This is a diary of depression mixed with anger. It's based on two men who successfully avoided both while they faced the thing we all fear the most: Death. Leroy Sievers and Randy Pausch both made peace with their impending death, knowing that not only was it was inevitable as it is for all, but imminent. They faced death and did not display anger and depression, and that is where I admit I am not so strong. I am ashamed to be alive in light of the spirit that they displayed throughout the moments we know we will all face - but don't believe we have to day to day.

I'm seething inside after watching Saturday night's transparent panderings to the religious right; who's hubris in co-opting the phrase "culture of life" is unforgivable. I feel they have absolutely no credibility to claim any moral standing on life at all and I'll explain why.

because it was called a "civil forum'. Anything that cant' even be intellectually honest about it's title will not give me any comfort that I am being educated and not just brainwashed. Civil - from the word "civic", meaning having to do with the people;

just type 'define:civic' into a google search and you will find the following rather specific Wikipedia entry:

Having to do with people and government office as opposed to the military or religion

How perversely ironic is it that a country was founded in order to keep the government from interfering in the individual worship of any of it's citizens has now reached a point where some citizens are deliberately trying to make sure that their government reinforces their religious identity?

Opol had the composure to put together the diary that I wanted to.
Wise Up and Rise Up – or Kiss It All Goodbye

So the best I could do is cross-post my sub-rant that he inspired in me that flowed out in the comments of his most excellent thump to the head.

This place is my therapy; I tried to quit cold-turkey last week when I found myself becoming dangerously unhinged in public and thought I could just go back to watching movies and cartoons or even turning it off altogether and going back to wearing out my iPod with Beethoven and heavy metal. (the good 70's and 80's kind, with real guitar heroes)

You may have noticed I failed in that effort. So here's one more swing with my angst: Thanks OPOL for winding me up...

OK, so those of you who read last night's diary, I can only say I picked a helluva day to quit drinking. (apologies to Randy Quaid)

So tonight I am so goddamn pissed I needed to put up both sides of the same coin:

First of all: John? What the fuck were you thinking? Oh, you were thinking about....

Second: Since Elizabeth is still by your side and still supporting you, like Hillary Clinton still being married to Bill after his indiscretions, Why haven't these two Democratic families become the National Poster Family for the Defense of Marriage Act?  

I've just realized that I have to put down my Kos.

I came here a few weeks after the first Yearly Kos because I was so damn impressed by all of you. My first few diaries revealed what a sourpuss I am and I really came here because I'm stuck in a small town full of narrow-minded, religiously deluded, xenophobic Republicans who have blinders on to anything they don't want to see or hear.

And they've gotten to me to the point where I realize I'm becoming unhinged.

There's a little more after the fold

That's a quote.

I'm writing this as stream of consciousness because I just walked in the door from another two hour session with my neighbor from two doors down. To put this on the record, since I refer to him often in comments and other diaries, I find my neighbor to be an honorable, admirable man. He has been married to the same woman for decades, he has raised a beautiful daughter who is tops in her class and is now about to graduate college, and he works harder than anyone I know making a living two cents at a time with a family-owned vending machine business.

Having said that, the title of this diary is the echo I can't get out of my head from tonight's encounter. Follow me while I try to sort this out.

Litho published an absolutely tragic diary this morning that has me reeling.

My neighbor and I have bantered about politics for the six years I have known him. We've been on good terms; the arguments get contentious and I'm a real hothead, but he is pretty unshakable and that seems to balance out. Lately my head has been hotter than usual because the things he keeps repeating are straight off of Rush Limbaugh's transcript, but my neighbor keeps telling me he doesn't admrie Limbaugh all that much.

But when we talk about the mortgage crisis, it's now just gone sour. I walked away for the first time, and I was still talking to myself and shaking with anger even when I got back to the house.

if you have a morbid sense of curiosity of what Clear Channel and Fox can do to an otherwise normal guy, read the rest of this. If you've just had a meal, perhaps you can come back later after it's settled.

has got my mind bouncing around inside my skull, and I'm thinking: The whole thing runs on greed. He who makes more money has more power, he who makes money by advertizing revenue is basically running a perpetual popularity contest over ideas.

In other words, the media - corporate, mainstream, or otherwise - can't sell what people won't buy. So when I hear people start trashing the "Main Stream Media", or the "Corporate Media", I have to ask you all a question: who do you think is buying their shit?

Somebody has to be buying it or they wouldn't be paying so much to put it out there. I gotta dump more over the fold, I have a feeling this rant might go on a little longer than I thought.

at work all day long.

That was George Carlin's introduction to Carlin at Carnegie. He became famous and lauded for his comedy because people enjoyed the laughter he inspired. Through his astute observations using absurdity, irony, sarcasm, and later with rants filled with furious indignation about things we all felt, but couldn't say without losing our job or maybe our teeth, he told jokes about reality.  

So then there are politicians and commentators who don't advertise they are trying to be funny but suddenly claim every fuck up was really a joke only after it threatens to end their career. And I've reached - and far surpassed - my tolerance for hypocrites who laud themselves for their noble integrity but become instantaneous comedians when they go over the line.  Now there is the cover on the New Yorker that is supposed to be "satire" about the lies, stereotypes, and misconceptions being pushed (with much success) about Barack Obama.

Enough. I'll rant further in the 'extended comments' for those with a thirst for more unbridled angst.

Mike Stark posted a diary this morning that made me feel more comfortable with Barack Obama as our candidate, and hopefully as our future president, than before. I started to look at the bricks and mud that are being thrown at Obama by all sides, and the slow but inexorable change that it is bringing about in all of us as a result.

This is how I know Obama is the best person for the job - he manages to piss everybody off at some point and time. That proves he's taken a position that is somewhere between the extremes of both sides and sometimes even the middle. Translation: the only guy who is demonstrably engaged in true compromise will have absolutely every camp ticked off at some point and time; and that is the only thing that eventually forces all camps to offer something on the table in concession that can eventually create a position where all parties involved are offended the least.

There's just a little more on this below the fold...

At the end of a routine about some absurdly inappropriate things a person could say in a job interview, George Carlin said, "Let em know you’ve been there!"

We know you were here, George.

Genius. Many of you will argue with that distinction, but George Carlin died on Sunday, and in this man’s opinion he was a genius. Whether you liked him or not, Carlin inspired many of us to think thoughts that no one else ever thought of, "These are things that no one has ever said before: ‘Hand me that piano". He made us look at the world differently. I probably steal one of his lines at least twice every day, and If a day goes by where I don’t...

Well, let me just say I probably didn’t leave the house. (But I still can’t reach the way the dog can).

Troutfishing posted a diary this morning, and I'm not picking on him any more than I would dismiss Dennis Kucinich for being bold enough to put grounds for impeachment into the Congressional Record. I'm picking on the great mass of warm bodies that is not banging the drum here at Kos (and where credit is due, at other bastions of true patriotism) Remember, being a patriot means more than just singing anthems, wearing pins, waving flags, and always being proud of your country no matter what. It also means you have the courage to fight against your fellow countrymen when they betray the ideals for which we stand.

I wanted to post my short exegesis on why Bush has not been impeached yet, (and for those of us who believe he should have been by now, the greater blindness of letting him off the hook).

Because we can't handle the truth.

What follows is one man's theory of why.

because between Bill Clinton and George W. Bush we will have left a historical record that says:

Sexual indescretion is of more interest to the American people than a misbegotten, tragically misconducted, and still unfinished war.

Scooter Libby will have had his sentence commuted by one president because he was not convicted of any of the charges he was originally accused of; only perjury during an investigation. Bill Clinton was impeached for exactly the same reason.

And lastly, what you tell the world - and the American citizenry (if they are courageous enough to stomach what this means) is that whether or not a president should be impeached depends on

(but not the actual truth)

And we are comfortable deluding ourselves that we uphold the ideals of those who founded this country. Kucinich is seen as a joke or a political tool today; in decades to come he will be seen as the only guy on the Titanic who actually admitted there might actually be icebergs in the water.  

I have a neighbor who believes that since Al Gore contested the 2000 presidential election because of the irregularities in Florida that he, Al Gore, made it impossible for their ever to be a fair election ever again. Why? How?

I asked him...

"Well, because of Gore, now all any candidate who lost has to do is scream 'shenanigans' like some carney at the fair, and then everyone will demand a recount and scream that they were cheated by some nefarious force that caused their candidate to lose, not just a lack of votes".

At the time he said this, I thought he was nuts. Now I still think he's nuts about the fact it's Al Gore's fault, but the idea we can have elections that leave the people feeling like their will was done is indeed seeming to have come to an end.

Follow me over the fold to ponder why.

...of the president. He is an agent, conducting affairs "on behalf thereof". If he was deliberately left "out of the loop" by those who's responsibility it was to convey to him the information he was charged with subsequently expressing to the public, than a crime was still committed.

Karl Rove just admitted that the press secretary of the office of the President of the United States was deliberately not informed.

The reason we have a press secretary is so that the citizens of this country can get information from the president on a daily basis without the president himself being confined to the briefing room for an hour a day. But to say that the press secretary had a different body of knowledge to disseminate to the public from the people who that information was about has to be a crime.

Can we please put impeachment back on the table now, Nancy?

Ok. So we all know what she said; the debate now from Hillary supporters is the interpretation of what she meant.

Oh, she wasn't advocating that someone actually shoot Obama, she was just establishing an example of how the Democratic party brought itself together after such a tragedy late in the primary season - June - and that the Democratic party should be able to sustain the campaign that long.

That's the most benign thing you can say about it.

But...

with his diary today. I was once ambivalent about politics; then I was curious but uninformed, then I was still deluded thinking that a candidate could be judged on his merits regardless of what party he belonged to.

So I wrote the following comment in response:

I just came across Mash's Diary about another alleged case of disgraceful behavior by U.S. soldiers; make no mistake I make no judgement on the soldiers themselves for I know that I can make no claim I could endure their daily nightmare and fare any better. Anyone who has read my comments or diaries knows I would snap less than ten minutes after my boots hit the ground.

The following is the comment I left in response, and I thought it worthy to stand on it's own about my feelings in general towards Bush and his cronies and what they have done to our soldiers and our country: