You Go, Pre-Title IX Girls

Stephen Mally for The New York Times

Marlene Carver, 57, leading the pregame warm-ups for the Robins Late Bloomers last Wednesday.
NYTimes: Grannies Are Flexing Their Muscles, Gently

I don't have any nostalgia for six-a-side basketball or being forced to play in zones on the court. When I was in grade school we played that crazy game & I was always a defender, never a shooter, so I hated it; I never got to handle the ball! I love this article about the Granny Basketball League for that picture of those happy athletes finally getting their shot. If I had been born in 1953 instead of 1957, I would never have gotten to play high school sports. (Title IX became law in 1972.) If my sister had been born in 1957 rather than 1961, she wouldn't have gone to college on a basketball scholarship or played professionally. (Scholarships for women were first awarded by the AIAW in 1977.) I'm glad these women finally got a chance to play.

To the theme music from “The Sting,” members of the Cedar Rapids Sizzlers and the Robins Late Bloomers — two of the eight teams in the Granny Basketball League in Iowa, for women 50 and older — took the court. Dressed in white blouses, black bloomers and horizontally striped socks, the women lined up as they would have if their game had been played here in the 1920s.

[]

The games involve teams of six players. Two players from each side must remain in each of the three distinct sections of the court. Running and tight guarding are forbidden, and players can dribble only twice per possession.

Six-on-six basketball was an Iowa staple for girls for most of the 20th century, and it remained a source of pride long after the rest of the nation had adopted the five-on-five game.

Only the Granny Basketball League’s oldest participants saw or played the three-court game. Iowa switched to two courts in 1935, according to Troy Dannen, executive director of the Iowa Girls High School Athletic Union. Six-on-six games were played exclusively from the late 1800s through 1984, when the style was challenged in court by three girls who argued that it damaged their chances for college scholarships.

To settle the suit, the state agreed to sanction five-on-five and six-on-six competition, with schools choosing which to play. The athletic union’s board voted in 1993 to end six-player teams. At the time, Dannen said, roughly 140 of the state’s 396 schools were still playing it.

But many in Iowa remain nostalgic for the old style and for the dynamic scorers it produced, like Denise Long and Molly Bolin. Long was the first woman drafted by an N.B.A. team; the San Francisco Warriors selected her in 1969, but the selection was disallowed because high school players could not be drafted. Bolin, who was nicknamed Machine Gun, starred in the Women’s Professional Basketball League, which existed from 1978 to 1981.

The state tournament at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Des Moines was the ultimate event for Iowa schoolgirls, and the championship game frequently sold out. Those memories play into the Granny Basketball League’s popularity.

“I’m 63,” said Linda Toerper, McPherson’s sister, who plays for the Sizzlers. “But I’m really 16.”

[]

The game also offers a second chance to women who never played in high school. Irene Reinking, a 69-year-old from Cedar Rapids who has 14 grandchildren, stopped playing after eighth grade. “My dad didn’t think practicing basketball was the most important thing in the world,” she said. “So I stayed on the farm.”

Sen. Tim Johnson Update

Good news again -- Senator Johnson has been discharged from the hospital into a rehabilitation facility.

WaPo: JOHNSON UPDATE

More than two months after suffering a brain hemorrhage, Sen. Tim Johnson (D-S.D.) has left a Washington hospital and entered a private rehabilitation facility, his office said yesterday.

NYTimes: Sen. Johnson Moved to Private Rehab Facility

NYTimes Caucus Blog: Johnson Leaves Hospital

Billionaires for Bush

Estate tax statistics from an article by Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone (on the net on Alternet) on how Bush's budget compares to the estate tax cuts he wants to make permanent. (hat tip to Digby of Hullabaloo)

If the Estate Tax were to be repealed completely, the estimated savings to just one family -- the Walton family, the heirs to the Wal-Mart fortune -- would be about $32.7 billion dollars over the next ten years.

The proposed reductions to Medicaid over the same time frame? $28 billion.

Or how about this: if the Estate Tax goes, the heirs to the Mars candy corporation -- some of the world's evilest scumbags, incidentally, routinely ripped by human rights organizations for trafficking in child labor to work cocoa farms in places like Cote D'Ivoire -- if the estate tax goes, those assholes will receive about $11.7 billion in tax breaks. That's more than three times the amount Bush wants to cut from the VA budget ($3.4 billion) over the same time period.

Some other notable estimate estate tax breaks, versus corresponding cuts:

* Cox family (Cox cable TV) receives $9.7 billion tax break while education would get $1.5 billion in cuts

* Nordstrom family (Nordstrom dept. stores) receives $826.5 million tax break while Community Service Block Grants would be eliminated, a $630 million cut

* Ernest Gallo family (shitty wines) receives a $468.4 million cut while LIHEAP (heating oil to poor) would get a $420 million cut

And so on and so on. Sanders additionally pointed out that the family of former Exxon/Mobil CEO Lee Raymond, who received a $400 million retirement package, would receive about $164 million in tax breaks.

Compare that to the Commodity Supplemental Food Program, which Bush proposes be completely eliminated, at a savings of $108 million over ten years. The program sent one bag of groceries per month to 480,000 seniors, mothers and newborn children.

And think about how much money the government would have to spend on veteran's benefits if we weren't giving the heirs of Sam Walton billions of dollars.

Georgia State Senator Blocks Bill That Would Free Genarlow Wilson

For extra credit, readers, guess the race of GOP Senate President Pro Tempore Eric Johnson (R-District 1). He is the politician who blocked consideration of the bill which would free Genarlow Wilson and hundreds of others convicted of statutory rape and given mandatory 10-year sentences for consensual sex. Answer (& picture) below.

Karen Russell, HuffPo: GOP Rep. Blocks Bill To Free Genarlow Wilson

Yesterday GOP lawmaker Eric Johnson wrote an op-ed criticizing the bill after he originally supported the bill:

Usually, society complains about sentences that are perceived as too soft. Granted, this sentence was harsh. But it was MANDATORY under the law. Life comes with accountability for our decisions. Genarlow Wilson could have selected different friends to hang with. He could have joined millions of law-abiding teens all over the country enjoying New Years' Eve without alcohol, drugs and sex. He could have left the hotel when "the fun" started. He didn't. He made a choice. Now his life has changed forever. That is sad. I hope other young men and girls will learn from this tragedy and avoid his errors.

Johnson admits the sentence his harsh and tragic, yet he remains willing to throw this young man's life away. As Johnson himself says, "life comes with accountability for our decisions". I say we hold Johnson accountable for his decision to continue this injustice. The Georgia legislature and its flip-flopping leader Johnson must be held accountable for this tragedy. The bill should be placed back on the agenda and Georgians should have the chance to correct this gross miscarriage of justice.

NYTimes: Bill to Aid Georgian Convicted of Sex Crime Stalls in Assembly

ATLANTA, Feb. 19 — The second piece of legislation introduced with the intent of helping Genarlow Wilson, a former honor student and star athlete who is serving a 10-year prison sentence for having oral sex with a 15-year-old classmate, may be in trouble in the Georgia General Assembly.

Senator Emanuel D. Jones, a Democrat, sponsored the legislation, which would make it possible for judges to reconsider the cases of hundreds of young adults, including Mr. Wilson, who are serving long mandatory minimum sentences in prison for having consensual sex with teenage minors. Mr. Jones said the bill was mysteriously left off the agenda of the Senate Judiciary Committee last week.

And on Monday, the Senate’s leader, Eric Johnson, publicly denounced the bill and said that although Mr. Wilson, now 20, was serving a harsh sentence, he deserved no leniency.

Genarlow Wilson Online Petition



Question Answer: Georgia State Senate Leadership

Unsurprisingly, he's white.

Kirsten Gillibrand in NYTimes

Nathaniel Brooks for The New York Times

An Albany International Airport worker greeted his new congresswoman, Kirsten Gillibrand, with her mother, Polly Rutnik, and her son, Theo, 3.
Frenetic Start in Congress for One Democrat, Class of ’06

SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. — When Kirsten Gillibrand was elected to Congress this past November in a tide of Democratic victories, she soon learned that her campaigning was not over.

This political novice found herself in a precarious position: a Democrat trying to represent an overwhelmingly Republican district extending into the state’s North Country, a onetime Manhattan lawyer in a place of factory and mill workers, dairy farmers and retired military veterans.

Now, even as the congratulatory letters continue to trickle in, she often looks like a candidate who is still on the run. Ms. Gillibrand, 40, spends virtually every free moment scurrying back from Washington to her district to attend town hall gatherings, meet-and-greets at local malls and — yes, already — a fund-raiser.

That frenetic pace reflects her uncomfortable reality: that her victory last fall, like the success of Democrats nationwide, may have been an aberration that could be undone with a swing in the mood of the electorate or by formidable opposition.

Politically, the first term is typically when House incumbents are most at risk of defeat. And Kirsten Gillibrand is among the most vulnerable of this group. Even her closest advisers acknowledged during last year’s campaign that her odds of winning were slim, given that she was facing a four-term Republican incumbent in a district where Republicans outnumbered Democrats by roughly 80,000.

Gillibrand was criticized in a recent post on firedoglake for her middle of the road positions and constant fundraising; I don't think people understand just how conservative and Republican her district is. Having grown up there, I do.

More from the NYTimes article on the district:

The passion the war arouses in her district was illustrated at that meeting. A constituent rushed up to her and loudly warned her not to support any of the resolutions that Democrats were considering to express disapproval of Mr. Bush’s proposed troop buildup in Iraq.

Pointing directly at Ms. Gillibrand, the man, Dave Browner, told her that many lives were at stake. “You’re in the big leagues now,” he said, his voice rising. “Any resolution will put our troops in danger.”

Then, as he turned and began storming off, Ms. Gillibrand did something that seemed to disarm him: she gently held him by the arm and thanked him for his thoughts. But ultimately, she did not commit to a position.

(As it turned out, on Feb. 16 she voted for a nonbinding resolution denouncing the president’s plan but including two simple clauses expressing support for the troops.)

Roots in the District

Such passions typify the 20th Congressional District, a bedrock Republican area that encompasses dairy farms, stretches of Adirondack State Park and the northern counties of exurban New York City, including Columbia and upper Dutchess, areas that have increasingly drawn New York commuters and second-home buyers.

I'm not sure if this is good news or not for Gillibrand (I no longer trust the Grey Lady after they withheld information about Bush Administration lawbreaking before the 2004 election, and then there's Judy Miller and the Clinton attacks of the 1990s) but the Times says this article is part of continuing series:

The Freshman
Settling In
This is the first article in a series that will chronicle Kirsten Gillibrand’s first year in Congress.

Wildlife Spotted

This bobcat was photographed by a woman in her backyard in Barre, Mass., west and north of Worcester. (Worcester Telegram)

Try Not To Think About This While You're Going Through Airport Security

BoingBoing: TSA site pwned by identity thieves

The TSA's website was hacked by identity thieves who used the "Click here if you're on a no-fly list" to harvest personal information. Lots of sites get pwned by hackers. Most of those sites aren't run by entities who claim that they're keeping the skies safe by taking away our toothpaste. Is it any wonder that an organization that thinks flip-flops are made safer by passing through the X-ray machine is incapable of managing to secure its own servers?

Supporting The Troops, Republican Style

Smile for the photo op, soldier!
whitehouse.gov caption: President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush talk with Sgt. Patrick Hagood of Anderson, S.C., Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2005, during their visit to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington D.C. White House photo by Paul Morse
WaPo: THE OTHER WALTER REED
The Hotel Aftermath
Inside Mologne House, the Survivors of War Wrestle With Military Bureaucracy and Personal Demons

Returning veterans who have served in the army of AWOL McFlightsuit and five-deferments-I-had-other-priorities Darth Cheney are treated like shit by the underfunded Veterans Administration. But aren't you glad millionaires are getting all those great tax cuts!

This may be the worst story in the article; this poor double amputee was left off the guest list for a White House ceremony because his missing legs would show. Sick.

Perks and stardom do not come to every amputee. Sgt. David Thomas, a gunner with the Tennessee National Guard, spent his first three months at Walter Reed with no decent clothes; medics in Samarra had cut off his uniform. Heavily drugged, missing one leg and suffering from traumatic brain injury, David, 42, was finally told by a physical therapist to go to the Red Cross office, where he was given a T-shirt and sweat pants. He was awarded a Purple Heart but had no underwear.

David tangled with Walter Reed's image machine when he wanted to attend a ceremony for a fellow amputee, a Mexican national who was being granted U.S. citizenship by President Bush. A case worker quizzed him about what he would wear. It was summer, so David said shorts. The case manager said the media would be there and shorts were not advisable because the amputees would be seated in the front row.

" 'Are you telling me that I can't go to the ceremony 'cause I'm an amputee?' " David recalled asking. "She said, 'No, I'm saying you need to wear pants.' "

David told the case worker, "I'm not ashamed of what I did, and y'all shouldn't be neither." When the guest list came out for the ceremony, his name was not on it.

Here's the link for the first part of the story from Sunday's WaPo.

Has Anyone Told John McCain?

I don't think Tom Brady has been practicing abstinence, do you?

Boston Globe: Tom Brady's former girlfriend pregnant
Actress identifies Patriots QB as father

Boston Herald: Daddy oh! Bridget’s pregnant, but Tom has no plans to marry ex-galpal

Support the Troops is Just a Catchphrase in Bushworld

Hey, man, we're just here for the photo op.
WhiteHouse.gov caption: President George W. Bush and Mrs. Laura Bush talk with Sgt. Patrick Hagood of Anderson, S.C., Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2005, during their visit to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington D.C. White House photo by Paul Morse
Here's your compassionate conservatism. Walter Reed Army Medical Center is a frightening labrynth where soldiers and their families are left to cope basically on their own, a direct result of the starvation diet veteran's programs have been on via Bush's tax cutting war budgets. Plus, Chimpy McFlightsuit would rather scatter $10 billion dollars to a bunch of lowlife leeches like Halliburton than fund care for the soldiers he sends off to fight his war. Shame. Maybe Bush's handlers could send him into Building 18 so it will get cleaned up for the photo-op?

WaPo: Soldiers Face Neglect, Frustration At Army's Top Medical Facility

Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan's room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.

This is the world of Building 18, not the kind of place where Duncan expected to recover when he was evacuated to Walter Reed Army Medical Center from Iraq last February with a broken neck and a shredded left ear, nearly dead from blood loss. But the old lodge, just outside the gates of the hospital and five miles up the road from the White House, has housed hundreds of maimed soldiers recuperating from injuries suffered in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

[]

While the hospital is a place of scrubbed-down order and daily miracles, with medical advances saving more soldiers than ever, the outpatients in the Other Walter Reed encounter a messy bureaucratic battlefield nearly as chaotic as the real battlefields they faced overseas.

On the worst days, soldiers say they feel like they are living a chapter of "Catch-22." The wounded manage other wounded. Soldiers dealing with psychological disorders of their own have been put in charge of others at risk of suicide.

Disengaged clerks, unqualified platoon sergeants and overworked case managers fumble with simple needs: feeding soldiers' families who are close to poverty, replacing a uniform ripped off by medics in the desert sand or helping a brain-damaged soldier remember his next appointment.

Just For Laughs

In my office, that person is me.
A hilarious clip from Canadian TV (2000) with bonus appearances by Mike Huckabee, Chimpy McFlightsuit, and Tom Vilsack (via liberal catnip, a blog I recently discovered & mean to add to the blog roll. Note to self, update blogroll!)

Bob Geiger's Saturday Cartoons

Via Democratic Veteran, read Anthony Bourdain's takedown of the current 'chefs' on The Food Network.

Presidential candidate and serial liar John McCain comes out in favor of abstinence for the unmarried in his campaign today. Problem? Apparently Mr. FlipFlop Express was, himself, somewhat of a get-it-on-john. Whoops!

Hard to Keep Up

Republican shenanigans are too numerous to catalogue. I'll try, but these are the tip of the iceberg.

Once again, Bush is sending troops into Iraq without the necessary armor to protect Humvees from IEDs.

And when those soldiers are wounded as a result of Bushco's incompetence, the Pentagon is now refusing to let VA doctors see medical records from field treatment for the poor kids they're treating at Walter Reed and other US hospitals. Sick bastards.

Dick Cheney's son-in-law scuttles chemical plant security.

Nevada Governor investigated for receiving 'gifts' from contractors.

Alaskan Congressman uses false Lincoln quote (published in the Washington Times this week, also) on the floor of the House.

The Justice Department's top environmental prosecutor signed a consent decree with ConocoPhillips. Problem? She was dating their top lobbyist, and they just bought a house together.

As an antidote to all this bad news, I recommend watching Ohio Representative Tim Ryan's speech on the floor of the House yesterday, at this diary on dailykos. Now that's how I want Democrats to respond. Tough and on point.

[Republicans try to shout him down with a parliamentary question}
I will not yield.

Now let me speak to the resolution. This is very simple. It says two things. We support our troops and we do not support escalation. It's very simple. And here's why.

We have already done this. Mr. Speaker; we've already done this, we've already tried the escalation, and it HAS. NOT. WORKED. From November to January '05, we escalated by 18,000 troops, boots on the ground, and the number of daily attacks increased by 17%. From June to October of '05, we increased by 21,000 boots on the ground, and the number of dialy attacks increased by 29%. And from May to November of '06, 17,000 more boots on the ground, and the number of daily attacks increased by 80%.

This escalation has not worked, and it will not work. The number of insurgents has increased from 5,000 in '03 to between 20,000 and 30,000 in October '06.

So this is very simple. And I wanna make just a few more points Mr. Speaker, and one is this: with the last vote for the war, no matter which party you are in or how you voted, we assumed that the President and the Secretary of Defense would send our troops over there with the proper equipment. But with this escalation, Mr. Speaker, we know that the 21,500 troops that are going to go over there will not have the proper Humvee kits, up-armor for their Humvees, they won't have the proper jamming devices or enough of them, and the won't have have the number of trucks that they need. Period, dot. You now know it.

So if you vote against this resolution, you're voting to send our troops over there without the proper equipment. Before it could be excused. Because we trusted the president and assumed, but now we know.

And finally, Mr. Speaker, we've heard a lot over the past couple days about the American Revolution, and the Civil War, and World War Two. Well Mr. Speaker, our President today is not Washington, he is not Lincoln, and he is not Roosevelt. And so I think our Republican colleagues should take the advice of the Secretary of Defense, and that is YOU GO TO WAR WITH THE PRESIDENT YOU HAVE. You don't go to war with the President you wish you had.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Nancy Pelosi's Got a Blog

And it's pretty good. Be sure to watch the statements of the Democratic veterans opposing Chimpy's escalation plan.

The Gavel

Sad, Then Happy News

Sad: The New York Times and the Washington Post (aka Pravda and the Soviet News Agency) violating their anonymous news policies and ONCE AGAIN letting the Bush Administration gin up a false case for war: Glenn Greenwald (now at salon.com, you have to watch an ad to read it, but it's worth it).

But then, I can't tell you how happy this little story made me:

Look at the picture of Chimpy McFlightsuit in this WaPo article trying to get a 7-year-old boy to stop flashing the peace sign. Those kids were smart:

As Bush chatted with some children, other youngsters were overheard by a pool reporter.

"He's my favorite president," one said.

"My favorite president is President Obama," another replied.

"Who's that?"

"He's the first black president."

Hat tip to Gristmill

Footie News

By Stephen Dunn, Getty Images
Jimmy Conrad celebrates his first international goal, a score that put the U.S. up 1-0 over Mexico. (USA Toady)

"The Bake, Boca & Deuce Show at Craven Cottage" Yanks Abroad: FULHAM'S AMERICAN ROOTS

US Women's National Team coach Greg Ryan has named his squad for the Algarve Cup next month; Shannon Boxx is back from injury.

The draw for the Copa America tournament was today, and as usual, the US is in the Group of Death (three World Cup qualifying teams + Columbia)

Tim Howard will sign a five-year contract and make his move from Manchester United to Everton permanent (USA Today/ icLiverpool has a nice article on Timmy, too.)

My Soccer Blog has player rankings for the US players for the US-Mexico game last week.

When you can't get to the TV, crazed footie fans, you can watch SkySports on your computer at this website. Scroll down, it's in a box on the right. (hat tip to 101 Great Goals)

Video highlights: 12 best goals around the world in January (YouTube, via 101 Great Goals)

10 best goals in England's Championship this year

Don't miss Zinedine Zidane's Top Ten Goals; what ball control skills (YouTube via Who Ate All The Pies)

Another Corporation Smears Democrats

RawStory: An image of bondage gear is then shown, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi then depicted in a dominatrix outfit while the associated jingle declares that "Love is free with Pelosi":
This time it's Blue Mountain Greeting Company, a subsidiary of American GreetingsInteractive which is owned by American Greetings.

I won't be buying any American Greetings cards until I see a full, widely-disseminated apology for this crap. Of course, there is no Love Republican Style card. It wouldn't be as easy to photoshop the Rethugs stealing our money to give it to Halliburton and oil companies. And the images of Abu Ghraib aren't exactly holiday fare.

RawStory: National greeting card company carrying 'Love Democratic style' card with Pelosi, others in bondage

Video Evidence: John McCain's FlipFlopping Express

Go watch this video at TheRealMcCain.com and see John McCain swinging as the wind blows. I can't wait until someone puts together a video like this on the Mittwit. (Hey, guess what? Some of it's on YouTube already; this is Romney lying to the people of Massachusetts in 1994 when he was running against Ted Kennedy.) Romney claimed to be pro-choice when he ran for Massachusetts governor four years ago, and today he says he's always been anti-abortion. Huh? He'll say anything to win; that's true of every one of these sleazeball Republicans running for President. Rudy Giulani used to be liberal on all social issues, but he'll be holding hands with Jerry Falwell in a few months.

RIP Charles Langford, Lawyer for Rosa Parks

Rosa Parks leaving the Montgomery courthouse with her attorney, Charles Langford. Feb. 22, 1956. (photo via Academy of Achievement)

Farewell to a lawyer whose work changed our world.

Montgomery (AL) Advertiser: Editorial: Langford crucial to bus boycott

[H]e was best known as one of the attorneys for Rosa Parks and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. during the Montgomery Bus Boycott that began in 1955.

Langford assisted another young black lawyer, Fred Gray, in representing Parks during her trial and appeal for refusing to give up her seat on a city bus.

Langford and Gray also represented King and about 90 other Montgomerians when they were accused of violating the state's anti-boycott law.

Langford also was one of the team of attorneys who filed the Browder vs. Gayle lawsuit that ultimately resulted in Montgomery's segregated bus system being declared unconstitutional. The ruling ended the bus boycott after 381 days and served as a major step toward ending racial discrimination in public transportation nationally.

Montgomery (AL) Advertiser: Civil rights lawyer, veteran lawmaker Charles Langford dies

LATimes: Charles Langford, 84; Rosa Parks' lawyer and Alabama politician

WaPo: Alabama Senator Charles Langford; Rosa Parks's Lawyer

MontgomeryBoycott.com

Happy Valentine's Day

Sailor's Valentine

The History Channel: The History of Valentine's Day

Stories I Missed While I Was On Vacation

Photo via 750 Volts

The U.S. drop-shipped 363 tons of cold, hard cash, the long green, on pallets to Baghdad in the days before the Coalition Provisional Government turned the reins over to the Iraqis. That's 4 BILLION dollars in $100 bills for those of you keeping score at home, the largest ever shipment by the Federal Reserve Bank. Think about that when you're paying your taxes in April. Think harder about that when you're voting in November!

Boston freaks out over a guerrilla marketing scheme involving light boxes. Do terrorists usually put brightly colored lights on their bombs?

Tim Russert's reputation in tatters: Dick Cheney's press flack testifies that they go to Press the Meat so they can control their message (Timmuh won't ask any hard questions); Pumpkinhead himself testifies that all his conversations with government officials are presumptively off the record. As Dan Froomkin says, that's not reporting, that's enabling.

Joe Biden calls Obama "the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy". Obama was not amused: "I didn't take Senator Biden's comments personally, but obviously they are historically inaccurate. After all, we've had presidential candidates like Jesse Jackson, Shirley Chisholm, Carol Mosely Braun and Al Sharpton. They gave a voice to many important issues through their campaigns and no one would call them inarticulate."

Senator Tim Johnson (D-SD) is reportedly reading news reports and doing some work from the hospital.

Creepy chuckle by Crawford Caligula, as UPI reports:

At a farewell reception at Blair House for the retiring chief of protocol, Don Ensenat, who was President Bush's Yale roommate, the president shook hands with Washington Life Magazine's Soroush Shehabi. "I'm the grandson of one of the late Shah's ministers," said Soroush, "and I simply want to say one U.S. bomb on Iran and the regime we all despise will remain in power for another 20 or 30 years and 70 million Iranians will become radicalized."

"I know," President Bush answered.

"But does Vice President Cheney know?" asked Soroush.

President Bush chuckled and walked away.

Vacation Book Report #10

The Bright Forever (2005) by Lee Martin


**** out of five

Coach Mom received this book from my sister for Christmas and it is just not her cup of tea. She told me she couldn't read it because it was "all over the place, a different chapter for each character, and the first chapter is just two sentences. What kind of writing is that?" While all these statements are true, the cover also said it was a Pulitzer Prize finalist for fiction, so I gave it a go.

The story: In a small midwest town, a nine-year girl disappears after riding her bike to the library after dinner to return her overdue books. Her math tutor and his down-on-his-luck neighbor are suspects. The suspects and the girl's family tell their stories of what happened, as do many others in the community.
The book got me through our flight from the Bahamas to Ft. Lauderdale, a two-hour layover, and most of our flight to Boston. I felt warmly towards the book while I was reading it, but it seems less substantial as I think about it today. Partly I liked it because it was set in a small town in 1971, and I knew all the references, from pop culture to the security of small town life. I had pretty much figured out whodunit 3/4 of the way through, but wanting to know exactly what happened kept me reading. The prose is a lot leaner than the last two lush fiction writers I read.

Final stats:

10 books read;

2 nonfiction, 7 fiction, 1 falsely labeled nonfiction but mostly made up;

authors: 4 female, 6 male;

rankings: one 5-star, two 4 1/2 star, two 4 star, one 3 1/2 star, two 3 star, one 2 1/2 star, one no star.

Vacation Book Report #9

The Lady and the Unicorn (2004) by Tracy Chevalier

*** out of five

Did you read Girl With a Pearl Earring? Then you've read The Lady and the Unicorn. The artwork in question is a tapestry, not a painting; the setting is France and Belgium, not Holland; the guilds are the weavers and the dyers, not the painters; but other than that, this is the same novel. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed it; but having read the earlier novel, this is a rewrite, wonderfully elegant, but disappointing for its sameness.

Vacation Book Report #8

The Memory Keeper's Daughter (2005) by Kim Edwards

**** 1/2 out of five

I didn't think I'd like this book because the premise is so bizarre. A young doctor's wife goes into labor during a freak snowstorm in Kentucky, and he is forced to deliver his own baby with the help of a nurse. His son is born healthy, but a second child is delivered; a daughter with Down Syndrome. The doctor's own sister died of Down Syndrome when she was a teenager, and to save his wife the pain his own mother suffered he hands the baby to the nurse with instructions to take the child to an institution. The nurse, who is secretly in love with the doctor, takes the child, moves away, and raises her as her own. The doctor tells his wife her second child was born dead.

Completely implausible, but according to the author's notes, this is based on a true story told to her by a minister. The writing is beautiful, lush and lyrical. Even the doctor who gave away his own child becomes a sympathetic figure. It's the second book I've read here that reduced me to tears.

I return to the frigid north tomorrow, so only one more book to be read here on the pink sand beach.

Vacation Book Report #7

Friday Night Lights (1990) by H. G. Bissinger

**** 1/2 out of five.

Friday Night Lights was approached from my low expectations. I had seen both the movie and the TV show, and felt that they glorified racism, sexism, and football as religion. Turns out that is because the film and the television version stripped the book's exploration of those factors and reduced this fine complex book to the simple story of Permian High School's 1988 football season. If you've seen the celluloid versions, you must read the book.

Racism? From the book I learned that Odessa, Texas public schools were not integrated until 1982. 1982! 28 years after Brown v. Bd. of Education was decided. 19 years after George Wallace blocked black students from entering the University of Alabama, and John F. Kennedy sent in the National Guard. In 1982 I was 25 and had graduated from integrated public schools and college. I couldn't have imagined that segregated schools still existed in the USA.

Sexism? Pressure on girls at Permian High School to conform was so intense that girls scored on average 75 points below the boys on scholastic aptitude tests.

Football as religion? It's the whole book, but especially the chapter near the end about how Permian's foe in the state semi-final game changed their entire grading system to ensure that no football player would be suspended for failing to maintain a 70 average. And woe to those who challenged the orthodoxy. A 35-year teacher, Will Bates, who refuses to give a star football player a grade he didn't earn, is drummed out of the school.

And as a bonus, I enjoyed the chapter about the great oil bust of the 1980s, which led an anonymous Texas oilman to say: "After all, we're just another Middle East war away from another boom." (p. 230)

Odessa is just 15 miles from Midland, Texas, where Chimpy McFlightsuit grew up.

On to the next tome!

Vacation Book Report #6

A Gesture Life (1999) by Chang-rae Lee

**** out of five

I was a little unsure of this book given that all the endorsements on the back cover were for Lee's first book, Native Speaker (1995), although that is not surprising when I find that Native Speaker won the PEN/Hemingway Award, QPB's New Voices Award, the Barnes & Noble Discover Great New Writers Award, the Oregon Book Award, and the American Book Award.

A Gesture Life started slowly, introducing the main character, 'Doc' Hata, and his exemplary life in his bland surburban community on the outskirts of New York City. The book slowly opens up as Doc describes his distant past as a medic in the Japanese army during WWII (where he fell in love with a comfort girl), to his more recent difficulties with his adopted daughter Sunny. He is a great storyteller.

The prose is lovely, clean and lyrical, and I was not surprised to learn on the Penguin website that Lee is the director of the MFA program at Hunter College in New York City.

I look forward to reading Native Speaker.

Vacation Book Report #5

The Dog of the South (1979) by Charles Portis

*** out of five

I picked up this book because of Roy Blount, Jr.'s blurb on the back cover: "No one should die without having read The Dog of the South." Now I can die a happy woman.

It's a funny meandering story about Ray Midge who journeys to find his wife, Norma, who has run off with her first husband in Ray's beloved Ford Torino. The trail leads him to Mexico and Honduras and he meets many lost souls and crackpots along the way. As I read the book I thought of the movie "The Player" and decided that The Dog of the South is Fannie Flagg meets Hunter S. Thompson. It's definitely a period piece, of a time when border crossings were routine and casual drug use more mainstream.

I read some of the book in the middle of the night because on Friday night, I was awakened to hear my brother's name being shouted over and over. I finally realized that I was not dreaming and hurried to dress (although I was still asleep enough that I dressed without ever turning on a light, stumbling around trying to locate my shoes with my feet.) Someone had rattled the locked door of guests at the hotel, and they were trying to rouse my brother the manager to tell him. I hurried to his quarters and woke him. He sleeps with a sleep machine due to sleep apnea and had slept through all the commotion. After we checked the premises and called the police I went back to bed at 2:00 a.m. but of course was too wired up to sleep. So I joined Ray Midge on his mad trip and read for an hour before I could relax and sleep. (We have decided, on reflection, that the marauder was actually another set of guests, a young couple who appear to have gotten quite drunk and apparently couldn't find their room in their condition. The following morning they required bloody mary's for breakfast and reeked of stale alcohol.) It fit in perfectly with this crazy book.

Vacation Book Report #4

Mistler's Exit by Louis Begley

*** 1/2 out of five

I read Louis Begley's Wartime Lies when it first came out but hadn't read any of his later novels. I did not know that he wrote About Schmidt (later made into a memorable film with Jack Nicholson and Kathy Bates).

Mistler's Exit is a short book, about a powerful New York adman who had just learned he has terminal cancer. Rather than tell his wife and son, he takes a solo trip to Venice where he is somewhat surprised to find he is never alone. It's beautifully written. Definitely the point of view of a rich powerful man, which is interesting to me because it's so other. Enjoyable.

Vacation Book Report #3

A Million Little Pieces (2003) by James Frey

0 (nil, nada, nothing, zero, zilch) out of five

I was aware of the controversy about this book, that the author sold it as a nonfiction account of his six weeks in rehab, but much of it was either totally aggrandized or completely made up. It was on the shelf here in the library so I read it. What a piece of crap. The guy makes himself the hero of his own rehab. Despite having succumbed to the terror of what he calls "The Fury", the rage that rules his life and sends him careening down the road of addiction from age 10 to age 23, suddenly in rehab he becomes all Mr. New-age, Tao-Te-Ching-reading, stand-up tough guy who irrevocably quits drugs and alcohol by sheer willpower alone, eschewing AA. Right. The conceit became larger as the book went on and he went from vomiting scumbag to righteous saviour of others.

Frey writes in a very stylized way. Every paragraph (many of which contain only a word, or a sentence) is left-adjusted. There is no punctuation other than periods, and many sentences would be marked as "run-on" by a sixth-grade teacher. There is a breathless quality to the whole book which makes me see how Oprah could have been conned. Read The Smoking Gun's take-down for the truth of Frey's little memoir.

Now that I've read it, I want my six hours back.

On to the next book.

Vacation Book Report #2

Today's book is The Ladies' Man by Elinor Lipman (1999)

** 1/2 out of 5

A light frothy romantic comedy of a novel, true to the blurb on the back which compares her writing to a 'wryly perfect New Yorker cartoon'.

Perfect for a short-attention span vacation book, although my attention did flag a few times. The book is written almost exclusively in dialogue which kept making me think of turning it into a Broadway play. The kind of dialogue that is never actually spoke in real life, smart arch sentences, clever, no stumbling or filler words.

Vacation Reading List

OK, I know I said I was going on hiatus, but you know what? I lied. I have a access to a computer and I am reading up a storm. So, here's the first book I read on my vacation:

Stuffed: Adventures of a Restaurant Family (2001), by Patricia Volk

Rating: ***** (five stars out of five)

I love books about food and this is a great book about food and family. Volk's family ran a series of restaurants in New York City from 1888 to 1988, but this book is more about her amazing family. I loved it. I laughed and I cried. And I drove Coach Mom crazy by interrupting her book several times to read her the parts that made me laugh out loud.

A favorite passage:

Maybe you've heard of my Aunt Ruthie. She's the woman who was taken hostage in her Bronx apartment by an ex-paratrooper on August 4, 1990. It was a hot night. She left her bathroom window open. Jose Cruz climbed in and held Aunt Ruthie at gunpoint for seven hours. BRAVE, the Daily News ran under her photo on page 1. YIDDISH CHARM NAILS SUSPECT, said the New York Post. He ate all her plums, a wedge of Jarlsberg, and three nectarines before the police exchanged her for two cigarettes.

"When you go to prison," Aunt Ruthie counseled him, "Take out some books. Learn a different profession. It's important in life to get hold of yourself."

Gooch Rerouted to St. James Park

Contrary to previous reports (shame, Sports Illustrated), Oguchi Onyewu has signed with the Magpies of Newcastle. He won't play with Franck Ribery, but he will play with Obafemi Martins, and he may play with Michael Owen (swoon).

International Herald-Tribune: United States defender Oguchi Onyewu joins Newcastle on loan

SI: Gooch joins the Toon
U.S. defender Onyewu headed to Newcastle on loan

FoxSports: Onyewu joins Newcastle on loan

Independent (uk): Onyewu eager to make Newcastle move permanent

Hiatus

Heading to the islands, mon, back in two weeks.

Bease!

BBC: DaMarcus Beasley completes the scoring 20 minutes from time as Manchester City book their place in the fifth round

FA Cup third round: Man City 3-1 Southampton

ObamaMania

NYTimes: Barack Obama at his fellow student Bradford Berenson’s apartment, where he watched the 1990 election returns.
Articles on Obama everywhere this weekend. Does he have the greatest press people ever, or did a memo go out amongst the corporate media?

NYTimes (Page 1): In Law School, Obama Found Political Voice

Boston Globe: (Page 1): At Harvard Law, a unifying voice
Classmates recall Obama as even-handed leader

LATimes: Early on, Obama showed talent for bridging divisions

WaPo: Harvard Experiences Sculpt Obama Appeal

WaPo: Obama Excites Entertainment Community

Sunday Times (uk): Secrets of Obama family unlocked

Just For Laughs

Bob Geiger: The Saturday Cartoons

And a bonus laugh: WaPo: Norm Coleman Injured in Dumpster Dive

Gooch Lands

SI: Oguchi Onyewu was a key member of the U.S. back line at last summer's World Cup.
FotoSports/WireImage.com
In France, where he will sign for Olympique Marseille. One of his teammates will be Franck Ribery, the exciting young French striker. Good luck Gooch!

Goal.com: Onyewu Set For Marseille Switch

SI.com: Onyewu to Marseille
French giants reportedly land coveted U.S. defender

SoccerTimes.com: Onyewu move to Marseille is completed.

Racist Injustice in Douglas County, Georgia

ESPN: If he had accepted the plea bargain, Wilson would've had to register as a sex offender and wouldn't have been permitted to live in the same house as his younger sister.
ESPN covers the Genarlow Wilson case. Look at the case they found to compare to his situation:

The position of Barker [the judge] and the district attorney, McDade, who refused to comment, is that Wilson is guilty under the law and there is no room for mercy, though the facts seem to say they simply chose not to give it to Wilson. At the same time this trial was under way, a local high school teacher, a white female, was found guilty of having a sexual relationship with a student -- a true case of child molestation. The teacher received 90 days. Wilson received 3,650 days.

This is a disgrace.

So, Did You Listen to Chimpy McFlightsuit Last Night?

Wonkette

I didn't bother, because when his lips move, I know he's lying.

Actually, blogger Greg Palast has discovered a Bush tell:

He sticks the tip of his tongue out between his lips. Like a little boy who knows he’s fibbing. Like a snake licking a rat.

In his State of the Union tonight the President did his tongue thing 124 times — my kids kept count.

If you want to see a real speech, written by the person who is giving it, watch Sen. Jim Webb's Democratic response. Crooks & Liars.

The real good news? Legislators in New Mexico have started the impeachment process. Drip, drip, drip, let's wash Bush out of our hair. Chimpeachment, baby.

News Round-Up, January 23, 2007

Stories I didn't get around to this weekend, in no particular order:

Yesterday was Blog for Choice day (see photo, above). Why am I pro-choice? Because I believe women are equal and free. In order for women to be equal and free, we have to have the right to make decisions about what happens to our bodies. It's that simple. Digby nails the argument.

Steve Clemons at the Washington Note asks Bill Richardson, do you have a problem with inappropriate behavior towards women? Making lewd gestures to women. Jeez. If I worked with him, I'd already have been fired for kicking him in the jewels. Welcome to the 21st century, Bill.

Scooter Libby is using the Marion Barry defense: "Bitch set me up!" The bitch being Karl Rove.

The NYTimes sez, lower your cholesterol the old-fashioned way, with niacin (vitamin B).

The NYTimes also has a ridiculous article peddling White House spin about how involved Chimpy McFlightsuit is in editing his speeches. Right. The guy doesn't like to read, but he's a great editor.

The US has created a new superbug, an antibiotic-resistant bacteria, in Iraq; according to Wired News, 700 US soldiers have been infected to date.

The WaPo ran an attack-piece on the front page this weekend about the sale of John Edwards's house; TPM has been following the blow-back.

Steve Gilliard's News Blog moved. Note to self, update bookmarks.

Cheney is a Synonym for Warmongering Chickenhawk Moron

Sorry for lack of posts, I went to a family wedding this weekend and now am laboring to glaze my work for a sodafiring Friday.

For entertainment today, I recommend reading Liz Cheney's (yes, daughter of Dick) op-ed in today's Washington Post. Then read the hundreds of comments. 46 pages of 'em right now. Here's mine (page 22):

Fact-free BS masquerading as opinion in the WaPo. First off, Lieberman isn't a Democrat -- he's a member of the Lieberman for Connecticut Party. Second, winning is no longer an option. The time for winning was when we invaded Iraq, based on lies, with a too-small force and a ridiculous strategy conceived by the stupidest foreign policy team in the history of the United States. We're just enjoying the fruits of being greeted as liberators, like your idiot father said. Why is the Post letting the idiots who got us into this mess tell us how to get out? Why not give a column to someone smart, oh, someone like Scott Ritter, or Al Gore, or a liberal blogger, or any of the smart people who said, there are no WMD, this whole thing is being made up by Cheney and PNAC, the British tried this 80 years ago and it didn't work, why don't we stick with the real problem which is Al Qaeda and bin Laden and forget about secular Hussein? Oh, that would hurt your cocktail party reputation. Got to stay in the Kewl Kids Klub. Thanks for nothing, WaPo.

Charity?

dailykos: Salvation Army's War on the Poor

The Salvation Army is evicting low-income women from two buildings in Manhattan that were donated to the Salvation Army specifically to provide housing 'for women of modest income'.

The Salvation Army also discriminates against gays and lesbians. Send your charitable donations elsewhere.

Extremes

I keep telling people, global warming isn't just about warm weather. It's about more and more weather extremes as we lose the delicate balance of our temperate world. Witness, the past few days in Europe:

LATimes:
Huge waves lash into the port of Wimereux, northern France.
(AFP/Getty Images)

LATimes: 27 die in fierce European storms
High winds and heavy rain damage buildings and cancel flights.


It snowed in Malibu this week -- yep, that Malibu, surf city, Malibu Beach, sunny southern California: LATimes: Expected thunderstorm becomes snow and hail


Icicles cover oranges in a grove along Victoria Avenue in Riverside.
(Irfan Khan / LATimes) Jan 17, 2007

It's Hard to Keep Up

From Overheard in New York:

All I'm Going to Say Is That the First One Is Free

Old JAP: Alan, I'm thinking about upgrading my phone. I hear good things about the Blackberry, but will that be compatible to send emails to my friends with Crackberries?

Alan: Ummm, I'm not going to bother explaining, but yes, they are compatible.

--Kosher pizza place

Deja Vu: My Personal Financial Information Hacked - Again

First my alma mater, Boston College, then my hometown newspaper, The Boston Globe,, now Marshalls/TJMaxx:

The Consumerist: TJ Maxx & Marshall's Hacked, Tons Of Credit Cards Stolen

Boston Globe: TJX credit data stolen; wide impact feared

RIP Art Buchwald

When I was a kid, my parents used to read the Art Buchwald columns out of the paper and laugh uproariously. He had a wicked sense of humor, in a good way.

NYTimes: Art Buchwald, 81, Columnist and Humorist Who Delighted in the Absurd

WaPo: Newspaper Columnist Art Buchwald Dies at 81

Editor & Publisher: A Visit With Art Buchwald: 'Tell Them to Just Keep Writing'

Wikipedia: Art Buchwald

Gates Foundation to Review Assets for Social Responsibility

Reacting to the series in the LATimes, the Gates Foundation has announced that it will conduct a review of its assets to assess whether they are socially responsibility. Hooray, investigative journalism!

Hat tip to the Technology, Health & Development blog, which left this news in comments.

News Round-Up, January 17, 2007

Happy 65th birthday, Muhammad Ali [photo from wikipedia]
The Greenland ice sheet is melting much faster than scientists had predicted; our consumption of crap is increasing global warming; even the God Squad is becoming concerned about global warming; yet the fucking morons in the Bush Administration are cutting funds for the scientific research that could help. God help us.

Obama's running. Wow, who saw that one coming?

The Scooter Libby trial started yesterday. ThinkProgress links to all the blogs with good coverage. First time ever bloggers got courtroom seats as press!

The Bush Administration is running federal prosecutors out of town (TalkingPointsMemo), using an obscure provision in the Patriot Act (dailykos). Greasing the skids to skate for their crimes? Can you say 'abuse of power'? Stay tuned.

The Crawford Caligula has been out there doing interviews and cementing his unpopularity. You can watch his psychopathic giggling as he talks about war; Scott Pelley of 60 Minutes (transcript, video), and Jim Lehrer of PBS (transcript, podcast)

Hey, I'm finally in a majority: NYTimes: 51% of Women Are Now Living Without Spouse

Digby has a dark post about death squad activity in Iraq possibly encouraged by Bushco. Because it worked so well in El Salvador.

Finally, I am sad to report that Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake has been diagnosed with a third recurrence of breast cancer. Get in there and kick cancer's ass, Jane. We're all pulling for you.

Addition to Blogroll

A few months ago I saw a link to this blog & bookmarked it. Can't remember for sure but I think I saw it on BoingBoing. [Yup, here's their post.] I'm sure Don Crowdis is one of the oldest bloggers out there. He doesn't even own a computer, just writes his posts out in longhand and mails them to a relative who posts them for him.

Don To Earth
A Nonagenarian (90+) Ponders Life, the Universe, and Aging

Yesterday he posted about having survived the largest man-made explosion prior to the atomic bomb in 1917. I had never heard of this. A ship loaded with bomb-making materials exploded in Halifax Harbor, and over 1500 people were killed from the explosion.

I was four years old, and survived physically unscathed, but my mother lost an eye and my aunt was thoroughly crippled. The large family across the street was not so fortunate -- all but one died at breakfast. It was, and still is, the dividing date in my life. During the next two and half years, I lived in seven places, three of them foster homes.

All this made me anything but a headstrong hero about anything. I learned I was not the boss anywhere, and this made me a very good boss later on, as a teacher, as the head of museums, and as the chairman of associations of various sorts. I was careful, and preferred to be understated until I showed my hand, although I know my real nature was to take charge. The Halifax Explosion took my DNA and made me what I became. On December 6 each year, I am very conscious of all this.

Read the rest, he writes well and has an interesting and informed perspective on things.

God Coming to USA

The Telegraph (uk) reports that Liverpool and Rafa are definitely not renewing Robbie Fowler's contract, and that he is therefore exploring the option of moving.....

to....

MLS! USA! USA! Robbie Fowler would trod the same ground as we mere mortals.

Breathe, Coach Mom, breathe.

Right-Wing Fruitcakes Still After Title IX

The inimitable Michelle Akers [1999 World Cup]
Michelle Akers powers past her way past Brazil. She would later convert a penalty to seal her side's 2-0 semi-final triumph.
Copyright: FIFAworldcup.com / Brett Whitesell / Daniel Motz
Great, great article on Title IX in, of all places, a British paper, The Guardian (uk).

Steven Wells, Guardian (uk) Sportsblog: Why American sports are facing the ultimate Title fight
The Title IX law has been eroding sex discrimination in the US for 35 years, so it's no wonder the right-wing fruitcakes want to get rid of it.

Thirty-five years ago President Nixon signed Title IX - a 37-word law that banned sex discrimination in federally funded education. It revolutionised US sports, changed the lives of millions of women and girls, led to the formation of a professional women's baseball league and to the US women's soccer team winning two World Cups.

More importantly, Title IX smashed to smithereens the creaky old idea that sport is somehow inherently masculine. There are 10 times as many women playing high school sports as there were in 1972. Five times as many women now play sport in college.

And beyond the statistics, there's overwhelming anecdotal evidence that Title IX is the best thing ever to happen to US sports. "When I was growing up throwing slow balls in baseball-crazed Southern Illinois," writes Hank Shaw. "I didn't know a single girl in my class who was active in sports. Fast forward to the present: six of my seven nieces love playing sports. That's all the proof I need to cheer on Title IX."

Title IX has achieved "an explosion of female Olympic stars, college and professional women's teams playing to packed stadiums, new magazines aimed at female athletes. But most of all the freedom, strength and joy of a whole generation of young women," wrote Ruth Conniff in the Nation.

In short Title IX is the bee's knees, the cat's pyjamas and the bollocks of the most enormous dog. As good things go it's up there with love, rainbows and orgasms.

Which means, of course, that it's attacked relentlessly by the gibbering jihadists of right-wing fruitcakery. Bush administration employee Jessica Gavora - former speechwriter to Newt Gingrich, John Ashcroft and Roberto Gonzalez - slammed Title IX as "affirmative androgyny" (as if that would be a bad thing). Anne Coulter - right-wing über-troll and self-confessed fan of Joe McCarthy - described Title IX as "the ultimate totalitarian folly", "crazed feminist social engineering" and an "insane feminist dream ... to change nature".

[]

[t]he heart of all the arguments against Title IX [is] the somewhat Victorian notion that sport is strictly for people with penises. Thirty-five years on, the really amazing thing about Title IX is that it's still going strong. Still forcing schools and colleges not to fob female athletes off with second-rate equipment and facilities. Still inspiring girls to do something more than just wave pom-poms on the sidelines. Still changing the world one pony-tailed midfielder at a time.

Happy birthday, Title IX.

Like the right-wing fruitcakes who oppose having cheerleaders cheer for both boys and girls games. Why is that controversial?

Winnie Hu (I kid you not), NYTimes: Equal Cheers for Boys and Girls Draw Some Boos

I Have A Dream

That someday Bush and Cheney will get their just desserts, and be judged on the content of their character.

Pic from Dependable Renegade: Sittin' in the Dock at the Hague...