Photoblogging!

Hydraulic Ram

You know how human beings anthropomorphize just about anything? We see hands in the clouds, the grill of a car with the lights and the logo seems to make a face, and so on? Some guys, when they see something like this, see something else entirely. That's one well-hung bulldozer.

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Smart Car

On the other hand, I spotted this adorable little SmartCar in Belltown near my office. It was parked outside a retirement village, although it could easily have belonged to someone visiting the antiques or wine shops across the street. I never realized just how small they were; it does take up only half the parking space alloted. It has a logo on the back that reads "Fortwo," and they'd better be a Euro small two, not an American supersize two.

Politics: The cognitive dissonance of Mike Huckabee's supporters

I experienced a serious case of psychic disconnect this morning as I was reading my blog entries and listening to talk radio. First, I especially enjoyed this piece from John Cole of Balloon Juice in which he documents the ways many fiscal Republicans are clenching their hands in disbelief in the Huckasurge. Cole quotes Sullivan as saying:

Every complacent secular Republican who has scorned those of us worried about the fundie right is beginning to squirm in the face of Huckabee's surge.

It's a strong and sharp critique, and it's damnably true. Sullivan enjoys the schadenfreude of watching Rich Lowry and Charles Krauthammer writhing in terror at the notion of a Huckabee nomination.

The Reverend Mike Huckabee is so far to the right, such a pander to the Evangelical arm of the Republican party, that it's insane to claim otherwise. Huckabee is an Evangelical's evangelical, a man who has no interest in either foreign policy or fiscal responsibility, a man who would use the bully pulpit to sermonize this country. (It's especially sad that Lowry, while pointing out that Huckabee is a creationist, has to bow down and say, "Even if there are many people in America who agree with him, his position would play into the image of Republicans as the anti-science party," without adding the key point: Huckabee, and the people who agree with him, are delusional and stand in opposition to reality.)

So imagine my sudden cognitive dissonance this afternoon when I heard Michael Medved (a Discovery Institute scholar now, did you know that?) talking about how the Huckaboom is a great sign because it's proof that money doesn't control the elections. Huckabee's way down in the fund raising and yet seems to be doing very well in Iowa. It's proof that you can do well without being ultrawealthy. Which is all well and good.

But then Medved goes on to say, "The comparison to Howard Dean is unfair. Because Dean was to the far left of his party, and he raised a ton of money from lefties like himself. Huckabee hasn't raised that much money, and he's still doing well. And Huckabee isn't to the right of the Republican party, Mike Huckabee is mainstream!"

And my poor irony meter up and died right about there after giving a small whine of protest.

As near as I can figure out, Medved is either insane (not impossible; the man believes in Bigfoot and associates with HIV denialists) or he just admitted that the Republican party is in the complete thrall of social conservatism to the exclusion of fiscal conservatism (or even institutional conservatism) and has moved so far to the right that St. Reagan couldn't get the nomination today, a fringe party, no more worthy of the collective attention of decent Americans than the Green Party or the Taxpayers Party.

Politics: Liberal overreach

Far be it for me to rag only on the right. Yesterday, I was again flipping through the AM dial and it settled on Air America. And there, some nasally-voice whiner was complaining about the Consumer Products Safety Commission, about how under Bush its budget and staffing had been slashed, and how the head of the Commission had gone in front of Congress and told it that she didn't need more money or staff to do her job, and how she had been ordered by the executive to shut down the CPSC.

He was really working himself into a lather. He was going on and on, and finally he said, "And it's because the CSPC has been cut that there's so much lead in our children's toys! It's because the CSPC has been cut that there's so much E Coli coming across our borders!"

*Click* That was enough.

If you're going to rant about our government, you should not rely on your audience to be dumber than you are. The CSPC has no responsibility for food: that's the Department of Agriculture. Secondly, almost all of the E Coli outbreaks in the US have come from domestically grown product.

I'm reminded of this maddening moment:

I just read a paper on the problem of evil which asked why God allowed "the Iraq's" to attack us on 9/11. The thing that upsets me most here is that my students don't just believe that that Iraq was behind 9/11. This is a big fact in their minds, that leaps out at them, whenever they think about the state of the world.

My house was full of giggles and estrogen

Kouryou-chan was ill with the flu for her birthday last month and this past weekend was the first major opportunity we've had to give her the sleepover she wanted. So Omaha and I spent all Saturday in a flurry of baking, cleaning, and hanging up decorations so she could have her event.

She had seven of her friends over, five of which stayed the night. For sixteen solid hours this house was full of giggling, crazy, wired on sugar little girls. Even Yamaraashi-chan came over, even though it was her weekend to be with her mother, and I'm grateful that angilong let her come. It made a big impression on both of them.

It was good, though. We had them make their own pizzas using store-bought mini pizza crusts and whatever toppings they most enjoyed. They went through the pineapple like they'd never see it again. Kouryou-chan's oldest friend was a little bored with the choice of the movie-- she was also frustrated because, even though she's two years older she cannot read at sufficient speed to keep up with the subtitles.

They were worried about the poor cat, especially when I watered her.

Omaha and I struggled to get them to sleep, too. We put them in their sleeping bags around ten, and they were still giggling and talking around midnight.

This morning I made pancakes for a dozen. Again, Kouryou-chan's eldest friend was bored and helped me make the pancakes instead of staying downstairs playing with the others. Despite there being only seven of us, the pancakes were gone by the time parents started to show up and pick up the girls.

We should do that again. It was okay.

We spent the rest of the day putting up the Yule decorations, setting up the tree, and running around to do family gifting. Omaha was so despondent over being taken by fraud for quite a bit of cash that she's been moody most of the day, so I took her out to eat.

Now that we're home and things have quieted down and Kouryou-chan is in bed, I decided to get ready for sleep myself with a treat. I didn't have dessert at the restaurant so I could come home and make my favorite winter concoction: 1.5oz Dilettante's dark chocolate and 6 oz lowfat milk warmed in the microwave, then mixed with 1 oz of Rumplemintz and topped with freshly whipped and lightly sweetened heavy cream. Mmm.