Fuck Bob Ehrlich

I can't wait until Martin O'Malley kicks your sorry ass in '06.

Wow

No one needs to write anything about Dick Cheney's ridiculous lies this weekend, because Tbogg has it covered.

(link courtesy of firedoglake)

Late Night TV

Because I was so lazy this weekend I didn't even watch the Sunday chat shows, but I did catch Meet the Press during a late-night re-broadcast.

I wish I hadn't seen it, because it scared the shit out of me:

MR. RUSSERT: Not trying to alarm the American people, but to talk straight to them this morning, I'd like to go around the table. Chairman Kean, let me start with you. Based on everything you've learned during the course of your work as chairman of the September 11 Commission, do you believe it's a distinct possibility that you could witness a nuclear bomb in the United States of America in your lifetime?

MR. KEAN: I believe that, and we talked to nobody who had studied this issue who didn't think it was a real possibility. And if we don't perhaps head Lincoln's advice and, at this point, think anew and act anew, I worry very seriously.

MR. HAMILTON: Oh, yes, I think it's a distinct possibility. This technology is spreading. It's no longer confined to a few people or one or two countries. We've been fairly fortunate with the non- proliferation regime over a period of several decades now. We don't have nearly as many nuclear-power countries as might have been predicted 30 years ago. So the technology is spreading; terrorism is spreading; radical Islam is spreading. You've got an explosive mix here.

MR. RUSSERT: Senator Nunn?

MR. NUNN: I agree. I think, though, that the message ought to be: It is certainly possible, but it is also preventable. There are a lot of things we can do that we have not done. I think the public can get involved by getting their leaders to put this on the front burner. Lastbestchance.org will get you a copy of the film. We believe that getting the public involved to help people like Dick Lugar, who are over there every day trying to explain to people why the Nunn-Lugar program is not foreign aid--and that goes on constantly. He and Joe Biden and others who support this program need help, so we need the American public involved, and also, we haven't gotten this formula yet. We've got to get a way to get this message to the Russian people. They've got to put pressure on their leaders, also.

MR. RUSSERT: Senator Lugar, a distinct possibility?

SEN. LUGAR: Yes, but I have the optimism that Sam has, that it's preventable. And I would just say: The need for more effective diplomacy in which we get together with the Russians so they help out our seven partners in Europe to spend this money that Lee Hamilton's talking about. Or are we--really work with great people like Jim Reed and Andy Weber and others who are there in the Pentagon now who have been instructors to us about what happens with chemical weapons, which we haven't talked a whole lot about and which may be a threat, or a dirty bomb, in which you don't have a nuclear bomb explosion but you pretty well ruin a city--these are all aspects that are preventable but more likely.

Not three hours earlier I'd caught part of the goofy Tom Clancy Ben Afflected vehicle The Sum of All Fears, in which the Baltimore Inner Harbor is blown up by a recovered Isreali bomb. It was strange to see a Sunday roundtable chat without Dems and Repubs bashing each other. They were all in agreement that we're fucking doomed to endure a nuclear attack, and probably soon.

Lazy

I had a deliciously lazy weekend and did next to NOTHING. Friday we ate at Kyodai and played Scrabble; Cha beat me 284-282. Saturday we visited Len and Schott and their new twins. I held wee Emily for an hour as she slept and occasionally fussed--she's the tiniest thing I've ever seen at barely six pounds. Mom and Dad are doing well but they must be going mad. In the three hours we were there there was not a second where one or the other baby wasn't bawling, hungry, or pooping. In fact, poor Len often has the twins feeding at once, and as soon as they're done eating they poop and then after being changed they poop again and are immediately hungry. Sleep? Yeah, right.

Saturday evening we went to M and M's new house in Rogers Forge. Newlyweds who just spent a month moving and painting without doing any socializing=truly hyper folk. We played board games as usual (Balderdash, some Lego version of charades) and finished lots of wine.

Sunday Cha had a booth at the SoWeBo Festival and made several hundred dollars selling her political buttons and T-shirts and henna tattoos. Meanwhile I stayed home and did LESS THAN NOTHING all day.

Monday we went to the Khumari buffet, walked around Mt. Vernon for an hour, then ate dinner with Julio and Yo! Adrienne at Saigon remembered. Then, Cha again defeated me at Scrabble, 259-238.

Have I mentioned I hate Scrabble?

Now I'm back at work. Several daytime positions are popping up in Tech Services, and I hope I can land one of those. I was completely unable to drag myself out of bed this morning, and kept going back to sleep until noon when I finally jumped up and went for a three mile run before work.

Noe!

While certainly less visceral than Noe's criminally intense Irreversible, Seul Contre Tous is nevertheless painfully engaging. Noe is brash and unafraid of taboo, and is audacious enough to put a warning on the screen in giant block text: YOU HAVE 30 SECONDS TO LEAVE THE THEATER before dragging us further into his deranged butcher's depravity.

Strangely, by the time he warns us it's already too late, because the worst has happened. Noe's first film is more interesting than Irreversible because there's some humor here--sick humor to be sure, but the butcher's thoughts are as intricate and surprisingly funny at times as those of Dostoevsky's Underground Man. Irrervrsible is completely devoid of joy, fun, or humor.

At least I thought so. I strongly caution you against I Stand Alone or Irreversible unless you're a sick bastard like me. If you're up to them, though, these are challenging, technically superior films.

Monkey of God

Reminds me of a certain smirking chimp...

NOT a crash, jerk-offs

I hate the way headlines scrub hostile action from the Iraq War.

The headline should read US Soldiers Killed when Helicopter Shot Down. I guess all those troops killed by IEDs are actually killed when their Humvees "crash" after being blown up?

Frommer's Top Ten Destinations 2005

When an anchor on WBAL-TV's News at 11 last night asked "What does Baltimore have in common with Barcelona and Belize?" and promised the answer "after the break," I told Cha it must be the fact they all begin with B.

Wrong.

I do love Baltimore, but is it worthy?