Reeding Levl

Movie Reviews

Only college undergrad? I was expecting something like astro-physicist post-doc fellow.

Typing Test

This is fun. I may be slow, but I'm faster than Rook over at Rooks Rant. Personally, I don't think they should allow people who type less than 60 words a minute to blog. It's painful to watch, that s-l-o-w h-i-t-t-i-n-g o-f t-h-e k-e-y-s:

62 words

Speedtest

Someone needs a few strokes

Bush, recently, on pre-war intel:

“Do I think somebody lied to me?” he said. “No, I don't. I think it was just, you know, they analyzed the situation and came up with the wrong conclusion.”

So what should we do now that we know the intel was wrong and that we've tossed away 3 trillion, have killed countless innocents, and have sent millions into exile?

Bush says he'll give up golf.

That should solve everything. I'm sure that the Iraqi refugee begging in the backstreets of Jordan with her child blind from US clusterbombs and the U.S. children who will live amid crumbling bridges, roads, and schools as they pay off the trillions in debt will take great solace from Shrub's giving up golf.

Bob Barr

It looks like Bob Barr's going to run on the Libertarian ticket. While I disagree with Libertarians, I at least find their positions to be consistent. Barr, to his credit, stands against Shrub's War and the erosion of individual rights. The Libertarians are what the Republican Party might look like if they were ideologically sincere. As it is, they've become the Plutocrat Party--something that won't change in the least with a McCain victory.

ConneXXions

When McCain's campaign started to take off, honest John evidently hurriedly looked under every rock for the slimiest characters he could find to run things for him. This, along with his pander-to-Joe-five-pack gas tax-cut plan, shows us something about how he'd run the country if elected.

After John McCain nailed down the Republican nomination in March, his campaign began wrestling with a sensitive personnel issue: who would manage this summer's GOP convention in St. Paul, Minn.? The campaign recently tapped Doug Goodyear for the job, a veteran operative and Arizonan who was chosen for his "management experience and expertise," according to McCain press secretary Jill Hazelbaker. But some allies worry that Goodyear's selection could fuel perceptions that McCain--who has portrayed himself as a crusader against special interests--is surrounded by lobbyists. Goodyear is CEO of DCI Group, a consulting firm that earned $3 million last year lobbying for ExxonMobil, General Motors and other clients.

Potentially more problematic: the firm was paid $348,000 in 2002 to represent Burma's military junta, which had been strongly condemned by the State Department for its human-rights record and remains in power today. Justice Department lobbying records show DCI pushed to "begin a dialogue of political reconciliation" with the regime. It also led a PR campaign to burnish the junta's image, drafting releases praising Burma's efforts to curb the drug trade and denouncing "falsehoods" by the Bush administration that the regime engaged in rape and other abuses. "It was our only foreign representation, it was for a short tenure, and it was six years ago," Goodyear told NEWSWEEK, adding the junta's record in the current cyclone crisis is "reprehensible."

Hmmm. I wonder if honest John's plan to encourage more gasoline consumption has something to do with his budy Doug. Does this sound familiar? The Republican need to give their party a more accurate moniker--the Oilicrats perhaps? (Or is there a way to morph plutocrat and oil into one word?)

"We were created for conflict."

McCain's pastor problem (YouTube)

So here are the top 10 Memorable Quotes said by McCain's religious advisers:

1. "Do you know the difference between a woman with PMS and a snarling Doberman pinscher? The answer is lipstick. Do you know the difference between a terrorist and a woman with PMS? You can negotiate with a terrorist." - Pastor John Hagee in his book What Every Man Wants in a Woman (Charisma House, 2005)

2. "The Quran teaches that [all Muslims have a mandate to kill Christians and Jews]. Yes, it teaches that very clearly." -Pastor John Hagee
Living Liberally :: Top 10 Outrageous Quotes From McCain's Spiritual Advisers

3. "I believe that the Hurricane Katrina was, in fact, the judgment of God against the city of New Orleans...I believe that New Orleans had a level of sin that was offensive to God, and they are -- were recipients of the judgment of God for that...There was to be a homosexual parade there on the Monday that the Katrina came. And the promise of that parade was that it was going to reach a level of sexuality never demonstrated before in any of the other Gay Pride parades.... The Bible teaches that when you violate the law of God, that God brings punishment sometimes before the day of judgment." -Pastor John Hagee

4. "The military will have difficultly recruiting healthy and strong heterosexuals for combat purposes. Why? Fighting in combat with a man in your fox hole that has AIDS or is HIV positive is double jeopardy." - Pastor John Hagee on Don't Ask Don't Tell

5. "[Gay marriage] will open the door to incest, to polygamy, and every conceivable marriage arrangement demented minds can possibly conceive. If God does not then punish America, He will have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah." - Pastor John Hagee

6. "It is impossible to call yourself a Christian and defend homosexuality. There is no justification or acceptance of homosexuality.... Homosexuality means the death of society because homosexuals can recruit, but they cannot reproduce." - Pastor John Hagee

7. "Only a Spirit-filled woman can submit to her husband's lead. It is the natural desire of a woman to lead through feminine manipulation of the man...Fallen women will try to dominate the marriage. The man has the God-given role to be the loving leader of the home." - Pastor John Hagee in his book What Every Man Wants in a Woman (Charisma House, 2005)

8. "I cannot tell you how important it is that we understand the true nature of Islam, that we see it for what it really is. In fact, I will tell you this: I do not believe our country can truly fulfill its divine purpose until we understand our historical conflict with Islam. I know that this statement sounds extreme, but I do not shrink from its implications. The fact is that America was founded, in part, with the intention of seeing this false religion destroyed, and I believe September 11, 2001, was a generational call to arms that we can no longer ignore." - Rod Parsley in Silent No More (Charisma House, 2005)

9. "Gay sexuality inevitably involves brutal physical abusiveness and the unnatural imposition of alien substances into internal organs, orally and anally, that inevitably suppress the immune system and heighten susceptibility to disease." - Rod Parsley

10. "Only 1 percent of the homosexual population in America will die of old age. The average life expectancy for a homosexual in the United States of America is 43 years of age. A lesbian can only expect to live to be 45 years of age. Homosexuals represent 2 percent of the population, yet today they're carrying 60 percent of the known cases of syphilis." - Rod Parsley

The media's take on this is interesting. It's a sin to be in any way critical of the US but a virtue to spout hatred for the marginalized both within and outside of the country. By the way, the idea that Middle Easterner Muslims are going to be attacking our shores some time soon as they march to take over the world is so ludicrous that it could be the plot to the next Batman movie (except that it wouldn't even be plausible in that context).

I've been bounced!

I guess I should just give up. There's a large group of rightwing idiots petrified that someone will bring up uncomfortable facts. The Discerning Texan recently "bounced" me from his comments for being "a misinformed wacko" with the gall to mention the fact that the US wasn't going to drill itself out of its oil shortage.

Boing! That is the sound of a misinformed wacko being bounced from the comments...2 percent of the worlds RESERVES is one hell of a lot of oil, easily enough to drastically lower the price. (and I even question the 2% number when you include both coasts, Florida, Alaska, and the HUGE new field they just found in the Dakotas...)As for daily usage, the Chinese just passed us up as numero uno. But no wacko wants to say anything bad about their brothers in the struggle for world socialism....Statistics are like a*holes: everybody's got one. The oldest trick in the book is to throw out numbers that have absolutely nothing to do with one another, nor the poing being made....

The US has an 11 year supply of oil. If we stopped importing and drilled every inch and crevice of every oil field in the US, our supply would completely run dry in 2019. When placed on a graph, US reserves are so miniscule that the graph has to be stretched vertically for the US amount to be fully visible. The petroleum reserve, if we used every drop of it, gives us a whopping two months of gas.

It's strange. To my recollection, I've never cursed or engaged in ad hominem attacks on rightwing blogs, but I've been bounced or personally attacked numerous times. Swerve Left, on the other hand, has been going since January 2004 and I have yet to ban anyone from commenting. I even keep rightwinged blogs (those few that engage in rational debate) on my blogroll. This just goes to show how frightened some people are of actual debate. Mr. Discerning Texan can now go back to his fellow Fox News nimwits who think that oil prices are solely due to the fact that environmental fascist terrorists won't let Shrub drill in Alaska. The same people who think the earth is 10,000 years old, evolution is a commie plot, that the terrorists are planning to gas their rural Texan trailer, and that George Bush is a cowboy.