Ares and Athena in Atlanta

Monday

2010-04-05T09:42:00.000-04:00

Marmot Montag

2010-03-22T10:26:00.001-04:00

Yes, We're Still Alive.

Still Alive...

2010-02-15T12:52:00.001-05:00

MM

2009-12-07T12:50:00.001-05:00

Monday

2009-11-30T14:22:00.000-05:00

Monday

2009-11-23T12:53:00.000-05:00

Marmot

2009-11-16T12:28:00.002-05:00

Yes, it's Monday.

Marmot Monday

2009-11-02T13:19:00.002-05:00

How NOT To Do It

2009-10-28T12:11:00.002-04:00

Man who threw feces in courtroom draws 31-year sentence for robbery.

Dude, you're doing it wrong.

The Department of The Obvious Checks In

2009-10-27T12:58:00.002-04:00

CNN falls to last place in ratings for prime-time programs.

In other news, water is wet and the sky is blue.

Marmot Monday

2009-10-26T12:45:00.003-04:00

Editor?

2009-10-16T12:58:00.004-04:00

The Seattle Times has got to find a better headline writer. From today's web edition:

Huskies linebacker achieves his dream, now has torn ACL.

Who dreams of achieving a torn ACL?

Ares

Swine Flu

2009-10-13T22:39:00.000-04:00

Marmot Monday

2009-10-12T12:26:00.001-04:00

We're Baaack!

Ig-Noble Peace Prize

2009-10-09T14:01:00.003-04:00

This best part of POTUS winning the Nobel Peace Prize isn't the award itself. It's the stream of commentary that can be harvested in it's wake. Cherry picked from Instapundit are the favorites thus far:

"How do you say 'jumped the shark' in Norwegian?"

From Richard Cohen of the WashPo: "At the same time, and amazingly enough, the Pulitzer Prize for Literature went to Sarah Palin for her stated intention “to read a book someday.”

More to follow on this developing un-story.

Ares

Working in Government

2009-10-09T12:56:00.003-04:00

I am enjoying my current foray into working for the government. The daily brushes with absurdity and Rube Goldberg administrative processes are never ending entertainment. This week's installment was brought to us by the bench outside my office door. The other day we had a group of folks visiting the office. Most were what could generously be called big boned. At one point during the visit four of these endomorphs attempted to wedge themselves onto a bench that was built for two. With predictable results the bench collapsed, leaving one person slightly injured. As a result of this little incident it was decided that the benches are a hazard to persons of this body type and we will not be given a replacement. (Swear I'm not making this up.) I remedied the congnative dissonance by spending many hours watching the Violence Channel with my good friend Frito Pendejo.

Ares

A Question for Steve Jobs

2009-10-07T13:24:00.003-04:00

As I'm sure we're all aware that there are algorithms that look at your shopping choices and try to present you with possible purchases up your alley. It is with that in mind that I pose this question to Apple: What in my long iTunes history metal and rock purchases make you think I'm down for some Camper Van Beethoven? Somebody check under the hood of Skynet.

Ares

Tyler Durden Tuesdays

2009-10-07T01:28:00.003-04:00

There is a decent reason for the rot and neglect of this space over the past few months. I was engaged in a foreign pursuit: enjoying the hell out of life. Between the pursuit of happiness and the cacophony of stupid permeating the everything I thought it best to keep my trap shut in this space. Sure, there's been lots to comment upon. But I haven't managed more than a “boy, this sucks” conclusion of late, and you already knew it sucks. So for a little bit henceforth I'm gonna throw effort at the silly.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2009-07-20T13:09:00.003-04:00

Marmot Monday

2009-07-13T12:47:00.000-04:00

News From The Northwest

2009-07-03T12:57:00.002-04:00

Or should I say “News flavored product”. Todays installment of the Why The F*** Are You Telling Me This files is courtesy of the ever-classy Seattle Times: Yakima Teacher Reprimanded For Sending 5-Year-Old Student Home With Bag Of Feces In Backpack. Leave it to the Times to make me wish for more stories about Michael Jackson being dead. While we're on this topic I've got a few questions of my own. For those that have issues with my digression on the subject please bear this in mind: I didn't make this a front page story in a major newspaper.

What sort of societal standard should we be hold out teachers to with regard to kids making a grunt sculpture in their classroom?

What would be the appropriate verbiage for telling a parent their precious little snowflake dropped a deuce in public?

Will this necessitate an addendum to progress reports? I.e.: Math B+, Reading C, Deportment Good, Absence of Dookie in Classroom Unsatisfactory.

Should Hallmark come out with a new line of cards to ease the communication between teachers and parents? “Roses are red, violets cost more, Your little angel, took a s*** on my floor.”

I could continue on this line but you get the idea. Personally I'd like to buy the teacher a tall cold one for dealing with this directly. I would have called the janitor (or HazMat) and waited in the hall. The kid's parents need to move right now. If they don't his prom date, and probably his wife, will know about this. As for the Times, the analogies between feces stories and their Port-O-San of a newspaper are too numerous to pluck. They've pretty much succeeded in beclowning themselves on this one.

Ares

McKinney, Redux

2009-07-01T18:50:00.002-04:00

McKinney still held on ship of activists detained by Israel.

KEEP HER!

Ares

Recently Encountered

2009-06-29T12:48:00.001-04:00

One Time Offer

2009-06-28T18:32:00.003-04:00

Sad news: TV pitchman Billy Mays is dead. On a brighter note, the family has said his organs will be donated. Call in the next 15 minutes and you get the second kidney or lung for free! In other news, police have announced there is now an APB out for the ShamWow! guy.

Ares

Jesse To The Rescue

2009-06-27T22:40:00.003-04:00

Jesse Jackson: Family wants 2nd autopsy. Because every situation is improved upon with the arrival of Jesse Jackson. Nice to see he's found himself a gig after that whole "Wanna cut his nuts off" thing during the election. Stay classy there Jesse. Wonder if he'd be pitching in if Lenny Kravitz had kicked the bucket?

Ares

I Could Have Told Them

2009-06-25T18:34:00.003-04:00

Just in case it was a mystery, website TripAdvisor did a survey in which Atlanta came in dead last of preferred destinations. In other news water is wet and the sky is blue. Of course, the Atlanta Convention and Visitors Bureau took issue. Nobody wants their house publicly referred to as a privy. I've got a comeback campaign slogan for the Atlanta Convetion & Vistors Bureau: "Yea it sucks but we're working on that piss smell".

Ares

Things You Already Know

2009-06-17T04:28:00.005-04:00

You're well aware that gas prices are on course to follow last year's take-us-to-the-cleaners run. As Americans, we're all intimately familiar with getting screwed with out pants on. In the midst of this turd in a teapot gas price thing we get another in depth analysis from the news-flavored product factory called CNN. We'll set aside the obvious point that oil prices exist outside the economic laws of supply and demand. Apparently there is a third dimension:

"Considering that supply seems ample and demand is weak, the fact that oil is going up looks kind of weird," says Adam Sieminski, chief energy economist at Deutsche Bank. "But those factors are being overwhelmed by a huge sigh of relief that we're not going to have the Great Depression."

I see. The mere fact that people are exhaling forcefully has caused an increase in oil prices. Maybe, and I'm just spitballing here, the reason the entire system got crashed is because we let guys like Adam Sieminski craft apologist explanations for the largest corporations on the planet bleeding us like butchers. The article also says the U.S. economy is using 2.5 million few barrels per day this year than in 2009, but that actual fact can't complete with the force of a huge sigh of relief.

"Meanwhile, there are signs that a demand recovery could be on the way in Asia."

Actually, no, it's not. I keep hoping there are adults paying attention somewhere. For all my pseudo-anonymous ranting this actually a little important. If were are going to construct a future society that unplugs us from fossil fuel dependence there has to be time to actually construct it. Letting the corporate crack addicts continue to take a crowbar to our knees is another stitch in the coffin lining of that idea.

Ares

Sign Of The Times

2009-06-14T13:24:00.003-04:00

Good piece on CNET about the utter lack of coverage on the major networks, especially CNN, of unrest in Iran. I sincerely believe it stems not from conspiracy but astounding incompetence. CNN is becoming to news what MTV has become to music: Not a content conduit but a culture delivery device.

Ares

It's Not Natural

2009-06-04T21:05:00.005-04:00

Gay penguin dads in German zoo hatch their first chick. Not to worry, the voters of California will outlaw this soon. I'm certain that with the penguin's well-known powers of critical thinking and highly developed cerebellums they chose a homosexual lifestyle solely reap the benefits of minority status in penguin society. It's all a part of shoving the radical homosexual penguin agenda in our faces.

Ares

VeJo the Ho

2009-06-04T20:57:00.002-04:00

Oh please oh please oh please. Vernon “VeJo” Jones has publicly dropped the clue that he's considering a run for governor of Georgia. There are few reasons why reading those words brought glee into my teeny, tiny heart. First, I no longer reside in Georgia so I'll be rolling in blooming fields of Schadenfreude. (Visualize the closing credits of Little House on the Prairie and you'll have the correct image of my mental state.) Second, you just don't get big, fat, juicy comedy pitches thrown right into the strike zone every day.

Vernon's real tragedy, his real lament in life, is that he didn't have a big enough kingdom to loot. He desperately wants to level up to where the big money and prizes reside. And before you reject the idea out of hand remember that Marion Berry was re-elected after being caught on video smoking crack. Cynthia McKinney got re-elected after acting like a crack head. With these stars to steer by, nothing is out of reach for VeJo. For those residing outside Dekalb County let me give you a visual of what life in Georgia would be like under VeJo: Imagine post-Katrina New Orleans only without the hurricane. Georgia under the current governorship of the feed salesman moves only as a result of inertia, not competence. VeJo would bring levels of graft and entropy difficult to comprehend. By reading the comments section of the AJC article this apparently isn't lost on potential voters.

So here's the official Ares and Athena prediction for VeJo: He'll fall flat in his run for governor. He'll bide his time and make a shot at the 4^th U.S. Congressional district. Given the 4th's voting record he's got a pretty good chance. He will not, however, fade from political life. He's too incompetent to hold an actual job and his ego will tolerate nothing less than a personal sequel. This will be fun to watch, from a distance.

Ares

Hummer Time

2009-06-02T15:01:00.003-04:00

A frightful idea has crossed our bow. Seems a Chinese company may acquire GM's Hummer line. (Side thought: How far have you fallen as an industry when Fiat is considered your white knight?) This sends a shiver down my patriotic spine. What's next on our tour of domestic economic decay? Little Debbies made by Hezbollah? Omaha Steaks outsourcing to India? An F-16 assembly line in Syria? Jimmy Dean sausage moving to Mecca? First they came for the Hummers......

Ares

Congressional Birthday

2009-06-01T20:15:00.002-04:00

Ares and Athena News Alert: Tuesday is International Whores Day. Celebrate appropriately by sending best wishes to your elected representatives.

Ares

Bacon Lives!

2009-05-14T04:09:00.002-04:00

From Amazon's Al Dente blog. Hard to top this, so I'm just gonna re post it below. God bless America.

Bacon Maple Bar Saves Part-Time Vegetarian

by Martha Snodgrass on May 11, 2009

After a cleansing five-day intense yoga retreat at Breitenbush Hot Springs, where the menu is strictly vegetarian, I was feeling clean, strong, healthy, and in desperate need of protein. Figuring I'd be home around dinner time, I planned to continue my healthy streak with some tekka maki from my local sushi restaurant. But as the evening rush hour began to waylay our progress, and my carnivorous hunger began to kick-in, I thought I better sate my need before I started to eat my own fingernails. Fortunately for me, as we cruised through Portland, we happened past VooDoo Doughnuts, the home of the Bacon Maple Bar.

I was a little concerned about what this intense shot of sugar and fats would do to my thoroughly cleansed and hyper-relaxed system after nearly a week of a meat-free, low-fat, zero refined sugar diet. I also had to consider that I still had five non-stop hours in the back of a small car to go (making intestinal distress disastrous).

Once we entered Voodoo Doughnuts, a Pepto-Bismol pink former Denny's restaurant, I searched the display case and there past the Voodoo doughnut dolls (which come complete with frosting-painted grimace and pretzel voodoo pin impaling their little doughy hearts), vegan doughnuts (exactly NOT what I needed), doughnuts covered with Coco Puffs and Captain Crunch, I saw one maple bar topped with two strips of crispy bacon. Hunger and nutritional need drove me to pull out my wallet.

Now, my aesthetic sensibilities started to kick in and I noticed the bacon fat had cooled, congealed, and turned white. Suddenly I lost my appetite. I think it was CJ, the most experimental of our quintet that dove in for the first bite. After seeing the satisfied roll of her eyes, my curiosity overwhelmed my hesitation and I dug in. It was pure syrupy pancake and bacon bliss. This was the breakfast I'd yearned for each morning I'd woken up to tempeh and eggs.

While I wouldn't recommend making a trip cross-country for this doughnut, if you find yourself in Portland, it's definitely worth a five-minute trip out of your way to try it. Also, if you happen to be at breakfast with all the makings nearby, drop a strip of warm bacon on a maple bar and you'll have an even fresher experience than mine.

Ares note: Gotta go, on my way to Portland.

They're Baaaaack!

2009-05-11T12:15:00.001-04:00

Simplicity Itself

2009-05-09T03:38:00.003-04:00

As usual in life, the best solutions are the ones that are the least complicated. With that in mind I came across the following idea today, posted a blog whose name I've since forgotten. Sheer genius.

Dear Mr. President:

Please find below my suggestion for fixing America's economy. Instead of giving billions of dollars to companies that will squander the money on lavish parties and unearned bonuses, use the following plan. You can call it the Patriotic Retirement Plan:

There are about 40 million people over 50 in the work force. Pay them $1 million apiece severance for early retirement with the following stipulations:

1) They have to retire.
A· Forty million job openings.

B. Unemployment fixed.

2) They have to buy a new American CAR.

A· Forty million cars ordered.

B. Auto Industry fixed.

3) They have to either buy a house or pay off their mortgage.

A· Housing Crisis fixed.

It can't get any easier than that!

Ares

Who Needs A Warm Up?

2009-05-04T14:39:00.004-04:00

Here's something that makes pandemics and global warming feel good by comparison. Seems Russia is going to build floating nuclear reactors above the Arctic Circle. There is so much wrong here I don't know where to begin. Russians operating nuclear reactors gives me apocalypse nightmares. Add the word "floating" to the descriptor and I want to stock up on canned goods and iodine. Now let's throw in the possibility of a China Syndrome in the Arctic ice and it's a perfect Book of Revelation stew. Here are words I never thought would cross my keyboard: I wish to god they had a Sierra Club chapter in Russia.

Ares

Big Goodbye

2009-04-26T14:17:00.004-04:00

Another installment of the Vay Con Dios Files. J.G. Ballard, who lived large in genre that was eventually labeled Transgressive Fiction, has gone to the great beyond. I supposed I would write a lot of f'ed up fiction too if my childhood had been like his. The movie and novel Empire of the Sun is based on his experiences as a child in a Japanese prison camp during the second world war. Aside from Empire of the Sun, a select few weirdos in this world are familiar with his book Crash, which is about car crash fetishists. I won't begin to explain that one. He definately slaughtered a lot of the sacred cows of fiction (and normalcy for that matter) and paved the way for the Chuck Palahniuks and Trent Reznors of this world. Adios amigo, it was weird knowing you.

Ares

Hopefully We're All Going To Die

2009-04-26T13:35:00.002-04:00

Let the salivation begin. Pavlov has rung the bell and on cue the media outlets have begun to drool. There's a multi-national disease outbreak in the larval stages. Death and suffering that's photogenic soon to follow. “Flu outbreak could become pandemic” proclaims my local rag in that same voice that teenagers hoping to get laid use. Act I is people wearing surgical masks in public. Act II will be hospital shots and government press conferences. Some network, somewhere, will show the movie Outbreak before next week is out. My spam inbox will start piling up ads for antibiotics. Never mind that this particular organism has a very low mortality rate. Disregard that over 36,000 people die every year in this country from regular old fashion flu. Twice that many die from hospital screw ups. The rational medical professionals will get very little face time in the coming weeks. Reason, logic, and facts don't make for good numbers. Instead of specialists we'll get journalists that have written books providing prediction.

My favorite quote thus far: “How quickly can Swine Flu make you sick? About 90 minutes of CNN should do it.” Second favorite: “The virus does not travel at the speed of Tweet.” I'd love to sit here and pontificate some more but I've got canned goods to stockpile and money to hide in a mattress.

Ares

Tea

2009-04-18T12:17:00.003-04:00

I have to admit I'm having fun watching people debate about what the debate means with regard to the Tea Parties. Because if there is one thing Americans are good at, it's talking about thinking about how the conversation is going. On the one hand you have legions of people that have only in the last 4 months found their voice about government spending, as if it all began in the middle of January. On the other hand you have people that six months ago were saying dissent is the highest form of patriotism, now rummaging through their Thesaurus to find new derisive descriptors. Running through all of this you have the media (sans Fox) conspicuously either avoiding coverage or deriding protesters. Anderson Cooper's indulgence in teabagging references dug the credibility hole even deeper. And as over half a million people protested on April 15th the New York Times did it's Marcel Marceau impression. Somebody tell the Gray Lady she ain't wearing any clothes.

I'm not pimping for either side here. I think everyone here is sufficiently infused with enough bullshit to strain credibility. The bigger worry is that with every corner of the national discourse propping itself up on foundations of sarcasm, hyperbole, and worst-case-scenarios how are we going to recognize authentic truths when they make an appearance?

Ares

Crack and Taxes

2009-03-30T13:28:00.003-04:00

Brief aside here. Just read that former D.C. mayor and professional victim Marion the-bitch-set-me-up Barry owes $277,000 in back taxes. My first and last question is this: How does a city councilman that's legit make enough money to owe that much in taxes to begin with. Something tells me that crack smoking aside I made some wrong decisions about careers.

Ares

Tasmanian Devil Tuesday

2009-03-24T19:52:00.003-04:00

Thought we'd change it up a bit.

Athena here: we loves 'em, truly, but is that thing wearing a diaper?

Marmot Monday

2009-03-09T11:35:00.000-04:00

Marmot Monday

2009-03-02T11:08:00.000-05:00

Marmot Monday

2009-02-23T11:11:00.001-05:00

Who knew there were so many pictures of marmots out there?

Separated At Birth

2009-02-18T23:21:00.002-05:00

More like separated in elderly life.

Marmot Monday

2009-02-16T11:16:00.002-05:00

Job Market

2009-02-14T11:15:00.003-05:00

Man the job market is getting rough.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2009-02-09T11:13:00.003-05:00

Jamie's Magic Palace

2009-02-04T01:53:00.004-05:00

Apologies for the overly long rant that's to follow. I feel if I don't hammer this out it's going to fester like a cognitive zit begging to be pinched. There was finally a ray of hope on the evening television lineup. Tonight's NOVA was about the National Security Agency and it's role “post-9/11'. (By they way, we took a vote and decided that 'post-9/11' is the most abused and overused term of the decade.) Unfortunately for me and the thinking public they gave James Bamford the keys to the show, letting him write and direct it. You may remember Bamford from such hits as his 1982 book The Puzzle Palace, or such ditties as The Agency That Could Be Big Brother in the New York Times. Bamford has fashioned himself a career by selling the NSA as the boogey man to fear in our technology-laden society whilst pandering to the dark reasoning of people that go out of their way to believe the worst about this country.

I don't have a problem with Jamie B believing what he wants to believe about the world or the government. The distressing issue was his soiling a once great brand (Nova) with his personal neuroses. On a plate that cries out for balanced reasoning and thoughtful analysis we were served slick visuals and multiple money shots of his books. The first half of the hour touched on a few of the 9/11 hijackers and what they did inside the US. Bamford posits that based on their communications the NSA should have intercepted the plot and therefore stopped 9/11. Mind you, the communication Bamford references are calls made from within the US, so there's that whole pesky 4^th Amendment issue. Also, prior to 9/11 I'm not sure they actually broke any law by calling a house in Yemen. Mere association doesn't get you on the domestic legal system dance floor in a pre-9/11 America. It did, however, usually get you a date with a deportation hearing and a one way ticket home. That is, if the NSA is allowed to tell INS, which they aren't. The truly asinine aspect of the issue was the FBI had agents assigned to the NSA, and NSA was aware that some of the hijackers were associated with Al Qaeda. But due to legal restrictions, put in place by the Clinton administration, those FBI agents were forbidden from telling the FBI about the hijacker's existence. Never mind all that, says Bamford. Someone should have known what was going to happen and broken the law to bring the hijackers to the FBI's attention.

I think at this point I actually yelled at the TV. Because of Bamford's book The Puzzle Palace even cave-dwelling Koran thumpers are well aware of the NSA's collection methods and capabilities. As a result of this the hijackers and their overlords never discussed operational matters via telephone or e-mail. The communication restrictions are even outlined in the Al Qaeda training manual. So what, exactly, was the NSA supposed to know if no one talks about anything related to the plan?

The second half of the hour glossed over, from about 10,000 feet, how the NSA has changed 'post 9/11'. Of course, Bamford trotted out how it was wrong, wrong I tell you, for the NSA to ignore FISA. Mind you, the intercept targets that circumvented FISA were calls originating overseas from 'known associates' and NSA was doing so under Executive Orders. Those were facts that clogged up Bamford's well rehearsed speech...I mean show...so he didn't bother introducing them. There was a repeated tone of indignation at the idea the NSA would monitor calls inside the US. (Whereas it was this exact failing that was trotted out in the first half our as Bamford's reason why 9/11 happened.) Somewhere around this point in the program Mrs. Ares, who is by all measure a layman on this topic, saw the distinct nakedness of the show's intellectual emperor.

Again, I don't give a snot if Bamford believes what he cares to believe. But tonight Frontline and an infomercial had a baby and it was called NOVA. I know that the P in PBS stands for Public. But given that PBS is taxpayer funded can't we call down some thunder against X-Files rejects dressing up like smart people and beclowning the good name of NOVA? PBS is supposed to be the last refuge of thinking Americans that actually still turn on the television during prime time. It's our 10 acres of palm tree-covered beach in an ocean of American Idol and Desperate Housewives. And thanks to Jamie Bamford, it just went condo.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2009-02-02T11:19:00.001-05:00

Rendition

2009-02-01T20:35:00.004-05:00

Interesting little blurb percolated its way out today. Seems the Obama administration has issued an executive order allowing the continuation of the practice of rendition. For those unfamiliar, rendition is where you turn a terrorism suspect over to a third party government for interrogation. The practice actually goes back to the Clinton administration, but we don't like to talk about that. The interesting part of this little development has been the silence that has met the announcement. The New York Times and Washington Post, two outlets that flogged the last president for the practice, are conspicuously silent on the new ruling. I guess it's only bad when someone you don't like is ordering it.

Ares

Update: Someone with way more time and smarts than I followed through on this. Professor Hutchison of the Dissenting Justice blog posted some before and after statements by Human Rights Watch. This is the before:

The US government should:

Repudiate the use of rendition to torture as a counterterrorism tactic and permanently discontinue the CIA's rendition program;

Disclose the identities, fate, and current whereabouts of all persons detained by the CIA or rendered to foreign custody by the CIA since 2001, including detainees who were rendered to Jordan;

Repudiate the use of "diplomatic assurances" against torture and ill-treatment as a justification for the transfer of a suspect to a place where he or she is at risk of such abuse;

Make public any audio recordings or videotapes that the CIA possesses of interrogations of detainees rendered by the CIA to foreign custody;

Provide appropriate compensation to all persons arbitrarily detained by the CIA or rendered to foreign custody (emphasis added).

This is what was issued after by Human Rights Watch:

"Under limited circumstances, there is a legitimate place" for renditions, said Tom Malinowski, the Washington advocacy director for Human Rights Watch. "What I heard loud and clear from the president's order was that they want to design a system that doesn't result in people being sent to foreign dungeons to be tortured -- but that designing that system is going to take some time."

Note to Human Rights Watch: Turn off the lights & lock the door. You're now hacks instead of advocates. Mind you, I'm actually in favor of the practice of rendition. But when a group that advocates something as basic as human rights twists sideways in it's seat merely because of who occupies the Oval Office they've ceased to be useful. Co opting is it's own form of corruption.

Pox Populi

2009-01-30T14:26:00.004-05:00

Like everyone else in this fair land I've been a passenger on this ride we call America for the past few months. Thus far the most intolerable aspect of this entire Tilt-a-Whirl hasn't been the economy or the election. It's the incessant yapping of just about every corporate news source. Those who frequent this humble space know this has been one of my whipping boys from the start. But as I've said before, we seem to be exploring new ground. The sense of masturbatory glee, emanating from the endless exploration of the possible permutations of how each new development is going to make your life worse, is reaching a pitch I've only seen previously in church revivals. Earlier this week the Seattle Times (it's superiority to the AJC in skill and class can be measured in Angstroms) ran a front page picture of a Depression-era shantytown and went elbow-around-the-ass to tie it in to current events. Not to be outdone, a local television station dedicated the lead that night to the “Deepening Financial Crisis”, then spent 10 minutes waxing about how it was going to make your life worse. If the media were a religion right about now we would all be wearing Nikes, holding pudding cups, and searching the heavens for the comet. To which I ask one of my million rhetorical questions: What are they going to do when life doesn't cease to exist?

Meanwhile, I've been dedicating my unemployed time to self-productivity. Aside from playing a lot of Call of Duty: World at War I've been reading & researching. I recently finished Cool It, an updated and Cliff Notes version of The Skeptical Environmentalist by that modern Martin Luther, Bjorn Lomborg. Lomborg uses a phrase I absolutely love, Catastrophe Porn, in describing the fascination/fixation with doom, death, and destruction. Talking to people about Bjorn Lomborg reminds me of the Christians I knew growing up that abjectly refused to read Bertrand Russell's Why I Am Not A Christian. Speaking of religion, up next on the reading stack is Heavy Metal Islam. Report to follow.

On the research side I've spent some time digging into the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, better known as the stimulus that is currently making its way through the governmental large intestine that is congress. Kinda pathetic overall. I think I would entitle it the No Lobbyist Left Behind Act, but that title was already taken. High points: $1000 payroll tax cut for couples (gotta have a job for that to kick in), $7500 tax credit for first time home buyers (good luck getting financing), $102 billion for welfare/unemployment (probably gonna wear that one out), $30 billion for highway construction (doesn't buy a popcorn fart's worth of infrastructure, beside we did this x10 4 years ago), $19 billion for clean water & flood control (could always use that), $20 billion for health care information technology (so much for the private sector making it's product better), and $6 billion for weatherizing modest income homes (does that count condos that have been flipped a dozen times & can now be bought with a Sears card?). Those are just the high points. I'm sure there's a hemp research grant or interstate visitor center buried somewhere in there. One other key point: Only about 10% of the money actually gets spent in 2009. The rest over 2010 & 2011. Overall it doesn't give me a warm fuzzy, and I'm not alone. Rasmussen puts the latest approval for the plan at 42%.

And finally, lest we look too serious, we here at Ares and Athena offer a glimpse of our kinfolk. Just to clarify, our familia is the guy on the mower, not the cop.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2009-01-26T12:38:00.002-05:00

One Last Kick

2009-01-19T10:34:00.002-05:00

Economists Warn Anti-Bush Merchandise Market Close To Collapse

Marmot Monday

2009-01-19T09:30:00.000-05:00

Marmot Monday

2009-01-12T12:10:00.000-05:00

Refuse to Elaborate

2009-01-08T13:50:00.003-05:00

Porn industry seeks $5 billion federal bailout. So many double entendres, so little time.......

Ares

Non sequitur

2009-01-07T13:07:00.004-05:00

A very curious turn of phrase crossed my path this morning. I was doing a drive-by of iTunes, looking for song that's been stuck in my head. After selecting the song for download a lawyer-length disclaimer popped up that I had to agree to. Being unemployed and having a surplus of spare time I actually read the disclaimer. Towards the bottom I found the following sentence:

You also agree that you will not use these products for any purposes prohibited by United States law, including, without limitation, the development, design, manufacture, or production of nuclear, missiles, or chemical or biological weapons.

Alright, I surrender. How is some Barry White gonna be reengineered into a solid fueled, multistage rocket with a 600KT warhead sitting on top? My Chemical Romance can't be turned into Sarin, although it might feel like it when you're unwillingly subjected to the former. Is someone somewhere worried about Kim Jong Il's Touch being used to build bigger Dong's?

Ares

Don't Let the Door Hit You

2009-01-06T13:21:00.003-05:00

Good tidings to pass along here at Ares and Athena. Vernon "We-gotta-darken-this-place-up" Jones is unemployed. This is change I can believe in. Joining the swelling ranks of the unemployed, Vernon said he plans to devote more time to his hobbies of kitten stomping and hamster baseball. Don't worry, though. Like a case of electoral Herpes Vernon will reappear from time to time in political life. He's too corrupt and base to actually hold down a legitimate job. Maybe he can get together with Cynthia McKinney and form a Coalition for the Socially Inept and Politically Autistic. (Possible branding suggestion: They could have the acronym pronounced 'septic'.) One thing that will definitely be on VeJo's agenda will be a driver's ed refresher. After being ferried around the county by a platoon of Praetorians for the last 8 years he's going have relearn basic rules of the road. As for the picture above, I couldn't resist. One good Photoshop deserves another.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2009-01-05T12:39:00.002-05:00

Humna Humna Hamas

2009-01-04T21:59:00.006-05:00

For the latest in deep thinking about the Israel/Palestine soap opera I point you towards the erudite Michale Totten. Personally, I think Hamas' biggest complaint is that they're getting their asses slapped around like a blow up doll at a steroid convention. All the money in the world via Iran and Saudi Arabia and they can't produce a single decisive victory. Makes me think they kind of enjoy the beatings.

Then there's this from Totten friend and regional guru Noah Pollak:

From the JPost:

[IDF officials] said that it was likely that a number of senior Hamas operatives and terror chiefs were hiding and conducting their operations from within Shifa Hosptial in Gaza City.

“Hamas operatives are in the hospital and have disguised themselves as nurses and doctors,” one official explained.

Now the Israelis have done it — they’ve forced Hamas leaders to dress up like nurses. Zionist cruelty knows no bounds.

Ares

Changes Great and Small

2009-01-04T20:50:00.003-05:00

Apologies for the new paint job. I'm tinkering with the environment here. The new gadgets on the right are from a huge list of stuff you can add to your blog courtesy of Blogger. I figured a Shakespeare insult generator (for Athena) and a Homer Simpson picture of the day (for me) were the most tasteful additions I could embrace. I passed on the Monkey Poop Flinging Game, but only after great rumination.

I think it's pretty safe to say I'm settled out here in the northwest. The boxes are all unpacked, the books are all on the shelves, and the fridge is appropriately stocked with local microbrew. The first two weeks here were a bit sideways. An enormous snowstorm started the day I got into town & didn't let up for two weeks. Biggest snow hit the region has taken in over 50 years. The few plows they have utilize rubber blades instead of steel and they won't use salt on the roads because it kills the spotted owls or some such nonsense. (I hear you laughing Funky C.) Bottom line: One half inch or more of ice on all the roads for over two weeks. Overall it was fun to look at but everyone is glad its over.

Now that I've had a few weeks to catch my breath & look around the disparities between the regions are coming into focus. No right or wrong, just differences. First, the people are ruder. Very little eye contact and almost no acknowledgment. People just seem to be stuck in their own little bubble of thought. Second, lots of rednecks without the accent. My neighborhood has more full-sized pickups with lift kits and big tires than I ever saw in Georgia. And this is in the burbs, which are specifically lacking in mud bogs or streams to navigate. Third, traffic congestion is appallingly bad here. The environmentalists refuse to allow the expansion of major arteries (this is what locals tell me) so more cars are stuffed through the same pipe each year. Mass transit infrastructure is a fraction of what it consists of in the ATL, so unless you work Monday through Friday along a major route it's not an option. The bright note out here are the libraries, which are flippin sweet. My local branch has a fireplace with big comfy chairs alongside.

I could babble on but this a few lines longer than are usually prescribed. Gonna go watch the snow that's falling, again.

Ares

Another Year in Books

2009-01-02T12:38:00.007-05:00

So unlike my esteemed colleague and sibling Athena I decided to actually wait until the end of the year to post my reading list. Mainly because there were one or two I was still trying to finish. That said, here we go.

A More Perfect Constitution by Larry Sabato. Well worth it, should be required reading for registered voters.

What Are You Optimistic About? by John Brockman. Sucked. I'm optimistic that the book was lousy.

Everything Is Illuminated by Jonathan Safran Foer. Excellent in an acquired taste sort of way. Watch the movie instead.

House to House by David Bellavia. Excellent, but not recommended for those that can't suspend their politics about the war.

A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini. Excellent

Snow Falling On Cedars by David Guterson. Excellent and flawless. Made me want to move to the Northwest......oh wait.

Delta Force by Charlie Beckwith.

How To Work For An Idiot by John Hoover. More about overcoming your inner idiot. Funny and practical.

Cop In The Hood by Peter Moskos

Chechen Jihad by Yossef Bodansky. Screaming flapping piece of shit. Wanted my time back.

Lasso The Wind by Tim Egan. Excellent! Egan has skills.

Robert's Ridge by Malcom McPherson. Good but a tough read along the lines of Lone Survivor.

Retribution by Max Hastings. Exhaustive and exhausting but good. We're finally getting enough distance from WWII that some objective stuff is being written.

The Fourth Turning by Strauss and Howe. Great and a bit scary. Again, should be required reading.

The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac. Good but an acquired taste.

Charlie Wilson's War by George Crile. Amazing guy that Wilson. Worth the time.

Ultramarathon Man by Dean Karnazes. Psycho.

The Life & Times Of The Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson. Fun read, Bryson never disappoints.

Beyond Band of Brothers by Dick Winters. Should be required reading for leadership courses.

Snuff by Chuck Palahniuk. Very acquired taste by an author people either love or hate. I think the readers know where I stand.

The Forgotten Man by Amity Shlaes. Kinda sucked. Amity needed an editor and a mission statement.

Communication Excellence by Brian Polansky.

Flushed by Hodding Carter. Fun look at the potty.

The Simpsons and Philosophy: The D'oh! Of Homer by Various. Right up my alley and well worth the time. Favorite chapter: Thus Spake Bart: On Nietzsche and the Virtues of Being Bad.

Overall a bit less than the previous year and a bit less diverse. This is something I intend to remedy this year, having access to an excellent library system and a lot of spare time.

ps. Happy New Year to all 3 of our readers.

Ares

What's an Antonym for Dignity

2008-12-30T12:14:00.004-05:00

“All of us have voices in our heads, whispering insanities. Rep. Cynthia McKinney’s problem is that she lets hers speak.”

slate.com

Sorry for the extensive emptiness in this space. It's not a marmot-advocacy society or anything, I was just trying to keep the page moving. My favorite loon is back on the radar, literally. Cynthia much-ado-about-a-hairdo McKinney took her one person band of crazy on the road. Recognizing a kindred spirit in the perpetual Own Goal Society known as Palestine she decided to lend a hand. She stowed away in what looks like a pretty swanky yacht called the Dignity (too much irony, it burns) and attempted to bring the Palestinians some bandages and warm bodies. This didn't sit too well with the Israelis, so they decided to PIT the boat.

So much to topically tickle, so little time. In keeping with the ethic of the professionally oppressed she made sure there was room on the boat for a reporter. Mind you, they could have carried more medical supplies if the reporter hadn't been there, but then who would have documented her righteousness? Also, I noticed a distinct lack of Black Panther bodyguard types on this mission. Guess they aren't too enthusiastic about situations where the other side might actually shoot back. I think the part of this I love most is that its lost on Cynthia that if she were a woman in Palestinian society she'd be a barefoot, burka wearing, baby making machine that could be beaten just for opening her pie hole. Of course, the bigger picture here is now is our chance. She's out of the country, revoke her stinking passport & inflict her on the rest of the world. Let her be a true believer and go live amongst the people she champions. The backside bonus would be an increase in the national IQ and a bit of peace and quiet.

Ares

my year in books

2008-12-27T13:25:00.004-05:00

Ares began this little exercise last year, and, inspired by a gift from L., my local book pusher, I decided to continue on with it myself. Following are all the books I’ve read this year, in order (mostly—I put down and picked up a few). For me, when it comes to books, all things are created equal, so there are vast swings from the canon to non-fiction to chick lit (its mostly crap, with a few exceptions) and back again. And when I discover a writer I like, I tend to read everything they’ve written (preferably in chronological order—yes, I know I have control issues, and I’m at peace with that knowledge).

So thanks, L, for the journal and for many of the books on this list!

The History of God, Karen Armstrong. Incredibly dense, full of good info.
Dead Until Dark, Charlaine Harris. This is where it all began, for you True Blood fans.
Club Dead, Charlaine Harris
In the Company of the Courtesan, Sarah Dunant
Dead to the World, Charlaine Harris
Dead as a Doornail, Charlaine Harris
Absolute Friends, John LeCarre
All Together Dead, Charlaine Harris
Suite Francaise, Irene Nemirovsky
U-Turn, Bruce Grierson. Ares recommended it, and I agree its worthwhile.
Secret Yankees, Thomas Dyer
Sweet and Deadly, Charlaine Harris
Last Scene Alive, Charlaine Harris
Undaunted Courage, Steven Ambrose. Fascinating account of the Lewis and Clark expedition--now I want to visit Montana.
What’s a Ghoul to Do? Victoria Laurie. Crap.
Sleeping with the Fishes, MaryJanice Davidson
How to Manage Your Mother, Alyce Faye Cleese. Good info for any situation, not just mothers.
Dead and Dateless, Kimberly Raye. Worse crap.
The History of Love, Nicole Krauss. Engaging.
The Alphabet Sisters, Monica McInerney
The Mission Song, John LeCarre
Coyote Waits, Tony Hillerman
Listening Woman, Tony Hillerman. Thanks for the Hillerman dose, Jayne.
On Beauty, Zadie Smith. I liked White Teeth better.
Year of Magical Thinking, Joan Didion. Extraordinary.
Small Favor, Jim Butcher. Love me some Harry Dresden.
Ultramarathon Man, Dean Karnazes. Dude is in love with pain.
From Dead to Worse, Charlaine Harris
Undead and Unworthy, MaryJanice Davidson
Bottlemania, Elizabeth Royte
Natural Capitalism, Paul Hawken, L. Hunter Lovins, Amory Lovins. Very, very good ideas for improving our world--all of which are in use, not just conceptual.
Under Cover, MaryJanice Davidson
Brick Lane, Monica Ali
The Great Awakening, Jim Wallis
Things I Learned from Knitting, Stephanie Pearl-McPhee. Funny, but not her best.
Dog of the Marriage, Amy Hempel. Sublime haiku in fiction.
Collected Stories of Amy Hempel
Sea of Poppies, Amitav Ghosh. Lovely story
The Notebook, Nicholas Sparks. Sorry L., but its sentimental crap.

In progress, on the nightstand, at year’s end:
Your Money or Your Life, Joe Dominguez and Vicki Robin
A More Perfect Constitution, Larry Sabato (Ares’ copy)
The Cultural Creatives, Paul Ray, et. al. (beloved by a friend, but its just not blowing my skirt up)

So that's my year in books, though there's still room for one or two more. We'll see. I'm working on a knitting project with a deadline, so it may be more movies than books for the next week or so.

Athena

Marmot Monday

2008-12-22T12:49:00.002-05:00

Marmot Monday

2008-12-15T12:29:00.001-05:00

Marmot Monday

2008-12-08T21:12:00.001-05:00

Marmot Monday

2008-12-01T10:23:00.000-05:00

Sunday Quote

2008-11-30T21:29:00.003-05:00

"Yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. We are stricken by no plague of locusts. Compared with the perils which our forefathers conquered because they believed and were not afraid, we have still much to be thankful for. Nature still offers her bounty and human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply. Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.

True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.

The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit."

FDR's inaugural speech. More applicable than ever, 75 years later. Lifted from the quite readable Dr. Housing Bubble.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2008-11-17T15:59:00.004-05:00

Sorry, been a bit slack in the marmot department lately.

Ares

Autumn In Decatur

2008-11-09T12:48:00.003-05:00

Arguably Atlanta's best season

Oskar Blues' Ten Fidy Imperial Stout, on tap at The Brick Store.

A Little Hesse

2008-11-08T23:00:00.006-05:00

Now there are times when a whole generation is caught......between two ages, two modes of life, with the consequence that it loses all power to understand itself and has no standards, no security, no simple acquiescence.

Herman Hesse Steppenwolf

Yea, what he said.

Ares

New Headline

2008-11-02T21:19:00.005-05:00

Economy So Bad Half of All U.S. Households Are Below Median Income Level. Obama Promises to Fix Within First 100 Days.

Okay, maybe The Onion has already done that one. I don't know. It's along the lines of their "Earth's Continued Rotation Plunges Half the Planet Into Darkness" entry.

Ares

Separated At Birth

2008-10-28T15:51:00.003-04:00

Is it just me or does that moronic, self-proclaimed skin head that wanted to lop off a bunch of heads look like a cast member of Sesame Street? (Note to self: Must get Photoshop.)

Ares

2008-10-25T16:33:00.002-04:00

So. Much fuss is made by the Rs about the Obama tax plan, and they say it would have 45% of the tax base paying no taxes. While, as a taxpayer, I like to believe that my fellow Americans are pulling that wagon with me, I know that all of them are not.

For those earning too little, I bear no ill will. Since I was raised by a single mom working pink collar jobs, I know what its like to be in a family headed by a hard worker who just doesn’t earn enough.

For those earning too much, however, I would like a little change. I am not naïve enough to believe that there will ever be an employee of the I.R.S. savvy and well-equipped enough to find all the myriad tax shelters and refuges of the very wealthy.

And yes, I know that the very wealthy pay a large, large portion of the taxes already in this country. But, and I quote W. here, quoting John F. Kennedy “to whom much is given, much is expected.” (Interesting side note: he has used that quote at least four times in the last year or so; in announcing his intention in early 2007 to reauthorize PEPFAR, the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, in remarks in honor of World AIDS Day last November, in a BBC interview in February 2008, and in a USAID speech in July 2008. Does he know he’s quoting a Democrat? Does he care?)

So, when I turned on my television the other night for little mindless viewing, I was amused to see Ari Fleischer (yes, the one who left the Bush administration a while back) singing the party song about that 45% who will not pay taxes under an Obama presidency.

And it got me to thinking (always a bad sign, but bear with me).

Let’s flip that, shall we? What that really tells me is that 45% of our working folks earn SO LITTLE that they should not be taxed. Nearly one half of Americans, working jobs, who earn so little that they should not be taxed. And its contrary to all we are taught as Americans—that if you work hard, play by the rules, and do the right thing, you will get ahead.

None of this changes my mind about who I will vote for Tuesday week. But it does remind me how very lucky I am—I have a roof over my head, heat in my house, and (too much, really) food to eat. I am lucky to live where I live, at the time I live, and to have the freedoms and abilities I have. I am happy to do my part, and for those who might take advantage or try to get over, well, that’s for them to live with.

Athena

Marmot Monday

2008-10-20T09:06:00.000-04:00

Marmot Monday

2008-10-13T19:18:00.001-04:00

Marmot Monday

2008-10-06T10:34:00.002-04:00

Get Well P.J.

2008-10-02T12:46:00.005-04:00

Disturbing news was just received at the A&A Global Operations Center. Seems P.J. O'Rourke, Ares favorite and writer I'd most like to be, has been diagnosed with cancer. Those that are familiar with P.J.'s work will probably say "what took so long". From his own literary mouth....

I looked death in the face. All right, I didn't. I glimpsed him in a crowd. I've been diagnosed with cancer, of a very treatable kind. I'm told I have a 95% chance of survival. Come to think of it -- as a drinking, smoking, saturated-fat hound -- my chance of survival has been improved by cancer.

I still cursed God, as we all do when we get bad news and pain. Not even the most faith-impaired among us shouts: "Damn quantum mechanics!" "Damn organic chemistry!" "Damn chaos and coincidence!"

I have, of all the inglorious things, a malignant hemorrhoid. What color bracelet does one wear for that? And where does one wear it? And what slogan is apropos? Perhaps that slogan can be sewn in needlepoint around the ruffle on a cover for my embarrassing little doughnut buttocks pillow.

Furthermore, I am a logical, sensible, pragmatic Republican, and my diagnosis came just weeks after Teddy Kennedy's. That he should have cancer of the brain, and I should have cancer of the ass ... well, I'll say a rosary for him and hope he has a laugh at me. After all, what would I do, ask God for a more dignified cancer? Pancreatic? Liver? Lung?

You can read the rest of it here. Surely P.J. is laughing loudly at the irony. God speed and best wishes for a rapid recovery. Hope you're back on your ass in no time.

Ares

Athena PS: my darling friend Annie, a 23-year survivor of colon cancer (who was given a 20% chance of surviving, by the way) would say PJ needs a brown ribbon. If he had been so lucky as to be diagnosed with colon cancer, she would have dubbed him an honorary member of the Semi-Colon Society. She's a real punster, that one, as well as a gem of a human being.

bailout, shmailout

2008-09-30T14:15:00.009-04:00

So, this week's prize for best manipulation of the political machine goes to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. Goodness knows the last word is far, far off in the entire Wall Street debacle, but I'm here to talk about my personal favorite snapshot of the moment. All the geniuses we've sent to Washington to serve in our nation's Congress have apparently not figured out one of the basic rules of legislative sausage-making: don't call a vote if you don't think you can win.

Yesterday the $700 billion bailout bill was called for a vote, and while we're all shocked--SHOCKED!!!--that the vote failed to pass, what is more shocking is who did NOT vote for it.

The President and Vice President reportedly worked the phones furiously, attempting to persuade Republican legislators to vote for the bill. When all was said and done, Speaker Pelosi delivered the votes she promised. However, the Republicans failed to deliver, and 2/3 of the House Republicans voted against the bill.

As a side note, the President's approval rating is 27%, which only reinforces why the bill lost despite the frantic politicking.

Now, Congress is currently controlled by the Democrats, though narrowly, so this could be called their loss. But this match still goes to the Speaker. She brought the votes she promised.

I make no predictions about how this fiasco will end, but I am proud to see that John Boehner, a mighty, mighty jerk, got beat by a girl.

PS: this is a much more succinct description of my question about the whole nasty mess.

Athena

Ares Postscript: Constitutional scholar and Ares & Athena favorite Larry Sabato says in his experience Rasmussen tends to have the most accurately reflected polling data. Rasmussen puts congressional approval ratings at 9%! Holy Margin of Error, Batman.

Marmot Monday

2008-09-29T18:32:00.001-04:00

Another Name for Atlanta

2008-09-29T04:32:00.003-04:00

I think Atlanta is a Latin word that means "metropolis full of f****** morons". Why, you ask? Gasoline. For those not local, Hurricane Ike disrupted gasoline supplies to the southeast because of refinery shutdowns. Mind you, the effects of the hurricane on supplies took a few days to make themselves known. Then, quite suddenly, the media noticed there was a supply disruption and gleefully reported on it every chance they got. Using tried and true phrases like "worry about" and "fears of..." they created a feedback loop. Fear about shortages are now making the shortages worse, which allows for a wider display of shortages by the media. (I'm looking at you AJC/WSB/WXIA/Fox5.) Now panicked people are sucking stations dry. My local QT usually gets a tanker delivery every day or two. Saturday they had 5 and were empty by 3 pm. There are confirmed reports of people convoying behind gasoline tanker trucks then mobbing the destination. Deep thinkers are even dialing 911 to ask where there is gas. Anybody seen my copy of The Road Warrior?

Ares

Rafael, Someone You Should Know

2008-09-23T19:34:00.005-04:00

A little bit of injustice has settled in our midst. Not the grand "fightin the man" kind of injustice, but rather a miscarriage of honor. For those uninitiated, Rafael Peralta, USMC, threw himself on a grenade during the battle for Falluja back in 2004. Other service members have since been awarded the Medal of Honor for the same actions since. A final ruling was issued last week and the recommendation for the Medal of Honor was downgraded. Some are saying it's because Rafael was an illegal immigrant, others are saying the medal was downgraded because he was already wounded. What nobody questions is that Rafael loved his adopted country and the Corps with a fullness most of us cannot fathom. The true issue here is that Rafael loved the men he was with so much that he couldn't bear the thought of them being hurt when he could do something about it. So he took very deliberate action that resulted in his own death, and allowed every one of his team mates to survive. If you've ever served in a capacity where you place your life in other people's hands and they place theirs in yours its the kind of commitment that brings hardened, grown men to tears. The least we can do is accord such commitment a place of honor, which is where you come in. Sign the petition. It costs nothing and you won't get on somebody's mailing list. This is one of those times it's easy to do the right thing.

God speed Sergeant. "Day is done, gone the sun...."

Ares

Fall

2008-09-23T12:28:00.002-04:00

Welcome to Autumn. I can't find gas for my car, the stock market is melting down, there's a clown's theater of an election going on, and all I can think is "Damn the weather sure is nice". Here's to that first robin of Autumn.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2008-09-22T11:30:00.002-04:00

Marmot Monday

2008-09-15T11:18:00.002-04:00

Why We Fight

2008-09-11T09:07:00.004-04:00

Unfunded

2008-09-10T03:37:00.005-04:00

So this week brings word of yet more pension fund failures. This installment is brought to you by Cobb Our-S***-Doesn't-Stink County, Georgia, and the state of Nevada. (Okay, Nevada hasn't tanked yet but there's nothing to check its demise.) Let's be clear, these are not failures of the market. These are failures of the people that manage these funds. There's a four word term I want everyone to practice repeating: Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation. Get familiar because they're going to write your checks one day. For some reason public sector fund failure doesn't bother me as much a private sector one. After all, there's only so much you can do with government financing. But when a big fat company like United Airlines simply doesn't make its fund payments, causing it to fail, and then goes running to bankruptcy and passes off it's fund to PBGC, that's criminal with malice and aforethought. Bonus round: The United CEO got $37 million in stock and bonuses upon the company's emergence from bankruptcy.

PBGC's increasing load piggybacks nicely with the US Government going into the mortgage business. (Aside note: My understanding, and I could be wrong, of the Freddie/Fannie failure is that it wasn't their bad loans but their inability to continue packaging and reselling their debts. Some guy named Ponzi first came up with that idea.) Dovetailing with this theme congress is setting up to see who can give the biggest handout to the domestic auto industry. Because we really need subsidized Tahoes and F-250's. Behold, the era of small government is upon us. To those that argue for the privatization of social security I say what's the point? Athena, where was it you read a few years ago where someone described the US Government as the world's largest insurance company with guns?

The terrain is changing beneath our feet. Without much in the way of public consent and little in the way of discourse the fundamentals we've counted as solid are being renegotiated. Thirty years from now, when the academics and pundits sit down to write histories of the days we're living now, we are going to be excoriated for hubris. In the mean time, mom better get to work on a Plan B.

Ares

Feelin a Little Fred

2008-09-09T00:38:00.007-04:00

Fall must be on the way because I'm starting to dig into existentialism again. It gets as regular as the leaves turning with me. The pause that finally comes with the break in the weather allows a pullback and some meta inspection. The only possible explanation for digging into Nietzsche in early September is that I'm trying to will a change in the weather.

Anymore I'm finding a bit of fascination with the concept of the Ubermensch. The whole idea got hijacked by Adolf and twisted around by a bazillion amateur thinkers thereafter. Fred wanted humanity to redefine itself upward outside the constricts of the church and without resorting to nihilism. The industrial revolution, and the resulting shrinking of the world that occurred with the telegraph/telephone and steam engine, drove a lot of people out of eons of spiritual comfort zones and into a low grade mania. Fred saw where this was heading, nihilism and war, and tried to call a flag on the play. He called the first 50 years of Europe's 20^th century from the cheap seats. But he was just a philosopher, and a dense one at that. They paid as much attention to philosophers then as they do now.

What does any of this have to do with anything? Not sure, but I think all of this is my own personal flight from idiocy. A little too much time among my fellow man, and a viewing or two of Idiocracy, and I start digging into the deep thinkers so I can tell myself I'm not like “them”. Athena and I have a rhetorical question we've been asking each other for years: What's the prize for being smart? Okay, maybe her and I aren't that smart, but there's some blatant self-awareness at work. What's the reward? Anymore I see some virtue in being a knuckle-dragging Neanderthal. The further you seem to get from vice, habit, routine, and entertainment the more intractably complex things appear. Fred could have used a beer and some Cartoon Network. Might not have thunk himself to death. (Or visited the hooker that gave him the clap that eventually killed him. In the context of that I always thought it would have been deliciously ironic to put All to Human on his gravestone.) Taking a bit of my own advice I think I'll crack a Sam & see if Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends is on.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2008-09-08T12:10:00.002-04:00

Marmot Monday

2008-09-01T06:57:00.001-04:00

Marmot Monday

2008-08-25T09:57:00.002-04:00

Couch

2008-08-18T20:39:00.002-04:00

I know this picture has made the rounds, but I still laugh every time I see it. The good news is that the army has new camouflage. The bad news is that it only works if we invade grandma's house.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2008-08-18T15:09:00.000-04:00

Living the Cliche

2008-08-17T15:22:00.004-04:00

So I finally had a quintessential cliche moment. Thursday I was on the treadmill, three sweaty miles into my five mile run. I was panting like a trout in bass boat and sweating like a fat man in Phoenix when she gets on the treadmill next to mine. We've all seen the type: Betty I'm-just-here-looking-for-a-boyfriend. (I know, this type also exists in the male of the species.) They're easy to spot, with their $200 workout fashion ware and hair done, spending more time looking around the room than at the treadmill readout. This particular Betty had applied about 3 liters of her cologne prior to entering the sweat deck. Her eau d'Phosgene made the air shimmer for ten feet around her. My eyes watered like I'd been tear gassed. I coughed like I'd swallowed a chicken bone. A spike of molten vomit made it as far north as the spot where my tonsils used to be. Compounding the damage was my breathing at double the normal rate due to the aerobic activity. I actually longed for the smell of a Chinese restaurant dumpster in the Georgia sun. The treadmill has a fan, which I quickly engaged. This simply introduced the mustard gas into my respiratory tract at twice the rate. If my alveoli hadn't been enduring the equivalent of a Dutch Oven I'd have offered a few choice words. Instead, I'm forced to resort to this forum. So Betty, consider yourself ridiculed and derided.

Ares

Marmot Monday

2008-08-11T02:13:00.000-04:00

Nerd Test

2008-08-05T22:01:00.004-04:00

My name is Ozymandias, king of kings...

Told you it was a nerd test. Like I said at the beginning of this blog, we're overeducated. If you don't know who Ozymandias is you can look here.

Ares

Enlarged Stupid

2008-08-04T14:45:00.006-04:00

The last thing I want is for this space to be the home of the perpetually indignant. That said, I came across this piece in the Wall Street Journal and couldn't resist a trip to the soap box.

At a time when scores of companies are freezing pensions for their workers, some are quietly converting their pension plans into resources to finance their executives' retirement benefits and pay.

In recent years, companies from Intel Corp. to CenturyTel Inc. collectively have moved hundreds of millions of dollars of obligations for executive benefits into rank-and-file pension plans. This lets companies capture tax breaks intended for pensions of regular workers and use them to pay for executives' supplemental benefits and compensation.

Wow. It's takes a special kind of suspension of reality and belief to convince yourself this won't backfire. Best case scenario: It ends up screwing your company into the ground. Worst case scenario: Crap like this brings down government intervention on a scale not previously envisioned by anyone. Or we could go big picture and look at this in a historical context. The last time corporate America treated it's employees with this kind of contempt was the first quarter of the twentieth century. How did that work out for them?

I finished The Fourth Turning a few weeks ago. Its a bit of a diffuse read, but the very short version of their thesis is that American history moves in waves. About every 80 to 100 years it goes really sideways and gets stretched to the breaking point. Do the math: Revolution & Continental Congress, Civil War, Great Depression, 2000 to ..... One of the big reasons the authors attribute to the above timespan is that everyone that was alive during the previous rupture is dead, so no one remembers how much it sucked. Scary thing about the book is it was written in 1997 and some of their short term predictions have pretty much come to pass. Things like this WSJ fiddling-while-Rome-burns article looks like another log on the coming fire.

Ares

Another Signpost

2008-08-04T04:35:00.006-04:00

Local teenagers from the Hey Al Dubat area of Fallujah, Iraq, hang out during the afternoon near a Kentucky Fried Chicken July 16. Since the opening nearly seven months ago, the business has flourished and attracts many customers in the nearby area. (Official Marine Corps photo by Cpl. Chris T. Mann)

Just in case you needed another indicator that it's just about over but the shouting, there's now a KFC in Fallujah of all places. You know, the Fallujah where Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was sawing off heads a few years ago. The Fallujah of Operation Phantom Fury infamy. The Fallujah where they executed, burned and strung up 4 contractors from a bridge, then danced in the streets. Bing West talks about Fallujah's reputation within Iraq in No True Glory. It was a nasty place even by Iraqi standards; their version of New Jersey. A lot of Saddam's thugs were drawn from there. And now they've got original or extra crispy with teenagers hanging around in front. Screw the political benchmarks. When Iraq gets its first indoor mall, compete with teenagers hanging around all day, it's time to bring the boys home.

One final thought. The picture below is from inside the Fallujah KFC.

A friend of mine went to Detroit a few years back looking at medical schools. He told me while he was there he went to a KFC in a really bad, "Oh Shit" part of town. This particular KFC had Plexiglas pass-throughs at the counter because the neighborhood was so bad. So using the KFC metrics, Fallujah is now safer the Detroit was 10 years ago. I'm gonna start selling "US out of Detroit" bumperstickers and declare a quagmire. Then again, calling Detroit a quagmire is redundant.

Ares