Wedding Slideshow
Sunday November 28th 2004, 8:13 pm
So, the good folks at Downhill Battle have released BlogTorrent, a nifty tool that allows any schmoe to turn big ass files into bit torrents and upload them into files that have an extractor and downloader thingamegimme mixed in. And it all works, supposedly, without any stupidity. I like this idea. I like bit torrents. I had to give it a shot, and I need your help. How? By watching the slideshow I made for Anne’s and my wedding.
If you do pull it down, please let me know at rakSPAMSUCKSatREALLYSUCKSdotNOREALLYorg (everything in caps you should remove, natch).
Red State, Blue State, Still Lots of Ugly…
Monday November 22nd 2004, 10:08 am
Someone pointed me to We’re Not Sorry (you can find it on Google), a photo gallery of Bush supporters. They hold up signs that say “Yay for us! George W. fuckin’ ROCKS!”
It is filled with lots of very ugly people, and I’m not talking about their attitudes. We’re Not Sorry’s denizens are, in my unbiased opinion, ugly.
The whole site is a response to We’re Sorry, a photo gallery of Kerry supporters apologizing to the world. I hadn’t checked it out until just now, and I am proud to say that our nation is not as divided as we thought. The people who posted there? Just as ugly.
Truly, we are a mighty nation if our ugly people can feel free and confident enough to post their pictures on the Internet so the entire world can look and point and laugh at the freaks.
Things to Do
Tuesday November 09th 2004, 9:18 pm
1) Keep Terry McAullife, Donna Brazille, James Carville, Paul Begala and Bob Shrum (especially him) the hell away from the leadership of the Democratic Party. We thank you for your service in the past, but it’s time to go. We’ll call you, right after we take care of the next step.
2) Get a unified message of what it means to be a Democrat. Don’t be Republican lite, don’t be contemptuous, don’t be be equivocating. Come up with the message, and fucking stick to it.
3) Don’t forget: turn the compost pile this weekend.
(’Cause life goes on, you know?)
So
Wednesday November 03rd 2004, 3:12 pm
I like to think that if John Kerry had won, I would have felt nothing but overwhelming relief. No gloating, no triumphant “In your FACE!” Just relief. The feeling that, finally, people have realized how incompetant and crooked the Bush Administration is and what a disaster four more years would have been. Relief and a feeling that, yes, things might be on the track to peace, prosperity and boobies.
I haven’t seen much relief from the other side today, at least on the non-partisan sites I check out. There’s been no “Thank God, George W. Bush got re-elected so he can continue his policies.” It’s been all-gloat, all the time. I feel like I’m on a third-rate junior high football team that just got stomped 1000-nothing by a team of pros who were loaded on steroids and buffalo testosterone. The phrase “bad winner” comes to mind.
Just two thoughts for you Big Winners, then:
1) Now that you’ve got all three branches of government, the only people you can blame for your screw-ups are yourselves.
2) Please, please, please get cocky and complacent. You’ve got the government you wanted. Try not to break it too much; we’ll be taking it back starting two years from now.
One last nudge in the kidneys…
Tuesday November 02nd 2004, 12:06 pm
…to Victor Elizalde. Dude, either someone’s playing dirty tricks on you, or you’re really, really running the most clueless campaign in the state. Robocalls are one thing, but sidewalk graffitti?
You know, I think it would be possible to run a competitive campaign against Henry Waxman. Really. I think there’s enough Republican money in Los Angeles to raise a good fight, and Waxman’s been in office long enough that he could get slapped with labels that might actually stick (”liberal” is not one of them, at least not on the Westside). The two robocalls I’ve gotten from Elizalde are more evidence of someone who’s out of touch with his potential constituency, and this sidewalk spraying clinches it. It’s bad enough to annoy people, but to dirty their streets? And to violate the rules? If you couldn’t find supporters in Santa Monica who wanted to put signs in their front yards, dude, that’s your problem. Don’t make a mess in my fucking neighborhood.
Vote!
Tuesday November 02nd 2004, 11:41 am
If there’s anything that goes wrong with today, I’m going to chalk it up to bureaucratic stupidity more than dirty tricks. Not that I think there are devious political operatives who are going to get the dead to vote or keep people from voting. I’m sure they’ll be out in force today. But I don’t think they can match the sheer magnitude of a bureaucracy’s fuck-ups.
If you have problems with voting, call 1-866-MYVOTE1.
If you need immediate legal assistance, call 1-866-OUR-VOTE.
If you need me, I’ll be here, working and writing and making chili and cornbread.
Junk Mail Rally - Fin
Monday November 01st 2004, 3:21 pm
I had this great idea, back when I got my first unsolicted campaign mailer in May. I thought, hey, wouldn’t it be funny to hang on to all of the junk mail and show how big the stack got? It would be like high school, when I got enough college brochures to fill a large box. (That was a hell of an ego-booster, by the way. Harvard wants me to apply? So does Akron College? Sweet! After we all got accepted into our various colleges, my friends and I went to the beach and had a brochure bonfire. Fire good.)
My desk became clogged with the damn things, and Anne decided that it would be in the best interests of our marriage to clear out the office of any and all extraneous crap. The junk mailers were the first things to go when I upended my desk into a trashcan. I was sick of seeing them, sick of their claims and counterclaims, and, most of all, sick of giving them more mindshare than they deserved.
So, who wins? Who cares? Another bunch of assholes will be in the city council and school board. Woo-hoo! Santa Monica’s not about to dig itself out of its development backlog, the traffic will only get worse, and the parks will still smell of urine and bums. Third Street will look more and more like every other mall in America, Montana will get so expensive that stores will only exist for brand visibility, and the abandoned house on the corner will still be abandoned. The real power is with the city manager and the city attorney, and they’re not going to get bounced out any time soon. SMRR and the Chamber of Commerce are both too funded and powerful to give up their antagonistic relationship, and all of the city’s neighborhood nag groups will only get more entrenched and uptight and high on the little whiffs of power they get from their patron factions.
If I could become benevolent dictator of California, just for a little bit, I’d make laws saying that your political group’s real purpose must be reflected in your name. You can’t be Santa Monicans for Renters’ Rights; you’re now Santa Monicans for Cheap Rent. You’re no longer Santa Monicans for Change; you’re Owned by the Beachfront Hotels. Or, better yet, you’re all Annoying Assholes Who Waste Paper, Time and Bandwidth.
I’ll be so glad when this election is over.
