Mike Kinsley has put out a bleg via Sully:

My contention: Social Security privatization is not just unlikely to succeed, for various reasons that are subject to discussion. It is mathematically certain to fail. Discussion is pointless.

The usual case against privatization is that (1) millions of inexperienced investors may end up worse off, and (2) stocks don't necessarily do better than bonds over the long-run, as proponents assume.But privatization won't work for a better reason: it can't possibly work, even in theory. The logic is not very complicated.

1. To "work," privatization must generate more money for retirees than current arrangements. This bonus is supposed to be extra money in retirees' pockets and/or it is supposed to make up for a reduction in promised benefits, thus helping to close the looming revenue gap.

2. Where does this bonus come from? There are only two possibilities: from greater economic growth, or from other people.

3. Greater economic growth requires either more capital to invest, or smarter investment of the same amount of capital. Privatization will not lead to either of these.

a) If nothing else in the federal budget changes, every dollar deflected from the federal treasury into private social security accounts must be replaced by a dollar that the government raises in private markets. So the total pool of capital available for private investment remains the same.

b) The only change in decision-making about capital investment is that the decisions about some fraction of the capital stock will be made by people with little or no financial experience. Maybe this will not be the disaster that some critics predict. But there is no reason to think that it will actually increase the overall return on capital.

4. If the economy doesn't produce more than it otherwise would, the Social Security privatization bonus must come from other investors, in the form of a lower return.

a) This is in fact the implicit assumption behind the notion of putting Social Security money into stocks, instead of government bonds, because stocks have a better long-term return. The bonus will come from those saps who sell the stocks and buy the bonds.

b) In other words, privatization means betting the nation's most important social program on a theory that cannot be true unless many people are convinced that it's false.

c) Even if the theory is true, initially, privatization will make it false. The money newly available for private investment will bid up the price of (and thus lower the return on) stocks, while the government will need to raise the interest on bonds in order to attract replacement money.

d) In short, there is no way other investors can be tricked or induced into financing a higher return on Social Security.

5. If the privatization bonus cannot come from the existing economy, and cannot come from growth, it cannot exist. And therefore, privatization cannot work.

Q.E.D.

Bzzzzzzzt. Wrong!

Kinsley works from two assumptions:
1. That Social Security should always be available.
2. That Social Security should always work the way it currently works.

Of course, if you look at it from his perspective, privatization looks likes a bad, unworkable idea.

I, however, work from these assumptions:

1. Social Security is the only legal pyramid scheme in this country. We pay out current recipients from current contributions. This is no way to run a retirement plan. If Wall Street offered this kind of a plan, and then ran it the way the government runs Social Security, the SEC would be all over them. Which is a moot point because no Wall Street firm would ever be allowed to run such a scheme in the first place because pyramid schemes are illegal.

2. Most people my age---thirty-four---do not believe Social Security will be available to us when we retire. We have accepted it and have planned accordingly. Moreover, we don't want Social Security to be available to us when we retire because we:

a. don't want to burden our descendants by forcing them to pay into a bankrupt system to support our aging carcasses.

b. it's our bloody money, not the government's. We're tired of dumping cash into a system that doesn't work and will not pay our grocery bill when we finally reach retirement age. Which, considering the government's habit of upping the eligibility age every few years, means I will, roughly, be around Methuselah's age when I qualify for membership.

Social Security needs a complete overhaul that will be pricey in the short term, but will enable it to survive. But an overhaul is only necessary if you believe that there is an inherent social contract between the citizen and the government to provide for a pension in the first place. I don't and that's because I don't believe the government will ever hold up its end. I don't trust the government to spend my tax dollars wisely. Why on earth would I trust my financial future to them, particularly when there are other options available?

It's all about choice. I could do a lot with the money that is currently in my Social Security account. If I lose it in a chancy investment, well, that's my fault. Like the losses we suffered in our 401K account when the market tanked a few years ago, I won't whine and moan about holding someone accountable for what was a market fluctuation. I fully understand what it means to invest in the stock market: it's about as chancy as placing your all your chips on the spin of a roulette wheel. The difference between that spin and Social Security is that I at least have a chance at a return on my investment with the roulette wheel, whereas with Social Security, I know I'm not going to ever see dime one. I'd rather take my chances with the stock market, and as it's my money, and not the government's, I fail to see where they get off denying me the opportunity to do just that. Moreover, that they would deny me this opportunity because the faulty house of cards they've built would collapse if privatization were ever to come to pass is insulting. They're covering their asses with my retirement money and that pisses me off more than Kinsley will ever know.

If Social Security were investigated by the SEC, it would be shut down in a New York Minute. I fail to see why I should be legally required to keep throwing my money into a failed system. It does no one any good in the long run to keep blathering on about the worthiness of a "social contract," when the real issue at hand is the breach of the current social contract by blatant mismanagement.

Q.E.D.

Posted by: Kathy at 01:18 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 1130 words, total size 7 kb.

Bill Kristol has unwittingly joined a group of accomplished individuals: people possessed of a unique speaking style, who, when they write something and I sit down to read it, I hear their voices on my own inner stereo system.

Does that make any sense? No? I'll try to simplify. When I read these pieces, I hear the author narrating them, rather than just being able to read the text. I have my own internal audio-book narrator library.

Mr. Kristol is now in league with Henry Kissinger, Margaret Thatcher and William F. Buckely, Jr. Distinct voices all. Ever tried to read one of Buckley's Blackford Oakes novels? Ever tried to focus on these works of fiction, where the character has his own unique voice, without Buckely's part English/part Connecticut-boarding-school-boy accent horning in? It's hard. Same goes for Kissinger, whose doctoral dissertation I had to read for undergrad political science coursework. I barely made it through it: not because the subject matter was boring---hardly, but rather because if there's anyone who can put you to right to sleep with the droning, monotone quality of their voice it's Henry. Maggie Thatcher gets a little annoying because she's just so righteous. You should hear her narrate the passages in The Downing Street Years devoted to trade unions. Wow, did they ever piss her off.

I just realized this as I read this WaPo piece. I am undecided about two things. First, if Rummy really needs to go as Kristol asserts. Second, if I like having him inside my head when I read his work.

Hmmph.

{hat tip: Galley Slaves}

Posted by: Kathy at 12:18 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 275 words, total size 2 kb.

But I'm gonna do it anyway. But rather with a cattle prod. Less chance of it coming back to bite me in the ass.

Everyone's favorite commie pinko appears to be in favor of abolishing the death penalty. Not because that's the right and just thing to do, but rather because it's inefficient and doesn't serve as a deterrant.

In theory, I favor capital punishment. "An eye for an eye .. a life for a life," has always seemed just to me. Deterrence? I don't know. Deterrence always sparks the most arguments. Historically, there was a practical, timely death penalty. On March 6, 1933, Guiseppe Zangara fired on FDR's motorcade, killing the mayor of Chicago, Anton Cermak. Within days he was indicted and tried. Found guilty, he was executed on March 20, two weeks after gunning down Mayor Cermak. If that's what we had now, I would favor its continuation. Prompt and consistently imposed execution might have been a deterrent.

But that is not what we have; instead we have an rarely imposed, lengthily delayed death sentence. In 2003, Amnesty Int'l reported 65 executions in the United States. How many murders in 2002? 16,204. So, if you murder someone in the United States, your chance of being executed eventually is four-tenths of one percent. "Eventually?" In Florida, a state that actually uses its electric chair, notes that the average stay on death row is almost 12 years.

Let's face it comrades, the Left has won this debate. Capital punishment has been outlawed throughout the Western world, leaving the U.S. in the dubious company of China, Iran, Vietnam, Saudi Arabia, et al. Here in the U.S. death penalty opponents, in lieu of actually eliminating capital punishment, have raised nearly-insuperable obstacles to every instance of its application. Timothy McVeigh practically had to volunteer. Will Scott Peterson ever walk the green mile?

I think he's got a point. Commie pinko leanings notwithstanding.

I've lived in states where the death penalty is an option and I've lived in states where it isn't. In my experience, the death penalty is more of a political tool than it is about actually deterring people from killing other people.

You'll pardon the expression, but it's all in the execution.

It's not about right and wrong, per se, in the politicians eyes: it's about finding a way to protect their civilians. A rising crime rate, or one particularly shocking murder, will bring about the death penalty conversations and how much safer things were in the good ol' days when they had the opportunity to fry someone for a heinous crime. Some will come out strongly in favor of having the ability to execute the offender. Some will vehemently deny that the system has any right to "murder" someone, and will protest that someone who is innocent might be executed. In other words, it's all about the level of faith politicians have in the system. Death penalty advocates believe the system, despite its flaws, works. Death penalty protesters believe the system is too flawed to take such a chance.

And this argument always, it seems to me, swirls around in an atmosphere of panic and hysteria. Because we never really do talk about the death penalty when things are happy and people aren't being murdered left and right, do we? Nope. We're procrastinators: we wait until things are bad before we start speaking of it. This atmosphere does not lend itself to rational thought, hence this is precisely when the politicians jump in.

I don't know about you, but I don't want professional politicians deciding this one. Sounds undemocratic, I'm sure, but hey...someone's life is one the line here. Namely mine. If the theory behind capital punishment is that it's a deterrant, well, we're in trouble, kids. Because the American variant of capital punishment is nothing but a big waste of time and money. more...

Posted by: Kathy at 10:26 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 1242 words, total size 7 kb.

This just doesn't sound like a good idea.

A £7 MILLION overhaul of the visitor centre at Culloden will allow the public to experience the drama and fear of taking part in the historic 18th century battle.

In a "battlefield immersion area", made possible by a theatre with floor-to-ceiling screens on both sides, visitors will be thrust into the middle of a Jacobite charge and the government troops' response.

The public will be asked to assume one of several characters in the battle and follow their fate - as they do at the Holocaust Museum in Washington DC.

Research by the US company masterminding the changes has led to the battle lines being redrawn at the site. The exhibits will put a new emphasis on the post-battle Highland Clearances and massacres, dubbed the "ethnic cleansing" of the day by some historians. They will stress that the battle was not just the Highlanders against the Redcoats, and plans are afoot for a memorial marking recently discovered graves of government soldiers who died.

The exhibition designer is Ralph Applebaum Associates, of New York, which designed Bill Clinton's £100 million presidential library which opened last month in Little Rock, Arkansas. The architect is the award- winning Glasgow firm Gareth Hoskins which designed the new architectural exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum in London. The two companies are also working together on plans for the £70 million refit of the Royal Museum of Scotland.

The Culloden exhibition will borrow from Mr Applebaum's experience designing the Holocaust Museum. There, visitors are assigned the identity passports of people who lived, or died, in the concentration camps. At Culloden, they might be assigned to Ensign William Horne, who carried a standard into battle at the age of 14, or to Ann Leith, a woman who helped wounded Jacobites. Personal digital assistants will help them track their characters' fate.

"It's about engaging people personally with the battle, and leaving the battle as more than just visitors," Mr Applebaum said.

The "battlefield immersion area" will use live-action footage, sound, smell, "and even a bit of sleet if we can be innovative enough," said Alexander Bennett, of the National Trust of Scotland. "This will only last six minutes, because we feel this will be an emotional experience for people, and we will have to give them a warning." {...}

There was a reason, you know, the Duke of Cumberland---the English commander---earned the nickname "Butcher Billy."

The things people do to make history more "accessible." Crikeys.

Posted by: Kathy at 03:39 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 424 words, total size 3 kb.

Snort.

Don't forget the outhouses. Even Tiny Tim needs to gimp himself outside for a little relief every now and again.

I would also have to ask where's Bedlam? Department 56 made a huge model of Victoria Station a few years back. They should also have a model of Bedlam. Raving lunatics are so Dickensian. After all, had Ebneezer not got it together come Christmas Morning, chances are he would have wound up there.

{hat tip: the sex crazed llamas}

Posted by: Kathy at 03:23 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 88 words, total size 1 kb.

Laci Peterson and her unborn son were murdered on December 24, 2002.

Almost two years ago.

Her husband and the father of their child has since been found guilty of their murders and was sentenced to death yesterday.

According to the FBI, in the year 2003, out of a total 14,408 murders in the United States, 3,125 of those murder victims were women. Of those 3,125 women, 1,927 were white, just like Laci. Of those who did not look like Laci, there were 1,113 black women, 133 women who fit into the "other" category, meaning that their race was mixed and it would have been too time consuming for the FBI Statisticians to break their numbers down and 44 women whose race was "unknown," meaning God only knows what.

Also, in 2003, 573 women, out of that whopping total of 3,125 were also murdered by their husbands. Just like Laci.

The data for the year 2004 has not been totaled up yet, but from the preliminary statistics released earlier this year, while the overall percentage of murders had gone down when compared to the same period of time in 2003, it wasn't by much...and there was plenty of time between June and December for those numbers to skyrocket.

My point? Other women besides Laci friggin' Peterson have lost their lives to a murderer since she died almost two years ago.

Yet, how many of them have we heard about in this endless media circus that has surrounded Laci's disappearance and, subsequently, Scott Peterson's trial?

Not many.

Why?

Because they weren't as cute as Laci was. Odds are, even a few of them were pregnant too, but the murder of their third-trimester babies didn't prompt a national debate and federal legislation. They weren't married to the boy-next-door. They didn't have families who manipulated the media to their benefit.

Does anyone care about them?

If you watch CNN, your answer would probably be "no."

I care. While everyone is jumping on the "I'm glad that motherfucker will fry!" bandwagon, I pray for these womens' families and friends. I hope their murderers have been brought to justice and that their attackers will, too, face the death penalty.

After all, justice is served up on a daily basis even if CNN isn't there to cover it.

Posted by: Kathy at 02:35 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 384 words, total size 2 kb.

Hey! The Neopolitan Mafia is giving etiquette lessons in prison!

Eat your heart out, Martha!

Posted by: Kathy at 02:58 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 27 words, total size 1 kb.

Alexander Payne seems to be doing rather well with the myriad movie awards that are being announced.

{Insert random story of trying to weasel in next to accomplished people here}

Now, I don't know if this is accurate or not, but my sister Susie claims Alexander grew up two blocks away from us in Omaha and that she and my brother Mike know him.

Whenever Susie goes to Omaha, she has this habit of doing drive-by's. I've been in the car with her a few times when the urge to drive-by places familiar to her hits her. It's always interesting. This past January, when everyone was in town for the parentals 50th Wedding Anniversary party, I hitched a ride back to my other sister's house with her and her family. Fortunately, Susie has a son who, at that time, had just received his license, so we were taken care of in the designated driver department.

Poor Austin. He was trying to be the only adult in the car, because the rest of us were intoxicated, and she kept thwarting his ambitions by saying, "oh, slow down!" This happened on 52nd Street, where we passed by the house she said Alexander grew up in. She also said she called our brother Mike a couple of weeks previous to ask him---at one in the morning---why he hadn't told her that the Alexander Payne who co-wote and directed About Schmidt was the same Alexander Payne they'd grown up with? Mike, being the taciturn individual that he can be, blew her off. The fact that she'd called him at one in the morning had much to do with said blowing off, I believe.

Payne has filmed most of his movies in Omaha. This is no big secret. Yet, despite the fact that part of Citizen Ruth was filmed in our old neighborhood---Dundee--- and it's been said that he grew up there as well, I didn't think anyone in my family actually, like, knew him. I can't imagine there were a lot of Alexander Payne's running around in our old neighborhood.

Hmmph. So it could be true. I'm not sure. And I don't suppose we'll ever find out because I have a hard time imagining Alexander and Susie running into one another nowadays. Yet, it's always good to point out that stranger things have happened.

Posted by: Kathy at 02:34 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 398 words, total size 2 kb.

I wrote yesterday that the high winds we were having didn't bode well for the rest of the day.

Well, I was wrong and right with that statement.

No snow, fortunately. However, it's currently sixteen degrees outside. And that appears to be the high for the day.

I really do wish those pesky Canadians would learn how to shut the back door to the Arctic. Highly annoying.

Posted by: Kathy at 02:10 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 69 words, total size 1 kb.

The husband has only one thing to say to the Llamabutchers regarding their sex scandal:

Live by the photoshop. Die by the Photoshop.

That's just too damn disturbing for a Monday.

Posted by: Kathy at 12:58 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 35 words, total size 1 kb.

Gary over at Dayton v. Kennedy got linked by today's Opinion Journal.

Well done, sir!

Posted by: Kathy at 12:50 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 23 words, total size 1 kb.

And if you don't watch it, I'll take a chunk out of your ass with my claws.

Granted, I'm not too hot with the pshop, but hey, that's as good as it's gonna get at this time of night.

Build your own superhero here.

(And yes, honey, those Wolverine-ish claws are for you.)

Courtesy o' Everyone's Favorite Commie Pinko

Posted by: Kathy at 11:48 PM | Comments (2) | Add Comment
Post contains 67 words, total size 1 kb.

Margi has an excellent story about why Santa is so very important this time of year.

Go read.

I am commonly referred to in our family as the "afterthought's playmate." Meaning my older sister, Christi, is the "afterthought." There was a five year dry spell between our brother Mike and Christi. Apparently, according to family lore, Mrs. N. from down the block, after her own dry spell, had her son Jeff, and he got Mom to babylusting again. Christi owes her existence to Jeff N. It's a bit different for me, though. Eighteen months after Christi arrived, I came along, the logic behind this move being, as I understand it, hey, why not have one more while we're at it?

Christi and I have always been paired-up, as it were, because of where we line up on the family tree. That and there are eight of us, so we paired-up nicely. The fact that we're both female didn't hurt the selection process, either. We used to share a room. This was a bad idea, because as my mother puts it, "she's the sun; you're the moon." We didn't get along too well because I was an annoying younger sister and she was an infuriatingly bossy older sister. It's just the way things were. We started getting along better when we got our own rooms. Nowadays we get along splendidly. But when we were little, well...

You see, Christi has this head of flaming red hair and a milkpale complexion. I vividly remember that when she got ticked off at me when we were little, she would turn bright red. The transformation started in her cheeks. Two little red splotches would appear and then it would spread, like a rash, across her face and neck, completely drowning out the few freckles she had at that point in time in a wash of red. Her hands, however, were white as snow, clenched into fists at her sides and her knuckles were so tightly held you could see the translucent skin straining against her knobby little bones. I remember watching this transformation, more than once, and finding it so fascinating that I would completely blow off whatever she was yelling at me about. As you might imagine, my mental wandering did not please her, and she yelled at me about that, too.

One time, however, it was Santa that caused this transformation. Or rather the fact we'd missed him once again. more...

Posted by: Kathy at 10:05 PM | Comments (5) | Add Comment
Post contains 1359 words, total size 8 kb.

1 I'm sorry the tracka-backa thingie (that's the technical term) didn't work, but oh!! I'm so glad you let me know so I could read this beautiful story. Love. It. Thanks for sharing. xoxo

Posted by: Margi at December 12, 2004 10:31 PM (rKX9f)

2 BTW, that IS *THE* James, innit? The Cutest Redhead on the Planet, right? Give Christi and James my love, in any case. And take a hug for yourself.

Posted by: Margi at December 12, 2004 10:32 PM (rKX9f)

3 Yep, indeedy. That's him. She has to be clever to get around the lil' red head. Glad you liked it

Posted by: Kathy at December 12, 2004 10:39 PM (E0v6D)

4 My husband has been claiming that Maggie's (our 4 year old) tantrums MUST come from me, since HE never acted like that............... Guess he is right. I must have blocked out those episodes, since I do not recall them as vividly as you. Although I do remember saying I wasn't going ANYWHERE next year. And we didn't, if you recall. but they still got us, thanks to the extra back door on the family room. Sneaky, Sneaky, Sneaky. Love ya!

Posted by: Christi at December 14, 2004 02:08 PM (sXOoL)

5 Oh, yeah. Maggie got those from you. (talk about stating the obvious!) I'd completely forgotten about staying put the next year. How the hell did we accomplish that? Did we mutiny or something?

Posted by: Kathy at December 14, 2004 03:51 PM (E0v6D)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

Around five o'clock this morning the wind kicked up here in Cake Eater Land. Or so the husband says. I was blissfully conked out so I missed it.

Until I woke up, when I took a look out the front window at our barren yard to see that the lid to the neglected Victorian-ish lamppost had been completely blown off the lamp and was lying on the ground, three feet away from the base.

This thing is made out of heavy wrought iron. Granted all the bolts that are supposed to hold it in place are missing, because it's one more thing Tweedledumb and the Great White Hunter landlord neglect around here, but it's never flown off before in a heavy wind.

The husband ran out there a little while ago and put it back on the lamp. Taking a cue from Tweedledumb, he secured it with twigs, rather than with nuts and bolts from his own private stash, which he is loathe to share with the management of this fine house we live in.

I can only think that this does not bode well for the rest of the day. There were snow flurries a little while ago, but they've subsided...for the time being. On the tree branch outside of my office window, a pleasantly plump (read wide arsed) squirrel was attempting to shield himself from the wind by huddling next to the trunk and wasn't having much luck with it as the tree is swaying perilously. He has since disappeared. I assume he took to ground, realizing that hanging out in a tree, twenty-feet off the ground, perhaps isn't the best place to find shelter in a windstorm.

Fortunately, I have only one errand to run this afternoon: to go and buy smokes. Which I will do shortly. Just to get it over with.

Have I mentioned lately how much I despise winter?

Posted by: Kathy at 01:03 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 317 words, total size 2 kb.

I have one more day left to curry favor with (read suck up to) certain blogs who are nominated for the 2004 Weblog Awards.

Not like it matters, because I have all the pull of a mouse trying to haul an elephant around, but here are my endorsements.

(And, no, I'm not running through every category. Sheesh. It's like you people think I have nothing better to do with my time.)

Best Humor Blog: Protein Wisdom I'm endorsing Jeff mainly because I'm scared of what he'll do if he doesn't win. He seems kind of desperate.

That and he's actually funny. No one can elicit more spontaneous giggle fits from me than Jeff.

And what the $#@k is Scrappleface anyway?

Submit your Vote for Protein Wisdom Here.

Best Culture Blog: Big shocker here: The Llama Butchers.

They're my buds. Do you need any more reason to go and vote for them? I didn't think so, but just in case, know that, between Steve-o and Robbo, you get a pretty good impression of what an eighteenth-century Tory on crack would have been like.

You know, had crack been available during that era.

Submit your vote for the Butchers here.

Best Essayist: Another shocker: Lileks

Not because he's good or anything, but because he's my neighbor. Ya have to be friendly to your neighbors.

Submit Your Vote For Lileks Here.

Best Online Community: Munuviana

Besides sucking up to Pixy, this group blog saved the husband's chestnuts from roasting while he put this site together.

Submit Your Vote for Munuviana Here

Best Australian or New Zealand Blog: God Himself.

Vote for Ambient Irony Here.

Best of the Top 2500-3500 Blogs: Potomac Ponderings.

Because she's good and I'm taking this category from her next year!

Vote for Potomac Ponderings Here.

I'm sure there are other deserving potential recipients, but I'm in need of a nap, so they'll have to scrape up their much needed votes elsewhere. If you've got a deserving nominee that I haven't listed---or aren't familiar with, because there are a lot bloggers out there---feel free to throw them in the comments.

Posted by: Kathy at 02:53 PM | Comments (3) | Add Comment
Post contains 366 words, total size 3 kb.

1 Just out of curiosity (and not because I'm a wannabe stalker or anything -- no, never!), how much of a "neighbor" is Mr. Lileks? Like, down the road? Just curious! (and, nice new place, and I'll update sometime soon.)

Posted by: Adrianne Truett at December 11, 2004 11:45 PM (B2T6R)

2 I have his general location triangulated, but I haven't gone a-stalking. I've willfully restrained myself. Suffice it to say, if I wanted to find Jasperwood, it wouldn't take me too long. It's about a five minute drive. Restraining myself from stalking hasn't kept me from wondering when I'm going to run into him, however. It's so weird whenever he writes about "the neighborhood." His pizza guys are my pizza guys. His Target is my Target, etc. One of these days it will happen and I will not know what the hell to do with myself. I'll probably run and hide

Posted by: Kathy at December 12, 2004 12:08 PM (E0v6D)

3 Thanks! And congrats on the new site!

Posted by: Nicole Griffin at December 12, 2004 01:49 PM (xP6LD)

Hide Comments | Add Comment

For all the time and effort I expend on covering Minnesota's political scene, you, my devoted Cake Eater Readers, would think that I wasn't very interested in the whole thing.

And you would be right.

I have absolutely no tolerance for Minnesota politics. It bores me to tears because it's so damn predictable. Once in a long while you'll get a Jesse Ventura who will make things interesting, but for the most part...pfft. You have your DFL'ers, who want socialism. You have your Republicans who are cheesed at anything the DFL'ers want and who have just enough clout to ensure a deadlock at the legislature. It's just so, so...boring. Every legislature session is exactly the same. There's nothing new in this battle of (supposed) wits that makes me want to pay attention. About the most worked up I ever got about Minnesota politics was wondering whether or not to yell at Ted Mondale (Former Met Council Chair and ex-VP's son) and Mike Erlandson (the State DFL Chair and a major brownnoser) as they worked out on the elliptical machines next to me at my old health club. I opted not to. It would have been too much work and I was out of breath as it was.

But I do pay some attention, because I live here. The fact that the state is trending right and will eventually go majority Republican, despite our much vaunted Scandahoovian Socialist roots, is also interesting. With a 77% turnout, Kerry only won the state by 98,000 votes. Which really isn't interesting to people who don't live here and assume we are, indeed, a bastion of Scandahoovian-rooted liberality. But if you do live here, you would have assumed simply by the biased coverage we get from our newspapers that it should have been a much greater spread.

But there is interesting news on the political front regarding Senator Dayton's re-election effort and who Normy Boy (TM) is---potentially---endorsing as his opponent.

Courtesy of First Ring, who apparently snuck into Normy Boy's (TM) fundraiser in St. Paul the other night:

{...}Not to be undone in the speculations market, Coleman also offered an endorsement, of sorts, to Congressman Mark Kennedy, on the U.S. Senate campaign in 2006.

”I’m an ambitious guy and I think that ambition is okay. I have one ambition that I’d like you to help me with and that’s to become Minnesota’s senior senate in 2006. I saw Mark Kennedy tonight…and I think Mark is one of those people who could make that possible.” Coleman’s comments were loudly cheered with shouts of “Senator Kennedy” from individuals in the room. The Second District’s John Kline also said a few words, indirectly endorsing Kennedy when asked who he thought the Republican nominee would be against Evacuatin’ Dayton.

Kennedy himself was mum on the subject. That may change sooner rather than later.

Ruminations on the possibility of this after the jump. more...

Posted by: Kathy at 01:46 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 1486 words, total size 9 kb.

It appears to be official: Yushchenko is a victim of poisoning.

{...} A series of tests run over the past 24 hours provided conclusive evidence of the poisoning, Zimpfer said.

"There is no doubt about the fact that Mr. Yushchenko's disease — especially following the results of the blood work — has been caused by a case of poisoning by dioxin," Zimpfer said.

The 50-year-old opposition leader first fell ill in September and was rushed to the Vienna hospital. He resumed campaigning later in the month but his mysterious illness had left his face pockmarked and ashen.

Yushchcenko also suffered back pain, acute pancreatitis and nerve paralysis on the left side of his face.

He has accused Ukrainian authorities of trying to poison him ahead of Ukraine's presidential vote — an allegation they have denied.

"We suspect involvement of an external party, but we cannot answer as to who cooked what or who was with him while he ate," Zimpfer said, adding that tests showed the dioxin was taken orally.

Zimpfer said Yushchenko's blood and tissue registered concentrations of dioxin — one of the most toxic chemicals — that were 1,000 times above normal levels.

"It would be quite easy to administer this amount in a soup," Zimpfer said.

So, persons unknown dumped dioxin into his soup in an attempt to poison him.

What I want to know is this: are we going to be going back to the days of food testers? You know what I'm talking about: some expendable soul being forced to eat the King's food to see if it's been poisoned? Are we really back to that?

Posted by: Kathy at 12:21 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 273 words, total size 2 kb.

Two days ago, the former lead guitarist for Pantera was shot and killed by some nutjob who was upset that the band had broken up. Michele objects to lumping this act in with heavy metal's already tarnished image, because, as she puts it, heavy metal's image isn't tarnished at all:

{...}As with any news story that blames music, video games or movies for someone's criminal, deranged actions, the media misses one glaring point: in order for the killer to react in such a manner, he had to have some serious, deep rooted issues that go way beyond the music he listened to, the games he played or the movies he watched.

Metal has long been a favorite whipping boy of the hypersensitive, shallow-thinking My Morals Should Be Your Morals set. From the time Ozzy first barked at the moon, metal was imprinted with a warning label: This music is hazardous to your children. Freaked out parents and sociologists looked much deeper into the music than was necessary and proclaimed the genre as one that would cause its listeners to sign up for the church of Satan or become zombies in an army of juvenile delinquents.

You would think that when all these years later Ozzy became the darling of television and looked upon as a sweet, if dopey, father figure, the world would have figured out - albeit belatedly - that heavy metal is as much a theatrical act as Britney's original virginal persona.

Yet every media commentary I've read this morning on the death of Abbot has the same underlying tone - live by the sword, die by the sword. Metal is music for misfits, don't you know? What can you expect from the fans of a band whose lyrics are all unprintable in a family paper? They were heathens, I tell you! They drank and smoked and cursed! It's all so shrill and so unnerving.

{...}Of course, they will point to Abbott's nickname of Dimebag. They'll look at the Pantera DVDs and a see bunch of hard drinking, hard partying guys. And they'll conclude "the metal lifestyle is a dangerous one." And tomorrow on Page Six, there will pictures of some pop music princess with a bottle in her hand and her tits hanging out of her dress or a some boy band star holding a bottle of Jack Daniels and spitting at the camera. But, hey. They're just having fun, right? Pop Stars Gone Wild! What a riot! Give that guy some long hair and a guitar and suddenly he's a wild eyed beast who wants to eat your children.

It's not just the music of heavy metal that's misunderstood. The fans also get their share of the lies and distortion. We're all emotionally disturbed individuals with deep psychological problems, bad parents and broken homes who draw pentagrams on their bedroom floors and torture the neighbor's cats.{...}

Now, I'm not a metal listener above and beyond being subjected to listening to the husband's---a metal head---choices on the WinAmp. Quite frankly, I don't like much of it. But there are some albums I never would have listened to in the pre-husband-era that I do listen to now. I will out myself as one who actually likes Metallica's Black Album. I've learned over the years that, in the metal head community, this opinion means I'm actually a poser. If I were actually interested in what that community thought about me, I would have uttered that Kill 'Em All was the penultimate Metallica album. Never mind that the Black Album slams and actually, you know, sounds good (as in it's technically proficient and they made their music sound good in the studio). I'm a poser. Whatever. I'm not misguidedly seeking metal head community props. I like what I like, and I like melody when it comes to my music. Metal does not focus on melody. Kill 'Em All hurts my ears, grates on my nerves and sounds like musical vomit. more...

Posted by: Kathy at 03:10 PM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 1189 words, total size 7 kb.

Much like the crack young staff of the Hatemonger's Quarterly, I whined a bit about not being nominated for any 2004 Weblog Awards.

Apparently, however, they've gotten over their angst and they suggest that the rest of us do the same:

{...}And this brings us to another topic. It seems to us as if the 2004 Weblog Awards have inspired a ridiculous amount of e-malaise on the part of “webloggers” everywhere. Erstwhile talented “webloggers,” due to the introduction of the “weblog” awards, have been nattering on about some sort of existential crisis they are enduring.

Now that my “website” has or has not been nominated for such awards, say manifold “webloggers,” I simply can’t go on. I’ve lost that e-loving feeling. “Weblogging” just doesn’t have the beauty, the purity with which I used to associate it.

To which we, the crack young staff of “The Hatemonger’s Quarterly,” respond: Get over yourself, Sartre. You are an indigent hack who wastes endless hours penning posts that will be read by three people and a mule. And two of the people will have stumbled upon your “website” by mistake, whilst hunting for Internet pornography.

So let’s not pretend that your foray into unpaid pseudo-journalism has lost its magic just because your “website” has suddenly attracted four people and two mules.

Be done with picking the belly-button lint, says the crack young staff of "The Hatemonger's Quarterly." It's apparently not attractive and you really won't like what you find on the end of your finger.

Wiser words have never been written about the fine art of blogging.

Posted by: Kathy at 12:15 AM | Comments (1) | Add Comment
Post contains 267 words, total size 2 kb.

Bill Moyers is retiring from TV journalism.

And I quote:

"I'm going out telling the story that I think is the biggest story of our time: how the right-wing media has become a partisan propaganda arm of the Republican National Committee," says Moyers. "We have an ideological press that's interested in the election of Republicans, and a mainstream press that's interested in the bottom line. Therefore, we don't have a vigilant, independent press whose interest is the American people."

{Insert maniacally gleeful cackling here}

Whooo-boy. {Insert ab pain here from laughing too hard}

By all means, Bill. Keep hunting that peyote out in Big Bend National Park . The results are just hysterical!

UPDATE Steve-o has more on Bill Moyer's peyote habit.

Posted by: Kathy at 11:35 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 134 words, total size 1 kb.