Click images for desktop size: "Wedding" by Clarence Holbrook Carter There's an apochraphylic story from the sixties.
Lyndon Johnson was running for Senator. He told his campaign manager to start spreading a rumour that his opponent had carnal knowledge of sows.
The campaign manager was aghast. He sputtered, "Mr Johnson, we can't say he's a pig f***er! Its not true!"
In the joke Johnson replied, "I know that. The point is to make him deny it!"
The Republican Party never got the joke.
There latest commercial libeling Obama is a dangerous disgrace.
Implying that Obama is a pedophile goes too far. It harkens back to the evil Nixon "Dirty Tricks" campaign.
It also presents an ugly innuendo about the Republicans. The statement that they are using in their sly innuendo was a plea to teach kindergarten students the difference between good and bad touching from an adult.
Its not unreasonable to purpose that the Republicans don't want children to know the difference. Since they've created the ad its fair to surmise that they are advocating keeping children ignorant and even less able to protect themselves. Any right thinking man could decide that they wanted children ignorant so that they can prey upon them.
One of the few things I whole heartedly agree with Obama about and its twisted like this.
I've worked with young people for a whole lot of years. Its always been important to me that no kid, male or female, ever feel uncomfortable around me. I spend a lot of time in locker rooms with the kids. I've always made it a hard unbreakable rule that no coach, including myself, ever be alone with a kid in those sort of situations. There must always be at least one other coach and one other player. Its not much but its all I could come up. Kids are already woefully ignorant. They are
Click images for desktop size: "Flying Withus Dog" by Flying Wombat 007 vulnerable. They need approval and they need affection. Even 6' 5" 280 pound line backers.
They have to be protected. They need to be better informed. They need cool headed education from day one.
Not according to the Republicans.
I'm not a bible student. Maybe there's nothing in the bible about protecting the welfare of children.
Sarah Palin is a nightmare.
One of her decisions as mayor was to have the police charge rape victims for their rape kit examination . . . . She's strongly, vigorously on record demanding that rape victims who might sadly become pregnant be forced to carry the child to term . . . Clearly sexual predators are not inhuman monsters in her eyes.
People are actually still claiming that the "liberal media" are being unfair to her and McCain. What liberal media?
McCain lies all over the place and it should be ignored? And not ignoring it means you're a liberal?
McCain's incessant lying and rewriting of history being accepted as fact scares me. Its that old childish thing, "tell a lie three times and people will think its true." Its been proven effective for the Republicans since Nixon. Why change?
It does bother me that at his age McCain might not be able to tell what is the truth anymore. It would explain his stream of contradictory answers to things. Each moment he may be living in a different truth, like most of us.
Not being ageist just trying to understand how a man who purports himself to be a good man can be so many things that I typify as being a bad man.
Sarah Palin though: she's a pure monster. An ugly vile contemptible monster. Forgetting her bounty on wolves ($150 a leg . . .) Her vindictiveness and her Nazi like attempt to ban books, BOOKS! What is most vile is her attempt to suppress religious freedom.

Click images for desktop size: "Horrifique 2" by Unknown I do consider attempts to "cure" homosexuals and Jews as vile and an attempt to suppress religious freedom.
Its not that I find her religion so bizarre. All religions look bizarre to outsiders. The Catholic church with its ritualistic cannibalism would terrify an alien. It preaches against graven images but fills its churches with statues and graven images . . .
I'm sure that my own personal religion formed from years of Catholic catechism, zen learned from TV, movies, comic books and rock & roll seem freaky and other worldly to anybody outside of myself but that's cool. Its what I believe and I have a right to it.
It works for me and it doesn't interfere with you believing whatever you believe in.
When a religion preaches that you have to give them money or you're not allowed to believe or that it preaches intolerance of another's beliefs it stops being a religion to me. It becomes something ugly that is only an excuse to hate.
Palin, when she's not slurring dogs is slurring people and slurring those people's rights to believe what they chose to believe. She has argued that her faith is the true faith and that others are wrong! She argues so fervently that it seems clear that she will not allow me to believe what I chose, nor will she allow you to have your own personal religion.
She calls herself a "hockey mom". Which, I guess, is some bastardization of soccer mom. I always thought of soccer mom as a pretty pejorative term. It implies a woman who has no interest in sports but doesn't mind schlepping her kids around because she gets to socialize with other pampered upper middle class and upper class women where they can sit around and kvetch about their husband's career. It also implies a woman who's world of experience is so shut down that they can't envision another world.
I never viewed it as a compliment. I don't know of any women who embrace the term, until now. In fact I know many woman who resent being called soccer moms. They think its degrading.
It looks like the Republicans are going to steal the country from us and win the election. The rest of the world is amused or terrified. Unfortunately its our enemies who are amused and are friends and the neutral nations that are terrified.

Yesterday Apple released iTunes 8.
This is the worst piece of software Apple has ever released. It is draconian in the same way Microsoft is draconian. It is evil.
I'm not even talking about the way it begs for my complicity in sharing all my personal tastes and personality with them.
About 5 or 6 years ago, back in the days when OSX was called Jaguar, I think, Apple released an update that killed your internet connection! Not just mine but everyone who updated! I had to go to the public library and get the fix.
As ugly as that was most Apple users viewed it with wry amusement. We believed that Apple and its users were a team. This was just a mistake. We forgave and understood.
Then the iPod took off.
iTunes 8 is a cynical marketing ploy. Its contemptible.
One of the things I like about OSX is that its attractive, easy on the eyes, easy to work and concentrate without being overwhelmed with brutally ugly widgets and canvases.
iTunes 8 has decided that trying to trick me into impulse purchases is more important than me having my computer look the way I want it to look.
They've disabled some pretty basic functions. Some for no reason I can think of, some to turn iTunes into an advertising piece of spam.

Click images for desktop size: "The Cabinet Of Dr Caligari" Its unacceptable. By hacking around in the app I could get it looking presentable but then discovered that it renames all of my files and there is NO WAY to stop it. It does this for its convenience, not for mine. No way to keep my files named the way I want them named . . . how draconian. How Microsoft.
When this computer dies I will most likely get a much cheaper than Mac pc and run Ubuntu.
Apple is bending towards WalMart's ways and running the computers to the benefit of money and the iPhone. I bought the computer to work for me, not for them.
Oh, and there is no easy way to uninstall iTunes 8 and go back to iTunes 7. I know how to do it but I wonder if its worth the effort.
Nothing works better in iTunes 8. The only reason for the update was the Genius (!?!) bar and to add all the spam stuff.

With all my carping you might not believe it but I had a good day yesterday.
I took my ebike to my appointment with the High School head coach. That was pleasant and fun.
The interview was less so. Nothing wrong with it but I have some questions that I never got the clear cut concise answers I wanted.
I'm being understanding. As usual I'm trying to be careful and not be too understanding. I'm trying not to let my eagerness cloud my judgement.
My phone just buzzed to tell me that I had to recharge the battery. In that moment I was totally rushed thinking it was "the call".

Click images for desktop size: "African Desert" by Unknown The main problem is that the school can't afford to hire pure football coaches. They have teachers who've volunteered for unpaid overtime . . . I've been there before.
Teachers have a different perspective on the kids then a coach does. They should. They have different responsibilities and, while they do share some common goals they also have different goals. My concern is that the overwhelming goal be to the benefit of the kids.
Now I just get to wait for my phone to recharge then I'm biking to the store to get a couple can's of dog food!
Life is good and interesting even if the outside world isn't.