Breaking news on CNN Anderson Cooper (which I never watch, btw)...

Bush is sending a senior envoy to meet with Iranians in Geneva this weekend to discuss nuclear matters WITH NO PRECONDITIONS.

THis is a "big break with past policy" according to the talking heads.

Oh fer chrissakes. I can has president Obama yet?  linky goodness

While I was surfing my usual collection of blogs the other day, I saw a story on Huffpo that simply delighted me. Sandwiched between all the usual crap was this gem:

ALIEN VIDEO TO BE REVEALED TO MEDIA TOMORROW, MAN CLAIMS

YES! If there's one thing that puts a smile on my face without fail, it's the media reporting stories about UFOs. I seriously love that shit. Whether or not I think UFOs exist (in the flying saucer, E.T. sense) is besides the point...I am not entirely sure what I think about it. What I enjoy is the fact that the story is either a. A legitimate mystery of such magnitude that the media deems it worthy (cool!), or b. the crowning achievement of a hoaxster (respect!)

So, my father is a civil engineer, and he has worked for a small Maine construction firm for many years. This business is family owned by DEDICATED Republicans...Republicans who have embraced such lame GOP ideas as medical savings accounts, etc. My father, a lifelong Democrat (and Hillary supporter, as far as I know), has generally been at odds with his office mates in terms of political views. But finally, they found something they can all agree on...McCain's gas tax relief plan SUCKS FAT ROCKS.

My mother gleefully sent me this email today:

read this. (Dad's company) are in a panic. (Dad's Boss) isn't even voting for John McCain anymore because of this stupid idea. A republican for Obama!!

with this link.

I was happy to see this...

Democrats WAY ahead of McCain

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in Massachusetts finds both potential democratic presidential candidates ahead of John McCain by double-digits. Hillary Clinton leads the Republican 55% to 36%, while Obama leads 51% to 39%.

MA isn't going to go McCain. Just won't happen. However, he is free to spend as much money here as he can.

In other Ras polling news...

Potatoes!!

I have been reading a lot of diaries here about world food shortages, riots, etc. Naturally they are troubling to contemplate and thinking about them in relation to all the other crap this earth has to deal with in the near future can be downright depressing. Toss in the existential pessimism that I think a lot of my fellow liberals were born with, and our global problems seem insurmountable. It can be difficult for me to keep perspective and not underestimate the resiliency of the human race, particularly in the midst of the comfortable daily kvetching I see here everyday. After all, I have an active imagination and have seen The Road Warrior more than once. It's easy for us to imagine Armageddon.

So when I see articles like this one from Reuters, it knocks me back a few pegs and helps me to imagine a less Mad Maxian future for ourselves.  

10. Rout

yeah, yeah...we get it. Candidate 1 won over candidate 2 by an embarrassingly large margin. Sure, 'rout' sounds cool, with it's strong monosyllabic punch not unlike a dog's bark, but can't the punditry get creative? Obama clobbered Hillary in GA. Hillary gave Obama a drubbing in MA. Obama vanquished Hillary in DC. etc etc

9. Superdelegate

Not only is the concept dumb, so is the word used to describe these super duper folks who's single vote equals a gazillion mere mortal votes. I loathe them like so much powdered wig aristocracy. You know they lay in bed at night and smile knowing they have been bestowed with a 'super' prefix. Smug jerks, all.

Some of you may know that I hold a fine arts degree from a respected university, with a concentration in Painting and Art History. Certainly, the authority of my opinion goes unquestioned most of the time (which it should), and the scope and breadth of my knowledge of all things visually artistic is difficult to match. Perhaps Clement Greenburg or Robert Hughes come close. Perhaps not.

With this in mind, please join me on this journey of delight, reveling in what I call The Platinum Period: School of Freeperville ca. 2002-2004. These years were the pinnacle for Wingnut expression, and the art reflects a magical, almost giddy hopefulness.

The Platinum Period

Browsing through my favorite hip dadster blog Daddytypes, I came upon a link to an amusing NYT article about Venezuela's attempt to establish a list of 100 government-approved baby names.

Government approved baby names?? Zuh?

Hells, yes.

Check out my title...it is the perfect FOXy manipulation, something we see used everyday by this wretched network. Disguised as a simple innocuous question (there IS a question mark there, after all), we barely realize the subtle judgment nudge we are receiving, simply by the suggestion. Those guys at FOX? GENIUSES!

How else could they broach such controversial topics unless presented as a question, and still have some weasel room?

When I'm not reading political blogs, I am reading trashy celebrity blogs. Occasionally these worlds will collide, as they did today when I saw the following photos on a few of my bookmarked sites (to avoid the copyright infringement, I turned these photos onto high quality photoshop art a la OPOL. Please, feel free to print and frame them. I used the 'plastic wrap' effect.):

I'll give him props for keeping his abs about him while also working hard to reignite a cold war. Man knows his priorities.

...apparently, we love it!

One of the more obvious social changes for my generation compared to that of my parents has got to be the phenomenon of 'living together'. Boomers (more specifically, the hippies) may have pioneered the societal changes  that would eventually make cohabitation common, but it is their children who have truly taken the phenomenon to a new level of commonplace. Once somewhat taboo a scant generation ago even for those who were not particularly religious, shacking up is now utterly normal and downright unshocking. In my opinion, it has fundamentally altered how many of us live out our twenties and thirties, and how/if we choose to marry. For better or worse...?

Kossacks Under 35 is a weekly diary series designed to create a community within DailyKos that focuses on young people. Our overall goals are to work on increasing young voters' Democratic majority, and to raise awareness about issues that particularly affect young people, with a potential eye to policy solutions. Kossacks of all ages are welcome to participate (and do!), but the overall framework of each diary will likely be on or from a younger person's perspective. If you would like more information or want to contribute a diary, please email kath25 at kossacksunder35 (at) gmail dot com.

Hola.

In the world of obstetrics, 35 is a number infused with symbolic meaning. It is at age 35 that pregnant women and women hoping to conceive officially fall into the category of 'Advanced Maternal Age', meaning the game plan may need to adjust somewhat (or a lot). Even though 35 may be somewhat arbitrary, it does represent real changes in our bodies in terms of how pregnancies develop. After age 35, women may be less fertile than younger women due to less ovulating and higher instances of endometriosis or other conditions that can interfere with conception. After age 35, women are more likely to turn to fertility treatments and have multiples. After age 35, the risk of fetal chromosomal disorders begin to outweigh the risks of the tests designed to detect them. After age 35, pregnancies can take a harder toll on bodies, with increased incidents of gestational diabetes, etc. All of these risks increase exponentially with age.

Sadly, having children is a young woman's job, biologically. In my opinion, nowhere is the generational sea change between my Generation (X), and my mother's (Boomer) more evident than in how and when and if babies are being born today. Eggs gettin' old, X-ers?

...building on Major Danby's diary from Tuesday,

Let’s get some details cleared up here.

We need to find out if our individual Congressperson

1. Supports/ doesn’t support funding the upcoming supplemental Iraq War   funding request

2  Supports/ doesn’t support funding annual Iraq War funding request (later in 2007)

3  Supports/doesn’t support the Murtha Plan

more

Just finished watching the Obama segment on 60 Minutes and wanted to see what Kosville thought about it. I have been restraining myself from getting swept up in the Obamarama hype, even though I am admittedly pretty excited to watch his campaign.

The interview, IMO, was perfectly handled by Obama. A small example...Taped yesterday prior to his announcement, Steve Kroft brought up the fact that he was until very recently a smoker, which was handled brilliantly by his wife.

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I caught about 5 minutes of John McCain on Meet the Press just now, and was actually a little surprised by his performance. My surprise wasn't due to anything he said, which was predictable. What caught me a bit off guard was how old he seemed. Maybe I haven't seen him live on TV for awhile or something, but I was struck by the apparent lack of fire in his belly and the general slow-speaking tiredness that seems to have overtaken him. he spoke VERY quietly and deliberately, as if it took extra effort to string his thoughts together. His jokes fell flat, and he barely smiled.

Yesterday when I was out and about I heard a very intriguing report on NPR about the ingrained notion of ‘Us vs. Them’. According to neuroscientist Robert Sopolsky, our tendency to create a monolithic, scary THEM could be hard-wired into our brains. If this is fact true, it goes a long way to explaining the most disturbing behavior of humankind...the desire to hate and wage war.

By conducting experiments that presented people with the faces of people from other races, Dr. Sopolsky found the following discouraging reaction occurring in the brain:

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I completely agree with Thers (on Atrios) on this one, 'Pander Bear' as a nickname for McCain has some real legs. Although New Englanders with their crazy accent may not get the joke, I feel that this is to McCain as Flip Flop is to Kerry.

McCain from Vanity Fair via Atrios, on the topic of gay marriage:

Lend me your ears...er, eyes. Witness the simplicity and brilliance of what I am about to say regarding the upcoming midterm elections. Please read with unbridled enthusiam all you really need to know about the only winning strategy that we Democrats need to employ to coast seamlessly to rapturous victory. Victory with a capital V, Victory with a lowercase ictory... Truly, our guaranteed historical win can be achieved by following the simplest formula ever imagined by upright bipeds. The simplicity is so mindblowing it will shatter your skull. How do we do it, you ask? Tell me, Ablington, before I vomit from the suspense! you demand.

Here's what we MUST do, friends. THIS is the simple plan: