SwimFinsSF

This is outstanding

Faces of the Fallen

Immediate Threat?

I’m sorry but this is just too funny:

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld on Face the Nation

Thanks to the folks at MoveOn.org.

On John Kerry and things that hurt the cause

I’ve gotta admit that I’m a little bothered by what I’m seeing in the news lately when it comes to presidential campaign tactics. From the Bush / Cheny camp I would expect dirty games however i’ve been a more than a little concerned about what I’m hearing from John Kerry right now too. Its not really the message Kerry is trying to portray to voters as much as it is the way he’s presenting the message. I’ve seen and heard an awful lot of instances of him making statements that leave him wide open to attack.

Take, for example, his statements on ‘world leaders’ and ‘business leaders’ that support his candidacy. The fact is we all know and the Bush / Cheny camp know that this is the case. Unfortunately, what Bush also knows is that the majority of these ‘leaders’ can’t afford to step out and publicly support Kerry because doing so opens them up to the kind of retribution that Bush is capable of as long as he’s the sitting President. Therefore, making statements like this opens Kerry up to the obvious ‘Back it up with facts and names’ attack without making a point that anyone already knows and he can’t answer the attack in a way that fence sitters will buy…

Another such example is a statement I heard yesterday by Kerry takling about the tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of jobs per month that are going over seas since Bush took office. Again, we all know jobs are going over seas and outside of our borders and that can’t be argued. Unfortunately he got carried away and arguably misspoke rather than dramatically presenting verifiable facts. The result was opening him up to attacks that hurt his credibility.

The fact of the matter is I would probably vote for a talking Emu to get Bush out of office – but I’m not the person I’m worried about.. Kerry is an OUTSTANDING candidate that I feel no qualms about supporting. However there are a lot of fence sitters that aren’t sure yet and if one of the arguments we have is that Bush can’t be trusted (which is definitely true) it is REALLY important that John Kerry work hard to make sure his credibility is rock solid..

C’mon John… PLEASE be careful cuz you know the bad guys are just waiting for a slip…

Firing Squads

Just found this:

Utah Governor Signs Ban on Firing Squads

I guess I had no idea we still had places where firing squads – i just assumed this was something from the old west or Nazi Germany. Wow. Good for Utah.. I guess… :\

Free Speech and the Air Waves

You know… I’m not the biggest fan of Howard Stern. I think he’s a brash blow hard who relies on shock appeal to maintain listeners with very little interesting content or important issues to justify the shock. Those who know me know that I’ve got a tendency to listen to obnoxious radio like the right wing shows and the relgious right – largely to sharpen my tallons. I listen to these to understand where they’re coming from because, even if I think their position is insane and hateful, at least it has been considered and refined over time and its hard to prepare to debate issues if you don’t understand the counter point.. But Howard Stern is a different matter – he’s just trying to shock for the pure sport of it often and invariably after listening to him for any length of time I find myself screaming ‘WHAT THE FUCK’ at the radio and changing the chanel.

All that said I find this very disturbing:

Radio giant suspends Stern in crackdown against indecency

Not because I need to defend the man.. But more from the perspective that any large radio or TV conglomerate having ownership of a large enough swath of the broadcasting frequencies has the ability to silence any perspectives that they don’t agree with and essentially inhibit free speech.. The idea that one company has the ability to control in any way what we see and hear scares the living shit out of me. Radio and TV already has a frightening ability to influence the perspectives of the politics of this country by controlling how information is presented and the only saving grace in this is the fact that ownership is distributed and no single opinion dominates… The idea that a ‘holding company’ can control the content of its affiliates is very dangerous…

anyway… I need to get back to work… just pushed my buttons so I figured I’d say something.. Now back to your regularly scheduled broadcast.. 😉

They Got Him

In case you haven’t heard:

U.S. forces capture Saddam near Tikrit, capping one of the most intense manhunts in history

Regardless of what my position is on this war or the administration’s handling of it (and i’m having to bite my tongue to not go off on THAT) I am glad he’s in custody. Having him unaccounted for was muddying the whole process for everyone involved (supporters and those less supportive! ;)). Hopefully we can move on from here!