleasure, even with the break between this and the last post. LOST has learned that its possible to generate enough material for a book - if there's enough time for writing. LOST has not stopped writing in other places, either, having used this and other monikers on other progressive websites, as well as getting occasionally published in the LTTE departments of two or three of the local fishwraps - albeit under the Clark Kent moniker.

LOST is two years older, so is the world. The chips are growing bigger by leaps and bounds. People in the circle are fading. Skills long dormant have been nurtured again - and LOST has the fingertip callouses to prove it. A new instrument - the first in thirty years has been purchased, and its steel string tones are dulcet, and its more intimate fretboard more amenable to these digits which are pushing the half century mark.

We're entering the last throes, if you will, of the long national nightmare Frat party on the Potomac. It should be a cause - celebre, but the hangover will be felt by all, and already, the jockeying for blame assignment has begun with a vengeance. The bastards responsible - and fugue it, they Know who they are - are feverishly trying to deflect, or for those rich enough, further consolidate the protective ground around them. So Rightie Rupert is trying to buy the Wall Street Journal/Dow Jones Co.. Here's hoping that he comes out and proposes to the "Reverend" Moon, so that that match can finally be made. Sick twisted twosome they are. Mann-beast resurfaced this week to wish for assassination for John Edwards. Pathetic playground insults - their favorite medium, and all that they really have left at this point. But the real doo doo will hit the fan when the Preznit's tax cuts expire. EVERYONE except the poorest of the poor will be affected, and the latter will simply sigh and say, "sheesh, what took y'all sooo long, we've been moaning here for years." In this part of Redder than the Rest the grocery clerks are about to strike again. The vitriol with which they've been attacked - hell you'd think THEY were all "Illegals" too (the favorite pariah phrase of the ignant masses 'round these hollows) - speaks volumes about how dense and darkened the minds of far too many in this area. All these folks want is a wage that doesn't require them to get a third job - hell the dream of owning a home for most of these folks has gone the way of the dodo. No, LOST ain't talking about any local City Council-members, either.

Soo much more that could be said. So much needs to be spoken. Enough for now, though, the Yamaha APX is callin these fingers, and they must obey.

2007-06-05T17:57:00.000-07:00

IS IT STILL CALLED MOURNING SO MANY YEARS LATER?

LOST remembers the morning of June 5, 1968, waking up in nearly the same exuberant state which existed the night before, just before fatigue got the best of a seven year old boy struggling to stay awake to watch the triumphant speech of the newest American hero. At that age, 11:30 pm was pushing the envelope a bit too much, even for this kind of excitement.

I awoke to find my brother, sitting at the edge of his bed, looking older and more ashen than I had ever seen him before or since. He looked as though he’d been sitting there all night. It was a strange position to find him in, since I knew that he and one of our older brothers had been in the Ambassador that night, sharing in the excitement, the joy that reflected their volunteer efforts along with so many others. My brother’s rebuke to my rekindled mirth. "yeah, with a bullet in his head," spoken soullessly, with nearly no affect, thudded into my brain, and still hangs in my memory like some fetid weed, too onerous to approach, let alone remove.

In these heady days of "American Idol," and "All-Anna-Nicole-all-the-time," Robert Kennedy is almost a forgotten man in mainstream America. For some who do remember, he is little more than a footnote on a page about his brother's presidency, for others, he’s a cameo appearance in a TV movie about Hoffa, or Joe McCarthy, or the Cuban Missile Crisis. A handful of others seem eager to believe the most salacious details about his personal life that some hate-mongering "journalists" can conjure up. Even the somber anniversary of his murder has been obscured by the death of the conservative's icon, Ronald Reagan, who himself lived a full, long and richly celebrated life.

Yet whether remembered or un-recalled, revered or reviled, Robert Kennedy was a real-life story of redemption, a sort of modern day Ebeneezer Scrooge. He was himself transformed by tragedy, from a "ruthless" pursuer of perceived wrong-doers and those who would malign or antagonize his brother, to a statesman who cared about the poor, the impoverished, the hopeless in ways that few politicians have since. He made enemies among many progressives of his time for declining to immediately challenge LBJ for the 1968 nomination as well as Johnson’s disastrous course in Vietnam, then jumping into the presidential race only after Eugene McCarthy showed Johnson's vulnerability, and the public's disgust with the war.

Yet Robert Kennedy made up for lost time, and waged a passionate, if at times disorganized quest for the Presidency. Given what happened to his brother, his campaigning was absolutely fearless. Many of his campaign events featured him standing on the back of open cars, riding slowly through neighborhoods of exuberant people, eager to touch him and shake his hand. So many seemed convinced that his spirit and drive, and energy and charisma would help carry this country out of the Vietnam quagmire, and on to better things and greater prosperity.

To watch the footage of the somber funeral train snaking from New York to Washington that bleak Saturday, and view the sea of humanity turned out to pay respect was profoundly poignant. These witnesses to tragedy tossed aside individual differences and instead stood united solely by the depth of their collective grief. In so doing they showed appreciation for what the man was able to inspire in millions - an ability to emphasize common goals over factors that seek to divide. Scant few national leaders have succeeded in this effort to any significant degree since.

Tonight, if you are so inclined, say a prayer for the soul of this decent man who was ripped away from us. Say one for our Nation, so that we will one day soon be blessed with a bevy of public servants with Robert Kennedy's aspirations to social justice and yearning to improve our country as a whole. May they find us - or we find them, soon.

2007-06-01T09:49:00.000-07:00

IT WAS FORTY YEARS AGO TODAY . . .

How come it still sounds youthful, and I feel so old . . .

2007-05-31T07:11:00.000-07:00

WAY OUT OF TOUCH

Yes, four loyal readers, we already knew this one, but seeing the story in print as you can here reinforces your faith that you were right all along, and maybe that faith boost will spur us all to lobby, arm twist, speak out a little more to move the leaders we elected to lead on this issue, and stop emboldening the idiots

A unique survey question posed by the Gallup organization reveals just how far the president and Congress -- and most newspaper editorial pages -- appear to stand from the wishes of the American public on getting out of Iraq.

Gallup, in a report today, said it posed the question: If you had 15 minutes with President Bush in Oval Office what would you tell him to do about Iraq?

The majority (56%) said they would urgently urge him to focus on getting out of Iraq, with the highest number (nearly 4 in 10) agreeing with the wish to simply "pull the troops out/end it" and others backing other exit ideas . . .

. . Gallup concludes: "The majority of Americans, as measured in a number of Gallup Poll surveys this year, believe the initial decision for the United States to become involved in Iraq was [sic] mistake. Research also shows a majority of Americans favor a timetable for withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq . . .

. . . "The president maintains the loyalty of a smaller group of Americans -- one in four -- who are supportive of his current actions or would even want him to be more aggressive."

And 65% of those "one in four" have AM radio talk shows and/or work at Fox News Channel . . .

2007-05-30T21:18:00.000-07:00

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, DEAR 'LOST THROES'.

Couldn't let today pass without acknowledging the two year anniversary of SatanDick's proclamation,
"I think we're in the last throes, if you will, of the insurgency. Yet another reason why there'll be no 2009 late nite infomercials for the "Cheney Psychic Friends network." The DICK is constantly off the mark (ask Harry Whittington), and has no friends, only well heeled co-conspirators.

2007-05-27T20:04:00.000-07:00

SUNDAY STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS
No politics today. LOST simply needs a break from it, after last week's cave-and-spin.
So, driving up the hill from our little Stepfordesque enclave, LOST saw one. One of those makeshift memorial/monuments to . . . . something, LOST supposes. This one was affixed to a stainless steel k-rail, and consisted of a hand lettered sign and boquet. Yes, it was in the approximate location of a fatal auto accident from sometime in the last twelve months. But is this how the departed would prefer to be remembered? At the place of their last, desperate moments on the planet? Aren't there more fitting ways to enshrine the memory of a loved one? Carrying this out to the extreme, for pete's sake, people in Memphis would be dumping flowers around the Graceland commode where Elvis purportedly pinched off - er, breathed his last. Surely, there's a better way . . .at the supermarket today, an overheard conversation between a checker and a bagger. Okay, it wasn't overheard - it was being spoken loudly and clearly for all of the grocer's patrons to hear. And it was about the joys of social drinking - entire bottles of olive oil, vinegar, or Italian salad dressing. Good heavens, this was disgusting in a "Jackass" sort of way, and no, LOST hasn't seen either of those stupid celluloid monuments to human stupidity. Perhaps the grossest thing about being a choice-less spectator to the exchange was the fact that the checker extolling the pleasures of downing a whole bottle of Pompeii Extra Virgin was about 400 lbs and so amorphous that it was not feasible to determine whether this was a "he" or a "she", ICK! . . . but in the restoring faith category came the sermon at today's installment of Sunday Mass. Our long time deacon reminded us all that God is not necessarily a Lee Greenwood fan, and may not be particularly exercised about having to "Press 1 for English," or for that matter may not even care to. No, our Deacon spoke out loudly and clearly that God does, in His or Her infinite wisdom, care about all inhabitants of creation equally, and answers prayers of all without regard to efforts to create a national language. How refreshing in this land of the rednecks - where "fear and loathing of illegals" is not a Spiritual shortcoming, its the first two planks in a campaign platform for local public office. Thanks, Michael, you made LOST's day for that much appreciated blast of common sense from the pulpit.

2007-05-23T22:02:00.000-07:00

VOTING THEMSELVES OFF THE ISLAND

Two Sundays back, another edition of the reality show that wouldn't die - fittingly named "Survivo,r" came to a close, with an odd, "oooohh that was bad, REALLY bad" moment near the end. It seems that two of the final four contestants made a pact, where the one who had won the obligatory car prize giveaway agreed to give the car to the other contestant, in exchange for the other's promise to give the car winner immunity going into the final 3. The edited show still made out - in agonizing detail the hemming and hawing by the immunity promisor which culminated in his selfish-beyond-description decision to welsh on his promise - which he swore before God on television in the previous weeks, and kept the immunity for himself. Needless to say, this contestant -"Dreemz" turned his entire world into Nitemarez for the rest of his forseeable existence. He will forever be known as the guy who cheated his way to a free car - and he cost the other contestant the win in the game, too. Losers all around.

So it is with the Democratic leadership in Congress. They accomplished the unthinkable six months ago. They won all but one of the contested Senate races, and swamped their way in the House and returned both Houses of Congress to the Democratic side for the first time in twelve years. Unquestionably this was aided by the perception that too much dominance by the Republican party had opened the floodgates of sleaze and corruption; but equally above the fray of secondguesses is the notion that the American voters were fed up to here with Iraq, and wanted out. Wasn't that clear? Wasn't that obvious? How could that be misread?

So last month, when Commander Guy petulantly carried out his threat to veto funding legislation with concrete time tables for withdrawal, demanding that a blank check be sent to him or the "troops may suffer," no cohesive group of Dems stood up and said, "Blackmail, extortion and kidnapping are felonies, here's the same bill - I dare you to veto it again. Go ahead, make my day." Nope, instead they cowed themselves in the face of the only thing this President and his band of deferment wonks excel at: name calling. They sat by and hung their heads when Bush labeled their bill as "a political stunt." No one said, "no, dipstick, declaring the Mission Accomplished on an aircraft carrier is a political Stunt. Posing in front of an old church with artificial kleig lights and making recovery promises you have no intention of keeping - that's a political stunt. Oh, and making sure that every doggone public appearance you make is either propped up by military personnel or hand picked civilian sycophants, THAT's a political stunt. Sending you the bill we sent your Sorriness, that was leadership, that was doing what our constituents asked us to do."

So it really doesn't matter that some riders were attached, and that the minimum wage is gonna go up 2 bucks or that some of the uninsured children are now going to have money for coverage. That's right up there with telling the double amputee in the semi-private room to be happy, cause the patient in the next bed wants to buy your shoes. And to go through the very public agony over the last several days - this "oh no we better do as he says, or he'll make the troops suffer and we'll get in trouble" means that the Dem leadership is having its own "Dreemz moment." LOST doubts the public are gonna be in a forgiving mode on this one, which means that the only thing the party leaders have left is faith in the flaws of Americans' short term memory. I'd rather bet the farm on a pair of threes.

2007-05-21T07:31:00.000-07:00

WELL, AT LEAST IT'S NOT ANOTHER BEST-SELLING CONFESSION

Retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor was interviewed recently by Wingnut Network - er Fox News Channel. An excerpt from an article about the interview follows

O'Connor, a swing vote in favor of abortion rights and affirmative action, said she was seeing an unprecedented level of public criticism in recent months of state and federal court decisions.

The vast majority of the criticism, she said, is unjustified and borders on harassment of judges, especially in cases where lawmakers threaten impeachment of judges for decisions they disagreed with.

But federal courts, too, play a role in fostering public credibility by generally adhering to "stare decisis," or settled precedent, O'Connor said.

"Obviously, that is a concern," said the Reagan appointee who retired early last year. She responded to a question in a broadcast interview about the public's perception that the Supreme Court based its decisions more on politics than principle and whether that belief undermined the court's credibility.

Her comments come a month after the high court changed course on abortion, upholding a national ban on a midterm method of ending pregnancies known as "partial-birth abortion." It was a 5-4 decision that opened the door for states to pass additional abortion restrictions.

Liberal and some conservative legal experts have criticized the decision as disturbing and inconsistent because it seemed to defy a virtually similar 5-4 high court case in 2000.

In the 2000 case, O'Connor was the key vote in striking down an abortion ban that placed an "undue burden" on a woman's right to choose. O'Connor has since been replaced by conservative Justice Samuel Alito, who voted last month for the ban.

In the interview, O'Connor said she is working to put together a Web site aimed at junior high and high school students that will seek to instill respect for the judicial process, including "stare decisis" and the court's power to overturn actions by the legislative or executive branch that impinge on individual freedoms such as speech, religion and due process of law.

The goal, in part, is to counter recent attempts by Congress and state legislatures to unduly restrict the authority of judges simply on the grounds that they disagree with the outcome of a decision, O'Connor said.

"Now, when I was a youngster I do remember seeing on the highway out by the Lazy B Ranch a big billboard saying, 'Impeach Earl Warren,' and that was in the years when there were some cases like Miranda and some criminal cases, and people got all excited," O'Connor said.

Warren was a liberal chief justice who presided over court rulings that expanded rights for criminal defendants.

"But what we're seeing now is a more broadly based range of criticisms of the nation's courts, both state and federal," she said. O'Connor cited in part a failed South Dakota measure to jail judges for "erroneous decisions" and unsuccessful efforts by Congress to punish judges who cited foreign judgments in Supreme Court rulings.

O'Connor, 77, indicated earlier this year that she would have preferred to stay on the Supreme Court for several more years until she was ill but that she stepped down because of her ailing husband, John, who has Alzheimer's.

You gotta love the last line - you hear it so often lately. Stepped down to spend more time with her "family/ailing husband/blah blah blah." Not making light of Alzheimers. Going out slowly and in ever increasing dementia is horrific, and wouldn't wish that on anyone. Okay, maybe Rove or Cheney. Seriously, though, we have been bombarded in the past three plus years by one after the fact tell all after another from people who could have spoken up when they were close to the seat of power, but kept silently compliant, kept in their jobs, only to come out later and express remorse for not standing up to the Commander Guy of Crawford and his old Apprentice Darth Heinous. Here, O'Connor's recognition - tardily of course, is that partisan political expediency is creeping into and choking the vibrance out of our system of jurisprudence. And hers was one of five votes counted upon to set this whole partisan sycophantasia in motion. Sandy, get out your sackcloth robe and your ashes. But please, don't add to the pile of 35-bucks-a-throw, 400 page "mea culpas" such as Tenet's, or Woodward's last one, or any of the rest of those in the works by dozens of others now striving to cash in on their weakness or unwillingness to speak up and out when it would have mattered. We're up to here with the tardy tell alls. Speak up in your circle. Help shut down those who are trying to re-cast this as some courageous step in a new hundred years war against Islamic extremism. . That's what atonement is all about.

2007-05-20T08:20:00.000-07:00

WHO SAID IT HAD TO MAKE SENSE?

Sometimes things don't make any sense at all. Take for an innocuous example, the sign LOST observed on a video verbiage "crawler" display sign yesterday in Point Loma. The crawler tease marched out "8 oz brown and serve Sausage 3 for $3.00." Cheap? Sure. But the story ain't the price. The Story is that the sign was in front of a retail chain pharmacy. Now, LOST doesn't know about the rest of you, but LOST doesn't ask his chiropractor to do his taxes, or buy his personal hygeine products at Auto Zone, or chat with friendly neighborhood realtor about the latest thing in pharmaceutical sleep aids. So who the hell is gonna buy bloody sausage at Rite Aid, or Walgreens? It's just a dumb, icky idea.

Speaking of dumb, icky ideas, let's talk about "Surge the Course." That is the real name of the Bush policy in Iraq - because its what he's doing there. We've all heard the rhetoric about "fightin' 'em over there so we don't have to . . . ," or "when they stand up, we'll stand down," and any number of other poster slogans, behind which there is nothing - no strategy, no contingency planning, no long term planning, bupkis. At the other end of the political spectrum, and demonized by righties all, are those who say that our continued, surged presence in Iraq fuels the growth of both anti-U.S. sentiment in Iraq, as well as the growth of destabilizing influences like Al-Qaeda. Which side's take on the war/occupation is accurate? Consider the following from this mornings Los Angeles Times

A major CIA effort launched last year to hunt down Osama bin Laden has produced no significant leads on his whereabouts, but has helped track an alarming increase in the movement of Al Qaeda operatives and money into Pakistan's tribal territories, according to senior U.S. intelligence officials familiar with the operation.

In one of the most troubling trends, U.S. officials said that Al Qaeda's command base in Pakistan is increasingly being funded by cash coming out of Iraq, where the terrorist network's operatives are raising substantial sums from donations to the anti-American insurgency as well as kidnappings of wealthy Iraqis and other criminal activity.

The influx of money has bolstered Al Qaeda's leadership ranks at a time when the core command is regrouping and reasserting influence over its far-flung network. The trend also signals a reversal in the traditional flow of Al Qaeda funds, with the network's leadership surviving to a large extent on money coming in from its most profitable franchise, rather than distributing funds from headquarters to distant cells.

Al Qaeda's efforts were aided, intelligence officials said, by Pakistan's withdrawal in September of tens of thousands of troops from the tribal areas along the Afghanistan border where Bin Laden and his top deputy, Ayman Zawahiri, are believed to be hiding.

Little more than a year ago, Al Qaeda's core command was thought to be in a financial crunch. But U.S. officials said cash shipped from Iraq has eased those troubles.

"Iraq is a big moneymaker for them," said a senior U.S. counter-terrorism official.

The evolving picture of Al Qaeda's finances is based in part on intelligence from an aggressive effort launched last year to intensify the pressure on Bin Laden and his senior deputies.

Yep, and once again, the President is weekending in Crawford, continuing to extend his record of vacation days set as president beyond the reach of any competent successor. Why does LOST suspect that, while he's there he's stockin' up on some of that good ol' Walgreen's sausage?

2007-05-19T06:08:00.000-07:00

THE SPEW THEORY

Okay, you're in. Part of that exclusive club or organization you so wanted to be part of, for years. Their first big gala of the year is coming up, and its at the nicest facility in the county - and the next one. You've bought that new outfit you couldn't quite afford, and you've even thought about renting a car - no, a limo. You arrive at the event, having counted the slow plodding days leading up to it with intense, almost childlike anticipation. You get inside, and almost immediately, despite the huge crowd of the elegantly coiffed and impeccably dressed, something seems - or rather smells, amiss. As you approach the buffet table you stumble upon, hell let's be honest, you nearly fall into it, the largest pile of animal (you hope it's animal anyway) excrement you've ever seen. Its there in the room, if it didn't fill your nostrils with densely packed waves of nauseating putresences you'd expect carver/sculpters in there, making some artistic creation out of it, like a sand castle, or a bust of the guest of honor. Strangely, no one else at the party is looking at it, or for that matter even seemingly smelling it. How can this be?

You back away, and turn your back, start to recognize friends, and be recognized by others, and slowly, deliberately try to put the pile out of your mind. You know that you gotta eat, so you'll be having to contend with it again at some point, but for now, you can nonchalantly act like the dunghill is not really there. But then you begin noticing something else. Never in large numbers, but guests seem to float out of the ballroom, stay gone for awhile, and then come back in a bit more disheveled. In fact, some appear to have taken ill outside - damn that looks like they hurled out there - and still come back into the room to work the crowd, orthotic-perfect smile ablaze, eager to pump the arms and press the flesh, but damn, they're kind of reeking now, too, with a different olfactory assault, courtesy of their own in house digestery. is THIS the club you really wanted to join? What a choice, stay here and act like its all good, enjoy the music and the company and enjoy those pulsating whiffs of stench that are swirling about the ballroom - the surreality of it all seems crazy. Yet there is the alternative - make a bee line for the exit, wiser perhaps, but certainly possessed of a cleaner, more pristine source of air to breathe far from the barfing crowd?

This, gentle readers, is the plight of today's Republican party. Ignore the big steaming turd in the room. When it gets really bad, go outside the party and spew bile - preferably on the first prominent non-Republican you can find. If you miss and gerb a little of it on yourself, no worries, come back into the ballroom. Nobody'll say anything to you about it. It'll be as if it's not even there, and your friends will still smile, pat your back and tell you how great you look. Pretty soon, the poo-stank will dissipate, and boy, doesn't that carving station look terrific!! And somebody else will clean up the cascading mess you and your guests have created outside.

2007-05-15T21:02:00.000-07:00

IF YOU CAN'T SAY SOMETHING NICE, DON'T SAY ANYTHING

LOST's mom was always fond of that saying, and it is of particular importance today. There's great temptation to speculate - in a uniquely "Soprano's-style" way: Was he whacked, and was it Robertson, or Dobson, or both? Or there's the semi - reverent, "will he lie in state at the Crystal Cathedral - or at the Reagan Library?" The grassy knoller approach: "I'll bet he's really just having drinks with the not dead Ken Lay and Cheney at the latter's "undisclosed location;" the bluntly vengeful: "hope he enjoys the smell of sulfur, and the enduring warmth of brimstone:" The flamboyantly funny, "if Saint Peter greets him at the Gate dressed like Liberace, he's in for a long, bad hearing;"

The bottom line is that Jerry Falwell professed faith in the archetype of Compassion, yet displayed so very little compassion in his own public life. May God have abundant mercy on his contorted soul.

2007-05-13T07:42:00.000-07:00

ARE YOU PAYING ATTENTION G-DUB?

From the Stockton Record's editorial pages today, Mother's Day, 2007:

"They have served their county. They have personified patriotism. They have given their lives. They are heroes who have left loved ones who cherish prideful memories but mourn the loss of their son, daughter, spouse, father or mother. We salute their dedication but are left to wonder:

"Who will be next? And how many more?"

The note for this piece, which can be found here, notes that in 2000 and 2004, the "Record" endorsed Bush for President. This is a first step toward sanity. THe delicate, perceived political sensibilities of its readership should be set aside again, and the paper should apologize for its myopic endorsement of a bumbler-and his evil, money-grubbing bandit running mate, for the most difficult job in the world. Many of us had these two pegged in 2000, and entities with a lot of reach, like the Record in Northern California, put the word out, in a process repeated all over the country, giving shelter and comfort to millions of people who made that poor voting choice.

2007-05-11T17:59:00.000-07:00

WAITING FOR RATZINGER'S RAIDERS TO ATTACK . . . STILL WAITING . . . ANYTIME NOW . . . . NOT

You can find this in today's New York Times: HOUSTON, May 11 – Rudolph W. Giuliani directly challenged Republican Party orthodoxy on Friday, asserting that his support for abortion rights, gun control and gay rights should not disqualify him from winning the party’s presidential nomination and that Republicans need to be tolerant of dissenting views on those issues if they want to hold the White House.

In a forceful summation of the substantive and political case for his candidacy, delivered to a conservative audience at Houston Baptist College, Mr. Giuliani, the former mayor of New York, acknowledged that his views on social issues were out of line with many Republican primary voters.

LOST has been subject to bouts of failed and flawed memory of late, but it seems to me that this kind of stance was deemed deserving of condemnation by many in the ranks of the few, the proud, the (outwardly) pious, the (ahem) celibate crozier carriers just a few years - no, I remember, when John Kerry ran as a Catholic Democrat with the same views. In fact, Kerry supporting Catholics in many diocesan jurisdictions were threatened with sacramental exile if they dared vote for him. Abortion was, after all, one of the FIVE NON NEGOTIABLE ISSUES - the five most important stances that EVERY CATHOLIC had to uphold or he/she was no longer . . . Catholic. The funny thing was back then that even the unspoken favorite of that Shiite Catholic crowd, President McFlightsuit, had views on abortion ("acceptable in cases of rape, incest, and to save a mother's life") that were at odds with the "Official" Church person of no, never, whenever.

So, now that the mothers in Mother Church got what they pushed for and a whole lot more - as in more Iraq death and dismemberment, more poverty, more greed fueled income disparity and, of course no repeal - legislatively, judically or otherwise of Roe v. Wade where is the condemnation of GOP frontrunner Giuliani, and the corresponding admonition to faithful everywhere in the U.S to not vote for him on penalty of near total excommunication if not damnation? LOST is calling you out, Charles Chaput, you too Raymond Burks, and MIchael Sheridan. Prove that you were acting by your professed principles, and not merely as shill/enablers for Bush and Cheney. LOST ain't holding his breath, but sure will continue to raise this point, until you stand up and be counted. If its universally true, then say so, your weekly collection receipts be damned.

2007-04-30T05:26:00.000-07:00

IN CASE YOU WERE WONDERING . . .

As you watched "Real Time" last Friday on HBO who the puffy GOPologist of the week was - this woman who kept trying to offer up excuses for the war, the U.S. Attorney firing fiasco, and other assorted talking points, LOST was curious as well. So lookie what a "Google" for "Lisa Schiffren" came up with (emphasis is LOST's - and oh so timely too):

BY LISA SCHIFFREN
Friday, May 9, 2003 12:01 a.m. EDT

I had the most astonishing thought last Thursday. After a long day of hauling the kids to playdates and ballet, I turned on the news. And there was the president, landing on the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln, stepping out of a fighter jet in that amazing uniform, looking--how to put it?--really hot. Also presidential, of course. Not to mention credible as commander in chief. But mostly "hot," as in virile, sexy and powerful.

You don't see a lot of that in my neighborhood, the Upper West Side of Manhattan. (I'm told there's more of it in the "red" states.) I was mesmerized. I flipped around watching W. land on many channels. I watched the whole speech, which was fine. But a business suit just doesn't do it the way a flight suit does. In the course of this I peeked over at my husband, the banker. He was in his third month of reading a book about the Six Day War and didn't seem to notice.

Nonetheless, I know that I am not the only one who entertained these untoward thoughts. The American media were fully aware of how stunning the president looked last week. And they chose to defuse it by referring endlessly to the "photo-oppiness" of the event. The man uses overwhelming military force to vanquish a truly evil foe, facing down balking former "allies," and he is not taken seriously as a foreign-policy president. He out top-guns the Hollywood version, and all the media can talk about is the impending campaign commercial.

With a few exceptions: Brian Williams shook his head in awe at the clip and said, if I may paraphrase, "that, ladies and gentlemen, is a president at the pinnacle of success, having just won a war." The New York Post ran the hot shot on its front page. And Newsweek called it a photo-op but gave the president what can only be called a centerfold.

We all say things we wish we could take back, but this one? Thank you Google, this kind of drivel should keep someone from ever publicly speaking out on any topic ever again.

2007-04-28T08:55:00.000-07:00

"EXTRA! EXTRA! RONNIE'S RUGGERS EAT THEIR OWN!"

So Ronald Reagan gets the blame for the anomaly that finds the GOP standing in the sewage of nepotism, self-dealing and moral duality up to their navels, yet waxing nostalgic about the smell of the jasmine flowers? Fascinating, never knew that until today. Nope, LOST just thought that Reagan was the intended namesake of all things public on all levels of the very government he labeled as "the problem" decades ago.

LOST particularly despises the naming, on the campus of the beloved alma mater, of a large medical office building after Saint Ronnie. Reagan, who did so much for the University of California during his 8 year reign of terror in Sacramento. Good lord, if y'all want to be hyprocrites among yourselves, be LOST's guest. Knock yourselves out. But ixnay on the exportationay, already!

So it is with some amusement that today's news bears tales of the 2008 GOP hopefuls turning on one another. Could it be that the rank stench of an oozing pustule of rank avarice and contradiction like Tom DeLay has finally driven them over the edge, and away from Ronnie's Omerta? Or is it that their "All-Star" graft roster has burst at the seams - populated as it is by the bug man, the Dukester, Joe Renzi, Bernie Kerik, Bob Ney, Richard Pombo, Katherine Harris, Jerry Lewis, Mike Brown, Alberto Gonzales, Harriett Miers, Jack Abramoff, and others yet-to-be-named? Is it a form of that last gasping gagging blurt caused by staying silent for so long while serial adulterers like Gingrich pontificated on about the Clinton abuse of fidelity, or while vile, drug addled bloatables like Rush railed self righteously at all things "lib-rul," while tap dancing around the embarrassment of ther own, oh so imperfect behavior?

NAHHHHHHHHHHHH. Its just about winning. And, hoo boy, is it fun to watch!!