The Travails of the Astounding!

I really dig this sort of shot. It's hard for me to snap strangers in the street though. I feel squeamish about such invasions. I suppose it's easier with friends, because I can anticipate reactions. To me, it's always difficult making that decision, to attempt to capture that sublime moment of contemplation, or to avoid disrupting it all together. Reminds me of that quote from The Man Who Wasnt There, "But sometimes you look at it, your looking changes it. Ya can't know the reality of what happened, or what would've happened if you hadn't-a stuck in your own goddamn schnozz."I need to take that chance more often
. Okay, so here's the thing. Made to choose between a rivalry within Athletes Incorporated and the love of a great underdog story, the choice would be easy. Go Boston, Go. See: I care about sports up to a certain extent because of the nature of a teams story. And usually thats the story of the Mets cause hey, I'm a New York kind of guy. I like that they havent won a World Series since I first understood what the strange hat system meant. And the Subway Series with the Yanks? Oh man! What a glorious beating! But that's all part of the saga. The endless story that is sports. And let's face it, all sports stories are part of the greater story of lot's of people get worked up for whothehellknowswhat. So, when a team down 3 games in a best of 4 series, against their ARCH FUCKING RIVALS (I love good a villian, and the Yankees are great Villians), umm.. yeah, against their ARCH FUCKING RIVALS, to win the next 7 games brining them to their first Championship win in 86 years well, fuck. That's a great story!

Anyway enough about sports.

So I know this sort of thing happens in politics all the time. BUT DAMN. Every now and then, I feel it's vital to point out how FUCKED UP the status quo is. If this is politics as usual then usual politics must evolve, and awareness of such things is vital. Now, of course BOTH parties lie. However when you consider events in the order they occurred certain patterns emerge.

Afghanistan looks good when you think about the elections. But the Bush administration has done a very shitty job in controlling drugs and thusly territory has fallen back into Taliban control. Shit, Bin Laden did more to control drugs than Bush is, drug production has gone UP since the war! You remember Bin Laden, the REAL Villain in this sordid affair called Recent American History. Don't worry about Saddam and Iraq I'll get to that in a sec.

Like Now. First, President Bush tells us that Saddam is fixin to grease us. And well, after 911, some of us were really paranoid about that. So many believed him. Then it turned out that that was bogus. I suspected it was bowash the entire time, lucky guess.

We have not yet been able to corroborate the existence of a mobile biological weapons production effort. Technical limitations would prevent any of these processes from being ideally suited to these trailers. - Bush Administration Weapons Inspector David Kay, 10/2/03

SO, it became a human rights issue. Lets not forget that the human rights issue was NOT the reason given to going into war, it was a justification that came later. As far as the TENUOUS and often fabricated link between Iraq and Al-Qaeda, it is well known that neither Bin Laden or Hussein wanted to work together. They kinda hated each other.

Then there was that ridiculous Mission Accomplished fiasco. God, it's so easy for him to look stupid isnt it? Know why? Cause he gets it wrong so OFTEN! Remember when he said the war would pretty much pay for itself?! HAH! Bush says things are getting better in Iraq, but didnt Colin Powell just say things were getting worse?

Now, the FBI is looking into more Haliburton misconduct. Which informed citizen is truly surprised?

Even Republicans are highly disappointed with Bushs inaction, and failure. I leave you tonight with testimonials from Republicans who are voting Democrat for the first time in their lives. I think they offer some of the most compelling arguments.
A Marine who served in Iraq.
A former Marine.
A former Ambassador.
A Baptist with a great point.
A small business owner. (she's tiny!)
An idiot who voted for Bush.
A cool Republican old dude in a cool shirt.
A steel worker.
A crazy Punk activist...okay, just an angry old Republican.
A guy who still loves the Republican Party but won't vote for George Bush.
WHEW, that was exhausting.