Space Flight for us All!
It almost sounds like something straight out of the Onion Radio News, but this is absolutely true. Today, Mike Melvill piloted the first privately built spacecraft into low orbit. Now, if they can manage to do it again inside of two weeks, they have a shot at winning the X Prize.
Hmm, the X Prize, huh? Those folks should be careful. After all, they don't want to get sued.
Speaking of sued!
So, Ray Bradbury's miffed at Michael Moore. Seems ole Ray doesn't like the title Moore gave his new film, Fahrenheit 9/11. Yada. Yada. Yada.
Now, if there weren't a new printing of the novel Fahrenheit 451 due in two months, and a new movie in pre-pre-preproduction, then Bradbury probably could have let this slide. But, since Bradbury apparently feels that his fanbase is going to be hideously confused by the similarities of the titles....
Well, at least he says he won't sue.
I did mention Litigation, right?
And I'm likely to get sued for this. Bring it on, Mr. Moore.
Moore has stated that he has a team of rabid goatherders, um, lawyers, ready to defened his honor to the death - er, gavel - if need be. He has a War Room setup (perhaps in his supposedly luxurious Manhattan apartment?) to combat anyone who might malign his new film.
Could it be after all of the negativity that greeted Bowling for Columbine and its myriad factual problems that Moore has grown overly sensitive to one of his main tragic flaws?
He occassionally fibs.
Everyone who has ever passionately argued a point would probably concede that, at some point in the debate, they made up a number or a factoid, or an anecdote just to get the other side off-balance enough that they could come up with a better angle. Anyone who says that they haven't done that is either a liar or Bill O'Reilly. Wait. Nevermind...
And, for a long time there's been debate in the inner circles of the left and the right - "should we fib to make our case?" And I say, yes and no. After all, there really is precious little that can be called "truth" since truth is really nothing more than reality filtered through our individual perceptions and prejudices.
So, Mr. Moore. Sue me if you must, but I'm gonna say it again: You've got problems. You know it, and I know it. I hope your movie does well, though - even if I do sincerely hope that America gets another four years of Dubya, 'cause that's what we deserve. You cannot undo over thirty years of extreme ignorance in one election cycle or one documentary. Get out the hammers, Mr. Moore, we'll need brute force to change this country.
Random thoughts and notes
Well, I was wrong about Reagan. It seems that some folks in the area where I live all still in such shock that they have not yet raised the flag back to full staff. Two weeks. That's a lot of mourning for a man who helped put us into the mess we're in.
OK, that's still not fair. Reagan was, if you look at his background a little, not even a major Republican Player. Not at all like the Bush clan (who really have been secretly running this country at least as far back as Nixon). So, whatever, let's move on.
A two-week mourning period is not why I have been a slack/non-writing bastard. I've been moving to a new house. My friends are amazed at how "domesticated" I am. Well, kids, I'm not. I do plan on having a nice house, though. And no, I don't think that runs counter to any of my beliefs.
And that's it. Geez, this really was too much of a blog today. All filler and no substance. Oh, well. Go buy a paper, dork.
Spin one for the Gipper!
Ronald Reagan, fortieth president of the United States, died yesterday at the age of 93. And so begins the week-long orgy of remembrances, eulogizations, and whitewashing.
I mean, if they did for Nixon, why wouldn't they do it for Ronnie?
I never liked Reagan. Even as a five year old at the time he entered office, I just didn't like him. Hard to explain something that was 24 years ago - especially when you were so young. But I do know that I didn't like the man. And it certainly didn't help when he started making life in America even worse. Cutting school lunches to boost defense spending. Cutting social services to boost defense spending. Cutting anything and everything to boost defense spending. We will deal with the Reagan legacy in this country for several more decades, I think.
But then again, it's probably not fair to blame Reagan or speak ill of him. It is my belief that Reagan was a prototype of Dubya. A smiling puppet for the Right Wing to use as a calm voice and steady hand.
So, he's not quite so bad as Nixon, but he's still a stinker.
Continued headaches of the anal boy
Long weekends pretty much suck. Especially the Memorial Day Weekend. Of all American holidays, which one could possibly be worse? First, the local newscasts start at least a week before with warnings about "Memorial Day traffic" and "one of the busiest, and most dangerous, times of the year on the nation's highways." Gosh, thanks. If we go see Grandad at the VA hospital so we can, again, how he stormed Hitler's bunker as Berlin fell (didn't everyone's grandad have that story? OK, so mine didn't - they were smart enough to stay the fuck out of the military) we might well fucking die because someone else's stupid family wanted to feed them bad hot dogs and beer this weekend?
Screw all that. Besides, it's a depressing holiday simply due to its tone and theme. Let's ponder this one: We are to commemorate the fallen members of the military who gave their lives to protect our freedoms. I have absolutely nothing but pity and contempt for this statement. Pity for those who believe that statement, and pure contempt for the Ruling Class Asshole who first dreamed it up. The only soldiers, to me, who fought for our "freedom" would be the poor saps who fought for the Ruling Class during the Revolution, or as I like to call it, the Changing of the Colonial Guard, and maybe the leftovers who smacked the British around again in 1812.
I don't believe in the term War on Terror, so I don't classify anyone in Iraq or Afghanistan as fighting for our freedom. Sorry. Sue me. Hate me. I care. Those soldiers are over there are dying to provide the complacent middle class with some vague notion of false security.
But, I've gotten way off base here. Let me get to the third reason to despise the Memorial Day Weekend. The sheer hypocrisy, or maybe its just ironic honesty, in the way most people "celebrate" the holiday. Odds are real good that if you just read this entry and were offended, you either had a cookout and got blistering drunk Monday or you went out shopping.
Either way, that's a stunning tribute to your military service men and women, isn't it?
So, now that we're miles down the page, we can get to the point. Namely, that I had plenty of time to realize two things this weekend. One, the Mozilla Composer broke the hell out of my XHTML (such as it was to begin with) when I created the table layout for the site and, two, the Amaya browser/editor is still a pain in the ass to work with. So, it's back to the CSS books and guides - in hopes of leaning how to make those DIV tags work again. Sigh.
And, I'm certain that once I figure it out, it'll all change again.
Obligatory Nonsense
Who the hell is mat catastrophe?
About this "blog"
What is nihilism, for real?
Is there an FAQ?
Are you really this much of a prick in real
life?
Surfing in from a search result and not
finding it?
Obligatory Links Area
Below are some links to some people's stuff that I think you should check out after/during your stay here. Money back guarantee.
OK, it's just two links for now. Eat me. You want a link here, email me.
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