Hello. I rarely post a diary around here. Very rarely. Almost everything i ever want to say is usually better said by someone else in this community.

Yet every day all day i come here and read with enthusiasm the vast array of expert opinions. I feel almost as though I'm on a first name basis with just about every regular poster here. That's why this transformation into a bunch of single minded rant-proned candidate shills took me by surprise.

????

This has been the week from hell.  As some of you know, my 87-year-old father has moved to Atlanta. His house hasn’t sold, but the realtor thinks we have a much better shot at selling it without Dad  underfoot.  MiL, behaving in her usual steamroller fashion flew down and accomplished in thirty minutes what we hadn’t been able to do in 2 ½ years’ convince him that he needs to be with us.  Since Florida is pulling his driver’s license, he really had no other choice. He has Parkinson’s, but his mind is sound, although he does forget where he put things. Mostly he needs someone to keep track of his pills, cook him meals, do his laundry, and be company.

A lot of us here are in the same boat. The Dad Chronicles is place to vent for all of us in this predicament.  I plan to do a lot of venting because, other than my husband, I have no other place to turn.  Please share your stories and your concerns here.

Ladles and jellyspoons, I'm not one to rant. But today, I saw just the wrong bumper sticker on just the wrong gray, cold morning.

See, this sort of thing wouldn't normally bother me that much, but I was already in a bad state due to the ignorant actions of some of my state's legislature. Sometimes you're just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

I saw what is likely the most ignorant bumper sticker of the past six years -- and I've seen some bad ones. I choose the word "ignorant" carefully, and I think you'll see why when I tell you what it said.

I say "said" because even though the message of the sticker is worded like a question, it ended with an exclamation point, as though it were an imperative sentence, and not an interrogative.

Here's what it said:

WHO WOULD AL-QAEDA VOTE FOR!

Hi folks, long time no diary.

I was inspired to write this - my first diary since the cat food scandal - after being through the wringer during a business trip this past week.  I was one of the "lucky" people who was stranded this week thanks to massive incompetence on the part of American Airlines (who can officially go to Hades in my book) and mother nature (damn her and her rain!).

I only fly about once every 4-6 months, and it seems that the experience gets worse every single time.  This week I was simply blown away by the inconsistency and incompetence displayed by TSA employees.  But more importantly, my travelling companion inadvertently "smuggled" an illegal item onto one of our flights...

(warning: if you are one of those folks who's pretty little eyes can't deal with cursewords, you might want to just close your browser tab and move along to the next diary)

Things to rant about:

Don't get me wrong, I'm not selling out. The Democrats are losing all prospective by continuing their non-stop rant to get Bush impeached. All rants must have a clearly stated mission and a time line. The 8th inning of a ballgame when your home team is winning 15-0 is not a good time to start ranting about how the pathetic starting pitcher on the other team should be benched. Live in the moment, put your anger in the backseat and let your sense of amusement do the driving!

This freestyle rant redirects the sound and fury to more productive ends. Of course like any garden variety rant, my rant breaks every established rule about truth and fairness to get a few cheap laughs at Mr. Bush's expense, but I'm no longer angry. Like Elvis Costello once proclaimed, "I used to be disgusted but now I'm just amused."

Sorry, like my real sex life there won't be much of that discussed here, but for some reason the word attracts readers  kind of like the over used term FUCK, be happy I didn't use that term in the title.....

I am pizzed off this week end about the fact that we have now learned that Cheney was out to get the Wilson's and it consumed the office of the Vice-Presidency, to the point they were transcribing Tweety's show for word by word analysis and how to prepare the rebuttals. I don't know about you  but while we have TWO wars ongoing, I would think these people would have better things to do, especially since public opinion is we are losing them.

"Must read" is a phrase that can be abused here, but this post by Marty Kaplan in the Huff Post deserves the widest possible circulation.  Kaplan fears that the events of the last six years show that our "system" most assuredly is not working, or if it is, it is insufficient to curb the wretched excesses of the greedy, unscrupulous and cowardly:

Citizen-statesmen were supposed to govern us. Farmer-legislators were supposed to lead us. Where are our wise men today? Colin Powell, instead of blowing the whistle, sulks in his tent; Rumsfeld rants on the moor; George Tenet takes a bullet for The Man and gets the Presidential Medal of Freedom; Condi Rice appears as oblivious of her humiliation as any of the pathetic victims on American Idol; Paul Wolfowitz, the stain of our neocon nightmare on his hands, plays not Lady Macbeth, but Mother Teresa.

More below:

I'd like a president whom I can respect.  I'd like him or her to speak the English language clearly.  I'd like a president who will get the best deal for the American people--not the special interest fat cats.  In other words, I'd like a president who isn't corrupt.

The title caught my eye, so I read this diary, Neo-Progressives, with interest -- especially the preamble:

...What is now apparent is that we have a whole lot of "neo-progressives," people who have no hesitancy in supporting mainstream Democrats in the name of defeating Republicans. Neo-progressives cannot resist the temptation to support the lesser-evil as a pragmatic strategy, justified in the name of saving the country from yet more years of Republican dominance...

What came to mind was a question...
What's so neo -- or, for that matter, progressive -- about that?

And an answer...

And what's most ironic is, here in Wisconsin, two of them have a major reason to vote: they're a gay couple, and a marriage ban is on the ballot.

I am fortunate as well, I got the opportunity to eat a lot of pizza from a magnificent restaurant.  Or at least I had the opportunity until very recently, I can no longer purchase food there due to my conscience.  I ordered a pizza a couple days ago, and what greeted my eyes?  A Motherfucking flag on top of my Motherfucking Pizza Box!

More Below the Fold...

I've had enough. I've watched enough news, watched enough death, watched enough incompetence, enough, enough, enough.

Shut it down. I mean Congress. I mean the US House and US Senate. Obstruct everything. Stop everything. No more floor debates, no more back-room deals, no more sell-outs, no more legislation, no more purse strings, no more purse.

Hard to narrow it down, but I'll rationalise this "Qualitative Queue" of the truly heinous and the truly frivolous and the possibly-esoteric-but-probably-just-lame, by opining that an unabridged recital of my grievances might take 17 days to read -- without clicking through to any of the links...

The Republicans like to deride liberals, Democrats, and most of our allies' governments for espousing policies that they lump together under the heading of the "mommy state." Apparently this is supposed to represent a smothering, overprotective, busybodyish interference with the normal and right and just independence of every man--which may well say far more about the kind of home and family life most Republicans uh, enjoy, than it says about liberals, Democrats, or our allies' policies.

Be that as it may, I intend to argue that the Republicans' policies, at least since the start of the Shrubbery (if not before), have tended toward or been designed to foster, a mommy-type society of their own making. Their version might more accurately be termed a "Mommy, I've wet the bed" society, however, because the major (if not the exclusive) motivating factor underlying the rubber-stamp Republicans' policies, politics, campaign ads, party platforms, etc., is fear. Gut-wrenching, stomach-churning, flop-sweat-inducing fear.