Maybe A Blog, Maybe Not

A friend forwarded me a lot of information on the weird, Bizarro-world breaking news on the ballot mess that's breaking out like acne the night before the prom: Two felony convictions in Ohio, Florida rejecting the touch screens, the revelation by Black Box Voting that it was the Union and Democratic lobbies who pushed for Bob Ney's (R, Convicted) Help A Voter Act that shoved all those touch screen booths into the elections in the first place. And somebody (Barack Obama I think) introducing legislation to make the kind of voter intimidation that's become the norm in recent elections federal felonies.

This whole voting issue is heating up fast. But ... well, see my reaction below.

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: Tue, 30 Jan 2007 18:40:37 -0500 (EST)

Gov. Crist to recommend ditching touch-screen machines

By Anthony Man
South Florida Sun-Sentinel

January 30, 2007, 5:18 PM EST

Gov. Charlie Crist is preparing to recommend that the controversial touch-screen voting machines used in Broward, Palm Beach and 13 other Florida counties be scrapped and replaced with optical scanners that would count paper ballots.

U.S. Rep. Robert Wexler, D-Boca Raton, said the governor would recommend spending at least $20 million on optical scanners for the 15 counties with touch-screen machines when he presents his proposed budget to the state Legislature on Friday.

[...]

Wexler, who spent years battling Gov. Bush over the issue, was effusive in his praise for the new Republican governor.

"We have a governor in Charlie Crist, who in the highest form of bipartisan partnership, has reached out to me and has concluded that he now will become a champion of ensuring that each and every Floridian will have a paper trail and that their vote will be counted in the form that he or she wished it to be cast," Wexler said.

Copyright © 2007, South Florida Sun-Sentinel

Dear ***:

Yeah. Weird shit, huh?

It's like somebody's put Reality in the blender and hit "puree."

This little blogger is relating to the Zeitgeist as Tantalus relates to water.

Every time I get a flash of clarity, it slithers like a reflection hard-welded onto a blob of mercury.

And tonight, the saber-rattling over Iran moved completely over the top. It's obviously been building, but a rhetorical Rubicon was crossed in today's talking points.

Bush is like a drunken college frat boy who staggers into the biggest leather bar in Houston and yells (with that famous sneer): "I'm a'gonna kick me some faggot ass!"

And the only sound I hear from the Middle East is a quiet, deadly, and yet immensely pleased "Lock the door."

Woof! woof! bark the moonbats. Reality shifts and coils like smoke rising from a pipe in a reading room.

I give up.

How the hell am I supposed to come up with some clarity on a Reality that my brain keeps telling me FAILS all basic reality tests? (think 'Kant') I keep expecting to wake up with a washcloth on my forehead, and a concerned Aunty Em studying my face.

And then I remember that Here in Real Black-and-White Reality, Miss Almira Gulch still has a court order to kill my dog.

Hell.

Bests,

Hart

"There's an arrogance in the scientific
community that they know better than
the average individual."
-- Andrea Lafferty, Traditional Values Coalition
quoted in the NEW YORK TIMES 7-11-2004

Courage.