Posted inCurrent affairs Entertainment

West Point dean condemns “24” torture scenes

Even though I'm a progressive, I love "24." Torture away, Jack, I'll say to myself as my man, counter-terrorism agent Jack Bauer, shoots a bad guy in the knee and screams Talk! But now I'm looking at the show in a new light. The dean of West Point says that "24" isn't just entertainment. It's taken as real by our soldiers around the world. And that's hurting the American military. In a fascinating The New Yorker article, "Whatever it takes, Jane Mayer writes: This past November, U.S. Army Brigadier General Patrick Finnegan, the dean of the United States Military Academy…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

OSU stiffs Kulongoski on “state climatologist” title request

A week ago Oregon's governor, Ted Kulongoski, made a reasonable request of Oregon State University: stop calling George Taylor the state climatologist, since no such position exists. Taylor uses that title because he took over many of the duties the actual state climatologist used to perform before the position was abolished. That's like saying you're married to a divorced woman because you're living with her and otherwise filling the role of the spouse she used to have. Legally, you're not. In the eyes of the world, you're not. But OSU won't relinquish the fiction that George Taylor speaks for the…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Science

Relax, right-wingers: George Taylor isn’t being fired

When the person who calls himself the Oregon state climatologist is compared to Galileo, it’s obvious that right-wing paranoia has gone over the edge. The headline of today’s Oregonian story (“To governor, Oregon has no ‘climatologist’”) might lead conservative conspiracy theorists to believe that Gov. Kulongoski has ordered George Taylor to disappear into the dungeon where he keeps state employees who disagree with his policy on global warming. Actually, the truth is much milder. Kulongoski wants Taylor to stop using the title of “state climatologist” because there is no such position in state government. That’s a fact. George Taylor isn’t…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Science

Facts about George Taylor and the “state climatologist”

Here, finally, are some solid facts about the Oregon state climatologist position that supposedly is occupied by George Taylor, who minimizes both global warming and the impact humans are having on global climate change. For well over a week I’ve been waiting for answers from the Oregon State University (OSU) News and Communication Office to my questions about Taylor and the “state climatologist” title that he holds. Patience pays off. I just got a couple of emails from Mark Floyd. At the end of this post you’ll find, verbatim, the first message he sent me. After I read it, I…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Leave God out of the Super Bowl

Before I write this post, I want to thank the holy Tao for inspiring me. There’s nothing of me in what I’m about to say—it’s all Tao. Without you, the everlasting source of my yin-ness and yang-ness, I wouldn’t have been able to blog about God and the Super Bowl. If you like this sort of praise be! sentimentality, you must have loved how the Indianapolis Colts’ coach and owner brought God into their post-game remarks. Driving around tonight I heard right-wing talk show host John Gibson ranting about the progressives’ distaste for such God talk. Gibson claimed that the…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Local Portland news fixated on fluff and crime

The old adage, “if it bleeds, it leads” sure holds true for local late night television news. On Blue Oregon, Kari Chishom lamented a KOIN (channel 6) focus on crime, fear, misery, and death. Following in Kari’s eyeballs, I analyzed last night’s 11 o’clock news on KATU (channel 2) and found that those thirty-two minutes also were remarkably devoid of substantive stories. Here’s how the program panned out (times are somewhat rough as they were estimated by using my digital video recorder’s 30-second forward and 10-second back buttons): Total 32:00 (thirty two minutes: zero seconds) Ads and ”still to come”…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

George Bush is so irrelevant, he’s not even wrong

Yawn. It’s almost time for Bush’s 2007 State of the Union address. If there isn’t any paint I can watch drying, maybe I’ll turn on the TV for some lesser excitement. Through six years of hard work mastering incompetency, Bush has attained the ultimate irrelevant state: not even wrong. When I look at him now, I don’t feel the indignation, anger, and irritation that used to arise from a contemplation of his visage. He’s become a cartoon character, a “What, me worry?” caricature. Bush is so out of touch with reality there’s little reason to pay attention to anything he…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Haditha shows U.S. is “bad guys” too

I’ve always been repulsed by the talk of good guys and bad guys in Iraq. The Bush administration, along with conservative pundits, loves to paint the United States as being on the side of the angels. The “bad guys” are the Iraqi insurgents, Baathists, Al Qaeda fighters, militias—any and all who are resisting the Snow White pure intentions of the “good guys” to bring peace, democracy, and the American way to the middle east. Abu Ghraib’s torture and prisoner abuse should have put to rest this ridiculous dualism. But it didn’t. Too many Americans have an unfortunate ability to downplay…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Philosophy

What’s God got to do with lost climbers?

Hope I don’t sound heartless when I say to the relatives of the climbers lost on Mt. Hood, “Please, keep God out of your news conferences. Don’t use this tragedy as a platform for your religious faith.” Today Frank James, brother of climber Kelly James, said on Fox News: We are waiting and praying. Certainly there is a lot of praying. There are from time to time, tears. From time to time there is laughter…Our faith is strong. Our faith is three-fold. We have faith in Kelly, and Brian, and Nikko. We have faith in the rescuers. And we have…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Lars Larson blames James Kim for taking a wrong turn. But not George Bush.

According to conservative talk show host Lars Larson, James Kim is at fault for trusting a government map. What an idiot. I’m talking about Larson, not Kim. Kim died when he and his family tried to take a treacherous Oregon back road after they missed a turnoff to Gold Beach via state Highway 42. They ended up stuck in snow. After a week, no rescuers had appeared. Kim left the car and set out on foot to seek help. He succumbed to hypothermia. A tragedy. Thankfully, his wife and two children survived. Wednesday Larson talked about the Kims on his…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

I swear on the Quran, “It’s OK to swear on the Quran”

Well, I’m taking some liberty with this blog post title. I do indeed own a copy of the Quran, but I can’t find it at the moment. I’d be pleased to swear an oath on it, though. Just like the first Muslim member of Congress, Keith Ellison, is intending to do next month. Of course, the difference between Ellison and me is that I’d be equally happy to place my hand on a Bible, Bhagavad Gita, Tao Te Ching, or any other supposedly holy book and attest to whatever someone wanted me to affirm. I wouldn’t care which book it…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Lars Larson spouts conservative talk radio hypocrisy

My wife can’t understand why I listen to right-wing blowhards like Lars Larson, Michael Savage, Sean Hannity, Victoria Taft, John Gibson, and Bill O’Reilly. I tell her that driving along with Lars on the radio gives me the cardiovascular equivalent of a two-mile jog, my heart rate and blood pressure rise so much. More seriously, I love it when I catch one of these pontificators in an especially blatant conservative hypocrisy. Which is common. That’s one reason why the Republicans did so poorly in the mid-term elections: voters were fed up with all the say one thing and do another…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

A shocker!

This news has shaken my world. I never saw it coming. Are we nearing the end times? Can the center hold? Is there anything that can be counted on anymore? Will the world stop spinning on its axis?
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Saudi Arabia sex slave story brings Borat to real life

A Saudi Arabia man living in Colorado has been sentenced 28 years to life in prison after he was convicted of sexually assaulting an Indonesian housekeeper and using her as a virtual sex slave. A news video shows him saying, “The state has criminalized these basic Muslim behaviors.” Indeed, the Colorado attorney general had to fly to Saudi Arabia to explain to authorities there why the man, Homaidan Al-Turki, committed a crime. David Harsanyi, Denver Post columnist, writes: In Saudi Arabia - a moderate Muslim nation, correct? - women are forbidden to drive and must be covered head to toe…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Oregon House Democrats forgo revenge

“Values” voters, take notice: the Democrats are displaying a lot more charity toward their vanquished foes than the Republicans exhibited during their days in power. So if you value Christian compassion (or Buddhist, Jewish, whatever) and adherence to the Golden Rule—do to others what you would have them do to you—the Dems deserve your support. Today the Salem Statesman Journal had a front page story about State Rep. Jeff Merkley of Portland. He’s slated to be the next speaker of the Oregon House of Representatives, blessedly replacing the Evil Queen, Karen Minnis. When the Republicans had the majority in the…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Hoping for a Tai Chi election night

Yesterday my Tai Chi instructor, Warren, was talking about the importance of keeping your center. I’m looking forward to the Democrats doing just that tonight—getting this country centered again after too many years of right-ward tilting. So far, it’s looking good. Eight House and three Senate seats picked up. If the trend continues, we’ll wake up to a much more balanced United States. The Dems have learned from past leftist excesses. A lot more Democrats are running as moderates (or even semi-conservatives) this year. Nothing wrong with that. Bill Clinton understood the importance of holding onto the middle. That’s where…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Home life

DR Power Equipment should run for office

I’m a big fan of both the DR field and brush mowers, of which I’ve owned three, and the Vermont-friendly folks who work at DR Power Equipment. Today I enjoyed another pleasant customer service experience. Coming as it did on the heels of John Kerry’s ghastly “I vow I’ll never apologize for what I said unless I change my mind” (it took just a day) political gaffe, I realized how great it’d be if straightforward down-home people like those who work at DR Power Equipment were the only ones allowed to run for public office in this country. Kerry sort…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Dems should have locked John Kerry away

John, oh John. What was going through your unthinking mind? One week before the election. All you have to do is keep your mouth shut and not get in the way of the rising Democratic tide. But, no. You can't resist attempting a lame joke about how if college students aren’t smart and don’t study hard, they’ll end up stuck in Iraq. Understood: you were trying to say that Bush is a fool who did just that. A Kerry aide told CNN that the prepared statement, which had been designed to criticize President Bush, "was mangled in delivery." Kerry was…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Home life

I copy Laurel’s ballot. Are we lawbreakers?

Aren’t you envious, rest of the country? We voters here in Oregon, every last one of us, get to fill out our ballots in the comfort of our homes. Then we stick them in the mail, civic duty having been completed almost effortlessly. I make it even easier on myself by copying my wife’s ballot. Last night she sat at the kitchen table, thick voter’s pamphlet in hand, reading the qualifications of every obscure candidate and the pros and cons of ballot measures that we were undecided about. This morning, per our tradition, I picked up her not-yet-sealed ballot, laid…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

German polizei make Portland-area police look like sissies

How is it that German police can disarm a man wielding a samurai sword without hurting him, by using a broomstick, while Washington county police shoot and kill a teenager holding a three-inch fishing knife, and an unarmed mentally ill man dies after three Portland policemen rough him up? According to a news report, in Hamburg, Germany a man swung a samurai sword violently at police as they tried to disarm him. If this happened in Oregon almost certainly he would have been filled with bullets. But the polizei used a broomstick to subdue him. Check out the videotape. It…
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