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Sunday, February 26, 2006
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Bode Miller was the perfect candidate for the packaged American Hero, a good-lucking lad who played the rebel to perfection for the image-makers, and ran with the hype and the credit card ads to the 2006 Olympics. Miller was a portable symbol of American lone rangers, the guy who did it his way and reached for the gold. Except he didn't reach. He turned up hollow and empty and unwilling to sacrifice. He skiied off the course, and he skiied off the story-line.
Just as the Bridge to Nowhere is the perfect metaphor for rudderless national leader of the Republican Party, so the ski bum Bode Miller and his devil-may-care attitude toward spectacular failure on the world stage makes a fine stand-in for the President of the United States.
(Via .)
5:27:35 PM 
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Lewis Lapham, in Harper’s Magazine, makes the case against George of the Bungle.
(Via The American Street.)
This comment is great:
We are going to need all the war time powers we can muster once we take the presidency away from the neocons. That will be the only way we have to set things straight. Without it, the next president will not have the legal power he needs to bust the dirty deals of this administration. Without that, most of the dirty deals that establish tyranny in this country will remain forever. Is that what you want? Institutionalized tyranny?
Are you going to let your own desire for justice push you into a short term partial solution? That is exactly what you will do unless we get a president patriotic enough to know what's right for democracy and courageous enough to do the job no matter what. It'll be political suicide, but one good person with four years can do it.
4:46:41 PM
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Leaked details of W's Gleneagles bike crash (E&P)
In Scotland, an accident such as the one at Gleneagles could have led to police action. Earlier this year, Strathclyde Police issued three fixed penalty notices to errant cyclists as part of a crack-down on rogue riders. Legal experts also suggested lesser mortals could have ended up with a fixed penalty fine, prosecution, or at least a good ticking-off from officers."
John Scott, a human rights lawyer, said: "There's certainly enough in this account for a charge of careless driving. Anyone else would have been warned for dangerous driving.
"I have had clients who have been charged with assaulting a police officer for less than this. The issue of how long the police officer was out of action for is also important. He was away from work for 14 weeks, and that would normally be very significant in a case like this."
(Via robot wisdom weblog.)
Bush runs down a Scottish Constable, and of course it's hushed up. At least the Constable -- so far as we know -- didn't apologize for Dubya for getting in his way.
4:36:36 PM
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Yesterday Octavia Butler fell outside her house during what neighbors thought was a stroke. A neighbor kid found her outside her house. They rushed her to the hospital, and found blood had pooled in her brain, they operated but she passed away today.
A fantastic, humane writer gone. A big loss.
2:13:02 PM
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You Passed 8th Grade Math
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Congratulations, you got 9/10 correct!
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But that missed one hurts!
10:50:49 AM
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Since at least 2001, Bill O'Reilly has been harping on a pardon granted by President Bill Clinton to Marc Rich, who turned out to be a donor to the Clinton library. O'Reilly even went as far as to demand an FBI investigation into the matter. Will O'Reilly hold Bush up to these same standards, now that it has come out that the UAE donated at least $1 million to H.W. Bush's Presidential Library? Will O'Reilly demand an investigation into this seemingly quid pro quo? Or will he once again prove that he is nothing more than a partisan hack?
(Via News Hounds.)
10:39:02 AM
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© Copyright 2006 Steve Michel.
Last update: 3/15/2006; 3:38:45 PM.
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