World without a Superman

Over the course of the last three days, I have received several emails from MoveOn.org. Here's an excerpt from one Re: No Deal

"The latest Senate health care bill has no public option. No expansion of Medicare. And it does too little to guarantee that uninsured Americans will actually be able to afford the coverage they'll be required to purchase.1

Former insurance executive Wendell Potter put it best: the bill is "a big bailout to the [health insurance] industry."2

But it's not too late to fix the bill. And as Joe Lieberman has shown, just one senator willing to stand in the way can force legislation to be changed dramatically.

Senator Bernie Sanders, a strong proponent of the public option, has already made clear that he's opposed to the legislation in its current form—and he could decide to block it until it's fixed.3

But there's enormous pressure from all sides to pass a bill quickly, no matter how weak it is. Let's show Bernie and other progressives that we're counting on them to block this version of the bill—and we'll get their backs if they do."

I'm curious what they think "blocking this version of the bill" entails beyond defeating health care reform.

Do they think Bernie Sanders will tie Joe Lieberman up Jack Bauer-style and waterboard him until he changes his vote?

Do they believe that some of the Republican Senators are Democratic sleepers, waiting for Bernie to give them the signal to rip off their rubber face-masks and vote for single-payer universal health care.

Do they have worse anger-management problems than I do?

I'm going to go with (c) (though I guess the options presented aren't mutually exclusive).

While I have your ear, can we talk about the other major complaint being made by my fellow leftwing nut-jobs: "We got screwed because Obama didn't want to get his hands dirty." First off: we didn't get screwed. We got a health care reform bill that might-actually-oh-crap-I'm-jinxing-it-pass. And now: since when is governing solely the President's job? Remember when the Democrats were elected to Congress in 2006 because we were fed up with the Iraq war and then they... continued to fund the Iraq war. Maybe in the course of crafting the language of health care reform Congress will rediscover its spine and once again become a coequal branch of government. I, for one, am tired of having a king, a 9-member abortion panel, and a three-ring circus in place of a real government.

This is actually something that has been bothering me since Obama's inauguration. Much of the 2008 campaign felt like Spartacus played backwards ("I'm not Bush!" "No, I'm not Bush!"). The dust settled, and Obama won the popular vote 69.5 million to 59.9 million. In 2004, Bush beat Kerry 62.0 million to 59.0 million (thank you, Wikipedia). Fewer people voted for McCain than Bush. Naively (and this is very naive), that means that 2.1 million people who thought that George Bush deserved a second term also thought that John McCain was not qualified to be President (it probably actually means that 2.1 million Republicans didn't care who won in 2008 and 10.5 million Democrats didn't care who won in 2004 -- I'm not sure which group is farther off its collective rocker; or maybe 2.1 million Republicans died and 10.5 million Democrats turned 18 in 2007; who knows?), and while the rest of us anxiously watched to see how Obama would use his new-found superpowers to save humanity from total annihilation, no one bothered to wonder what those 2.1 million (or the 2.1 million and the 10.5 million) thought, why they changed their minds, or how to convince them never to vote for someone like Bush ever again. Until we answer those questions, I don't feel comfortable saying that the Bush years are behind us (mostly because I'm paranoid and want someone to tell me that a man who thinks war is the latest attraction at Disney's Adventure Land will never ever again be given command of the most deadly military force in the world; obviously no one can ever tell me that and I will continue to be paranoid).

Hopefully you've gleaned my point from somewhere in this convoluted chain of sentences. If you have, I would appreciate it if you could tell me what it is.

Gonna go pick me up summa them humpback whales!

Which, of course, was the plot for "Star Trek IV," which, of course, was subtitled: "The Voyage Home."

Yup. Tomorrow I board a plane for Seattle. I'll be there about three weeks followed by a week at a conference in Cancun followed by a month at Berkeley followed by another week in Seattle before finally returning to Seoul.

Those of you in any of those areas should look me up.

As Kernoff would say:
wooooooooooohooooooooooooooooooooo!

Bad Wolf

Mark this day on your calendar. I finally found something good that came out of the Bush Presidency: it kept Joe Lieberman as far as possible from the Oval Office. Yes, Cheney was an evil cyborg zombie from outer space (and possibly the future), but at least he was up front about it (remember when he shot a guy in the face?).

(those of you who communicate with me in other ways have probably heard this several times already; I apologize, but I can't sleep right now, and I feel this intense desire to spread the word that Joe Lieberman is a spoiled brat)

Gravy or grave?

Yesterday (or maybe it was two days ago now; I have no idea how time works any more), on the Daily Show, Mike Huckabee started talking about the first Christmas:

"This is a story like [people have] never heard in church... It's the story of an unwed teen mother who goes into labor far away from home... This has got to be the most humiliating, horrifying experience..."

Yeah. That's the only story I've ever heard in church on Christmas Eve: that the incarnation was cool, and all, but the real heroes of the story are Mary (who probably thought she was going to be stoned to death for her part in all this) and Joseph ("A man really has to love a woman to agree to raise another man's child." -- Keith Mars).

I don't know if this means my hometown pastor is ahead of the curve or that Mike Huckabee is wrong and my church experience is the common Christian one. At the very least, it's another reason that I really really really wish I could still unreservedly consider myself a member of the Episcopal Church (where you will find said hometown pastor) with all of their gay-ordaining, gay-marrying shenanigans. As it is, I guess I'll have to root for them from the fringe.

Because religion is exactly like the World Series.

More time! More distance! (less cow bell)

Killing time before meeting one of the professors to discuss a course I may or may not teach in the fall, I happened upon a stone bench with the following inscription:

"In memory of [woman whose name I can't remember] of Detroit, Michigan who dedicated these hills and valleys to the Christian education of Korean women."

I expected better of Obama's America.