Rowhouse Logic - Breathtaking Inanity

John from Americablog:

The House Republicans just shut down the Patriot Act hearings while the Democrats were still talking. It was absolutely amazing. Then they shut the mics off on the Dems. Even more amazing is that the House Republicans have the nerve to do this during a hearing on, what?, the Patriot Act! A hearing about our concerns about shutting down free speech and civil rights and the Constitution. So what do they do, they simply shut down open debate in the US Congress. Horrifying.

I’ve been so busy today I didn’t have time to watch this video until now. Now I have. It’s downright chilling. But also inspiring. The Democrats just kept going, the witnesses just kept going. It really was quite wonderful that even after the Republicans tried to literally shut down our democracy, the Democrats and the witnesses - in the best Grinch tradition - showed the Republicans that, Republicans present or not, microphone shut down or not, even House Judiciary Chairman “Tex” Sensenbrenner can’t stop democracy from coming.

Watch the video here. Good for the Democrats. You can dismiss this as theater if you like, but in reality, what else is left? The Democrats don’t control a single branch of government or hold a single lever of power, so good theater is one of the few avenues left to them. The entire Democratic Caucus needs to figure what John Conyers is eating for breakfast, grab a plate for themselves, stop harping on Dean for saying mean things about Republicans, and get down to the dirty business of being a royal pain in the ass.

Via PSoTD, this is a table blog postings and news articles on the Downing Street Memo by day. The data is taken from story counts on Google News and Technorati

I’m so pleased that at least some of us aren’t “really past that now” (read the second comment for the quote).

Update: I made a slight change to make it clearer where PSoTD’s data is coming from.

John Conyers:

I wanted to give you a brief update about the DSM activism we have been working on together, and to let you know that I am calling hearings on this issue.

When we began, it was just a few of us talking to each other about the troubling information in the DSM. The media is now covering the minutes, not in the sustained and thorough way that is needed, but it is a start. Thanks to you, many Americans who had no idea what we were talking about at the beginning of May have now heard about the DSM. The significance of the President of the United States and Prime Minister of Great Britain being asked about this matter in a joint press conference cannot be overstated. It is a testament to your perseverance.

As some of you may have heard, many, many new organizations have joined us in our efforts or are about to join us in our efforts. Prominently, Moveon.org is collecting signatures for the letter. We have now topped a combined 300,000. At the end of May that number was zero. From zero to 300,000 in less than two weeks. Just think about that.

A question often asked on DailyKos (yes, I read the comments)goes something like this: why am I signing this letter? The question is a legitimate one, as you are often asked to sign petitions or letters, and then there is no follow up.

Here is the answer: on Thursday, a week from today, I will be holding a hearing with my Democratic colleagues to begin to hear evidence about the DSM. We will have a number of witnesses, including Joe Wilson, who frequent readers here already know is a WMD expert and former Ambassador; Ray McGovern, a 27-year CIA analyst; Cindy Sheehan, whose son was killed in Iraq; and John Bonifaz, a renowned Constitutional attorney. At the conclusion of the hearing, we will go to Lafayette Park and I will personally deliver your signatures to the White House.

This hearing is just one step in an investigation that I am commencing that will literally span the Atlantic. I am in touch with British officials and former U.S. intelligence officials and I am determined to get to the truth.

At the hearing, I will disclose information found to date, which includes the public release of newly discovered documents. While none of these documents are as damning as the DSM, they nonetheless bolster the accuracy of it.

There is another point that has been missed of late. An article I read a week ago, I can’t remember where, quoted a right wing blogger as proclaiming this a dead issue and further stating that this was a test of the progressive netroots. Implicit was his contention that we were failing that test. A week later, the President was forced to respond (inadequately) to a question about it. We have passed the test.

Thanks again for your help and support. This is just the beginning. (I will check back either later today or early tomorrow to respond to your comments.)

Via Matt

Now where has John Conyers been my whole life?

Listen, about last night…I think I may have spoken without really thinking first. In the moment, I was quite serious about giving this up, but the moment wasn’t one of my best, to be sure. What I said is true, I’m not happy with the direction of the site. I expect more from myself, but, quite obviously, the path to improvement does not lie in throwing up my arms and quitting. The most I can really say for it is that it revealed a little bit more about myself and my insecurities than I would have liked. I felt as though turning away from this whole mess and moving on would make me feel better in some way. I was wrong.

Much of my insecurity, with regards to writing about serious matters, is rooted in my less than stellar formal education. I’ve been told by some of the best sources that this feeling is really nothing more than a reflection, in myself, of society’s over reliance on credentials. That’s probably true, but the adult mind is a big ship to turn mid-course, so it will take some time.

I’m not sure where this site going to go from here, but I think I’ll try to take it somewhere. I’d like to change the focus to something more substantive than it is now. I’d like to really focus in on the issues that burn me up inside, rather than always focusing on those issues which are hot buttons on a given day. Other than right around election time, I don’t know that I really care about what the score is. Some things need to be said, even if saying them has no immediate tangible effect.

Anyway, I’m not sure when I’ll post again as I really do need to evaluate where I want this to go and how I’d like to present it. I will post again. Maybe tomorrow, maybe next month, but soon. I’ve acquired a book on comma placement and sentence structure in the hopes that I might learn to communicate just a little more clearly (how fucking silly is that?). There are many things I’d like to be a good advocate for and, despite my recent crisis of confidence, I intend to learn how to do it.

So sorry about all the weirdness. If you stick with me long enough, you can be sure it will happen again — just ask my wife.

Covered in lint, he crawled slowly away from the rim of the navel, only to find the thick skanky air that is Philadelphia’s in Summertime. So it goes.

I may change my mind tomorrow, but I doubt it. I’m finished. When I started this site up, I did it because I wanted to advocate for the things I care about, and do so effectively. I assumed that my writing ability and my understanding of public policy would grow as the site did, but, in reality, the opposite has occurred. The site has grown less useful and less passionate by the day, and this has gone on for far too many days. I have yet to find my voice as a writer and I have lost hope that I ever will in this context. The blog has devolved into little more than pictures of beer bottles and cats, with occasional misrepresentations of things I’ve probably misread or didn’t fully understand. This site is nothing at all like what I wanted it to be. Such is life.

I will continue to contribute to the liberal internet community, and to its genuinely effective voices, in the various ways I can, but not as a blogger. The cat is in the bag. Thanks for visiting and goodbye.

Only because I can’t write right now.

Call me off if you like, but I really love medical humor. Way back when blogs were run, for the most part, by morbid teenagers who posted their morbid poetry, I ran a parody site named ProjectGastro which featured, among other things, an easy to use Self Surgery Kit. The kit itself was just a picture of a Civil War field amputation kit, but considering the fact that the average annual health insurance premium for families stands at $10,979, self surgery kits may be an idea whose time has come.

Anyway, go have a look at Tom’ Cruise’s Medical Forum where Tom discusses his high-potency vitamin treatment, I think you’ll really enjoy it.

Here’s one for the women! I hope the guys find it interesting as well. From the Daily Mail. Here’s an excerpt:

“A leading theory is that, far from being a defect, the failure of some women to orgasm regularly is actually a refined mate-selection tool.

Only men who are most skilled in the art of sex, physically attractive, or psychologically compatible will be able to make them climax.

These are the men they are most likely to stay with, and who would also be expected to make the best long term partners”

Interesting Stuff.

I just wanted to note that the Downing Street Memo got a little attention in the Washington Post’s World Opinion Roundup this morning. Unfortunately, it’s an online only column, but it’s still something. One thing I’d like to point out is that while the column does discuss Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman’s claim on Meet the Press that the memo has been “totally discredited”, it doesn’t mention that Mehlman’s claims have been debunked.

Media Matters:

On the June 5 edition of NBC’s Meet the Press, moderator Tim Russert questioned but failed to correct Republican National Committee chairman Ken Mehlman’s claim that the “findings” of the Downing Street Memo, a secret British intelligence memo suggesting that the Bush administration manipulated intelligence to support its case for war in Iraq, “have been totally discredited by everyone who’s looked at it,” including the 9-11 Commission and the Senate.

In fact, neither the 9-11 Commission nor the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence addressed the Bush administration’s use of pre-war intelligence.

Also, Matt has a very nice round-up of recent posts pertaining to the the Downing Street Memo. Go have a look and read as many as you can.

When I was in music school, the teachers would sometimes suggest to students whose time was a little off that they sleep with a metronome under their pillows. Anybody want to go halves with me on a metronome for Senator Kerry?

And so it goes:

She’s thankful and appreciative for the outpouring of support she’s received personally and online, but watches angrily as Michael Jackson, the “runaway bride� and “American Idol� attract hours and hours of TV coverage and wonders where the country’s priorities lie.

“In other countries there’s outrage and protests and vigils (over hostages). In our country, their picture is up there one day and then it’s gone,� said Cooper, her frustration evident.

To fully understand the title, you will need to read the whole story.

If you only read one thing today, please do read this. Take exception if you like, but do read it.

This is so lame, but I’m too off my game to write anything even sort of worth reading. I’m looking for the answer to the following riddle as well as the 80’s video game it comes from:

What’s tall as house
Round as a cup
and all the King’s horses can’t draw it up?

1) Matt wrote a list of the 10 reasons why you haven’t joined the Big Brass Alliance of bloggers asking that more media attention be paid to The Downing Street Memo. He even has a suggestion for non-bloggers, which is that they go get a blog and join up. Hell, I’m so sick of mine that I’d be happy to give it away if anybody wants it. Matt also has a very nice post on New York Times Public Editor Byron Calame’s all too brief discussion of the memo in his first column. Be sure to go have a look.

2) Whenever I take a day trip to New York, I’m always struck by the obscenity that is the lack of transportation which is both affordable and quick between Philadelphia and New York. You can have either cheap or quick, but never both. Actually, with Amtrak’s Accela down until next month, you can have cheap or expensive but not quick. That’s besides the point, however. What I’m getting at is that the trip between the two cities has been reduced, in the case of the Accela, to less than an hour, but at nearly $100 each way it just doesn’t make sense for most people to use it as a regular commuter service. If this was subsidized to an extent as to make it affordable for the average person to use the service on a regular basis, wouldn’t this provide a wealth of new economic opportunities for both cities? Not that the money (which would be significant) or interest is there at the moment, but it’s something the putters around my head every now and again.

3) I’m way late on this, but since I may be one of the only Philadelphia blogger who is opposed to Michael Nutter’s smoking ban, I should say that I’ve never been more pleased with a totally petty move by John Street. As it turns out, even in this crazy corrupted world of ours, one man’s overwhelming desire for props and ass kissing really can make a difference. Now if only we could ensure that Street felt an overwhelming need to have his ass kissed over every piece of really bad legislation passed by city council, but remove that same desire for the good stuff…

4) So some time this morning, some guy decides to climb the scaffolding surrounding Philadelphia’s City Hall tower. Naturally, each one of the local news stations feels compelled to get live shots of whatever tragedy is about to unfold. Even more naturally, each station parks a helicopter a few hundred feet over my house in order to get a good shot of the southeast side of the tower. One after another they come to get in on the morbid action, each louder than the last. Of course, I didn’t have to be at the office until 11:30 this morning. These things never seem to happen on the days I don’t get to sleep late.

Any of you who know me, or have read my previous post on clutter, understand that I struggle everyday to keep junk from overwhelming my life. I’m not sure where all the junk came from; might have been the constant flea marketing that I did almost every Saturday for a year or two. Or, it could have been the generous exboyfriend who just loved giving me things. Bottom line, I have a lot of stuff, too much stuff.

This morning, I was listening to XPN (they stream, by the way) and I heard a great song called, “Too Much Stuff”. This particular version was done by Lyle Lovett and Delbert McClinton. Between phone calls, annotating records, and answering emails, I’ve been searching for the lyrics to this song. I think it may be an old blues song and I’m pretty sure Lyle Lovett wasn’t the original artist. I found a song by Michael O’Keefe and Bonnie Raitt with the same name, but I’m pretty sure the song I heard was longer and the lyrics were different. And I can also say with reasonable certainty that the song I heard is not the “Too Much Stuff” by Michael Jackson. That’s pretty much all the info I’ve got.

OK readers, your mission, should you choose to accept it is to find me the lyrics to the Lyle Lovett version of “Too Much Stuff”. If you find the lyrics, just post them in the comments section. An MP3 would be acceptable I suppose, but I don’t want anyone to spend their precious pennies on my entertainment. Precious time is a whole other matter.

I’m not feeling very well so I’ll probably be off for a few more days. Have a nice weekend and don’t let the bastards drag you down.

I caught some of Aaron Brown’s interview with Charles Colson on CNN last night regarding yesterday’s revelation that Mark Felt was Deep Throat. It struck me at the time that Colson came off like something of a disjointed loon in need of a long nap. But, as Brown pointed out repeatedly, he is a Born Again Christian so I suppose that lets him off the hook for just about anything. Anyway, I just stumbled across this article in the Washington Post and it pretty much confirmed my disjointed loon assessment. I was particularly amused, however, with the quote from that true blue unhinged loon Pat Buchanan, saying that Felt is a “traitor” for having worked with reporters investigating the Nixon Administration. No real point here, I just think these old Nixon hacks are pretty funny.

I have nothing to say, so I won’t say anything until I do. I haven’t been smoking (much) for a few days. Not that I’m saying I’ve quit again, as that would be premature. Without cigarettes, I simply can’t seem to conduct myself in anything approaching a reasonable manner, so I won’t even try. Have a nice day.