There's no place like home

The other morning I started up the FJ1200 to ride to work. As it sat idling while I suited up, I noticed a spreading puddle of gasoline underneath it.

Damn it. I know what that is. When I rebuilt the carburettors last year, the one wear part I didn't replace was the inlet needle valves and seats. They looked pretty worn, but I didn't want to spend the money. And it ran fine all fall.

So I shut it off and drove the hack in to work instead.

I found a guy in New Zealand selling some needles and seats on eBay for a reasonable price, and I bought a set. They arrived a couple of days ago and tonight I decided to put them in.

I've taken the carbs off enough times now that it's not a huge deal and it goes pretty quick. I had the new parts in and the bike back together in about two hours. I also learned a new assembly trick for putting the crabs (sic) back on - if you mount them to the air box first, and then mount them to the cylinder head, it's a lot easier.

I cranked the bike over a few times to prime the carbs and then let it start. It was idling nicely, then it started to run rough and then I noticed a puddle of gasoline spreading underneath it again.


Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot?

So, since it was almost 9:00 in the evening, and I know all about gumption traps, I shut off the bike, put away my tools and went inside to write this blog entry.

Robert Pirsig coined the term Gumption Trap in his book Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

The book isn't really about Zen, and it's not really about Motorcycle Maintenance, but it does talk about some interesting things, and it is about a motorcycle trip to Montana - a trip I've made a few times. So I enjoy reading it.

A Gumption Trap is when you are working on something and something goes wrong. It takes the wind out of your sails and then you get frustrated and start to make mistakes. This turns into a downward spiral and things just get worse and worse.

It took me a long time to learn when I should just stop working on something instead of forging on and getting more and more frustrated until something major breaks.

But I did learn it.

But I still have to figure out why the bike is leaking gas.

And I noticed the fork seals are leaking pretty badly. Sigh.

This is an awesome rant from The Portly Dyke over at Shakesville!

That's it. I've had it. For the past decade or so, I've been assaulted by the whims of homophobic, sexist, racist, xenophobic, ethnocentric right-wingers.

I've heard them say absolutely outrageous crap, I've read their deluded rants, I've watched their insane, unethical, and fabricated "news" stories, and I've waved them off with a "Yeah, those are some crazy fuckers".

No more.

I've lived long enough now to watch the political pendulum swing a few times, so I knew that sooner or later, the pendulum would swing back from this radical pull to the right -- at times, I even thought: "Fine. Go on. Get crazy with it!"-- knowing that for every action, there is an equal and opposite re-action.

I don't know exactly what happened today, but, for me, this is that time. Reaction day has arrived.

If fundamentalist Xtians (I use this term consciously because I do not believe that anyone who espouses hatred, judgment, killing, etc. is actually a Christian -- any "real" Christians out there? -- you can consider yourself not included in this rant) -- if fundy Xtians have the freedom to claim that LGBT people are "less than", or sinful, or destructive, or threatening -- if Republican sock-puppets can claim that the media is owned and controlled by the "radical Left", and justify torture, and unlawful imprisonment, and wars predicated on lies -- if xenophobic, racist right-wingers can claim that illegal immigrants are over-running our country and ruining it -- if no less an august body than the presidential administration of the USA can dodge and weave and flout the rule of law -- and all of these people can do this while claiming that they are "protecting" my country somehow -- then I can speak, too.

...

From this moment forward, every time I hear some crap like:

1. Homosexuals are dangerous and want to subvert your kids to their lifestyle, OR
2. Women are already equal to men (and even have privilege over men), OR
3. Racism doesn't exist any more and isn't really a problem, OR
4. The media is controlled by the Radical Left, OR
5. Water-boarding isn't torture, and even if it is, sometimes torture is necessary,
6. OR, OR, OR . . . . .

I'm going to say: "No. That is factually incorrect, and I believe that you know that it's factually incorrect."

The only thing I can add to this is "Right fucking on!"

I wish I could write like this:

But look now what we have lost. Now when a bad guy crosses our threshhold, America becomes a pants-piddling mess.

Iran's president speaks at a great American university. That university's president, in the act of introducing his lecture, whines like a baby bereft of his pacifier that his guest is a big meany poopy-head. City Council members, too, and a rabbi, make like ten-year-olds, giving their press conference in front of a sign with his face struck through and the legend "Go To Hell." Up in Albany, Democratic leader Sheldon Silver treat the students of this great university like ten years olds, threatening to defund Columbia University lest censors like himself prove unable to shut the poor children's ears to difficult speech. (What, was he worried they'd be convinced, join the jihad?) Then a Republican presidential candidate chimes in—bye, bye, federalism!—saying Washington should starve the school of funds, too. American diplomats used to have the gumption to spar face to face with dreaded foreign leaders. Now they go on cable TV and whine about what a "travesty" it would have been to visit a site which properly should belong to the world. Hundreds of foreign nationals died in the World Trade Center on 9/11 (maybe even some of the Iranian!). Yet we have to systematically repress that—as if our national ego would crack like fine crystal if we were forced to acknowledge the mingling of American blood with that of mere foreigners.

This is a wonderful article about what America was, and what it has become. And it makes me sad. There is more, go read it.

(h/t to Shakespear's Sister)

Keith Olbermann's Special Commentary for yesterday, July 4th, was tremendous.

And those who did not believe he should have been elected — indeed those who did not believe he had been elected — willingly lowered their voices and assented to the sacred oath of non-partisanship.

And George W. Bush took our assent, and re-configured it, and honed it, and shaped it to a razor-sharp point and stabbed this nation in the back with it.

I just want to say a huge Thank You to Keith for saying so well what I feel. And for standing up and doing it in a public forum for many, many people to hear.

I truly believe our government has lost it's mind.

Here is a great column on the SFGate website entitled Sex Will Make You Go Blind
Single? Under 30? You are in grave danger. Your government says so. Please, stop laughing

...
It is the only viable explanation. It is the only way to account for something like, say, the latest twist in the Abstinence Education Program from Bush's increasingly laughable Department of Health and Human Services, a $50 million slice of embarrassing government detritus that is now actually encouraging all states to tell their single, youngish residents that they should -- how to put this so you don't shoot coffee through your nose? -- that everyone should avoid sex entirely, until they turn 30.

See? See your reaction? You are like: No way. You are like: Is the United States government really saying that? You are like: Laughter, a smirk, maybe a shrug and a sigh and a sad shake of the head and another glass of wine because, you know, what the hell is wrong with these people?

Maybe you think I am making this up. Maybe you think that our fair government, as sad and lost and nipple-terrified as it is, can't seriously be suggesting that, to avoid STDs and unwanted pregnancy and unchecked misery in their obviously sad and irresponsible little lives, single people under 30 should not have sex, like, ever. And maybe not even then.

You would, of course, be wrong.

It's for real. It's an actual HHS dictum and there are people who actually believe it should be adhered to, and I'm right now guessing you broke this rule this very morning and if you didn't you really, really wanted to, and if you're over 30 and/or married chances are you are sitting there right now wishing you were still single and/or under 30 just one more time just so you could squishily, juicily break that rule again, oh my God yes please. Just a guess.

He's right, that's my reaction.

This is total insanity.

As they say over at Pandagon all the time, Why is everybody in the U.S. Government so concerned about what people do with teh cock?

It's none of their fucking business!

Everybody with a functioning brain knows that abstinence only sex education doesn't work! People are going to have sex, no matter what you tell them (and why shouldn't they?)

So if you are really concerned with the teenage abortion rate, as all the fundimentalists claim they are, then you need to reduce teenage pregnancy. And if you want to teach abstinence, that's fine, but you need to teach them about birth control and safe sex too, so that when they do have sex, which they will, they don't get pregnant or contract an STD.

More from the column:

I remember Joycelyn Elders. I remember this feisty and outspoken surgeon general, appointed by Clinton back in '93, who dared to suggest, in public, that masturbation is fine and healthy and nothing to worry about and perhaps should be taught to teens as a safer alternative to riskier forms of sex.

The nation blinked. The Christian right, of course, was apoplectic. Clinton was forced to ask Elders for her resignation. Later, on the lecture circuit, Elders famously said, "As long as I was in Washington I never met anybody that I thought was good enough, who knew enough or who loved enough to make sexual decisions for anybody else." And there you have it.

I remember Ms. Elders (vaguely). I didn't remember that she was forced to resign because of the damned fundies.

I don't think anyone in the government should have any right to make any type of sexual decisions about anyone other then themselves.

Don't like gay sex? Fine, don't have it. But don't tell other people they can't have it just because you don't like it.

And I'll finish up with the end of the column:

I know, I know, it's all a bit silly. After all, the Bush government is all about restriction, contraction, containment and self-righteousness and pain. They're about as likely to pump out some positive sex vibes as the pope is to offer free condoms in the Vatican gift shop.

But Jesus with a Hitachi Magic Wand, one thing you can reasonably hope for is a government that's at least remotely in touch and relevant, the slightest bit informed about how life really is and hence will stop throwing these obnoxious bones to the gasping sexless Christian right. This is what you hope.

Meanwhile, we're still stuck with the same old questions: Is this really what our government is all about? Will this ever change? Can they really not hear all the derisive laughter?

Go read all of it. Now.

Possibly.



Now go vote tomorrow!

(Updated below)

Yesterday completely changed the Legal and Political landscape in America.

Yesterday President Bush signed a bill into law that effectively killed the writ of Habeus Corpus and turned him into King George.

Sadly Habeus Corpus went out with a whimper, not a bang. No one seems to care that this bill takes away some of Americans essential rights - the right to know what crime you are being accused of and the right to a speedy trial.

With this law King George can now imprison anyone he feels like, American or not, for any reason and any period of time. All King George has to do is declare you an "enemy combatant" and he can toss you into Guantanamo and throw away the key.

This bill also says to the world "America is a country that approves torture."

I am shamed by my government. And very, very scared.

Keith Olbermann did a piece on his Countdown last night about it. He had Jonathan Turley, a professor of Constitutional Law, on to talk about it.

Turley: "People have no idea how significant this is. Really a time of shame this is for the American system.—The strange thing is that we have become sort of constitutional couch potatoes. The Congress just gave the President despotic powers and you could hear the yawn across the country as people turned to Dancing With the Stars. It's otherworldly..People clearly don't realize what a fundamental change it is about who we are as a country. What happened today changed us. And I'm not too sure we're gonna change back anytime soon."

You can watch the video over on Crooks and Liars. I suggest you do.

I also suggest you vote Democratic in November to try and slow down this hemorrhaging of our Constitutional rights.

I am currently reading Glenn Greenwald's book How Would A Patriot Act? Defending American Values from a President Run Amok and am becoming more and more disgusted by the actions of King George and his cabinet.

Between King George grabbing absolute power above the law, Congress letting him - hell, helping him, and the Judicial Branch telling him it is allowed within the Constiution (it's not) and the Religious Right and their attempts to legislate their version of morality and stuff it down everybody else's throat, I am becoming very scared for my country.

We are heading down not just one, but many slippery slopes and I fear it's going to be a very long, slow climb back up, if we even get a chance to start back up at all.

And I feel powerless to affect it in any way. Sure, I can vote Democratic, and I will be doing so, but the Democrats are not that much better, and even if Congress wakes up and starts reigning in King George, it's going to be very hard to undo the damage that has already been done.

Updated: Glenn Greenwald has a link to the actual bill (pdf) that King George signed yesterday, so you don't have to take my word for what it says. If you don't believe that it actually takes away the writ of habeus corpus, go read the bill.

You might also be interested in reading Glenn's posting about the fact that Fox News is lying to it's viewers about what this bill contains.

Keith Olbermann really lets Bush have it over the fact that it's been 5 years now since the events of 9/11/01 and that nothing positive has happened.

You really need to watch this video.

I'm starting to fall in love with Keith Olbermann.

Bruce Schneier has an excellent post up on his blog about What the Terrorists Want.

I'd like everyone to take a deep breath and listen for a minute.

The point of terrorism is to cause terror, sometimes to further a political goal and sometimes out of sheer hatred. The people terrorists kill are not the targets; they are collateral damage. And blowing up planes, trains, markets or buses is not the goal; those are just tactics. The real targets of terrorism are the rest of us: the billions of us who are not killed but are terrorized because of the killing. The real point of terrorism is not the act itself, but our reaction to the act.

And we're doing exactly what the terrorists want.
---
Our politicians help the terrorists every time they use fear as a campaign tactic. The press helps every time it writes scare stories about the plot and the threat. And if we're terrified, and we share that fear, we help. All of these actions intensify and repeat the terrorists' actions, and increase the effects of their terror.
---
The surest defense against terrorism is to refuse to be terrorized. Our job is to recognize that terrorism is just one of the risks we face, and not a particularly common one at that. And our job is to fight those politicians who use fear as an excuse to take away our liberties and promote security theater that wastes money and doesn't make us any safer.

Go read it. Now.

Have You Had Enough? is a great political protest song performed by Rickie Lee Jones and The Squirrel Nut Zippers.

And what a great combination that is!

Here is the web site - and here is a link to the MP3.

From BoingBoing, of course.