One of the ways I keep track of dubya's christian college administration crusade against science and scientists is through University of Maryland Physics professor Bob Park's weekly newsletter. It comes to me via e-mail every Friday, but I just discovered (by...duh!...clicking on the link at the bottom) that it's also available on the intertoobz. So Bob Park goes immediately into my sidebar favorites list. Here's the first item on his list for this week:

1. STIMULUS: HOW COME NOBODY THOUGHT OF THIS BEFORE?
In case you didn’t notice, your 401k is shrinking. Don’t worry – President Bush has a plan: send a check to every family in America. People are supposed to spend it on the shoddy merchandise they didn’t buy at Christmas. Where is the money coming from? From taxes we paid to end Iraq’s WMD program. It worked perfectly; there is not a WMD to be found in Iraq. No one could think of anything except war to spend the stimulus money on (like maybe health insurance for children, or fusion energy, or the International Linear Collider) so Congress agreed to the President’s plan to write everyone a check. After decades of public-service announcements telling people to save, we can now expect to be told the opposite. So much for the laws of economics. The program would be more environmentally friendly if they cut out the middleman. Instead of every family, send checks to every business. Operating on a government subsidy would free business from the need to produce more useless crap to sell.

That's good stuff, innit? I've been doinking around for a few days now trying to write a post on this so-called stimulus package. I started with a simple logic exercise, trying to reason how injecting an extra Christmas shopping season into consumption-crazy America's retail year will somehow rescue an economy that has for years been riding an artificial high created wholly from extensive borrowing by the American people and insane, deficit spending by their government. I've not had much luck connecting those dots. This childishly simplistic and naive plan seems to go something like this:

1) Borrow money from the Chinese to send out checks to millions of Americans and encourage them to spend their way out of the problems caused by all their previous excessive spending.
2) Magic happens, millions of upside-down mortgages right themselves, foreclosures and bank losses disappear as the economy stops circling the bowl, and dubya rides off into the trickle-down economics sunset.

This is dubya once again doing what he does best—nothing. Kicking the problem down the road to the next administration, all the while claiming to have fixed it. Over at No Comment, in a post titled How Bush's Fiscal Mismanagement Created A Recession, Scott Horton reaches the same conclusion:

But the cute fix is just what President Bush has in mind. He wants to mail out checks to a large stratum of the economy in a move designed to bolster consumer spending. Economists are anything but agreed that it will serve this end. Much more likely, it will simply magnify the already devastating treasury deficit, which is a key part of the current problem.
Bush doesn’t really intend to do anything to avoid the recession. He is aiming to push it back a few months in an effort to create the public impression that the recession will be the responsibility of his successor.

I'm sure the right-wing noise machine is already at work, finding ways to blame our collapsing economy on the Clenis and/or our next president, but in the end dubya is going to have to wear this one. I'm betting this will eventually rival the invasion of Iraq as dubya's biggest failure, regardless of his efforts to pass the buck.

The flurry of retail economic activity created by this stimulus package will, I'm sure, provide some bogus numbers for officials to point to as a sign of progress, but like a flock of starlings that swarms into the air, spinning and churning and whirling like smoke from a chimney, those numbers must settle back to earth. Then what?

I don't know economics from applesauce, but I've had an ominous feeling about the state of our nation's economy for some time. I went digging in my archives to find out how long I've been beating this particular dead horse and I learned a few things. For instance, I learned that I've been blogging for about 16 months now; the one year mark for my rhetorical masturbation came and went unnoticed. I also discovered my archives are searchable, which is pretty cool considering the titles I've slapped on most of my 150+ posts before uploading them to the mother ship have often been only vaguely connected to their content, if at all. (I've been known to just name a post after whatever beer I'm drinking when I write it.)

I found a post about Chalmers Johnson and his book Nemesis from last February in which I mentioned his prediction of a US national bankruptcy and a world-wide recession. Coincidentally, I had that book in my hands today at Barnes and Noble, but I just couldn't pull the trigger on it. I'm being frugal. Then I returned to my mobile command center to find this headline on CNN's home page: World Markets Plunge On US Fears

Stock markets around the world plummeted Monday, prompted by pessimism about U.S. President George W. Bush's plans to boost the U.S. economy.

From Paris to Mumbai to Tokyo, it was one of the worst days for stocks since the terror attacks of September 2001, as share prices in Asia, Europe and the Americas all plunged by significant amounts; Wall Street only avoided joining the tumble because U.S. markets were closed Monday for Martin Luther King Day.

Investors remain skeptical about Bush's plan and are worried that a U.S. slowdown will lead to a global recession.

It will be interesting to see what happens to US markets tomorrow. They dodged a bullet today only because they were closed, but the ricochet could be nasty. I'm betting this final year of dubya's presidency will have a lot of days like this. I think we're in for a nasty downward slide economically.

I believe the chickens of an economy propped up by rampant consumerism on credit, both individually and as a nation, have finally come home to roost. The reason Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's interest rate cuts aren't producing the same effect as those of his predecessor is that American's have already spent themselves into trouble.

The prolonged period of extremely low interest rates initiated by Alan Greenspan created a blizzard of home refinancing with far too many homeowners borrowing against (and spending) the equity in their homes. With home prices now falling, many Americans are finding their single largest asset has vanished.

That's why dubya's gimmick fix of sending every taxpayer a few hundred dollars to spend on a new washing machine isn't going to work. The stock market is a measure of the country's optimism and I don't think there's much of that left right now.

My last post went awry. I set out to share my thoughts after reading The Looming Tower, but I somehow wound up just smacking dubya around again. It's becoming a reflex action for me. I shall endeavor to remain on course this time, however I guarantee nothing. A little more of Lawrence Wright's well-researched history of al-Qaeda:

From the beginning of al-Qaeda, there were reformers and there were nihilists. The dynamic between them was irreconcilable and self-destructive, but events were moving so quickly that it was almost impossible to tell the philosophers from the sociopaths. They were glued together by the charismatic personality of Osama bin Laden, which contained both strands, idealism and nihilism, in a potent mix.

The fact that he was a millionaire willing to finance terrorism and pay a monthly stipend to every wild-eyed religious zealot in his personal army strengthened his charisma a great deal. But bin Laden's followers weren't all nut jobs. Wright gives us a glimpse into the mindset of the hundreds of disaffected young men from all over the world who turned to jihad:

Most who joined the jihad did so in a country other than the one in which they were reared. They were Algerians living in expatriate enclaves in France, Moroccans in Spain, or Yemenis in Saudi Arabia. Despite their accomplishments, they had little standing in the host societies where they lived...., they defined themselves as radical Muslims while living in the West. The Pakistani in London found that he was neither authentically British nor authentically Pakistani; and this feeling of marginality was just as true for Lebanese in Kuwait as it was for Egyptians in Brooklyn. Alone, alienated, and often far from his family, the exile turned to the mosque, where he found companionship and the consolation of religion. Islam provided the element of commonality. It was more than a faith—it was an identity.

The imams naturally responded to the alienation and anger that prompted these men to find a spiritual home. A disproportionate number of new mosques in immigrant communities had been financed by Saudi Arabia and staffed by Wahhabi fundamentalists, many of whom were preaching the glories of jihad

Both the money and the mentality behind much of today's terrorism comes from Saudi Arabia, a country our preznit considers an ally in the War on Terra. We preach democracy while openly supporting a monarchy that keeps most of it's population poor and the royal family among the wealthiest in the world. The Saudi government holds on to power and maintains peace within the country through tacit support of fundamentalism and terrorism abroad. We ignore this because maintaining the illusion keeps the oil flowing smoothly.

The latter part of the book details how bureaucracy, massive ego and personality conflicts led to the deliberate misinterpretation of information-sharing policy between our intelligence and law enforcement agencies, and subsequently to our failure to prevent 9/11.

The most egregious incidents of withholding vital information were committed by the CIA under Director George Tenet, who worked for the both the Clenis and dubya. It's curious that dubya kept Tenet on as Director of the CIA, since he came into office determined to do exactly the opposite of everything the Clenis did (he was the anti-Clenis), but I guess he knows a sycophant when he sees one. Tenet stayed, and terrorism, which was already on the back burner under the Clenis, was taken off the stove by the new administration.

In my book, if any single person could have prevented 9/11, that person would be George Tenet. He was in a position to both ease the sharing of CIA intelligence with other government agencies, and to impress upon two different presidents the seriousness of the threat from radical Islam and terrorism. He did nothing, the towers came down, and the war preznit pinned a medal on his chest. Hmmph.

I finally sat down and finished reading The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright. This book should be required reading for all Americans. Wright interweaves two compelling story lines; one a fascinating history of radical Islam from it's inception in Egypt to al-Qaeda and modern jihad; the other an honest assessment of our government's failure to properly assess this threat and prevent 9/11. It's good stuff and I highly recommend it. Check out this little nugget:

Al-Qaeda's duty was to awaken the Islamic nation to the threat posed by the secular, modernizing West. In order to do that, bin Laden told his men, al-Qaeda would drag the United States into a war with Islam—"a large scale front which it cannot control."

Is it just me, or does that not make our preznit look amazingly stupid? 9/11 was a truly heinous crime against America, but it was essentially just a crime. Rather than treat it as a crime; track down and bring justice or death to Osama bin Laden and his posse, dubya unveiled his bullshit War on Terra and declared it would be a long war, perhaps taking generations to win. He gave Osama bin Laden exactly what he wanted; empowered him. He got played by a guy who hasn't seen indoor plumbing in a decade.

There are many guitars in the world, but this one is genuinely unique. It is the only guitar in existence that was hand built by yours truly. Lookit.



A peek through the sound hole at the signature and date from when I assembled the body reveals that it took over 6 months to complete. What can I say? It was my first time and the learning curve was pretty steep. It came out pretty nice, though.

Of course I'm thoroughly hooked now. I've done a lot of cabinet and furniture projects before, but those mostly just boil down to building boxes with doors or boxes with drawers. This is far more challenging. Very few power tools involved, lots of careful hand work on expensive wood. I want to be a luthier when I grow up.

I'm keeping this one for myself. I'm going to try to learn a few chords, but I don't hold out much hope for my talent or my perseverance. I'm looking forward to beginning work on Number Two, but it will have to wait until Spring when I return from my adventures in Oklahomistan.

A right-wing co-worker of mine — I'll call him Steve — has got those sneaky Democrats figured out. He told me today that Barack Obama used the phrase "victory in Iraq" during his speech after winning the Iowa caucuses. I don't know if it's true, and I've given up fact-checking guys like Steve. Refuting ridiculous Republican talking points gleaned from talk radio is both time-consuming and unfulfilling.

The latest turd Steve is flogging goes something like this: "Now that things have improved politically to the point where we can probably declare victory and pull our troops out of Iraq in the not too distant future, the Dems will start using the word "victory" in their speeches so they can try to take some of the credit or gain some sort of prestige from said victory." I'm paraphrasing there, but that is essentially the argument Steve ran past me today. When I pointed out to him that there had really not been any political progress in Iraq; that, in fact, the Iraqi government is so divided they can't even reach a quorum to do any government business whatsoever, he pulled a weird, little logical reverse no-take-backs switcheroo on me, saying the facts I was stating about the condition of Iraq's government had nothing to do with what he was talking about.

Steve explained to me that the political progress he was talking about was taking place here in Amurka. Really. That's what he said. An interesting bit of honesty there. See, Steve is one of those Republicans for whom political victory trumps all else. For him, conditions on the ground in Iraq are no longer relevant. It doesn't matter whether The Surge itself is successful, as long as the selling of the Surge was.

I had to end last nights post rather abruptly. My beat-down of Senator Jim Inhofe was interrupted by another round of nasty storms blowing through, forcing me to power down. Tornado sirens 'til 3AM, but I never had to actually get in the bathtub.

I completed my journey to the heart of red-state Amurka today, and have now set up a temporary Abandon Mythology command center in an undisclosed location near Oklahoma City, disguised as a '70s era 1-bedroom apartment. It's ugly, but it seems to have good intertoobz. I'll be blogging from here for a while, relating the southern style, deep-fried experience.

Nothing much to report thus far. The hole markers at the local disc golf course have been vandalized, making it very difficult to play if you don't already know the course. For a while I was just sorta wandering around throwing frisbees. One of the first things I notice every time I come here is an almost complete lack of sidewalks. And then, of course, I start noticing the abundance of fat people. With my spare tire, I look like a native. Sigh.

Due to warm, moist air from the Gulf of Mexico pushing up into the midwest, we've had a couple of freakishly warm days here in Misery. Mother Nature is now busy setting things right. Cold air from the north has rushed in to meet the challenge and push the spring-like weather back south where it belongs this time of year. I have somehow managed to find myself in a hotel directly beneath where the two air masses are battling it out. The tornado sirens (which must be right outside my freaking window) have been going off intermittently for a few hours now. It's been thunder and lightning and wind and rain and massive hail. I saw a few chunks almost as big as my fist earlier. I picked a bad day to venture out of the bunker.

My journey takes me to Oklahoma. Land of churches from mega to mini, and 3.2% beer. I plan to spend a few months discreetly studying the behavior of the people responsible for repeatedly electing a peckerwood like James Inhofe to the US Senate. He's the guy who called global warming:

"the second-largest hoax ever played on the American people, after the separation of church and state."

The man is jaw-droppingly stupid, and proud of it.

Our neighbors to the north are caucusing tomorrow night. I feel for them. I've never caucused, but I gather it's some sort of congregate-and-be-counted method of primary election voting. Temperatures are in the single digits tonight here in Misery; it's probably even colder in Iowa. And none of the candidates from either major party seem to be creating much heat either. I'd have trouble making myself venture out in the cold for any of them.

The Republican ballot is just a mess. Iowa Republicans appear to be looking for a candidate who'll give them maximum reassurance. The last several polls I've seen have it becoming a two-whores race between Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney; a soft-spoken Baptist minister and a flip-flopping, rich, pretty Mormon; a man who specializes in telling people everything is going to be all right and a man who will tell any one pretty much any thing they want to hear.

It gets worse back in the pack though. Behind those two you have John McCain and Fred Thompson; two doddering fools more old and tired than the lies they peddle about tax cuts increasing federal revenue. Thompson in particular is just phoning it in.

Bringing up the rear are Rudy Giuliani and Ron Paul. Rudy is fading fast, the more Iowa Republicans learn about him, the less they like. Pro-choice. Pro-gay rights. Serial adulterer. And probably dirty. Can't hide all that behind 9/11. Then you've got Ron Paul, the only Republican to speak any truths at all about Iraq and the War on Terra. Raising a ton of money and going nowhere fast. Fox News has decided not to let him participate in the next debate. Apparently he's a distraction to their propaganda campaign, even though he's pretty racist and even kookier than the other candidates on some issues, particularly taxes. I often wonder who will pick up Paul's young, anti-war supporters when he leaves the race.

On the Democratic side, Hillary Clinton has fallen back enough to make things interesting. Iowa is now a three-way race between her, Barack Obama and John Edwards. Bill Richardson and Joe Biden have just about fallen off the charts; Dennis Kucinich, Chris Dodd and Mike Gravel are already off, if they were ever on.

Of all the candidates, I most like Dennis Kucinich. (Honestly, how could a lefty like me not like a guy who wants to create a Department of Peace?) But of the five candidates from both parties with a reasonable shot at winning Iowa and gaining some momentum heading into New Hampshire, I only see one who could possibly be a good president, and that's John Edwards. I think he is the only candidate both willing and able to start nudging this country back to the left, where I believe it most urgently needs to go. But I'm worried about his ability to stand up to the right-wing-noise-machine in the general election. I don't recall him drawing any blood as the vice-presidential nominee 4 years ago, and I'd bet money this election will be even nastier than the last.

So, I guess it's a good thing I don't live in Iowa. I probably wouldn't even bother to put on my caucusing shoes.

Lately I've fallen back on old, bad writing habits; lots of little scribbles in notebooks and on notepads, envelopes and random torn pieces of paper, but never getting around to assembling all the little scribbles just so. Never getting around to doing the real work. The part that makes the difference between writing and daydreaming. So for this new year, I resolve to post more frequently to my blog. I realize that posting this resolution on the second day of the year is a bit of an inauspicious start, but yesterday was one of those days where I felt like I had drank numerous beers and tequila shots the night before. (I did it for the troops.)

And although I built this website as a place to put the blog, I also resolve to add more content to the site as well. I don't have any ideas yet, just a feeling that the place needs a little sprucing up.

Lastly, I resolve that at this time next year there will be 20 pounds or so less of me. I don't have a specific plan yet for how to do this, but I know it will involve a lot less imported beer, a lot less dark chocolate, and a lot less eating 'til it hurts.

Let it be written, let it be done.