Last Year's Blogs

In a swooping, majesterial screw-up last night, the Red Sox managed to lose 2 to 1 to the Texas Rangers. Yes it’s true, the Red Sox

http://www.bostondirtdogs.com/

have come to Brittany. The slipper blew the requisite $20 for a month to see a not-too-awful digitized version of the of a 20-seond-delayed live game on a four-inch screen, in the comfort our foreign living room, monopolizing my snazzier computer.

http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/apple-powerbook-g4-12/4505-3121_7-31278843.html

Rain and other March weather

http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/world/west_europe/

has curtailed our usual spare-time summer exploits of seaweed watching and deck lounging, so it is with relief that he can now watch the RSs lose even at a great distance.

Other exciting news includes the Spice Girls

http://music.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2113936,00.html

getting back together for a record-breaking, high-earning 10 months or so. They really should be Spice Women by now, they all looked a little incongruous in their push-up bras and what could only be described as corsets !? My grandmother, who actually wore them in anger, must be turning in her grave. Their light-weight ouevre used to send very young girls into paroxysms of ecstacy,while their light-weight costumes did the same for horny pop fans.

But it reminded me of P. Bush’s recent great ideanot the paroxysms, the looking back in timeness) inviting Vladimir Putin and the boys

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19500189/

to Maine. P. Bush’s world view has also been backwards looking. No matter how many push up bras and corsets he squeezes himself into, he still hearkens back to his posse’s (Cheney & Co.) old cold war “If You Wanna Be My Lover…” days. And you can imagine all those Cold Warriors sitting around the log fire up in Maine, toasting marshmellows and trading old CIA/KGB stories with the former Chief Spook himself, George Senior.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/topics/George+H.+W.+Bush

I think they are all happier this way, Evil Empire on one side, World Police on the other, both increasingly irrelevant in this China/India/Pacific Rim dominated world economy.

The Spice Girls made most of their money from little girls. The Cold Warriors thrived on proxy wars in third world countries that fueled fuel crises and arms races.

The world has moved on, yet these inconguous groups keep harkening back to the old days, when they made lots of money and wielded a lot of power.

Do we allow our culture and politics to be dominated by aging teeny boppers and behind-the-scenes men in suits? Do we have a choice?

The Red Sox are starting to look pretty good. —Pomerol

In a swooping, majesterial screw-up last night, the Red Sox managed to lose 2 to 1 to the Texas Rangers. Yes it’s true, the Red Sox

http://www.bostondirtdogs.com/

have come to Brittany. The slipper blew the requisite $20 for a month to see a not-too-awful digitized version of the of a 20-seond-delayed live game on a four-inch screen, in the comfort our foreign living room, monopolizing my snazzier computer.

http://reviews.cnet.com/laptops/apple-powerbook-g4-12/4505-3121_7-31278843.html

Rain and other March weather

http://www.bbc.co.uk/weather/world/west_europe/

has curtailed our usual spare-time summer exploits of seaweed watching and deck lounging, so it is with relief that he can now watch the RSs lose even at a great distance.

Other exciting news includes the Spice Girls

http://music.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,2113936,00.html

getting back together for a record-breaking, high-earning 10 months or so. They really should be Spice Women by now, they all looked a little incongruous in their push-up bras and what could only be described as corsets !? My grandmother, who actually wore them in anger, must be turning in her grave. Their light-weight ouevre used to send very young girls into paroxysms of ecstacy,while their light-weight costumes did the same for horny pop fans.

But it reminded me of P. Bush’s recent great ideanot the paroxysms, the looking back in timeness) inviting Vladimir Putin and the boys

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19500189/

to Maine. P. Bush’s world view has also been backwards looking. No matter how many push up bras and corsets he squeezes himself into, he still hearkens back to his posse’s (Cheney & Co.) old cold war “If You Wanna Be My Lover…” days. And you can imagine all those Cold Warriors sitting around the log fire up in Maine, toasting marshmellows and trading old CIA/KGB stories with the former Chief Spook himself, George Senior.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/topics/George+H.+W.+Bush

I think they are all happier this way, Evil Empire on one side, World Police on the other, both increasingly irrelevant in this China/India/Pacific Rim dominated world economy.

The Spice Girls made most of their money from little girls. The Cold Warriors thrived on proxy wars in third world countries that fueled fuel crises and arms races.

The world has moved on, yet these inconguous groups keep harkening back to the old days, when they made lots of money and wielded a lot of power.

Do we allow our culture and politics to be dominated by aging teeny boppers and behind-the-scenes men in suits? Do we have a choice?

The Red Sox are starting to look pretty good. —Pomerol

and jam. Heaven. —Pomerol

So Tony Blair is no more. He made his final appearance in Parliament yesterday (in England the Prime Minister has to actually stand up and defend his positions in front of the assembled members of parliament and it can get pretty rowdy. I cannot in a million years imagine P.Bush doing this) where there was a few token questions about policy, then laughter, tears, a lot of I-respect-you, no-I-respect-you-more stuff going on, and then it was finished.

Blair was in power for 10 years Slightly less than Margaret Thatcher
but still the longest serving Labor Prime minister in the history of Britain.

One reason he lasted so long is that he became less and less Laboresque as the years went by. This was most easily quantified by his blind support for P. Bush’s well-thought out and successful invasion of Iraq.

The people of Britain have had to bear the cost of supporting their troops as well as seeing the bodies of their dead soldiers return home. There is very little support among voters for Blair’s spaniel-like following of P. Bush’s every incoherent utterance.

But the people of America have to bear the consequences of his give-a-dog-a-bone policies as well. Time after time P. Bush has reminded us that our friend and ally, Tony Bloody Blair, was on “our” side, supported us, was supplying troops, and putting up with all kinds of indignities in order to swagger around wearing matching cowboy boots.

The thing, is Blair is a very smart guy. He trained as a lawyer, he battled his way to the top without the help of family connections, and he can defend his well-thought out policies in public.

He really messed us around. He lent P. Bush amazing amounts of credibility. People thought, P. Bush may have his ass on backwards, but Blair is smart. If Blair thinks there are weapons of mass destruction, the thinking went, it must be right.

Huge mistake, huge disappointment, huge lump of death, torture, trillions of dollars,
hypocrisy that America and the rest of the world is going to have to live with for a long time.

Creep. Good riddance. —Pomerol

I was raised by a conspiracy theorist. When I was in 7th or 8th grade, my mother gave me a book called the New Drug Story (Columbia Publishing Co, Washington, D.C.), an exposé about the pharmaceutical industry written in 1958.

The book is out of print, but used copies can be found online. When I saw the film version of John le Carre’s The Constant Gardener, I was reminded that my mom—like le Carre’s work of fiction—questioned the pharmaceutical industry–a foreboding authority that holds medical miracle secrets. I’m glad my mother taught my sisters and I to question authority (except her authority on things like curfews and smoking).

I am frustrated, however, that American must now figure out how to question a supreme authority. No, this is not a call to drop religion from your life. It’s a cry for help concerning Cowboy Bush’s Supreme Court legacy. In a nutshell: Bush got what he wanted.

As the Financial Times points out today,Bush is unpopular with voters and Congress, yet he has put in place a terribly conservative bench—one that will last long after he rides into the sunset. The problem, of course, is that our high court justices are lifers. They will rule until they decide to step down—or die. And Bush’s two new appointees, Samuel Alito (age 57) and Chief Justice John Roberts (age 53) are mere youngsters.

The Bush Supreme Court has sided with big business in most every decision that has come before it; and has taken a conservative—really neo-conservative—view of cases involving free speech, the environment, religion, the death penalty, and a women’s right to have an abortion.

No theory here—as usual, my mother was right. The Bush Supreme Court is a conspiracy against the people of the United States.–Chianti