The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Daily Parker post #1000

Yes, this is my 1,000th post since this blog started in November 2005.

I had hoped to write a long, introspective essay on blogging in general and this blog in specific over the years, but it turns out I have work to do today, so that will have to wait until the 2,000th post or so. (Many of you are fighting back tears, I know; though I suspect they're tears of joy.)

No, today I'm just going to mention the two most immediately relevant things that confronted me on my way to work this morning.

First, in the past 24 hours, the temperature in Chicago has dropped 27°C. Spot the cold front:

Second, my preferred candidate, John Edwards, for whom I had planned to vote today at lunch, has dropped out of the race. So I'll vote tomorrow, once I formulate Plan B.

SOTU blogging

(All times EST)

9:01pm: I'm having a strange duality of experience. It's hard enough listening to Dubya; I simply can't subject myself to Tim Russert on top of it. So I'm watching the NBC feed while listening to NPR and hoping there isn't a delay.

9:05pm: Yep. Minor delay. I might have to return to NBC's audio. "Madame Speaker:" now that is cool.

9:08pm: Why NBC, by the way? Dana Hork.

9:11pm: Bi-partisanship...from him? (It's 9:11: do you know where Giuliani is?)

9:13pm: Job growth for 52 straight months still doesn't bring it to 2000 levels. And who grew jobs to those levels? Hmmm.

9:14pm: 116m taxpayers will see more taxes? Yeah, because the 0.1m of them earning in the millions will be paying their fair share again--but everyone else will do better when the tax cuts expire.

9:16pm: He can't help smirking. Surplus in 2012? What happened to the surplus we had in 2000?

9:17pm: Somewhat more muted applause (despite the right from standing up) about cutting earmarks. Wonder why...Public vote for earmarks? Ah, now the Democrats stand up.

9:19pm: "Expanding consumer choice..." with a close-up of Barack. He's not pleased. Pelosi looks like she just sniffed Parker's butt.

9:20pm: Come to think of it, Cheney always looks like he just sniffed Parker's butt, so maybe Pelosi is just unhappy to be sitting next to him.

9:23pm: Wow, he's reaching for the stars there, going for a free-trade agreement with Panama. Hey, I like Panama as much as the next guy, but this is the SOTU.

9:26pm: Chertoff is scary-looking. (Yay! Nucular power!)

9:28pm: America is leading the way to cleaner energy technology and greenhouse-gas emissions? Really? I think the Swedes, Finns, Danish, British, Icelanders, Koreans, Japanese, and several other national groups might disagree.

9:30pm: Life needs to be treated with the dignity it deserves? Tell me, Mr. President, how does torture fit in to this ethic?

9:31pm: Oh, fer gossake, the Democrats have confirmed nearly all of his loony judicial nominees even after holding up nearly all of Clinton's sane ones.

9:34pm: I find it fascinating that the entire Supreme Court can sit there without showing any emotion whatever. I mean, that's control. You know four of them want to pummel the other five, including the one who wants to pummel himself (herself?) just to be in the majority.

9:36pm: The images of liberty abroad contrast slightly with the growing tyrrany at home, now don't they? And he's on shaky ground talking about evil people who hate freedom, what with the torture and all.

9:39pm: What former safe-haven for Al Queda is he talking about? Because, it appears that Afghanistan is still a safe-haven for Al Queda, despite six years of war. The incompetence is mind-boggling, but not nearly as striking as the Orwellian spin on it.

9:41pm: HuffPo has posted the whole speech, which I've just found, and to my horror I can see we're only half-way done.

9:44pm: What if the surge is working because the ethnic cleansing over the past four years was largely successful, meaning there are fewer people to kill?

9:48pm: Parker just started barking at something. Not sure what; possibly he dreamt of a squirrel. In any event, I just returned to the speech at the point where he contrasted "decades of dictatorship and the pain of sectarian violence," skipping over the part how ending one caused the other.

9:50pm: We cannot defeat a concept. Terrorism will always exist. This is why the policies of this administration are either doomed to fail (if the goal is to eliminate the "enemy" of terrorism) or doomed to succeed (if the goal is unending war). Neither is acceptable to freedom-loving Americans.

9:54pm: We do not need to intercept communications to stop terrorism. We need basic human intelligence. Our citizens are in greater danger from our own government snooping on us than from anyone overseas. Giving telecoms companies a free pass in scrapping the 5th Amendment will not make us more free.

10:01pm: He's learning something, too. Think he's ever encountered "Articles of Confederation" before? I mean, except when he flunked history?

10:02pm: Oh thank heaven, it's over. And having turned in my poorest performance ever in Dana Hork's quiz, at least I got the length right.

All right. I'm going to pop in a West Wing re-run and forget we have 357 days, 13 hours, and 54 minutes left in the worst Presidency in history.

10:10pm: Sorry, on NPR, E.J. Dionne: "No one is grasping for the mantle of George W. Bush." That was funny.

Single-malt Wiki

Via my dad, via the San Francisco Chronicle's excellent Mark Moford: Whiskipedia.

And 28 other things to be happy about:

Women and minorities appear to be galvanized by Hillary Clinton's presidential run. Youth and college-educated voters appear to be galvanized by Barack Obama's. No one at all is truly, deeply galvanized by Mitt Romney or John McCain or crazy little Mike Huckabee, and everyone is generally repulsed by the fetid little tyrant that is Rudy Giuliani. All of this, remarkably, seems just about exactly as it should be.

Bill Cliton: Screw It, I'm Running for President

From the Onion, via Marc Andreesen:

CHARLESTON, SC—After spending two months accompanying his wife, Hillary, on the campaign trail, former president Bill Clinton announced Monday that he is joining the 2008 presidential race, saying he "could no longer resist the urge."

...

Clinton also noted that, if elected, the timing would be perfect for his family, as his wife has recently expressed a desire to move back to the D.C. area.

Campaign shocker

Fred Thompson has withdrawn from the presidential race.

What's funny is he polled better than either Giuliani or Paul, suggesting that what little sense Thompson had still far outstripped the other two.