Just like Barbara Eden in "I Dream of Jeannie", Adam and Eve had no navels

Fundamentalist Christians explain why here: "Did Adam have a belly-button?" from ChristianAnswers.Net [I owe full credit for this hilarious link to Pascal Riché in his "Le ventre d'Eve" entry in the blog "A l'heure américaine".]

It seems to me that I had an illustrated Bible as a kid in which Eve most definitely had a very cute belly button. I don't know which Bible Mr. ChristianAnswerNetMan has been reading, but I have a fundamentalist's faith in the nude images burned into my brain as a child.

-true blue liberal

"For the Sake of Our Children," by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

Click here to read the whole article:
For the Sake of Our Children, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

During this brief inter-war period, before the Bushies start beating the next set of war drums in their runup to the 2006 midterms (after all, war is their only real issue), and before we're all totally distracted by their attempt to gut the key social program of the New Deal, we need to remember how destructive they have been to Mother Earth. Not just in their high-profile rejection of Kyoto, but in their appointments and the gutting of the EPA and their day-to-day favoritism of big businesses and their short-term bottom lines over our future and the world we'll leave our children. What the FUCK are the "conservatives" trying to conserve anyway? It's not our nation. It's not our world. Will their heirs really thank them for the extra cash when they're forced to live in a world where all the fish are poisoned with mercury and the "Mountain State" of West Virginia no longer has any mountains because they've been cut down to get to the coal (because it's easier than dealing with the UMW)?? Please read RFK, Jr.'s whole article and then e-mail it to your friends, or link to it in your own blog. I couldn't read it to the end at first. I had to take a break in this litany of environmental crimes to get my composure back.

The link above is to CommonDreams.org.
Here's a link to the same essay at Earthlight.org:
For the Sake of Our Children, Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

I know that his father must be very very proud,
True Blue Liberal

adv.|||||| isn't there even ONE True Blue Utah Liberal out there?? ||||||adv.

A quick post from a sponsor.

While some temporarily red states like Texas and Florida and Louisiana have seen lots of (ok, maybe not "lots of", but some) True Blue Liberal activity, there are other on-line stores, like the True Blue Utah Liberals store, that are still waiting for their first sale, months after stocking their shelves with buttons, shirts, sweats, hoodies, mugs, stickers, magnets, boxers, teddy bears, throw pillows, etc., adorned with a blue outline map of the Beehive State and a Liberal blue ribbon.

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or at other lonely stores from Alabama to Wyoming

Social Security Calculator

Click here for the Social Security CalculatorAccording to this tool, my benefit will drop 7% if Bush gets his way in the gutting of Social Security. What about your benefit? :::Social Security Calculator

BAN WAR TOYS -- Liberal Moral Value of the Day

Look at this if you dare (after all, you're paying for it) --"America's Army®" - Taxpayer-supported war games to train and brainwash the future cannon fodder of America

It was bad enough when our kids had to pay for (or beg their parents to buy) their first-person shooter games, now they can get them for free, with links to recruiters. I guess the Pentagon wasn't reaching the market penetration they needed at the local videogame stores. I had heard about this, but I stumbled on the link and I couldn't believe how bad it really was (I didn't play the "game", but its ominous splash screen is enough to make you puke).

Here's the #1 moral value of True Blue Liberal -- Don't teach our kids how to kill (until you draft them), especially not with our tax dollars. Can you imagine how hateful this website must look to anyone living outside the walls of America??

But did they mean the President named after the northwestern State? Or the one named after the District of Columbia?

Click here: A l'heure américaine: Pauvre George W. (l'autre)

Oh those silly silly French. They'll never understand how important it is to our blind patriotic fervor to have a complete lack of historical context and understanding, of even the simplest events and personalities in our past.
(Click here for the complete Washington College poll results mentioned in the Libération blog. I'm especially proud of the 3% of Republicans who think the first George W. lived in Neverland or Graceland!)
Support Our Troops! Or Die!
True Blue Liberal

One Down, Three Professional Sports to Go

Good News!! The New York Times annouces on 15 February 2005: "N.H.L. Commissioner Cancels Rest of Season"

I can't say that I'm really going to miss all those drunken suburban louts in their Rangers jerseys after a losing performance from their hapless but beloved Broadway Blues at the Garden (actually, they're not that pleasant after a winning performance either).
Hockey seems to have slipped out of existence without a whimper of complaint that I've heard, but here's the real question: If the rest of the professional sports circuses disappear (baseball may be the next to go after 2005's home run king gets an unimpressive unjuiced total of 20 or 25 dingers), will the male population of the United States actually start paying attention to the idiots in charge of our lives?

And by the way, a belated congratulations to the rest of the world for implementing the Kyoto accords. We couldn't possibly be more sorry about what we Americans are doing to the planet, but we've been too busy watching ESPN from the large screen TVs in the back seats of our idling Hummers and Lincoln Navigators as we burn large quantities of charcoal, propane and bleeding red animal flesh while "tailgating" (look that up in your Dictionnaire Anglais/Français) around the local football stadium; we're truly truly sorry, True Blue Liberal

Another reason to avoid Red States (a.k.a. "The Former Confederacy")

Today's Outrage: from The New York Times of 15 February 2005
"Despite Zoloft Defense, 'Teenager' Is Convicted of Murder"

The fact that he was poisoned by Pfizer isn't even the issue here.
HE WAS TWELVE YEARS OLD when he killed, AND he was on powerful psychoactive drugs, AND his (absent) father had given him a shotgun. There's a lot of blame to go around here, but I don't think the state of South Carolina has any business considering a life sentence for the actions of a 12-year-old child.

Comments from vindictive red-baiting red-blooded red-meat-eating red-state Republicans who think we should be executing our 12 year olds are encouraged below.

- True Blue Liberal

"A Princeton Philosopher's Unprintable Essay Title"

Click here to read the article in the Valentines Day New York Times :
"A Princeton Philosopher's Unprintable Essay Title"

Isn't it about time for the Times to grow up and start using adult language rather than constantly reverting to euphemisms? Shouldn't they take this step if only because it will piss off all the Right people (i.e., cultural red staters)? After all, if Princeton Unversity Press can print "On Bullshit" on the cover of a philosophical essay and Amazon can sell it with that title, why can't the Times use the title in its review?

Click here to buy at Amazon:"On Bullshit", by Harry G. Frankfurt

The only problem is, is that the argument of the book (as I understand it from the Times' & Amazon summaries), not only makes me think about the "quality" of our daily political and consumerist discourse, but makes me worry that every word I (or you) add to the blogosphere is only increasing the depth & density of the pool of virtual bovine fecal matter in which we find ourselves wading (if not drowning). But we all need to hear ourselves talk, if only to ourselves, don't we?

à bientôt,
True Blue Liberal

GWB on "... irresponsible class-actions and frivolous asbestos claims..."

"...we must free small businesses from needless regulation and protect honest job-creators from junk lawsuits. (Applause.) Justice is distorted, and our economy is held back by irresponsible class-actions and frivolous asbestos claims -- and I urge Congress to pass legal reforms this year. (Applause.)"

--2005 State of the Union® Address (whitehouse.gov transcript)

Let's put aside for the moment how tacky it is for the White House's official government transcript of the State of the Union® address to add the "(Applause)" tags to the end of every line. This is about the tackiness of the President taking time in his annual Congressional address to defend those poor asbestos entrepreneurs against those greedy asbestosis victims and their survivors, and for the members of the his party to applaud that exercise in bad taste.
Read this article "W.R. Grace indicted in Libby asbestos deaths" from today's Seattle Post-Intelligencer as an answer to Bushie's concern for his corporate friends.

Hundreds of miners, their family members and townsfolk have died and at least 1,200 have been sickened from exposure to the asbestos-containing ore. The health effects also threaten workers, their families and residents everywhere the ore was shipped, including Seattle, and people living in millions of homes nationwide where it was used as insulation.

Thank Fiery Jeebus that Dubya is going to legislate a cutback in their "frivolous claims".

--True Blue Liberal

If truth is the new standard, they'll also have to stop broadcasing Presidential press conferences and State of the Union® addresses

"As an FCC licensee, you have a responsibility to exercise independent editorial judgment to oversee and protect the integrity of the American marketplace of ideas, and to avoid broadcasting deliberate misrepresentations of the facts. Such obligations must be taken seriously and I urge you to decline to broadcast this advertisement."

--Michael Bayes, RNC Deputy Counsel

This appears in a letter that has been posted on GOP.com (remember to always pronounce it as "gop" not "gee oh pee") asking television stations to stop running "false" MoveOn.org ads. If truth is the new standard, then I guess we won't be hearing too much more about the Social Security "crisis" or military "intelligence" or the edibility of McDonald's "burgers" on the airwaves either.

Here's the link to MoveOn.org if you want to see the advertisement that got the Gop's knickers in a twist.

True Blue Liberal

The Class War Is Already in Full Swing (guess who's winning)

So the Bushies are going to balance the budget on the backs of the poor while keeping the rich and the war machine well fed. What a surprise. Click Here:The New York Times, 8 Feb 2005, Paul Krugman: Spearing the Beast. Paul Krugman continues to be the best writer on the right wing's attack on Social Security. He's absolutely correct. If they can bring down this cornerstone of the New Deal, then the rest will tumble easily.

But here's the question I haven't seen anybody ask about the dismantling of the evil liberal welfare state. What happens to the destitute elderly and disabled and uneducated and medically uninsured once the safety nets have been completely slashed? Are they supposed to pull themselves up by their nonexistent bootstraps, get their MBAs, and join the ownership class and the local country club? Or are they expected to migrate to Mexico or Canada or Guantanamo? Or are they simply expected to die quietly and cremate themselves so that a strong breeze can erase them from our welfare rolls, and our memory? (Or should they simply pray harder? Is it possible that some of the Bushies really believe that fiery Jeebus is going to Rapture up all the good Christians and slaughter the rest of us?)


Or will these human beings, these fellow Americans, these "others" who could be us with one small reversal of personal fortune, look for some way to rise up other than through the ballot box, if electoral solutions are not forthcoming? Doesn't anyone remember that FDR's New Deal was in many ways the reform of American capitalism that shut down a serious Communist and Socialist challenge in this country? Doesn't anyone remember that LBJ's Great Society was in many ways a response to real pressures from the disadvantaged and the left behind?

Just asking,
True Blue Liberal

I can't wait for tonight's State of the Union® speech to hear what's up with America's Holy Mission to Mars®!

Click Here: get your war on | page 30

There has been such a steady stream of pandering & stupidity & deliberate red herrings from the current administration that you sometimes need a reminder of some of the more ridiculous moments of the last four+ years.

"If Bush wants to dream big, why travel to Mars? Fuck it--why not travel through time?
We could go back in time to when all the continents were stuck together in one big-ass Pangea and just stick a flag in the middle and call it a day."

--Get Your War On

So really, I can't wait to hear Dobeliou's update on America's Holy Mission to Mars® in tonight's State of the Union® address.

Love,
True Blue Liberal