All it takes these days to turn a good day into a bad day is information from my lawyer, my ex or the IRS. I don’t know how to get past it, but these are stimuli that just jerk my chain and I just can’t get past it.

So once again, the lawyer emails me and tells me off because I was supposed to have done something in regards to an email she was supposed to have sent me. I never got it. Now I am two months behind. Go figure.

Do you believe in premonition? Psychic ability? Dream Prophecy? I am not sure I do, but I think it is a weird coincidence that I had a dream of my ex, and she was actually pleasant to talk to. Of course she wanted something. She wanted sex which she has not had since she kicked me out. I laughed her out of the house. Weird timing? Maybe.

Now I know I had the dream in advance of the lawyer email because I told it to my girlfriend. It was after I told her that things started to unfold once again. So now I am freaked, smoked a single cigarette, and have to re-center. All this because I got an email from my lawyer. I hate this shit.

It occurred to me that I have not talked about my “Smokin’ Oddity” in a while, so here is an update:

I am not smoking any more, for the most part. These days I sneak a smoke, maybe once a week, but for the most part, I have quit. Getting to this point however was certainly not a straight line.

In early June a huge wave of stress washed into my life. Problems with the Ex and other things pushed me back to the demon tobacco and smoking was once again on the table. Fortunately this did not last long.

All this came with me worrying about my health as well. Yeah, I knew it was bad, but hey, shit happens and the nicotine took the edge off the worry. Then of course I went to the doctor and the cigarettes had to go. But, being a doctor he was about to prescribe Welbutrin to help me quit. And it did.

So, for the next few weeks I smoked and took the pills and held down the puke until I did quit. Now, for the past three months I have been sneaking a smoke every once in a while. Turns out that one smoke will not make me rainbow yawn, not enough nicotine, so I can sneak one every once in a while.

Over the same period I have been coughing up chunks of lung and generally feeling miserable in the mornings, but even that has subsided a bit. Things are getting better. Finally, there seems to be a ray of light at the end of the tunnel for becoming permanently smoke free.

It was December 29, 1994 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena California. The streets of Pasadena were becoming bedecked with roses everywhere, but that was not why I was in the area. I was in the area to see a concert. Not just any concert, but one of the biggest concerts in many years. I was there to see Pink Floyds’ Pulse Concert, with what we all found out later would be the last tour Roger Waters would make with Pink Floyd.

There are several concerts I remember in my life, the Out of the Blue Tour by ELO in the summer of 1979 with Boston as opening act at the Fabulous Forum in Inglewood California, the first Elton John and Billy Joel team up in July of 1988 at the Coliseum, The Who’s final Tommy tour in 1990 also at the Coliseum in Los Angeles and the Pulse Tour. The first three in this list were incredible and at the time I never thought that there would be a better concert till the next came along, that was until Pulse.

I remember it so well, the concert just seemed to go on forever, and after three and a half hours, the band finally took their bows and it was over and everyone wanted more. They played three encores, how could we want more? But we did because we all knew that we were seeing one of the best rock concerts staged. The first half of the show was a mix of all their work except for Dark Side of the Moon. The coolest part was that you knew there was very little recorded material, it was all live. The sounds were crisp, intense, mellow, and so lush I thought I was being lifted up. It was so intense, it was cool. To give you an example, Shine on Crazy Diamonds was the first song out the gate, and done better than I ever heard it, I was stunned.

The second half was Dark Side of the Moon. I am sure they knew that everyone there wanted it, the concert that had not been seen in the US in over twenty five years. We got it, and man, did we get it. I am sure you know this album, you know, the one that was on the billboard top 100 for twenty five years, the one that no one has a clue as to how many records have been sold since it came out in March of 1973. We got to hear live and experience live an icon of music history. It was incredible, a sonic adventure running through the halls of insanity, being chased by the police and choppers, knowing your call will not go through, then finally running like hell. Yes, we were all lunatics on the grass, we never wanted to leave, spellbound every last one of us.

The encores started and the energy ramped up once more as Wish You Were Here wound its’ way through the stadium, and we did not have to wish, we were. Comfortably Numb set us up once more for Run Like Hell and the concert was over. No one had left, no one dared to miss a beat, but when it was all over we wanted it to start again, but now it was only a memory, one that we all shared and we all knew we had seen something special.

Years later when I talk about the concerts I have seen I always talk about this one in particular, and every once in a while, I meet someone else who saw the same tour and we are both back to 1994, reliving the best concert we both ever saw. All this because I picked up the two disc DVD set of PULSE and became nostalgic. I had the CD of the concert, played them over and over, and indeed when I picked this up I thought I was getting the CD, But no, it was the DVD and you kinow what, that is just fine with me, it brought back all the spectacular of the concert and I was there again, 12 years back in time, awed at the sounds.

So, if that sounds like a few thumbs up for the DVD set of Pink Floyds PULSE, you are right, go get it!

Half my life ago I moved out of my parents house and into an apartment. The apartment was small and I had a room-mate, but for the most part it was cool and a new phase of my life began. My parents told me I wouldn’t last three months. Well, they’re dead I still haven’t moved back in with them. Sorry mom, sorry dad, you just were not suitable room mates. Not like the one I had was, but at least he didn’t pry into my business.

For the longest time all I got from my parents was preparation for failure. I was never let loose to try to fly; I was kept safe and secure and hidden from the world. Example: I do not remember the exact circumstances, but once this guy followed me home from work, someone cut someone else off while drive or something, universal gestures were exchanged and tempers flared. Well, like I said he followed me home and I went in to get a bat to beat the shit out of this asshole. Well he was waiting outside with a tire iron; it was going to get messy. At this point my parent intercepted me and I never did leave the house. The idiot finally left and that was that. There I was with a good head of steam and no one to beat the hell out of. In any case, maybe I would have beat this guy, maybe he would have handed my hat to me, but the point was I needed to get into that fight for nothing other than my own dignity. I was prevented and I have never forgiven my parents for it. I understand why they did what they did, they did not want to see their 17 year old son beat the hell out of anyone or be beaten to a pulp. Sure, I understand that, but they did not understand the crisis of dignity I was working through internally, even though I told them at the time I had to go out there. Did they listen? Nope, and I have never forgiven them.

My favorite author, Robert Heinlein, had a term for these situations which he explained as a Martian concept. I was at a “cusp” and correct action was required. When a young Martian needed help for big decisions it would consult an adult or elder Martian. However, when a young Martian made its first right action at a cusp all on it own without consultation it was then considered an adult and worthy of judging rightly at cusps. This incident was a cusp where I judged rightly for myself, I understood the implications of my decision but was not permitted to use my judgment to grow and become an adult. Seems logical to me, and it would explain why I was so affected by the incident.

That brings me to my haunting. Here is the dream that seems to be on random / repeat in my subconscious:

I seem to be out of the house, but not really out if you follow me. Out, another building, but still my parents are around. I am working hard at this point. I work many hours and when I come home I work some more. I have set up an elaborate work station for myself to help me deal with all the demands I have placed on myself. It is an efficient and working machine, even in some sense relaxing and in fact cool to look at. One day I come home and it is gone, all the work I have done is disassembled and neatly put into drawers along with my t-shirts. I am devastated, all that work shot down in one day. A set up that took a long time to perfect and balance was gone. I ask my parents where all my work had gone and I get the response “We put it away, it was too messy”. At this point I feel literally sick to my stomach, there is an acrid smell and my world spins. I finally get up when my dad starts calling me a baby and to get over it like a man. At this point I become enraged and proceed to chew him out for being the failure of a father he was and that he should not be casting aspersions since his dream was to become and engineer and his father forced him into a life as a pharmacist, something he regretted all his life. I railed on him that he never grew up and in his gutless life was too afraid to consider a life beyond what his admittedly tyrannical father told him to do. He was a man, out of the army and still he let his father make his decisions. I beat him with his failures till he drops. Then there is my mother watching, and I start the same on her. Her big thing is “We always supported you, always wanted the best for you”. I scream at her all the times that she got what she wanted and where I was not a consideration. From being promised a good college education, being excepted into a world class art institute (this is true, I was accepted to Otis/Parsons in Paris / New York / Santa Monica) and having that ripped away because they had to go on an Alaskan cruise to simple things like letting my private mail remain private. The fact that they only accepted me when I was becoming successful in the jobs I was holding seemed to them that they had done a good job and it really was not me at all but their incredible parenting skills. You see they would tell everyone how proud they were of me except me. I never got praise from them for anything, only a set up for failure. Too cautious was the mantra of our house. Don’t get your hopes up. Is there a better less risky path to take? Don’t get hurt, it doesn’t do a thing. BUT I NEEDED TO GET MY ASS KICKED.

So here I am being haunted by a pair of scared and cowardly specters. Maybe, just maybe if I beat them up enough they will go away. Now I know what all you Freudians will say, I am overcompensating for my own failures and that two dead parents are easy targets. I have to face myself for what I am. But here is the hitch, my parents really were as I described, and I know that. They bare a large part of who I am and the way I face things and shade my decisions all the time. They were wrong, they did not need to shelter me as much as they did, and they should have let life teach me a few lessons early on.

So maybe this is an exercise for me, to put in writing what I wanted to tell my dead parents, what I could never tell them in life because a son does not say those things to dying parents. Things I have known for years but kept inside because when it all came down to it I wanted to be the good son, but get this, I never did what I could for them for fear of failing at it and letting them down. How screwed up is that. In an odd sense it is an ironic twist on them. But it was how messed up I was in regard to my parents. So I write this as a cathartic endeavor to rid myself of their lingering influence.

Obviously I could write a whole lot more on this subject, but how boring would that be for you the reader. I mean you would get to know me better and in a way more than my parents ever understood, but it would be a text of spite and vitriol, and no one want to read through hundreds of pages of that. So, I work through my problems with glimpses like this and more so in my more formal writings.

In my latest work, “Levis’ New Genes” I realized that I have cast myself in the role of Levi. Levi is a mistake, one that happens but should never be seen. He is locked away in an institute with other “mistakes” to live a safe and non demanding life. Of course like any good story that is not all that happens. As Levi grows I realized that the steps he is taking are metaphors for the steps I have taken in dealing with my parents. For a story that I wanted to be a comedy it is working itself into a pretty dark drama, I really did not want that, but that’s where it is going and I have to go with it.

I started writing “Levis’ New Genes” about two years ago when I was undergoing some very dramatic changes in my life. But as I approached the middle of the story where Levi is forced to face some very unpleasant facts, I found that I could not continue the story because I had not figured out how I had felt about the same issues. The issue in question was my adoption and how I felt about it.

I, like many adopted people, usually have very strong opinions about how to deal with the fact that their parents are not their biological parents. It brings options to mind that can really mess you up like “What would have my life been like if I had stayed with my biological parent?” This is a tough issue to face and obviously one that you will never be able to fully answer. For me, I reasoned that my biological parent gave me up for a good reason and that I was better off with my parents than I would have been with a 15 year old teen mother. It was probably the right thing to do, so why bother with questioning it. So when people ask if I ever want to find my biological parents I say to them, why would I when she made a life decision and gave me up, she must have had a good reason, who am I to rethink it for her? Likewise if she ever sought me out I would never take her up on a meeting. What good would it serve? So in a sense Levi had to face the fact that his early upbringing was a hoax or at least a deception. So, again, in my mind it left that character only one option on how to deal with it, and it is a dark reaction since he does not have years to process the facts.

I have lived that dark reaction in the last two years. My mother died and my father less than a year later. You can say that it was a relief for me, and I know that sounds cold, but in a real way it is the truth. For me there is no more net. I never used their net in the past, but it was “always there for me” if I could suck it up and endure the talk of failure and disappointment I proved to be for them. It’s gone and I am truly on my own to make my own decisions without someone thinking I make bad choices. My choices are now completely my own and I need that.

Amazing how the mind works, symbols and specters popping up in dreams to help you deal with feelings that you do not want to talk about or face openly. So, to those symbols and specters I say, “Be gone and haunt me no more for I have heard your supplications and ill-informed words and have deemed them irrelevant to my life. I have made my own mind up on how I want to live my life and you can not dictate your false wisdom to me any more. Be gone, haunt someone else, or be at rest in your earthy resting places. Be gone!”

Was that a little too Shakespearean? I know, Freud would say, “pull up a couch and tell me more about your mother…”

When are we going to get there? When are we as a species going to make the great awakening and realize that we are all in this world and life together? When are we going to realize that everyone has a purpose, that everyone is of worth and that worth should be allowed and expressed? When are we going to awaken from the fictions we create for ourselves and unselfishly do away with them? Is it to much to ask that everyone get a clue so we can move on? I want the utopian world of tomorrow that Robert Heinlein wrote about. I want it today.

In Robert’s world there is no starvation. In Robert’s world everyone has a worth and everyone is supported in any endeavor they wish to embark upon. In Robert’s world an artist is not starving nor ridiculed because his art is not comprehensible to others. In Robert’s world you can do anything you want or desire and it is all okay and encouraged.

Want to sit on a log all day and contemplate the nature of navel fuzz? OK, just don’t hurt anyone else while doing it, but sure, go for it. Want to create a mega-corporation and be master of universal widgets, great, and good luck, and we’ll raise a glass to you for trying. Now try something else. It’s a great big universe, try anything you want, just don’t hurt others doing it.

In a world like we have today where everyone can be fed easily if only the politics were not an issue, we should be able to all live without worrying about starvation. In a world like we have today, money is a fiction that needs to be looked at again. We know it is a fiction because at anytime a government can declare it has no debt, so what is the point of worrying about insubstantial cash? The world will run just fine in deficit as it will in surplus. After all, the basics are just that, the basics and must be provided for, money or no money. In a world like we have today everyone can live without having to substantially contributing to the society, and still not worry about heath care, housing and starvation. In a world like we have today, we can all pursue whatever path we want without having to worry about the necessities. It can all be provided, freely and without malice. Will there be rules? Sure, but just enough to define a civil society, rules that we can all understand and accept.

Why do I want this you ask, not that I have to have a good reason? Simple, I want to be one of those artistic people who wish to express my art without worry. I want to be able to do as I please without being questioned about it. I want to live and contribute to the world in a way that is not your standard work 8 hours a day to pay rent being left with no will to be creative at all, nor the means to afford my creativity. I want an alternative to the lives we are offered today. Since I am not independently wealthy, I can not live the bohemian lifestyle I want.

But I could in Robert’s world.

For the first time in a long time I am having the urge to go back to my serious writing. I do not know why this is the case, but I think I made some internal realizations that will now allow me to go back to the stories I was working on.

I will finish editing “Truth, Inc.” by the end of this weekend and will pick up on “Levi’s New Genes” since I now know that I have to take the character of Levi in a direction I did not want to go. Personally, I do not like to deal with the subject of madness, it always seems to strike too deep within me. But it seems this is exactly where I must go with Levi, I have unfortunately written him into a corner and I see no need to rewrite what I already have, it’s correct. So into the halls of madness I must go, where it will lead I do not know, but it will be interesting.

Other ideas have been percolating in my head as well. Storylines for “Have Another Puffer” and “Sands of Time” are making appearances in my creative corners. Looks like I will be starting new stories soon.

Also, I am having the desire to start working on a painting I want to do. I have had this idea for a huge project for years and of late it too is gelling in my mind. The images are firmer of late than they have ever been, the panels more solid, the composition more precise and the theme more firmly grounded.

I wish I knew where this shot of creative juice has come from, though it I think of it, maybe it been coming from the shot I have been taking.

You all know I have for months been getting my health back in order, the prescriptions are abundant and at times a bother, but I have been getting better. My triglycerides are down from a dangerous 1012, to about 220, and my HBAC has dropped from a staggering 10.5 to 7. I guess all the drugs are working. The other element for me was facing the fact that at 41 I was going through andropause. Call it menopause for men, but much more insipid. Where as women get symptoms, men just start declining in health. Andropause is usually signaled by a low testosterone level, which I have mentioned in the past is one issue I am dealing with. Well, about a month ago I started on depo-testosterone, basically a testosterone injection. Could creativity be associated with testosterone or hormone levels? Maybe, I am going to have to do some research.

In any case, my creative juices are flowing, time to get to work.

Just one more of my weird selections of music, I found a composer named Raymond Scott while trying to figure out if the music from the Looney Tunes was original or pulled from somewhere else. Turns out Mr. Scott was a very prolific and rather important figure in the music industry.

Ray Scott is often referred to as “The guy who made the Looney Tunes swing”, and on “The Music of Raymond Scott, Reckless Nights and Turkish Twilights” , a retrospective of his early jazz, you will hear most of the music that spiced up the Looney Tunes and Merry Melodies. Muted trumpet and sax over clarinet, much like Glen Miller, sums up the sounds here. At the time this style was all the rage as Glen Miller’s influence could be felt across the whole instrumental industry. But unlike Glen Miller, Ray Scott brings a more playful feel to his pieces, making them memorable and catchy. More than one song from this CD has ear wormed me, not bad for music seventy years old. Aside from the whimsy of the tunes, this is a tight recording, every note placed just so. Great care and artistry is apparent on every track.

From the opening track (Powerhouse), which if you have watched any cartoons at all you will recognize, to the last track (Peter Tambourine), you will hearken back to the likes of Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Ren and Stimpy, The Simpsons and even Animaniacs. As a jazz album it is pretty good too if you like your jazz very tight, a great contrast to the blues of the time.

Maybe just as fun as the music are the titles of some of the pieces. “Dinner for a Pack of Hungry Cannibals”, “The Girl as the Typewriter”, “At an Arabian House Party” and “War Dance for Wooden Indians” (with a conga feel) are a few examples. In most of these Mr. Scott is trying to recall a specific flavor or atmosphere, and in many cases it works. I can’t help to wonder how well this “visual” music would have worked seventy years ago. I say this because the people of seventy years ago had different references than we do today. I can see them relating to many of these pieces much more readily than I can because popular entertainment of the time would have shaded their interpretation of the music and made it that much more enjoyable. For example, “In an 18th Century Drawing Room” brings back the idea of mild civility and the relaxed pace of an upper class in days past. We still relate to this piece because we know it from the cartoons we watched growing up, but you have the sense that it was even better to people seventy years ago, waking stronger and more elaborate images than we experience today. Ray Scott knew how to wake memes within us and these were especially potent for the time.

So, if you are glancing through the Jazz (or Big Band, or possibly Novelty) section of you local music store, take a look. It is also available through Amazon, and at $9.98 it was a no brainer add-on. Take a listen, it’s cool.

I don’t understand people some times. Is it really so hard to admit there is a problem and need some help. I am not talking about an emotional or psychological problem, I am talking about an issue with your email?

Sure, none of want to admit that we can’t solve something so simple as an email account, but there are times that the seemingly simple is not so simple. Thus it was with a close friend of mine.

I give him access to my servers to run a few email accounts. Since I have an unlimited number of email accounts and host his domains, why not. I send him updates on traffic and what not, he runs his business and everything is good. Except when the servers are clogged with a DOS (Denial Of Service) attack or whatever, then it’s tinker time for my friend. He thinks because he knows a few things he knows what is going on. Well, is it any surprise that he screws up his account?

It is a pretty simple thing actually, I run my email servers on port 26, not 25 and with SSL to deny spammers from possible breaking in. Why port 26? Because most cable companies do not allow email relay (this decreases spam). Port 26 is usually not block thus useable. This is where it become interesting. He thinks he can fix it, that I had it all wrong. NOT.

So, after days of tinkering and his email boxes now full to the brim, I finally get the call. I don’t bother trying to talk him through it on the phone, it would be faster for me to just go over there and sit at the computer and fix all the tinkering. And so I do. And I ask:

“So, did you have anyone “fix” this for you?”
“Well, I did have someone here yesterday to look at it, I didn’t want to bother you.”
“You didn’t have them call me?”
“No, should I have?”
This is where I point out that the servers he has set up will not allow him to mail out and the POP3 is not set for this MX. “Yeah, you should have.”
“Why? It is only an email account…”
And thus the talk about mail relay and how to get around it.

Thus is how I then spent two hours fixing his accounts and resigning passwords because he told some else the passwords he was using. (BTW, he has about 60 emails for him and employees. He is a rather busy beaver, changed them all!) So, a little ego thus killed an afternoon.

The worst part of this is if he had not done anything at all it would have all come back the next day. Turns out that the server was under a DOS attack and nothing was coming in or out. Fixed that and low and behold, everything is peachy again, except the tinker bug had already infected my friend. Ego told him it was a simple fix, that the computer must have goofed somehow and that he could fix it. Ego would not let him admit he could not fix it. Ego and a rebellious nature.

I knew what he had done, why it was not working, he’s done it before. After all the talks that I run my mail a bit differently, after telling him time and time again that if it worked once on the computer it will always work because a computer is stupid. After explaining to him the errors that happen in a system are almost always human errors, not the computers fault, he still thinks he is smarter than me in this regard and can “fix” anything. How do you deal with this? I would never tell him how to run his business, their he is king, but he is no computer geek or guru.

This time I slapped him on the nose a bit and waited a couple of days before going over to fix the problem. He was without email for four days total, all because he would not let go of his ego and let things just stand and straighten themselves out. I guess we all do it, but wouldn’t it good if we could all just let of the ego once in a while and admit we do not know everything. I know I try not to fall into the trap, but, once in a while, there I am doing something stupid because I will not ask for help. Call me stupid too.

Are you part of the dating game? Did you meet your current mate from a dating site? Do you still check your profile for emails, views, winks, and other response? Is everyone in your life really ok with this or are they saying they are just to make you happy? Do you really need to check your profile anymore?

Look, this is purely from a mans point of view, but no, I don’t want to turn off my profile. I want to know that there are always women that would want to date me. Call it insecurity or just ego, but knowing that there are options are what men want. And I would say women would want the same thing, but I am not of that gender. But what message is this sending?

The wrong one if you are in a “committed” relationship. So you and your significant other have talked, sure, it’s ok to check the profiles, you’ll do it and your SO will do it. And what you are saying is “I don’t know of this will work out, so I want options”. How would you feel if your SO told you that? Not great huh? You would think there is no real meaning to the relationship and not take it seriously. Just because you check profiles.

How about if you are in a relationship that is into threesomes or moresomes? You think this changes whether you can check profiles? After all you are just looking for more friends. Well, guess what, it doesn’t change the equation one bit. Everyone wants to think that they are special, and by checking these profiles you are sending the “well, I could do better than you” signal. Talk about asking for problems, is it worth it?

So it is that I turn off my profiles. I want to tell that special person just how much they mean to me. Tell them that they are the one I want to focus on. Tell them that they are special and I do not need to look for others or even bother having “options”. Turning off your profile is a signal that you are serious about your relationship.

This has been an issue in two relationships I have been in. In both cases I may not have fully realized the importance of turning off the profile was. I last a truly wonderful woman the first time, she was so special to me. But fate smiled on me and I have met another wonderful woman, and this time I do not mean to mess it up with “quick profile checks”. She now knows how special she is to me because I have eliminated any competition, shown her she is the one I want.

The profile is off, yes, and it should stay that way unless something happens and you know the relationship is over and once again you are indeed “on the market” for someone else. It should stay that way out of respect and love. It should stay that way for all the reasons that you do not want to be told you are second in your significant others life. Or, if you are part of that swinging life, until you and your SO are so firm about the two of you that there would be no question in your mind of your love and respect for each other.

Profile OFF = I love you.

So, you’re probably asking yourself what the heck is Jeff doing putting that silly Happy Feet ad up on Miasma of Musings? Well, I usually do not get behind a movie even though I love them, but this is a total hoot.

I challenge you to click on the ad (it is perfectly safe) and let that front page run. It will start the trailers, and let them keep going (there are like seven of them). I bet you can’t help but smile and laugh. It is really there for me, so I can get a laugh every morning, and it has started of my day for the last week.

There is a lot of competition this year for “Best Animated Movie”. You have “Cars”, “Over the Hedge” (thumbs up from me), “Flushed Away”, and now “Happy Feet”. If I were to pick the best… I am going to pick “Happy Feet” with about ten thumbs up!

And now, the highest praise I can give it… “If it lives up to the trailer, it will be up there with “Beauty and the Beast”, “Monsters Inc.” and “The Incredibles”. It will go down as a total delight you are going to want to watch over and over as I have been doing with the trailers.

Happy Feet = Happy People.

Timing is everything.

Let’s play the “What if” game.

• What if George Allen had not said “macaca”?
  
  
• What if Dick Chaney had not shot someone?
  
  
• What if George Bush withdrew one third of the forces from Iraq?
  
  
• What if the CIA pulled Osama bin Ladin out of a hole?
  
  
• What if the Troops left after the proclamation of “Mission Accomplished”?
  
  
• What if Donald Rumsfeld resigned one week earlier?
  
  

All the other what if don’t matter, it is the last one that really has to have you shaking your head. All along I said that for the Republican to retain control of the House or Senate one of the following would have to happen: Pull out troops from Iraq, pull bin Ladin out of the hole, or fire Rumsfeld, and the Republican retain the control they want for the next two years. Well, the troops are still in Iraq, and bin Ladin is still in a hole, but Rumsfeld is out, a week too late.

If Rummy wanted to fall on his sword, don’t you think he could have done it seven days earlier? Doing it after the votes are counted, votes that were glaringly obvious from several weeks out, did nothing but make our already bewildered President look even more out of touch than he already is. For these political beasts not to see the eight hundred pound gorilla jumping on the bed of the upcoming election is about a myopic as a teen in puppy love. Well, at least Donald poked his head out from beneath the covers finally, but really, couldn’t he do it seven days earlier? I guess the snooze alarm was too tempting to pass up.

What if he had awoke to the need to retire seven day prior?

• The House would still have gone to the Democrats.
  
  
• The Senate would have remained in the control of the Republicans.
  
  
• The Dems in Congress while subpoenaing everything and everybody in the next year would in the end be ineffective.
  
  
• The troops would be out of Iraq in two years, but now I fear the troops will have to stay the course because our President will feel threatened and have to prove he was right.
  
  

In short, the Dems are going to force Bush into a defensive position. Bush will not want to admit now that his plan and lack of planning was wrong. He is going to want to retain his pride, and for this President pride is everything. Had Rumsfeld left a week earlier, bush would have a split House/Senate and he could “Work it out”. But now, once the investigations start, Bush will retreat to an “is not” position and that will be that.

Donald, you’re a week too late.

One of the funniest things about this senatorial race here in Nevada, is that Jack Carter, son of former President Jimmy Carter, has set up shop to run against incumbent Senator John Ensign. Nevadans being the political beasts they are looked on this with a dubious eye.

Needless to say that the muck was raked thick and odiferous, and when the stink clears tonight, Jack Carter will be sent home with a loss. He is an interloper in a land that plays very hardball politics. A carpet bagger of the truest stripe. In fact he said, and this is a direct quote, “Certainly I’m a carpet bagger, but I want to be your carpet bagger.” That says it all.

He was a man that bought a condo in Nevada to establish residence. I wonder just how much he likes Nevada when all is said and done. I wonder just how long he will stick around before the condo is sold and he moves back to Georgia or the Bahamas. I would say that his condo will be up for sale within 30 days, and he will be gone within 2 weeks.

So, I challenge the Review Journal to monitor Mr. Carters moves. If he is gone as quickly as I feel he will be, that will tell you just how much he loves Nevada and how correct the choice for John Ensign was.