With the war on, there hasn't been much 'fun' in the world. And there still isn't. I haven't come across anything worth sharing in a while (There is some funny stuff on the The Onion this week, but it is mostly war related.

So I thought I'd google myself. And others. Google has this interesting thing called Googlism where it basically takes your search items and, instead of returning links to pages, it returns a series of statements about that topic.

So I thought I'd do a few (My apologies to Mike and Kelleigh who I tried to google, but google didn\rquote t know enough about them to produce anything).

I only picked a few of the entries which were returns\'85(If there\rquote s only 1, that\rquote s all I got).
So\'85..

Me
henry lewis is the curator of the magic circle in london
henry lewis is a renowned legal scholar who has been a member of the chapel of the cross for more than 50 years
henry lewis is the founder and president of restoration global ministries
henry lewis is the par balanced to available funds?
henry lewis is named director of the new jersey symphony
henry lewis is no longer at incognito tattoo
henry lewis is leaving his wife daisy after twenty years of marriage

My Sister Mary
mary scott is a very extreme case
mary scott is a true warrior
mary scott is hearing voices \endash at least in respect to her present exhibition at the art gallery of calgary
mary scott is taking this issue back to public services for further discussion
mary scott is pretty sure she saw an unusually large woodpecker with lots of white in the wings
mary scott is 8 in age
mary scott is an enigmatic artist
mary scott is scheduled to appear before city council to defend her license to sell alcoholic beverages at envogue

I'm trying to think of a theme to redesign my site with. It needs to be able to incorporate a couple of ideas:

1) I have no artistic ability
2) It needs to tie in text and video
3) I have no artistic ability.

I thought of maybe doing a pseudo James bond theme, you know with the gun sight beginning and the layout being your 'gadgets'.

I thought of maybe having 2 little pac-man like ghosts (cuz they are easy to draw) and be like a 'day in the life' of ghosts. If you want videos, they\rquote ll watch TV, ect ect.

I thought maybe of doing it in a pseudo comic frame by frame style, but that brings me back to no artistic ability.

Thoughts?

Well, my guess is our troops will be crossing into Iraq before the weekend. Bush has declared that the window for diplomacy has closed (was it ever open?) and given Saddam 72 hours to withdraw. (CNN Reports). Of course, Saddam (Who lets face it is insane) has already stated that he'd rather die first. Which, of course, is exactly what the Texas Tyrant wanted to hear.

Well, maybe Texas Tyrant is too harsh. On the other hand, no it isn't. I'll be honest, as a left-leaning centrist. I don't really have a problem with ousting Saddam. Yes, there will be innocents killed - but I think getting rid of Saddam will over the long term, reduce the death and suffering in Iraq.

What 'Chafes my chaps' to steal a phrase from Bush, is the total mess he's made of things, as well as the fervent damnation that he and the right have used against any person or country that says 'Ummm, maybe we should discuss this thing before attacking a country'.

Newsweek via MSNBC has a good article called the 'Arrogant Empire' about how Bush (and cronies) in the year+ they've been in office has managed to make America one of the most hated and least trusted countries on the planet. And we're not just talking about the middle east, we're we've been hated for a while. We're talking about Britain and Turkey and Australia. Our allies hate us.

Add to that Bush's complete lack of focus/honesty on why we're going in. His desperate attempt to tie Iraq to 9/11. His not-at-all-veiled attempt to make it seem like he was seriously attempting diplomacy when it was clear he was just trying shut up dissenters. The US tried to have UN pass a resolution giving Iraq 1 week to disarm before war. Does that seem at all realistic? Can the US government do anything in a week?

Finally, Bush and the right have led a full out attack on anyone who disagrees with them, whether they be countries or US citizens. For those in the 'right', here's a small snippet of news for you. People can be against war and still supportive of our troops. Articulating an anti-war voice does not make you un-America, it does not make you pro-Saddam, it does not make you a communist, and it is not an act of sedition. I don\rquote t even see it as dissent. It is a statement of belief. These people think the war is wrong. You don\rquote t need to agree with them, but you need to respect their willingness to involve themselves in what they believe.

The Advocate reported yesterday that the Census Bureau (Motto: We count so you count!) released more information on the statistics of same-sex households in the US. Interestingly, it reported that 1/3 of same sex female and 1/5 of same sex male house-hlds are also raising kids.

Though they can't get married. And asking for the right to be married , accouring to the RR, is an assault on marriage.

And yet, Fox TV is planning on marrying 2 people who have never met.

Let's see, 2 people living together and raising kids - and marriage is not legal. 2 People out for 60 seconds of fame can marry people they never met. And it's legal.

Why doesn't that seem fair?

(You can read more about issues around Gay Marriage here)

Even though I'm a left-leaning moderate, I tend to listen to conservative talk radio because it both amuses me and frightens me at the same time. It also gives me an idea of where the other half of the country is coming from.

Well, I was listening to The Savage Nation last night and, of course, as a break from the war the topic was all Elizabeth Smart. So what were the thoughts, both from Michael and his callers? (I'm not making this up. You may need to sit down):

1) Obviously, the father was involved in the kidnapping. Most likely because of the polygamy in Utah. (They can't figure out why she didn't try to escape from her captors. The knife threat would be my guess, but I'm not a talk show host).

2) The father was disgraceful because he cried over her return instead of raging against the man who took her.

3) The kidnapping is the fault of the liberals, who released all the mentally ill patients from the hospital and refuse to do anything about the homeless problem. (Which is ironic, because I think it was Reagan who basically redefined what it meant to be mentally ill, so he could take funding away from the hospitals.).

4) The kidnapper pretends to be a prophet, and had them all dressed in middle eastern clothing because they knew the PC police would never question them that way (It was my understanding that he saw himself as some sort of Christian prophet, but that apparently didn't matter. It's the Muslim\rquote s fault).

5) The media is involved in the cover-up. (Nothing new here, I think it's a regular topic in the show. Like Stupid Pet Tricks).

The frightening thing is that this is the man has a number 1 talk radio, a NY Times Best selling book, and a show on MSNBC.

Someone with way too much time on their hands created this. The Adventures of Hurcubush.

A little anti-bush skit using clips of the old Hercules Movie. It's amusing, if for nothing other than the line:

They\rquote re like Hitler only more-so
we'll rub their oil on our Torso.

Anyway .... take a peek. Or don't. I don't care, I'm off to lunch.

Nuclear weapons and aggression in N. Korea, the world hates us, War in Iraq, an economy in the toilet. Don't we have better things to worry about than this?

_________ Update ______________

Hey me and Wil Wheaton think alike!

Well, we're most likely going to invade Iraq within a couple of weeks. And, while I'm not a fan of Suddam but having an 'evildoer' run a country is not unusual and we can't invade them all, regardless of what we think of them.

It's insane, the length that the Bush administration has gone to sell this war. They're constantly trying to tie Iraq to the 9/11 attacks (See Bush's latest press conference), which is nonsense. If they had any shred of proof of that, they wouldn't be keeping it a secret - as that certainly would help to win over the reluctant UN (Who, by the way, we're pretty much going to single handedly dismantle by going it alone. If the US is not bound by the voices at the UN - who is? If no one is, why have them?)

The manipulation of the US people, while scary, is not the scariest thing about all this. You know why we're going to war and why NOTHING will prevent it? Not protestor's, not the UN, not our allies? Because Bush believes God has decided he is right. And therefore what he is doing must be right. How do you debate that? ( Howard Fineman has a good piece in the last Newsweek).

I'm not saying the people shouldn't have faith or belief in god, I'm saying that when you're elected to the position of leader of the free world and the most powerful nation on the planet, you don't settle on 'God says it's okay' as your debate for invading other countries.

Regardless of how evil they are.

Greg has a bit on the war too, and Jimmy Carter's Op-ed in the NY Times.

BTW, for those who think this may just be the rantings of a liberal leftist (which I admit to being), The Pope isn't for the war either. Neither is the Methodist Church nor some of the preacher's in Bush's own church.

Well, Mike and I spent a good chunk of the weekend watching episodes from Season 2 of Q.A.F. We did the same thing about a year ago when we got our hands on Season 1.

It's basically a gay themed soap opera, though not as cheesy as the daytime soaps. Oh, and there is a lot more sex. A lot. Every time these guys go out to a club the streets are full of people being overly sexual. I live a bit away from Castro Street, which is about as gay central as you get and it doesn't even come close to what, apparently, the gay scene in Pittsburg is.

Anyway, the writing is pretty good (though does get a little preachy from time to time). LOTs of funny moments. My favorite so far is that Emmit and Michael get jobs as 'domestics' and it turns out that they are pretty much expected to do domestic services naked. Serve food, clean, ect. Michael drops out, but Emmit keeps doing it because he makes like $300 bucks and hour. Well, he gets hired by 2 guys who don't expect him to be naked which of course leads him to showing up and stripping to the amusement/horror of the people who hired him.

Anyway - it's good fun. And it was good way to share what little free time we had this weekend.