the talking dog
Dog Done
talking(dog) Point
As the tenth anniversary of the watershed
election of 1992 is rapidly coming upon us,
let's recall a witty campaign slogan from that era:
"Saddam Hussein Still Has A Job. How
About You?"
(8/19/02)
talking(dog) Point
James
Traficant, the crazy felon from Ohio, was expelled by Congress. The
vote was 420-1.
Who was the
1?
(7/25/02)
talking(dog) Point
“You
guys have written so much bad stuff about me I can't remember the last time I
f**ked a decent woman.
I have to go with strippers and ho's and bitches because you put that image on
me."
-- Mike Tyson, quoted in The New Yorker, July 1, 2002
(7/12/02)
talking(dog) Point
“A profession that we are a nation 'under God' is identical, for
Establishment Clause purposes,
to a profession that we are a nation 'under Jesus,' a nation 'under Vishnu,' a
nation 'under Zeus,' or a nation 'under no god,'
because none of these professions can be neutral with respect to religion,”
Judge Alfred T. Goodwin, writing for a three-judge panel of the United States
Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit,
finding that a requirement that public school children recite the pledge of
allegiance in their classroom is unconstitutional.
As our nation battles the forces of evil unleashed upon us by religious nuts from abroad, we consider this case to be a judicial faith-based initiative.
(6/26/02)
talking(dog) Point
“God
Save the Queen. We mean it man, we
love our Queen.”
-- Johnny Rotten, Sid Vicious and The Sex Pistols
Let's hear
it for the Golden Jubilee of the monarch of the Empire that gave the world the
demarcation lines
in South Asia, Africa and the Middle East that have spawned the resentments upon
which the sun shall never set.
(6/4/02)
talking(dog) Point
Signs of the Times:
A
billboard for U.S. Navy Recruiting over the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway,
depicting an aircraft carrier at sea. Its
tag line: "The U.S. Navy: Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of those Who
Threaten It" (Would that we
had a better national energy policy than aircraft carriers).
(5/2/02)
talking(dog) Point
Let's hand it to Secretary of State Powell. Not many of us thought he had the moves of one of the great statesman of the modern era: Joe Torre. But sure enough, he does. Just compare Powell's current Middle East tour with Torre's slow, deliberate walk to the mound when the relief pitcher is not quite ready, but almost...just another minute… In Arab capitals from Rabat to Riyadh, our Secretary of State is questioned as to why he is there, rather than in Jerusalem trying to rein in the Israelis. To them, the Secretary says, "Your point is?..."
(4/15/02)
talking(dog) Point
Well,
the nation is at war, holding together a tenuous international coalition, the
economy is in recession, so, the president has only thing to do next:
START A TRADE WAR! Apparently, Karen Hughes couldn't even figure out something
to feed her tongue tied boss to justify the stupid and counterproductive
imposition of up to 30% tariffs on imported steel, designed to prop up one of
our most environmentally destructive and inefficient sectors: the failing steel industry.
Of course, there ARE a lot of steel workers in West Virginia who may
benefit (at the expense of the other 99+ percent of us).
So in the end, when it comes to cheap political pandering versus standing
up for free market principles and harmonious relations with our allies, we know
which way the Bush Administration will go. As
if we didn't know before.
(3/6/02)
talking(dog) Point
Why, we wonder, was ex-mayor
Giuliani so interested in extending his term?
He seems to be doing just fine in his latest ventures, such as his management of
the Twin Towers Fund (pursuant to which he "needs" to have a staff
with a $1.4 million dollar annual budget, consisting of his former mayoral
employees) or his $3 million dollar book deal (by which he privately
appropriated his public papers to a personal foundation), and of course, the
lucrative speaking engagements.
(2/9/02)
talking(dog) Point
The World Economic Forum --
or the billionaire boys club -- opens in New York City instead of its usual home
in bucolic Davos, Switzerland. We
will see if Mike Bloomberg's New York will be an accommodating host to the event
-- an event at which he should certainly feel at home -- host or not!
If anything, like the violence of Seattle or Sweden or Italy, protests
get played out here, we may be lamenting the term limits rule that deprived us
of St. Rudy as our Duce for some time to come.
At least he made the police cars run on time.
(1/28/02)
talking(dog) Point
Just
as we were starting to forget about the great state of Florida and its state of
the art flight schools,
we are reminded once again why America is, was, and will
always be, the cradle of aviation.
Charles
Bishop's joyride with a Cessna shows those of us in New York and Washington that
at least our military doesn't discriminate:
Tampa's MacDill Air Force Base, where our war in Afghanistan
is being coordinated,
was every bit as undefended from the air this weekend as
the rest of the East Coast was on September 11th.
(1/7/02)
talking(dog) Point
Are
we the only ones who've noticed that the 43rd President, our Commander-in-Chief,
the irrepressible scion with the 90% approval rating,
looks remarkably like the Man from Mad Magazine?
Take a good look the next time he's charming you with his folksy, down-home good
sense and plainspoken-ness.
(11/29/01)
talking(dog) Point
(With thanks to the New
Republic)
Let's hear it for the Bush
administration presidential initiative that calls for U.S. school children to
adopt pen pals in Arab countries to show our solidarity.
What America could use now more than anything are thousands of letters in
schoolchildren's handwriting arriving from the Middle East.
(Karl-- you're so smart!)
(11/15/01)
talking(dog) Point
Apparently, a 15 billion dollar gift of taxpayer
money to the politically well-connected airline industry was insufficient.
We suggest ANOTHER 15 billion dollars for America's airlines (which will
join America's farmers as our nation's largest "welfare queens",
unlike our national railroad or post office, which, by statute, must be
"self-sufficient").
With the additional 15 billion dollars, America's airlines will be able to
provide security AND maintenance.
Or, perhaps, at least one of them.
(11/13/01)
talking(dog) Point
What if the doomed plane that crashed into
Pennsylvania had completed its horrifying mission, and ended up crashing into
the Capitol instead?
That would TRULY have been a tragedy:
There would be no Congressmen left to ensure that airline security remained in
the hands of Swedish and English based multinationals;
that airline profits remained high: and that the most affluent Americans got
their tax cuts that much faster.
Yes, truly a tragedy.
(11/3/01)
talking(dog) Point
Remember that awful campaign for military
recruitment "An Army of One"? Apparently,
in looking at the "war on terrorism,"
that appears to be a more prescient statement than we first gave it credit for:
it appears to be a deployment level.
(10/29/01)
talking(dog) Point
Florida
Not content merely to be expert in its ability to conduct elections, teach aviation and diagnose anthrax, the Sunshine State now once again demonstrates the superiority of its judicial system by acquitting O.J. on his road rage charge. A justice system as good as any (in Los Angeles County, anyway): one more thing that future Governor Reno can look forward to. [Editor’s Note: O.J. road rage acquittal versus Amadou Diallo, an innocent man unlocking his own front door shot down by a hail of 41 bullets, acquittal. Looks like Senator Clinton has a few things to attend to in her own backyard, wouldn't you say?.]
(10/25/01)
talking(dog) Point
Weren't the New York Yankees more fun to watch BEFORE George Steinbrenner and Rudy Giuliani made that pact with Satan?
(10/22/01)
talking(dog) Points
The Evil One and Evildoers versus POTUS Man!
The Evildoers? The Evil One? We wonder if things are explained to the President by Condie Rice, Colin Powell & Co. using comic books. How else to explain the constant use of these terms by our 43rd President in his speeches and public comments?
Osama bin Laden, his minions, peers and colleagues are terrorists, mass murderers. Using a term to describe them that would be more appropriate to the X-Men or the Super Friends does little to reassure us -- despite the recent media hagiographies and high patriotic war polls -- that this is a scion who's up for the job.
(10/18/01)
talking(dog) Points
Let's settle this Green-Ferrer thing the American way: let's bring in David Boies and James Baker and Johnnie Cochran, and fight this out like MEN.
(10/16/01)
talking(dog) Points
We’re sure it comforts the hearts of those who lost friends and loved ones at the World Trade Center and the Pentagon to know that their loved ones died as national heroes-- in the service of our unilateral abrogation of the obsolete anti-ballistic missile treaty and the need for an emergency airline industry stimulus package and capital gains tax reduction.
(10/12/01)
talking(dog) Points
Florida: Home of the Butterfly Ballot, the $10,000 Ask-No-Questions Flight School and the Anthrax Bacillus. How long until our 43rd President takes his War on Terrorism to the Sunshine State?
(10/7/01)
talking(dog) Points
In Fairness To Freddy...
....and to take nothing away from the remarkable bravery and self-sacrifice of the firemen who gave their lives to try to save World Trade Center workers on September 11th, but have you noticed many (or any) faces of people of color among those from New York's Bravest in the incredibly sad ongoing cavalcade of obituaries in our papers? There's no question that Rudy has done a remarkable job these last four weeks -- as well as these last eight years -- but some of Fernando Ferrer's griping about "the other New York" certainly does have more than a little ring of truth to it. It hardly stands to reason that African-American and Hispanic New Yorkers are not brave or smart enough to serve their City as firemen and women. The only conclusion we can draw is that they are not white enough to serve as things currently stand. This is not to justify what we believe would be a disastrous Ferrer Mayoralty should he win on October 11th and again in November. But, perhaps, it is a partial explanation for the otherwise seemingly inexplicable groundswell of support for the Bronx Borough President.
(10/7/01)
talking(dog) Points
It appears that the Associated Press's politically correct suppression of coverage of Palestinians celebrating in the street at the site of thousands of dead Americans missed the point of exactly what it is the Palestinians were celebrating. We forget that the great impetus for the original Oslo "peace" accords occurred right after an earlier group of Arab terrorists (and Palestinian compatriots or at least brothers in arms when it comes to murdering unarmed civilians) had unsuccessfully bombed the World Trade Center in 1993. Once another group had SUCCESSFULLY destroyed the World Trade Center-- the progress of the Palestinians accelerated to warp speed: now even a Republican President openly supports creation of a Palestinian state. We suggest that that state be located in Afghanistan.
Let's hear it for Ari Fleischer -- for TRULY espousing the meaning of what it means to be an American: we had all better watch what we say in these troubled times. Because if there's one thing America doesn't need in troubled times -- its freedom of anything-- least of all, speech or thought... Let’s make it a hate crime to say anything bad about the President! Did we hear someone say that they still thought he was an ignorant doofus without a clue who could better serve his country as Commissioner of Major League Baseball? Hmm, sounds like a capital crime to us…
(10/4/01)
talking(dog) Points
ELECT FREDDY!
We aver that a Fernando Ferrer mayoralty will end the threat of terrorism once and for all for New York City. Why are we so sure that Freddy will be able to do what the sainted Rudy Giuliani could not? Easy: because four years of Mayor Ferrer will make terrorizing NYC redundant.
(10/3/01)
talking(dog) Points
Its been almost a month since we've heard anything about Lizzie Grubman (despite the fact that the Hamptons crowd talked about little else in late August). She has never been given her due credit for pioneering the use of large, gas guzzling vehicles as lethal weapons.
(10/2/01)
talking(dog) Points
We join in Senator Robert Torricelli's call for a board of inquiry as to the "intelligence failures" that resulted in the attacks on September 11, 2001. In fact, we want the inquiry expanded to include an inquiry as to how the esteemed senior senator from New Jersey has managed to hold onto his seat. We nominate Gary Condit as its chairman.
(9/27/01)
talking(dog) Points
Rudy is right: we should eliminate term limits altogether -- in fact, as long as he's the mayor -- let's eliminate ELECTIONS altogether -- and just make him mayor forever-- including allowing him to name his own successor. That's the ONLY way we can show the terrorists that they HAVEN'T won!!!
(9/25/01)
talking(dog) Point: Chandra Who?
Everything really DID change on September 11th. Our bet is that while the World Trade Center was being destroyed and thousands of innocent people were senselessly dying, at least one thing was rising, Phoenix-like, from the ashes: Gary Condit's career. Besides her family, who in the public-at-large will now be thinking and worrying about a single murder-with-a-missing body when there are more than 6,000 in NYC? We hope we're wrong and that "infinite justice" ultimately triumphs not just overseas, but adds the career of a certain backbench Congressman from Ceres, California to those it calls to account. Hopeful, but not optimistic. (9/22/01)
talking(dog) Points
The Lock Box: was that something found near the Black Box?
Florida: home of the world's best voting machines AND flight simulators!
(9/23/01)