There are precious few times these days when someone asks me that lovely, all-purpose social question,
what do you do for a living? This may possibly have something to do with my obsessive avoidance of any social situation that requires human conversation, or may be the final karmic outcome of a long career of giving responses to that question that almost nobody outside of a bare few subcultures or sub-industries even understands, much less can feign an interest in. No more! These days, when someone across the room and/or table and/or means of public transportation pipes up with that gentle icebreaker of a question (note: we live in the country, next to a cow field and across from another cow field; there is no public transportation around here; the last buses stopped running by this house a few years ago, because of the economy, so that last bit there was purely conjectural, or to put it more bluntly, was a baldfaced lie) I can smile brightly, put down my paper plate, or book, or remarkable little technological device from the near-future, and say:
"I make fun of people on the internet …"
(At this point there is, always, the same look of polite confusion.)
"… for money."
That last part is the kicker. All right, maybe it is an oversimplification of things, but at least it is terse. My lot in life seems to be to part of those scant few voices tasked with wondering what the holy hell is going on when it seems like perhaps somebody more important ought to be asking that.
What a strange world. I think I may be in a coma, imagining all of it. Then I look at the people I am tasked with writing about, people elected to important positions or paid handsomely to say important-sounding things, and am pretty damn well sure of that whole coma theory. As evidence, I can even remember back when the melting of the planetary ice caps was considered a big deal, something that could not stand, something existential in its inherent, obvious badness. Now it hardly rates a footnote, and we look for oil in the places where the ice has melted.
Sigh. I really do not drink enough.
Blast from the Past. At Daily Kos on this date in 2006—Pentagon Wants to 'Double-Down.' Sadr the Target:
Whether the troops can be found to up the ante in Iraq and whether, if found, they can actually defeat al-Sadr in his own city without playing the Fallujah card is not something I'd want to "double-down" on even if we were just talking dollars instead of lives.
While the Pentagon makes its calculations, and American troops wonder which Christmas they'll be home, the Bush-Cheney attempts at juggling the Iraqi factions continue apace. About all that's missing these days is an invitation to Ahmad Chalabi for lunch at the White House. And, of course, a sane plan for getting out of Iraq. |
Tweet of the Day:
On today's
Kagro in the Morning show:
Greg Dworkin with polling on Fiscal Thingy issues, and who we trust to deal with them.
Armando notes some commentators are making the case that Republicans actually do best by conceding on taxes. And if modest tax hikes plus sequestration's cuts is a "fiscal cliff," then it's no better to replace them with social safety net cuts. Finally, tired of hearing that majority vote rules change is a "slippery slope?" Well, how about some historical data that says it's not really all that slippery after all?
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