Samantha
9/30/05
Hello everyone! I have been sick for the past few days. Today I went to the Doctors and had to get a Penicillin shot (in my butt) and it hurt SO much!!! I have Infected Tonsils. I haven't been able to talk for awhile and I missed two days of work. My Mommy made me Potato Soup and it was Very good...Thanks for the tips Grandma! Well I will talk to you guys later...I am off to bed...byes

Feel better, Sam! --Gary

Let me finish this with three pearls of wisdom from Tom DeLay:
1) Here's how he explained to the 1988 GOP National Convention why he did not fight in Vietnam: "So many minority youths had volunteered that there was literally no room for patriotic folks like myself."
2) Here's what he said to three young Hurricane Katrina evacuees at the Houston Astrodome just a few weeks ago, on September 9: "Now tell me the truth, boys, isn't this kind of fun? Kind of like a camp-out?"
3) And here's what he said on May 14, 2003, to the owner of Ruth's Steak House, after being told to put out his cigar because of federal government regulations banning smoking in the building: "I am the federal government."

DeLay's money and shady deals have affected many many local elections around the country in the past several years, and have directly lead to the Republican majority in the House and Senate. I hope they can make these latest -- and more serious -- charges stick, because I can't wait to see this creep in an orange jumpsuit....

Emily, what a story! You got switched from defense to prosecution, and from English to Spanish! :-) How did it turn out? Seems like the case should have been thrown out, or maybe delayed.

I forget where I found this photo, just somewhere on the internet. I knew it was Colorado, but didn't know exactly where. As to the webpage status, they keep telling me "soon" but so far, nothing. windstream at its best! --Gary

LATER: The first sentence of the story was re-written about an hour later (I presume because of complaints) to read: "Cindy Sheehan, the California woman who became a leader of the anti-war movement following her son's death in Iraq, was arrested Monday...." But the rest of the story still stands.

P.S.: I called windstream again today, and was told they still have some problems their end, but hope to have service restored sometime today. So this newsletter should be running normally again soon!

P.S. You can send items directly to me by email -- via the contact page, for example -- and get them posted that way.

Hey, about the team, Lindsey, I hear you. But it is possible to disgree with the current administration and still support the troops! :-) --Gary

On the bright side, Bush's approval rating continues to decline -- now down to 37%. That's lower than Nixon's approval rating through most of Watergate (though at the very end, Nixon's numbers went down to like 25%). The Presidential election is still three years away, God help us, but the composition of the House and the Senate will be decided next year. If the Dems can win back the house and/or Senate in 2006, they can begin to undo some of the evil this man has done. That's assuming all the votes get counted, of course....

On the other hand, it's beautiful here today. After a record high yesterday (101 according to the weather channel, thus ruining my prediction of August 4), today it's forty degrees cooler -- down in the 60s!

So, if tomorrow is the first day of fall (which it is), why is it still so hot??? Yesterday we hit 94, which tied an all-time record. Supposed to be in the 90s again today. Bring on, I say, the cool weather, the jackets and sweaters, the changing colors, the dew on the grass, the pumpkins and gourds, the apple cider, the Halloween candy, the birds flying south, the snap in the air, the frost, the leaf-raking, the early dusks, the dry cornstalks, and the furnace kicking on. Is that so much to ask? Where is it? I blame George Bush.

Hey, anyone stuck for a Christmas gift idea? Or, if not that, how about this?

We will watch it soon, Emily. It just didn't happen last Saturday. I've still got it (from Netflix)! --Gary

"Spellbound" is on for tomorrow night, after the game. Looking forward to it! :-) --Gary

Back to meetings for me in just a few minutes. Only til noon today. Had a great prime rib dinner at Misty's last night. My first time there. Okay, gotta go!

Yeah, and we're having lunched catered in by Beacon Hill -- which may be a new place to you? A nice Sunday-brunch kind of place out on top of the hill on North 27th. I think you can see Vern & Grace's old place from the parking lot. --Gary

In other words, "You didn't believe me when I lied about what a great job we did after the hurricane, so my handlers are telling me to read this statement." First of all, the responsibility was already his the day he took office. What he needs to do is be accountable for the lives lost due to his inaction. The statement itself is pretty mealy-mouthed. He says he's responsible "to the extent" that the federal government didn't do its job, leaving himself a big back door for when he wants to blame it on the local level.

On the other hand, you can just see the bold leadership on this face, can't you? And he did actually say those three words -- "I take responsibility" -- for the first time in his career. (So the weather channel in hell must be issuing a frost warning for tonight....) --Gary

First in line! --Gary

I can have a game of some sort up on Friday, for the weekend, but not a "Who Am I" -- that's a little more work than I have time for this week. But something!

Oh hey, something new on the projects page came in over the weekend!

Sorry! The quiet here is my fault, I think I scared everybody away when I made the newsletter my own personal anti-Bush zone. I'll try to tone it down. No more ranting -- until the impeachment hearings, which I hope will be soon. :-) (There's going to be a big "Impeach Bush" protest rally in Washington on the 24th, a week from this Saturday -- be sure to watch the news that day!) --Gary

Weird email problems at work here. This note arrived in my mailbox around 10 Friday night, but it was sent around noon of Thursday. Sorry for the 34-hour delay! --Gary

It sure sounds like that's what Rumsfeld is saying -- i.e., not following the party line in blaming the locals, and actually speaking sense! I guess the up-side to the whole story is that Brownie's out and won't have any more deaths on his head. And replacing him -- even in this carefully-managed way -- is an admission of guilt, of sorts. As close as this administration will ever come to admitting guilt. "What didn't go right??" --Gary

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said Friday that local and state officials shouldn't have to share in the blame for the poor response because they were in fact victims and not able to respond.

I haven't seen that, but I like the sound of it. Where did you see it? Colin Powell has been saying some good things lately also -- and about time, after doing his part to contribute to the evil that is Bush. Powell said that the response to the hurricane was a disgrace (or words to that effect, can't remember the exact wording), and also -- in a different context -- said he was sorry for the speech he gave before the U.N. justifying the U.S. invasion of Iraq. It was based on bad intelligence (though I'd call it deliberate lies) and said the speech was a "blot on his record." --Gary

But I did hear about Brown. I thought they would fire him, so he could absorb all the blame; but they didn't even do that -- they just took him off the front lines. It's only a PR move, and Bush gets to keep his "Brownie." The Republicans are going full speed ahead in the "Big Lie" mode. They're going to continue saying Bush did a great job, that the hurricane wasn't really that bad anyway (Chertoff is already saying that; he told the members of Congress in that night meeting that the press was making the Convention Center look much worse than it actually was--at which point one Democrat walked out), and that New Orleans will be better than ever. And if they just say it loud enough and long enough, people will believe it -- so that, two months down the road when they're building new housing in New Orleans and the Democrats want to get an independent investigation started, people will say, "Oh, not THAT again!?!" and go back to sleep. Besides, the only people who got hurt were some lower-class black people who shouldn't have been there anyway, right? Sorry, I'm kind of depressed today because it looks (today!) like the bad guys are winning.

But! Going into Old Fogey Mode in 5-4-3-2....
It was sort of like that with Watergate too. Now when you read about Watergate in books, or even when you can remember it like me, you tend to think of it as a package: Crime was committed, crime was investigated by press and Senate Committees, bad guys were sentenced to jail, Nixon resigned, the end. But when it was happening -- and it happened over many months, almost a year -- it was up and down, up and down. On one day there would a new piece of the puzzle discovered by the press: and you'd think, Yes! And on the next day, the White House would stonewall it to the point of killing the story: and you'd think, well, that's that--the creeps got away with it. Week after week of this... terrifically hard on the nerves, no matter which side you were on. But eventually the Senate investigation was established and it sorted things out. When Ford took over after Nixon resigned, he said "Our long national nightmare is over." And everybody knew exactly what he meant: It was a nightmare for all those months. So we've got to keep the pressure on for this investigation (or several of 'em!) -- and not just settle for the "investigation" that Bush wants to lead personally...

And speaking of which, Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) is doing his part, too! He's proposing legislation that would fine people who choose not to evacuate a storm heading their way. ????? As Keith Olbermann said last night when he named Santorum "The Worst Person in the World": "That's right, Senator -- and be sure to fine all those dead people in New Orleans!"

Jon Stewart on "The Daily Show" said of Brown, "In 2004, Bush appointed Brown to head FEMA, and he's going to start the job any day now." :-)

And hey, if anybody gives you that "God destroyed New Orleans because of its wickedness" thing -- and don't laugh, lots of people think that: check this -- just ask them why the French Quarter was almost untouched? Some of the bars there are already serving drinks again!

Thanks again! You already got me yesterday. :-) --Gary

I finally turned up a video of that Keith Olbermann editorial I mentioned below. Check it out!

Okay, going into I-Hate-Bush Mode in 5, 4, 3, 2...
You've probably seen by now the Nancy Pelosi comment on the news (which I mentioned below), but if not, the gist was this: She got to speak to Bush on Tuesday and said to him that he should fire Michael Brown (FEMA head). Bush said, "Why would I do that?" "Because of all that went wrong," she said, "because of all that didn't go right!" And Bush wrinkled his tiny forehead and said, "What didn't go right?" He asks, what didn't go right.... After that, to the news cameras, she called Bush "oblivious, in denial, dangerous." With bodies still floating in the streets of New Orleans, he recently said this: "The good news is -- and it's hard for some to see it now -- that out of this chaos is going to come a fantastic Gulf Coast, like it was before. Out of the rubbles of Trent Lott's house -- he's lost his entire house -- there's going to be a fantastic house. And I'm looking forward to sitting on the porch." How do we account for this "disconnect" (as more and more of the press is calling it), this eerie lack of feeling? While thousands of people were still trapped in the Convention Center, he was chuckling -- to the news cameras -- about what a great party town New Orleans is, and how he enjoyed himself there "a little too much sometimes" in his younger days. Apparently this disconnect runs in the family: You maybe heard what his mom had to say about the evacuees now living in the Astrodome? Barbara Bush said, "So many of the people were underprivileged anyway, so this is working very well for them." She doesn't want them to get too comfortable there, though: She went on, "What I'm hearing -- which is sort of scary -- is that they all want to stay in Texas." Who ARE these people???

P.S.: Read this article on Bush's phony photo-op in Mississippi. It's amazing.

Yeah, sounds like everybody is loving school this year, which is great. (Congrats on your new school, Anna!) As Karen said, having to drag yourself every day to someplace you don't want to be is the worst.

Enjoy my birthday, everyone! :-)

At Grandma's last night when we were all watching the news, I predicted that the political fallout would begin to show up within a month; and that the Feds would eventually finger New Orleans Mayor Nagin as the fall-guy. Well, both those things happened a lot sooner than I thought. Late last night a group of Senators met with some of Bush's cabinet (including Chertoff and Brown) and, as CNN tells it, the meeting was "contentious." Some Republicans predictably rallied around Bush, but many of them were just as critical of the government response as the Democrats (led by Nancy Pelosi, who on TV this morning called Bush "in denial" and "dangerous," God bless her!). The Republican leadership started to heap the blame on the local level. Representative Tom DeLay (you remember him -- the so-far-unprosecuted criminal who put his whole family on the payroll and can't account for half a million in campaign contributions?) said FEMA was designed to work "from the ground up," meaning the mayor has to ask the governor, and the governor has to ask FEMA, before FEMA can do anything. (Check this news release, from FEMA's own website, in which -- incredibly -- the first responders are instructed not to respond....) Other Republicans accused Pelosi and the other vocal Democrats of trying to "politicize" the disaster. Well, they should listen to their former poster-boy Newt Gingrich who said the slow response "puts into question all of the Homeland Security and Northern Command planning for the last four years, because if we can't respond faster than this to an event we saw coming across the Gulf for days, then why do we think we're prepared to respond to a nuclear or biological attack?" And they're still trying to control the press, by preventing photographers from taking pictures of the bodies recovered in New Orleans.

When it was wondered why Bush seemed even more out of touch than normal during all this, some have suggested it is because all his handlers were out of town: Bush himself was on vacation (though he did "cut it short" by two days and came back to Washington on Wednesday -- three days after the hurricane struck); Dick Cheney was on vacation in Montana, and returned to Washington even later than Bush did; White House Chief of Staff Andy Card was fishing in Maine; and Condi Rice was relaxing in New York. She attended the Monty Python musical "Spam-a-Lot" on Wednesday night (where she was booed!), and went shoe-shopping the next day, September 1, four days after Katrina struck. One shopper there shouted "How dare you shop for shoes while thousands are dying and homeless!" -- and was promptly "removed from the store."

And read this first-hand account of Laura Bush's visit to a Red Cross shelter in Lafayette, Louisiana. She and her entourage took over one of the rooms there -- unfortunately the only room in the place with a working phone -- and tied it up for eight hours, along with the food service room and the women's showers.

This is bigger than Watergate. Even though Watergate was about actual laws being broken by the nation's highest officials, and no one -- yet, anyway -- has suggested any laws were broken here, the scale of this is much bigger. Watergate was about a couple of sleazy little crimes ("third-rate burglaries," to use the White House's phrase) and an abuse of power which was still kind of abstract to the average voter back then; this is about, at the very least, governmental negligence which has caused thousands of deaths and cost tens of billions of dollars. Watergate didn't produce any corpses, didn't show any crying babies and separated families on CNN, and Watergate brought down a president....

Finally, do yourself a favor and read this editorial ("'City' Of Louisiana") by Keith Olbermann, the anchor of MSNBC's "Countdown." He delivered it on-air Monday night. It is excellent!

Thursday night on CNN Michael Brown (FEMA head) said the Feds had learned only that day that people were in the Convention Center (which was the third day most of them had been there, with no food, water, first aid, etc.); yet the very next morning he said, "We've provided food to the people at the Convention Center so that they've gotten at least one, if not two meals, every single day." It was a few hours after this lie, by the way, that Bush complimented him: "Brownie, you're doing a heck of a job!"

On Friday, from the Oval Office, Bush offered us all this advice on higher gas prices: "Don't buy gas if you don't need it."

"Homeland Security" has so far cost us more than 100 billion dollars; wouldn't it be nice to have that money now to rebuild New Orleans?

For the length of one hundred and twenty miles ... the land is defended from the encroachments of the river by a high embankment which is called the Levee; without which the dwellings would speedily disappear, as the river is evidently higher than the banks would be without it. ... [S]he [the Mississippi River] was looking so mighty, and so unsubdued all the time, that I could not help fancying she would some day take the matter into her own hands again, and if so, farewell to New Orleans.

Again I say, thank God for the free press. The stories and images they are broadcasting are revealing the official lies. (Here's a great article from the Slate site about what some reporters are doing.) It's somewhat reminiscent of Vietnam: Every week the Pentagon officials told us we were winning the war and doing good work. It's a technique (which Hitler named and wrote about as early as 1925 and cold-bloodedly used throughout his career) called the "Big Lie": If you tell a big lie and stick to it, he said, sooner or later people will believe it. And it works, when you control the press as Hitler did and as our own right-wing tries to do. The only antidote is a free press. Reporters on the scene in Vietnam and other individuals like Daniel Ellsberg published the truth about the war; and thankfully our reporters are publishing the truth about this disaster.

Anna, good luck on your first day of school. I hope you love it there. Please write in and tell us all about it. It sounds like a wonderful school!

Gary, I read your letter to the editor in the paper Sunday. Very nice! I'll be curious to know if anyone responds to it.

Wow, tell Mr. Baker he has a new fan! Lots of good stuff on that page. And I liked the picture of him with Howard Zinn, who is the author of one of my favorite books (which I recommend highly): "A People's History of the United States." That book tells you all the things that your history teachers leave out. ...Though maybe Mr. Baker is an exception! --Gary

Thanks! --Gary

My email seemed to be working ok; I did get email from other senders. Sorry your notes didn't make it through. I haven't seen the paper yet. It was Sunday's paper? Do you guys subscribe to the Journal-Star? --Gary

Yeah, what is God trying to tell us here? The most incompetent, amoral, and ignorant person ever to sit in the White House (who actually rigged an election to get there), yet he's the one who has to handle 1) a catastrophic terrorist attack, 2) the biggest natural disaster in U.S. history, and 3) two Supreme Court vacancies. "Okay, America, you didn't even whimper when a moron stole your highest office; let's see if you like the way he handles this, and this, and this!" --Gary

Cool! In the paper, or online? I'll check it out. --Gary

Did anyone catch his little photo-op in Mississippi? Totally moronic. He had made a show of shaking hands with a few carefully-screened survivors, and then in front of the cameras said, "I was just talking to a man who was raised...in a house...that is no more." Wha...? I think he was aiming at "eloquence" but hit "stupid." Another great line: He said, "The great city of New Orleans will get its feet back." What can I say? The best, though, was this (and mind you, it's five pm of Day Five when he says this): "This was a major storm that's gonna require immediate action." ......?? If this storm had swept through Crawford, Texas, I guarantee everything would have been re-built by now (including the George Bush library -- both books!) and they'd be putting the finishing touches on the landscaping in time for church tomorrow.

I take it from your post, Amanda, that Ryan figured out how to get TiVo'd programs into the computer...?

Not at all! But I figured anyone who has the NSA, FBI, and CIA on speed-dial, like Hagel must, would know...everything. :-) And thanks for the above site. Cool! --Gary

Anyway, our leaders in Washington must have finally started watching the news, because just this morning Bush -- looking tanned and refreshed after a good night's sleep and a hot breakfast -- stepped in front of the cameras and said the relief efforts were so far "not acceptable," and then got on the chopper to go have a look for himself. I understand he will fly OVER New Orleans but won't land, like Erika said. (Oh, how I wish he WOULD land, right next to the Convention Center, so he could make a speech about how the relief effort is going.) He will land, however, somewhere in Mississippi, where I'm sure there will be plenty of FEMA workers he can shake hands with, and plenty of cameras....

Amanda, be advised that Hagel's office may be contacting you for a security check on me. :-) I called each of my representatives last night (Senators Hagel and Nelson, and the district Representative Fortenberry) to say that this was a national disgrace, that "Homeland Security" was revealed as a massive fraud, and if America under Bush can't help its own people did they know of any OTHER country we could ask? (This was after hours, so I left messages on their machines.)

And finally, happy birthday Sam and Livy! Sorry for filling up this page with chatter on your birthdays! Hope you had (and are having) fun!

I did hear one person -- some official type, on the scene in New Orleans -- allude to this. He mentioned that the National Guard presence in New Orleans was so minimal because most of the Guard was over in Iraq. No doubt true! On another topic: the Senate and the House both met tonight in emergency session to approve a 10 billion dollar aid package for the hurricane states, and in the course of it Dennis Hastert (Republican, and Speaker of the House) asked -- out loud, unfortunately for him -- whether we should give any money to rebuild New Orleans at all, given that it will probably get hit by another hurricane sooner or later. Well...! Reaction was immediate from Louisianians, demanding an apology. So he's in hot water now. He's saying his remark was "taken out of context." Of course. --Gary

I hear you, Erika, and I agree with every word -- except for Jeb: we've got to do everything we can to keep him OUT of the office! Bush bothered me too (not for the first time!) when he was giving his little talk about how bad things were but we're going to beat it, etc etc, and all you could see was his vacation tan and his stupid grin. He's a bad man. --Gary

I watched an ABC interview with Diane Sawyer & Bush and it was comical. Bush is trying to be nonchalant about calling a specific Coast Guard troop and calling him by name (& then messing up his name) and dumb things like that. It is disgusting..

I wish I were at Hagel's office now, to hear the inside of it from there.

"As I sit here & watch the live coverage from New Orleans after Hurrican Katrina I realize your organization can be blamed for the anarchy that is slowing down the rescue efforts. You all should be ashamed of yourselves! That is directed towards anyone who works for the NRA or supports them in any way. If guns were not readily available in every store on every block looters would not have been able to gain access to them as easily. Why was there no widespread chaos during the Tsunami? Because they are not as gun happy as the United States. We have you to thank for this. For everyone that dies from now on in New Orleans, know that YOU are personally responsible."

I got an email back telling me to expect a direct contact from a representative.

I also tried to email Wal-Mart, something along the same lines, but I couldn't find an email that goes to big wigs, only to my local store.

Well done! --Gary

I just heard that the number of stranded people in New Orleans is not the 20 or 30 thousand we keep hearing, but more like 60,000 at least. A National Guard driver said that when one of the buses pulled up to the Superdome last night, hundreds of people came streaming out of the nearby high-rises and hotels hoping to board. These are people who've been holed up for three days with no news, and when they saw the buses figured this was the evacuation. So the evacuation problem is much bigger than previously thought.

And ya gotta read this article. It's from a German magazine's website (der Spiegel); I don't expect the article to get much play here in the land of the "free press." In brief it says that in 2001, FEMA warned of just such a disaster in New Orleans, but the Bush administration cut New Orleans flood control funding nearly in half in order to pay for the Iraq war. I hate George Bush.

P.S. Feeling all hot and bothered after my gasoline rant below, I edited it a bit and emailed it to the Journal-Star. Well, someone from the paper just now called me to confirm my identity and told me they were printing my letter. She said they've been "inundated" (bad word choice maybe?) with letters but wanted to print mine. So watch the editorial page, Lincolnites, and tell me if it appears. (I don't take the paper.) And remember, you read it here first! Our webpage has scooped the Lincoln Journal-Star. :-)

The only one I've heard of is Venezuela, which I mentioned below. Pretty nice of them considering a certain loudmouthed servant of Satan "evangelist" recommended we assassinate their President just a few days ago. Would be nice if Iraq's new government (which Bush bought and paid for with American lives) would maybe offer some oil on the cheap... but I guess not. --Gary

Okay [deep breath!], to change the subject, it's time for some more movie news!
Everyone was worried about the summer box-office, when it seemed like no one was going to the movies. Well, maybe that's because the summer movies were stinkers, and they were saving the good movies for later this year, like:

The Producers, opens December 21: Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick in the movie version of the Brodway version of the original movie version which starred Zero Mostel and Gene Wilder (follow all that?). This will be way funny. In fact, the original movie is still way funny -- rent it if you haven't seen it!

We'll be talking about some or all these at Oscar time -- only 185 days away...

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Donna
9/1/05

Happy Birthday, Olivia!!!

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Ryan, Amanda, Tristen & Teghan
9/1/05

Happy Birthday Liver Bean!

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