As Dylan said in his recent "Chronicles" : "The twenty four hour news cycle would have been my own personal hell" (or something like that, I am paraphrasing because I can't find the quote now), I have to concur. The curtains are drawn and the lights are still low. I'm working from home for perhaps my last day. I've been trying to find other things to do during that time. One is working on my band memoir, which I've almost completed. But I need time for the near-end events to gestate a little bit. I have the ending, just not the near ending. Then I will revise it, and hopefully in two to four years it will be worthy to show someone, ha ha.

Getting back to the 24 hour news cycle, here is the latest flap in sports. Wanna know my first reaction when I saw it? It was far from being offended, like so many of the folks out in Jesusland seem to be. I thought it was fucking cheesy.

Ah, my life in the virtual office is about to be over. Oh well, it was fun while it lasted.

Pragmatic Liberalism, a book once published by a professor of mine, I believe is a good starting point for where to move forward. I think we need to think beyond capitalism and socialism and come to some form of balanced approach in an applied philosophy. Think of things in terms of enterprises. The NFL is very capitalistic, but also has mechanisms to level the playing field somewhat. Major League baseball does not. US Healthcare damn well could if people would learn how to stop using paper forms and faxing things. Balance, equilibrium, consensus, these are words that should be embraced. Moderation.

I bought the Lakoff book yesterday, and will begin reading it shortly. I was a little harsh in the "dumb fucks" statement last week. Aren't we all human when we react to our greatest fears being realized?

Oh dear. I've gotten myself into a little trouble by sending out this one. But it's still fuckin' funny. Like a Yankee lib with tourette's.

The curtains are drawn and the candles have been burning for the past couple of nights in a quite home vigil. The only solace I can take is that we live in "Baja Canada" and not "Jesusland." I am so disgusted I don't even know where to begin.

The working people who voted for that man based on social conservatism will get what they deserve, more lost jobs, further economic marginalization and some day they will be the ones marching to the drumbeat of what we've been saying all along. I suspect a major scandal will break out somewhere in this term, once the Dems get their sea legs back.

The mainstream media has it all wrong. For the Dems to survive they need to go further to the left, not to the right. I think the idea of trying to pursuade the Jesus freaks and the dumb fucks who claimed they were "undecided" up until the end is the wrong way to go. Sure there are more stupid people than smart people in this country, but we need to take back the word liberal in this country and wear the moniker with pride.

I'm sure I'm not the only one who has harbored thoughts of leaving this country, or fighting for California to secede, or a whole slew of other things. My wife says it best: My sense of patriotism died on 11/2/04. But I'm not ready to give up just yet. The pendulum will swing back in the other direction.