No one ever checks this website anymore, because I’ve totally gone underground. I have been posting a little on the Awkward site, but I understand that’s really far away from here, location-wise. It’s hard to keep two websites that serve a similar purpose bookmarked at once.

And now that I’m finally posting, I’m posting about politics. Which I recognize is not always the most fun for everyone … but I just have to comment on this article I read this morning. Here’s the thing: two days ago there was this election. Two Rebublicans beat two Democrats in governor races, and two Democrats beat two Republicans in Congressional elections. And when I saw this, my first instinct was, “there goes the public option.” Because conservative Democrats … of which there are enough to ruin the country for everyone … are looking for any, ANY excuse to not have to alienate the insurance industry or take a stance on any issue that might be labeled “principled.”

The compelling narrative is that Americans are angry at Obama’s radical policies. There is absolutely no proof of this, mind you, but it’s a compelling narrative, and that’s what the press is going to focus on. At least, that’s what I thought yesterday morning.

And lo and behold! I wake up this morning and here’s the front page article in the LA Times:

Election results rattle some Democrats

With independent voters favoring GOP candidates in New Jersey and Virginia, many in Congress wonder whether they’ll lose electoral support themselves if they stick with Obama on controversial issues.

What the shit is that? This is already an opinion piece. “Many in Congress wonder whether they’ll lose electoral support themselves if they stick with Obama on controversial issues.” Who exactly are the many?

Now, as the entire House of Representatives and a third of the Senate prepare for next year’s midterm elections, some moderate Democrats are wondering whether they can afford to follow President Obama’s ambitious legislative agenda on such controversial issues as healthcare and climate change. One said the results were a “wake-up call.”

“There are going to be a lot more tensions between the White House and Congress,” predicted Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.), a member of the Blue Dog Coalition of fiscally conservative Democrats. “They’ve been under the surface so far — and they’re going to come out in the open.”

…

But “lesser mortals need to be worried about their independent voters,” Cooper said, “because they have shifted strongly against Democrats in recent months. Independent voters tend to look at the issue, not the party, and they don’t like a lot of what Congress has done.”

So from many down to one? I’ve read the entire article, and Cooper is the only Congressman they talk to who even expresses an opinion on what this means to Democrats. On top of that, Cooper’s saying that independents don’t like what Congress has done. But the only controversy is that Congress has not been progressive enough. They have talked about a lot of controversial issues. But they haven’t done a frigging thing except continue to bail out the banks — in continuance of a policy that was started during the Bush Administration and passed with bipartisan support — and adopt a recovery package that was too paltry because it was watered down to appease conservatives. So the only two Congressional decisions I can think that might have upset independent voters are essentially conservative measures that conservatives have disagreed with simply because they’re grasping for some sort of identity.

And it’s all rhetoric, anyway … as soon as that bailout money started flowing to the states, the governors were pretty quick to take grinning idiot pictures with their constituents holding up those giant checks.

Phil Gingrey, who voted against the stimulus package, passing out a giant check of stimulus money.

Oh, but there’s this:

Whit Ayres, a Republican pollster, said that Democrats such as Cooper had reason to be nervous.

“Republicans won independents by 2 to 1. It was overwhelming. It was breathtaking,” Ayres said. “That is a huge shift since the last two elections in a very short amount of time.”

Ayres said that his polling data indicate a clear shift in the independent vote starting in April. He said that “spending and debt” are the reasons — “starting with the bailouts, followed up with the stimulus package, the budget with its $1-trillion deficit, healthcare with another trillion.”

Here’s a reporting tip for James Oliphant, Peter Nicholas, and Christi Parsons, the astonishingly clueless authors of this article: when your thesis is that the country is afraid of Obama’s progressive agenda, the best support for your argument probably will not come from a “Republican pollster” who does not cite any actual figures. Especially when one of the poor spending decisions he mentions — healthcare — has not actually been adopted. And the $1 trillion figure is based on the already watered-down compromise healthcare reform bill and not the progressive bill, which is projected to save money.

And the other point is that the Democrats who lost to Republicans WERE NOT IN CONGRESS.

Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), who heads the Democratic election effort in the House, said that Democrats, in fact, were vindicated by Tuesday’s results.

“There were only two elections yesterday that had to do with what Congress is doing and the Obama agenda,” Van Hollen said, citing congressional races in California and New York, both of which were won by Democrats. The New York victory came somewhat as a surprise, as Democrat Bill Owens beat back a surge by conservative candidate Doug Hoffman.

Right? Since when do governors get to vote on the President’s agenda? So how does any of this have anything to do with Obama’s progressive policies? Is it not more likely that voters in Virginia and New Jersey simply felt their governors were incompetent?

But the common sense view means nothing. In a week, it will become common, accepted wisdom that voters think Obama is too progressive, and the conservative Democrats will leap on this as an excuse to continue to be the pussies they’ve really wanted to be all along. The public option is dead, because anyone who’s up for election in 2010 is going to mainly be concerned with collecting that sweet insurance industry money to waste on their elections that they’re going to lose because at least 70% of the public wants a public option. And all the Blue Dog Democrats, who are essentially Republicans, will be replaced by Republicans who are actually Republicans, and instead of gridlock with a 1% chance of things going the right way, it will just be gridlock again.

So in the end, what this article is saying is “the American people prefer gridlock.” We have been so terrified by Obama’s year of radical socialism that we would prefer the government do absolutely nothing. Which is pretty much what we have right now, minus a pinch of hope. Looking good, America!

Bernie Sanders is the only socialist in congress. Well, really, Democratic-Socialist. Which is not the same as communism or fascism, no matter what your people might claim. Your people are ignoramuses. Stop listening to them.

Personally, I could go for a little more socialism. This capitalism thing is for the birds. I’m tired of feeling completely on my own at all times. We’ve living in a society here, people! Let’s stop pretending we are not, just because we’re afraid that doing anything for the good of humanity will turn us into pussies. Or people who have no say in the functioning of our own government. Granted, I’ve had a lot of great, stimulating conversations with my representatives about healthcare, and it would be a shame to lose that kind of one-on-one attention. But if I have to give up one or two power lunches with Nancy Pelosi so my neighbor doesn’t have to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars for the privilege of having cancer, that’s a sacrifice I may be willing to make.

Tell ‘em ’bout it, Bernie!

So, what about this new terrorist plot? Are we buying it? I haven’t seen a lot of evidence one way or the other yet, but given law enforcement’s history of picking up raving lunatics and selling them to the American public as dangerous terrorists, I’m a little wary of anything they pitch to us. A big part of the problem is that, for every claim that sounds like it might be legit, there are 50 that sound highly suspect. From today’s LA Times:

The affidavit also alleges that authorities found images on Najibullah Zazi’s laptop of nine pages of notes on making explosives and fuses, apparently in his own handwriting.

Okay, so far, so good. That does sound pretty suspect. But then:

In addition, the affidavit alleges that authorities have found other information linking Zazi to the suspected plot, including his fingerprints on a small electronic scale and double-A batteries, which are often used in making bombs.

I love how reporters never bother to question anything, ever. “Small electronic scales” and “double-A batteries” are often used in making bombs. That sentence could be changed to read “… a small electronic scale and double-A batteries, which are often used in making cookies” or “… a small electronic scale and double-A batteries, which are often used in sending mail.” You could go into my apartment right now and find my fingerprints on a small electronic scale and double-A batteries. And that’s the top, A1, ultimate best evidence they have, is a scale and some batteries. One of the strongest pieces of evidence that Zazi is a terrorist, as reported by the LA Times with apparently no irony, is that his fingerprints were found on double-A batteries. The FBI spent money to dust a pair of double-A batteries to determine that the suspected terrorist touched them. Why are they bothering to dust these things, anyway? Didn’t they find them in his apartment? Can’t you just assume that the guy’s fingerprints will probably be on items that he keeps in his apartment?

And how about the way this plot was uncovered?

Zazi, who had been monitored by authorities for some time after returning from a trip to Pakistan, was stopped on a New York bridge on Sept. 10 after driving from Colorado on what he said was a trip to settle a business deal that had gone sour.

New York police checked his car and allowed him to leave, according to court documents. Soon after, police showed pictures of Zazi and several others to Afzali, the imam of a Queens mosque who had worked as a police informant in the past.

Zazi and his father later talked by phone with Afzali, who told them of his contact with New York City police detectives.

Zazi flew back to Colorado and agreed to be questioned by FBI agents, who interviewed him for three days. Zazi abruptly stopped cooperating with authorities on Saturday, prompting his arrest.

So let me get this straight. The FBI started monitoring him because he took a trip to Pakistan. He came back to America, drove from New York To Colorado. They stopped him on his return trip while he was driving on a New York bridge … why? Did they think he was going to blow it up? I have been on many bridges in New York, and I can tell you that they are not very convenient places to stop a car. They couldn’t wait until he got off the bridge? Or were they just stopping every Muslim guy who drove across a bridge on September 10?

So then they check his car and let him go. Later, they show his picture to an imam at a Queens mosque, “who had worked as a police informant in the past.” Who was this informant informing them of “in the past”? It sure doesn’t seem like the FBI ever arrests terrorism suspects on the down low, since every time there has ever been a terrorist probe on even the shakiest ground it immediately becomes front page news. There was that thing at JFK a few years ago, which was complete nonsense. Did the imam have anything to do with that? If so, my vote would go for “unreliable.”

Okay, but so they talk to the imam, who says, “yes, I know that guy who you stopped on the bridge.” Then the imam calls Zazi and says, “some New York City cops were asking me about you.” Zazi says, “what the fuck? Lemme talk to them.” He then flies back to Colorado because New York City cops were asking about him (what?!?) and voluntarily talks to the FBI. But he stops talking “after 3 days.” I mean, really, can you blame him? How many fucking days can someone spend talking about a pair of double-A batteries?

Here’s the kicker: the imam? Afzali? They promptly turned around and arrested that guy, too! “Thanks for the info, bro … you’re going down!”

Oh, and there’s also this:

In announcing the charges on Sunday, Assistant Atty. Gen. David Kris emphasized that authorities had “no specific information regarding the timing, location or target of any planned attack.”

Well. I don’t know if this terrorism plot is real, and I don’t really care. Clearly, the FBI is out there doing their job, stopping Muslims from owning scales and batteries, driving across bridges, and being informants to the FBI. And for that, we should be grateful.

In other political news, this is somewhat chuckle-worthy:

This woman is a hero. I have no credit card debt, thank God. But the amount of money banks are allowed to charge in interest rates is outrageous. Share the shit out of this one.

The empty inbox.

I’m done! Finished! No more email again, ever! It is a glorious day to be me, and American!

I really do apologize for ignoring poor little JeffreyDinsmore.com. The fact is, I’m getting way more hits on Awkward Press than I ever have on its sad older brother. I swear, it’s all in the name. No one wants to read a blog with the name of a man. I really should have done it old school and called it The Sweetly Mysterious (a URL that I no longer own, BTW.)

But there are still politics happening in the world that probably don’t fit on my business site, and so here I have returned to post another Glenn Greenwald banger. As you may have read, Tom Ridge is acknowledging in his upcoming book that the Bush Administration used terror alerts for political purposes. Well, duh. The thought of having a color-coded terror chart has always struck me as ridiculous, even though it is now accepted as a “thing.” (Has anyone even been updating the terror chart lately? I’m no mathematician, but doesn’t the law of averages say that if we haven’t been attacked in 8 years, the threat of terror is “low”?)

I remember all too well how hard nearly every mainstream media voice worked to make me feel like I was a fringe lunatic during the Bush administration, a point that Greenwald addresses:

But that is how our political culture works. Throughout the Bush years, those who said demonstrably true things were continuously dismissed as fringe, conspiracy-driven leftist-losers: those who questioned whether Saddam really had WMDs; those who argued that the invasion of Iraq would lead to long-term military bases in that country; those who worried that warrantless eavesdropping and Patriot Act powers would lead to abuses; those who opposed the war in Afghanistan on the ground that it would be drag on for years with no resolution, etc. etc.

Having been proven right about all of those things hasn’t changed perceptions any at all.

Exactly. Exactly right, Glenn Greenwald. There are no flowers to greet those of us who thought it was all a bunch of bullshit. Why are we still made to feel wrong, when we have repeatedly been right?

And while I’m on the tangent of how smart I am: I still don’t believe those Dan Rather documents were fake. That whole argument never made a lick of sense … they were typed using a font that wasn’t invented for another 2 years? And then funneled through secret sources until they got to Dan Rather? So Dan Rather would look like a fool? No way.

New York Press, via some website called Bossip, is reporting that Lady Gaga has “come out of the closet” as a hermaphrodite. They supply this unsourced quote from Lady Gaga which was clearly never said by anyone ever:

It’s not something that I’m ashamed of, just isn’t something that I go around telling everyone. Yes. I have both male and female genitalia, but I consider myself a female. It’s just a little bit of a penis and really doesn’t interfere much with my life. The reason I haven’t talked about it is that it’s not a big deal to me. Like come on. It’s not like we all go around talking about our vags. I think this is a great opportunity to make other multiple gendered people feel more comfortable with their bodies. I’m sexy, I’m hot. I have both a poon and a peener. Big f*cking deal.

I call bullshit!

I never thought I’d say this, but … well done, Bobby McFerrin!

World Science Festival 2009: Bobby McFerrin Demonstrates the Power of the Pentatonic Scale from World Science Festival on Vimeo.

There is something awesomely American Gothic about this picture.

A two-headed baby was born in the Phillipines! All hail the two-headed baby revolution!