blogging with bourbon

for those of us without cable or the desire to watch much of it, here is a summary of the run up to quite possibly one of the most important elections we will ever face in our lifetimes:

The Swifties! Denounce the ad! I denounce all ads! But denounce that ad! I denounce all ads! He didn't denounce the ad! I like eggs! 527s! Response ads! The ad said you lied in Vietnam! How dare that ad say such things! You must react more strongly to the ads! He's not responding strongly to the ads! Shakeup because of the response to the ads! Guard duty scandal revived to respond to the Vietnam angle in the ads! The documents are forged! No they aren't! Yes they are! Vote Bush or die! We need another ad!

yes, in deed. personally, i get all of my information from the daily show with jon stewart. however, it dawned on me while i was reading the article from which the above quote was taken that tomorrow is the third anniversary of 9/11. i would never feign to know where you might have happened to be on that tragic day, dear reader. as for me, i was playing my geetar with some friends at around 12 midnight (japan time) when one of us just happened to check the computor to get his electronic mail from the "internet." through the bbc website, we heard the news. i don't think any of us slept that night.

so, here we are. almost 3 years hence, and where do we stand?
the following is a check list:

(stolen from William Rivers Pitt. check the link above if you don't believe me)

• Millions of jobs lost in the last four years - check!
  
  
  
• Unbearably expensive health care - check!
  
  
  
• A total loss of confidence within the international community in our moral leadership - check!
  
  
  
• The underfunded farce that is the Department of Homeland Security - check!
  
  
  
• The underfunded farce that is the No Child Left Behind bill - check!
  
  
  
• The fact that military assault weapons will soon be making a perfectly legal return to a neighborhood near you - check!
  
  
  
• The deeply illegal outing of a deep-cover CIA agent by Bush administration officials, who did it because they wanted to silence a critic - check!
  
  
  
• The rape and torture of men, women and children in the Abu Ghraib prison, horrors that were sanctioned in writing by Bush's own lawyer and the Secretary of Defense - check!
  
  
  
• The allegation by Senator Bob Graham of Florida that Bush torpedoed any aspect of the 9/11 investigation that came within spitting distance of his friends in the Saudi royal family - check!
  
  
  
• The allegations by several generals that Bush's people started stripping necessary troops and resources from Afghanistan to bolster their ill-conceived charge into Iraq - check!
  
  
  
• The myriad accusations by a dozen insiders that Bush and his people ignored the terror threat until the Towers fell, and then used the attacks to scare the American people into an unnecessary war in Iraq and a mammoth payday for their friends in the weapons and oil business - check!
  
  
  
• The fact that no weapons of mass destruction have been found in Iraq - check!
  
  
  
• The fact that no connections between Hussein, bin Laden and 9/11 have been established beyond the bloviating hyperbole of a few senior Bush officials who haven't yet gotten the memo - check!
  
  
  
• Does anyone even remember Enron? - nope!
  

...and jesus wept. i'll have mine on the rocks, mizu-wari.