Monthly Archive for March, 2006

Top Ten Things Overheard During George W. Bush’s Trip To Cancun

March 31, 2006 0 Comments Tags: , .

  • 10. “Feels great to get away after three straight weeks of work”
  • 9. “As president of the United States, I pledge to do whatever’s necessary to help the Cancunians!”
  • 8. “Couldn’t we have stayed home and gone to Chi-Chi’s?”
  • 7. “Cozumel? Isn’t that the chick I made Secretary of State?”
  • 6. “When do I get to meet Zorro?”
  • 5. “Holy crap, how’d they move these pyramids from Egypt?”
  • 4. “I’ll have a non-alcoholic pina colada…just kidding, juice me up, Pepe!”
  • 3. “NAFTA? Don’t they make auto parts?”
  • 2. “Secret service! He’s choking on a nacho”

  • 1. “Once you get a little buzz going, my poll numbers don’t look so bad”

From Thursday’s Late Show With David Letterman

McCain to speak at OSU spring commencement

March 30, 2006 0 Comments Tags: , .

Okay so that last post was lie, but I had to repost this!

John McCain, a Republican U.S. senator from Arizona and former Vietnam POW, has been selected by Ohio State to send off about 7,000 graduates at the spring quarter commencement on June 11 at Ohio Stadium.

McCain, a presidential candidate in 2000 and thought by many to be a potential 2008 candidate, was chosen to speak by OSU’s Commencement Speaker Committee, which is comprised of students, faculty and staff.

“I am delighted to have the opportunity to deliver The Ohio State University’s commencement address,” McCain said in an OSU media release. “Ohio State is consistently recognized as one of our nation’s best public universities. With a faculty committed to students’ academic success and graduation rates continually on the rise, the state of Ohio is fortunate to have this impressive institution call it home.”

OSU President Karen A. Holbrook said it will be an honor for OSU to have McCain speak at commencement.

“He has a distinguished record of bravery and service to his country and I’m sure his words will mean a great deal to our students,” she said in an OSU media release… read the rest

[ From The OSU Lantern // By Josh Thompson and Ryan Merrill ]

:: flashback ::
It seems like just yesterday when Bush was the OSU spring commencement speaker… I was working at the OIT main office in Baker Hall that day. I remember looking out the 5th floor window down at the stadium, all I could see was the scoreboard, but part of me was happy I wasn’t able to see him. My roommate Kelly was graduating and she was one of the people to turn their backs while he was speaking. Thankfully she wasn’t alone, though the usual attempts were made to make you think it was all sunshine and buttercups.
:: /flashback ::

Now it will be Basak who will be in attendance this year, wonder what she’ll do…? :-)

Here are some McCain resources if you’d like to learn more about this guy [who voted against the Federal Marriage Amendment, but opposes a woman's right to abortion, supports the war in Iraq, and endorses Kenneth Blackwell for Ohio Governor] :

big brother sister is watching… and laughing

March 30, 2006 0 Comments Tags: .

if nothing else, having general statistics on my visitors is always good for a laugh every now and then. how else would i have found out that if you Google “chicken attacking city” my site will be the 7th result listed?

yes, that’s it, that’s my post! nothing sad, angry, political, or cynical today, i’m taking a break.

Before All Hope Is Lost

March 27, 2006 1 Comment Tags: .

From AlterNet: By Adam McKibbin

Every two hours, a young person commits suicide. To raise funding for this epidemic, some concerned musicians and activists have combined forces.

Take ActionThis month, an unusual assemblage will make a return pilgrimage to Capitol Hill, appearing before the press and logging face time with congressmen, all with one goal in mind — increasing funding for suicide prevention. On March 1, punk band Matchbook Romance — along with 11 other bands — and their Take Action! tour mates began a two-month trek across the country, raising money and awareness for a quiet, misunderstood epidemic.

While the names of the bands on Take Action! CDs are changing from year to year, two men behind the project are constants — the National Hopeline Network founder Reese Butler and Hopeless and Sub City Records founder Louis Posen. Butler and Posen will be speaking alongside Sen. Patrick Kennedy, D-R.I., during the conference on Capitol Hill, and their joint efforts have helped make the Take Action! tour a shining example of all the good that can occur when music and activism cross paths.

But nobody is resting on their laurels. How could they? Not with kids in the United States between the ages of 10 and 24 taking their lives at an alarming rate of one every two hours. The suicide statistics are alarming; the prevention statistics are infuriating. As recently as 2000, the federal government allocated zero dollars to fund suicide prevention programs. In part because of the public efforts of the Take Action! tour — and the 100,000 plus petitions the tour has brought back to Washington — Congress has finally put it into the budget. But, in the grand scheme of D.C. spending, the crisis is merely getting chump change thrown at it. [Read the rest of this article]

The Take Action Tour is coming to Columbus, Ohio on Friday, April 14th @ Newport Music Hall, tickets are $16 available from Ticketmaster.

Canada starts beating seals to death tomorrow.

March 25, 2006 0 Comments Tags: , .

  • Review of V For Vendetta: An anti-authoritarian action film

    • From Columbus IndyMedia, this is the best review of the movie I’ve found so far.

  • March 18th Protest Recap from Basak

    • Stop the war.She has a lot of great photos posted and does a much better job of recapping the day’s events. Not to mention she uses a few of my photos in her post.

  • Student Debts, Stunted Lives

    • From AlterNet, addresses a generation of indebted students, something I can relate to all too much: “There is social control in loading young people up with financial obligations. Burdened with debt and desperate to have and keep a job… there is certainly no time for protesting, organizing or causing the kind of social and political trouble young people cause from time to time. How many young people turn away from low-paying but vital professions because they can’t earn enough to pay back their loans? How many potential social workers, pro bono lawyers, journalists, environmentalists, teachers, artists, secondary medical professionals and community workers are we losing?”

  • Canada’s seal culling to begin Saturday

    • Canadian seal pupIn this instance, culling means beat to death. Up to 325,000 seal pups. They claim “it’s not cruel or offensive and it helps the local economy.” Yeah, I suppose beating a 2 week old seal over the head isn’t cruel, I’m just being too sensitive.

    Some argue that “if people would stop buying fur there wouldn’t be a demand for it.” My response: just because there’s a demand for something doesn’t mean you have to cater to it.

    PETA has a video of last year’s massacre, and it was the first video I had to stop watching because it was so disturbing. I mean yes, all of PETA’s videos make me sick (that’s an understatement of course.) But this one has sound, you can hear the seals crying, and hear the footsteps of the merciless “hunters” walking on the snow. Okay I really don’t consider them hunters. Cavemen is a better term. With all of the trillions of dollars invested throughout history on military and medical technology, we’re still going around beating seal pups to death with a big stick, that’s the most humane way this can be done? Makes about as much sense as the electric chair. I am so glad the world is watching closer than ever, maybe this will be the year we stop it.

    I understand the argument that the only reason people are so outraged is because seals are cute. Yeah, they are. But personally it outrages me to see any animal killed for its fur. This event just happens to be drawing the long overdue limelight and I’m adding my little bit in the hopes it will finally show people what they need to see. No more of this out of sight out of mind $hit. If people saw how fur ended up in their closet, they would probably (hopefully) throw up all over themselves. Pretty fur coats don’t just magically appear on the racks at the store, they have a cruel and violent history that started way before some rich lady started parading it around. We should be ashamed of ourselves.

Inside the Brooklyn Bridge, a Whiff of the Cold War

March 22, 2006 0 Comments Tags: .

From NY Times – Published March 21, 2006:

“For decades it waited in secret inside the masonry foundations of the Brooklyn Bridge, in a damp, dirty and darkened vault near the East River shoreline of Lower Manhattan: a stockpile of provisions that would allow for basic survival if New York City were devastated by a nuclear attack.

City workers were conducting a regular structural inspection of the bridge last Wednesday when they came across the cold-war-era hoard of water drums, medical supplies, paper blankets, drugs and calorie-packed crackers — an estimated 352,000 of them, sealed in dozens of watertight metal canisters and, it seems, still edible…”

I’m categorizing this as “awesome” in the sense that I am often awed by history. Especially NYC history. Just imagine stepping into this room with the stale air and dusty crack of light coming in, finding all these Cold War supplies… crazy. One of the world’s most well-known and popular bridges was able to hide this room for over 50 years! Just another example of how a city becomes a being of its own, with power and everything.

no clever title tonight

March 20, 2006 1 Comment Tags: , , .

following up on my previous post about V for Vendetta…

it’s an amazing, beautiful, scary, and inspiring movie. whether intentional or not, it is amazingly parallel to this American life. [no, not the NPR program, the one we are living right now as American citizens.] it’s a glimpse into what could happen if this madness keeps going. you see how much power can be harvested from fear. how phone tapping could turn into 24 hour surveillance. how homeland security threat levels could go from innocent color codes of the day to determining what curfew we are to abide by (yes, i’m ending a sentence with a preposition– wait, not anymore!) i don’t want to say too much and give anything away, so i’ll stop here. i was completely inspired though, it was so fitting to see this film on the eve of the march 18th protests. it’s amazing, go see it. now. quit reading this and go. okay wait, maybe finish this first.


brooklyn is here!

i am dog-sitting for about a week. she is basically the equivilent of a child from a previous relationship. her other mommy is going on vacation so this mommy gets to watch her. oddly enough, i haven’t seen either of the cats since she got here, amazing how they find places to hide so quickly. should be an interesting week. let’s add them up… one dog.. two cats.. two hamsters.. one human trying to maintain control.

ohio statehouse

march 18th.

this past saturday, goodale park to the ohio statehouse. it was a gorgeous sunny day out, though it still had the March chill. i have my M18 photos posted to flickr, please check them out and let me know what you think. personally, i think the rally was a success. but that is based solely on emotions evoked and has nothing to do with numbers, group interaction, etc. and i’m glad the press actually acknowledged that anything happened.

ugh, i think i’m getting sick, i can’t think at all let alone try and form sentences. i want to say more about saturday but i’m about to fall asleep (and it’s not even 11 yet, i must be getting sick), so check out the pictures.

today is the last day of winter.