By-gone whipsmarts

I was recently identified as a Whipsmart Brazen Hussy, which is a term I don't take lightly, and feel I live up to. In fact, I believed for a long time that one day people would group the three interesting Texan whipsmart funny women: Ann Richards, Molly Ivins, and me. But what's happened in the ensuing years is that I left Texas, and Ann died, and now, sadly, so has Molly.

Living in Texas while watching Ann kick Clayton "just relax and enjoy it" Williams's ass inward was a fine thing. Reading Molly's version of the theater that is the Texas Legislature was also a fine thing. These women didn't know me. But they provided me hours of constant enjoyment, pride, insight.

Rest in peace, Molly. Wherever you are, I want you to know: the New York Times editors were wrong, and should have left your description of the annual chicken slaughter in New Mexico alone. Gangplucking was definitely the best approach.

Keep Fiddlin', Nero

I guess it's nice how much we care about horses and paintings. But now we know there was all that money, all that media space, and we used it up on exactly one painting and a dead horse.

$34 million dollars was generated from private donations in record time to keep The Gross Clinic at Jefferson. Barbaro the horse had to be put down and it garnered 5 pages of the A section of the Philadelphia Inquirer.

So the next time you trip over a homeless person muttering to himself, think about how warm the painting is. That will make you feel much better. And don't wonder why all the homicides in this city are discussed in the B section. In this town, dead horses surpass dead humans any day.

Hello, Kettle?

From the Category of Hello, Kettle? This is Pot Calling, here are the two headlines that were shown one on top of the other at Yahoo.com tonight.

1. Bush Chides Iraq over recent executions
2. 34,452 Iraq civilians said killed in '06

I can't be the only one here who finds it ironic that a man who openly defies international law and signed more death warrants as governor of Texas (including that of seemingly-rehabiliated-and-certainly-born-again Karla Faye Tucker) than any other elected official alive today in America thinks that those handling Saddam's execution "fumbled it" and made it look "like it was kind of a revenge killing."

I further can't believe that Tony Snow isn't rushing to help us understand that, while most of those 34,000+ deaths were at the hands of Americans, a whole bunch were due to Sunni/Shi'ite actions. Also roughly the same amount have been wounded. And I'm not even discussing people in prison or who have had to leave their homes. That numbers about a half a million more people.

What an astute guy that Unca Dub is. Pay no attention to the escalating civil war in Iraq or those whose lives have been utterly displaced, be sure to bring in more troops with no discernible current or exit strategy, and for God's sake don't forget to carp about the execution of one badass dictator--not the fact that his trial was outside the realm of international law, just that it seemed like come the day, he was killed revengefully.

And my guy got impeached for the heinous crime of getting some in the Oval Office and then saying he hadn't.

Sources:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070117/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070117/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_iraq
http://www.commondreams.org/views/020900-105.htm

HB MLK

Happy Birthday, Martin. I learned today your name was originally Michael but that your father changed it early on to honor Martin Luther. Does that mean he changed his own name, too? I don't know. When I think about you, I think about the influence of Gandhi on your life. I think about Title 7, the part of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that deals with discrimination in the workplace. I think about Brown v. Board of Education, and I think about Rosa Parks. These things hold for me the promise of justice. They are the gold standard.

When I look at reality, I see cases like Mothers Work, the maker of maternity clothing, settling a lawsuit brought by pregnant employees who were fired. (This is the height of obstetric irony.) I see a national policy on immigration that refuses to consider on whose backs the infrastructure of this country was built. I see glass ceilings. And I see the limitations of the legislation that held so much promise.

But still, I am inspired. I am inspired to do the best I can for disenfranchised people whose access to law is uneven. Happy Birthday, Martin. Your legacy and dream live on.

Sources:
http://www.bizjournals.com/philadelphia/stories/2007/01/08/daily32.html
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/16462004.htm

Mooove over Mad Cow

And make way for Butt Ugly Cow. Yes, for the two people left who were unsure whether genetic modification didn't have some potential downside, it's...a two-faced cow. And I'm not talkin' 'bout no gossip, neither.

The farmer whose cow(s? Does face give persona? Why does Miss Manners never bemoan the vital stuff like this?) this is/are had this much to say: "Genetically, this is one of my better calves," he said.

What? Um, excuse me, Mr. Farmer sir. Can I help you consider another career immediately, like computer tech or truckdriver or attorney or any other field in which you don't have a hand in the manufacture of freaky little bovine Frankenbabies?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070104/ap_on_fe_st/two_faced_calf