At the Rose Theatre in Post Townsend, the movie currently showing is…

Master and Commander. Held over for a second week.

Given how sail-crazy Port Townsend seems to be, I’m not surprised at all.

from ivymcallister

you are darkturquoise #00CED1

Your dominant hues are green and blue. You’re have good intentions and want to people around you to get along. Even though you tend to battle with yourself, you are very good at solving other people’s conflicts. Your saturation level is very high – you are all about getting things done. The world may think you work too hard but you have a lot to show for it, and it keeps you going. You shouldn’t be afraid to lead people, because if you’re doing it, it’ll be done right. Your outlook on life is brighter than most people’s. You like the idea of influencing things for the better and find hope in situations where others might give up. You’re not exactly a bouncy sunshine but things in your world generally look up.

Enter your username to see your friends colors: the spacefem.com html color quiz

There’s an issue in Star Trek that tends to really warp one’s suspension of disbelief. It’s this:

Isn’t the captain so valuable that it makes no sense to send him on trivial but risky away missions? What happens if the captain gets killed?

It now looks like Mr. Bush has seen too many Star Trek episodes.

I was particularly thinking this as I read an article in the Washington Post about reactions to the secrecy of the trip. For example:

“But Jonah Goldberg, editor-at-large of National Review Online, called the trip “a political masterstroke,” saying: “This wasn’t lying about an 18-minute gap on a tape or lying under oath. If they had announced the trip and there were attacks and people had died, everyone would be screaming bloody murder about how Bush put people in harm’s way.”

“If there had been attacks and people had died…” Hm. So, Mr. Goldberg appears to believe this alternate scenario would’ve been preferable:

President Dies in Secret Flight to Iraq — Cheney Sworn In
Journalists, Advisors Also Killed – Number Not Known Due to Unprecedented Secrecy

When I mentioned this to Ulrika, she opined, “Well, it’s proof Bush isn’t running the Administration after all — he really is expendable.”

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Then we have another WaPo piece written from one of the few reporters alllowed to tag along. Hair-raising paragraph:

“A senior administration official told reporters that even some members of Bush’s Secret Service detail believed he was still in Crawford, Tex., getting ready to have his parents over for Thanksgiving. It was just one reflection of the extraordinary preparation — and secrecy — that went into this most unusual presidential trip.”

In other words… As far as those members of the Secret Service are concerned, someone kidnapped the President on their watch.

Now it turns out later that a few members of the Secret Service did indeed accompany Mr. Bush on his jaunt to dump his parents, wife, and other family… So he wasn’t completely unprotected, nor was the entire detail kept in the dark.

But think about how you’d feel if you were on that security detail, and the guy for whom you’ve pledged “to take a bullet” cut out and ran on you.

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A while back, I had a post where I said the Administration’s motto appears to be, “Fuck you.” We can now add a few more to the list:

Fuck my mom and dad.

Fuck my wife.

Fuck the Secret Service.

Fuck the country if I get killed.

I’ve said for a while that Bush’s invasion of Iraq appears to have been driven, more than anything else, by a desire to say to his dad, (picture a schoolyard sing-song voice) “Ha, ha… I did something you couldn’t do.” And that committing US troops to harms way for the sake of personal therapy was a really crappy way to carry out one’s duties as President. Some friends told me I was wrong, that Georgie was such a loyal son, and this was just payback for his dad… as if solely trying to please his father rather than annoy him was any less a theraputic option.

But I look at what happened this Thanksgiving — where Junior decided Poppy just wasn’t trustworthy enough (you know, a former President), and leaving his mother, wife, and children wondering where Dad had gone AWOL to this time… And I find it very difficult not to believe that George was telling everyone in his family, again, “Fuck you.”

That’s family values for you.

But then, he’s a uniter, not a divider.

Hey… I just heard something I thought was really cool. I found it through a link-of-a-link from Doc Searls’ page.

You can listen to the .MP3 here. You can read the lyrics here.

Neil Postman once pointed out how news was a manufactured commodity by noticing how very few stories have an actual, direct impact on one’s life.

Usually that’s true for me. The people and places in the news are usually pure entertainment.

But today, for the second time in seven days, I heard someone I know speaking as a guest on The Tavis Smiley Show on NPR.

It was Jim Santangelo, who these days is the President of Joint Council 42 of the Teamsters (scroll down a bit on that page to see Jim’s mug and bio).

Back when I was a shop steward for Local 630 of the Teamsters, at Gallo Wine in Commerce, Calif., Jim and I were part of the union side of the table in negotiations for a new contract. He represented the truck drivers, as Secretary-Treasurer of Local 848. Why the clerical staff (which, as a computer operator, I was part of) and the drivers belonged to two different locals, I don’t know.

Jim was on Tavis’ show because of the grocery strike down in LA. Yesterday, the Teamsters announced they were going to start observing the picket lines of the cashier/checkers, who are striking against Safeway. This effectively means Safeway isn’t going to be getting any new groceries to stock on their shelves.

Jim’s take on it was that Steve Burd, the CEO of Safeway, was trying to unilaterally cut off the health benefits of his employees, and was willing for the strike to go on forever to do so. He also, in not so many words, opined that Burd was an intransigent, stubborn, counterproductive asshole.

So Jim basically said that if cutting off supplies to Safeway in Southern California doesn’t work, they may go national… Because the Teamsters’ negotiation with Safeway, Albertsons, and Kroger is in two years, and they know the outcome of this strike will settle all parties’ approach to the next negotiation.

My point?

My point is, to paraphrase Lloyd Bentsen, I know Jim Santangelo. I’ve worked with Jim Santangelo. I wouldn’t go so far as to call him my friend, but still. More particularly, I’ve worked with Jim Santangelo in a negotiation exactly like this one, with the same make-or-break issue between the union and management, with managerial representatives who were… hm. Less than fully cooperative and/or knowledgeable. {cough}

And Jim had no problem with them.

So, for Jim to come out and say what he said about Mr. Burd at all — let alone, on national media — in the middle of a negotiation…

God. I shudder to think just how bad Burd must be to deal with.

So, effective today, I am boycotting Safeway, for the duration. Not that we shop there all that often, and yes, I have more than a twinge knowing girlpirate works there…

But it seems to me to be the right thing to do. And I ask you to do the same, if you think it’s at all practicable for you.

…of the ability to post via e-mail. This is only a test. Had this been an actual post, it would’ve been more interesting.

“The people have given us the duty to defend them, and that duty sometimes requires the violent restraint of violent men. In some cases, the measured use of force is all that protects us from a chaotic world ruled by force…

(T)he credibility of the U.N. depends on a willingness to keep its word and to act when action is required.

America and Great Britain have done and will do all in their power to prevent the United Nations from solemnly choosing its own irrelevance and inviting the fate of the League of Nations.

It’s not enough to meet the dangers of the world with resolutions. We must meet those dangers with resolve.” (Source of speech, the New York Times.)

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So, there you have it, folks. Unless the UN authorizes an assault force against the USA to excerise “violent restraint” against the USA as a “chaotic” nation, the UN runs the risk of becoming irrelevant. George Bush says so.

Well, no.

But he does seem determined to have that result happen, doesn’t he? America delenda est?

{shudder}

I just love how Jorge can say this sort of thing with no apparent sense of irony, with no realization that it applies to him more than anyone else. You’d think an alleged Christian would know more about motes and beams.

So I’m having Fresh Ginger Gelato Classico and Hansen’s Diet Ginger Ale, both from Trader Joe’s. Almost overkill, but not quite.

Have you ever noticed that ginger-the-spice is not ginger-the-color? It’s more yellow.

One of my favorite signs at Mae’s Phinney Ridge Café:

“Hire a teenager now, while they still know everything.”

This has been breathed on somewhat, for perspective and removing the most glaringly obvious bits of a cable.