Newscoma

I think it goes without saying that John McCain has had a rotten couple of weeks.

I guess that’s why he canceled his press conference, the only one scheduled for this week.

I know these guys get tired. I get tired. I probably need some fruit or something. Possibly a vitamin or a beer.

Maybe I’ll live dangerously and have both.

Anyway, right now McCain is sounding like that weird old guy standing in a dirty wifebeater and plaid golf shorts yelling at kids to get off his lawn while they are sitting on the bikes on the road.

If I were to give any advice to McCain, I’d probably say that the best thing he could do is realize that people have had 8 years of muck. Obama is causing attention because he’s doing things differently. Do something different if all of this is ticking you off.

Oh, and then there is this.

I can now add artist to my resume. Of course, I didn’t do very much except act like a 12-year-old boy fascinated with Fangoria but it is of the good.

When you lose someone you care about, it’s hard.

Tomorrow is the memorial for our friend Stewman. He wanted Squirrel Queen and I to speak at his service.

I don’t know what I’ll say. I plan on working on that later today.

This summer has been a violent mistress. I am comforted by knowing this too shall pass but I’m in critical burn out right now. My leg is still sore from the spider bite but it’s better. It could have been so much worse so I’m grateful for that.

With Stew’s passing, I’m, of course, thinking of life and mortality and how everything has a root system. I feel like the world is connected. I’m also thinking because of intense stress that has accompanied these hot months that I may need a break from the world and sleep for a few days. Death reminds you that there is little time on this planet. We must make the most of it. We just have to.

I’m also thinking about being in a pattern that isn’t pleasing me right now. And how that if people are stuck, how do they get unstuck.

I’m working on that.

Stew was always supportive. He was amazing and he never backed down, even if he was afraid. He walked through the fear even when he was terrified.

I hope that I can as well.

Homer and I hung out yesterday afternoon and it was lovely. There is nothing like having a sister. Seriously, I recommend it highly.

We heard over the weekend that some of the people who inhabit our world are headed back to the Middle East. We quietly spoke about it as not to disturb the kids. They know about the war but they are also kids. Having children and trying to explain war and that some of their friends’ parents are going away is not an easy task to do.

Later in the evening, the oldest niece was rambling on about her new Johnny Depp obsession and said off the top of her head “Are we occupying Iraq?”

I stopped. Where did this 12-year-old get that? I said I thought we probably were and she nodded.

She then talked about Helena Bonham Carter and when she grew up she wanted to try Coors Light because the bottle goes blue. (I will talk to her about this abomination when she gets older.)

Kids pick up a lot from television and from hearing the hushed voices of the adults in the house. You can’t protect them from certain things.

But if I could, I would protect them from the ugliness. I would give my life for these kids.

This morning, I read this story about Joseph Dwyer. It’s hard to read.

Waxing philosophical this morning.

I’m sort of fried right now so please forgive me that the blog hasn’t been too active in the last few days. It’s been a bit crazy.

1. First of all, I have no idea why I don’t live in Brattleboro, VT. I honestly love that place and I really hate the hot. The dogs and I are listless.
2. I would like to learn a new language. I’m thinking Spanish. Or German.
3. If you haven’t seen Dr. Horrible yet, you better get on over there. You have until midnight.
4. Cute Baby ALERT!
5. Michael Silence tells of us Blognetnews’ election engine. Looks promising.
6. Funniest thing I’ve heard all week came from Badger who told me that writing stuff in the bathrooms of juke joints was Redneck Twitter. I sometimes do verbal twitter with her. Like randomly saying bs I usually put up on Twitter. She just rolls her eyes at me. “Look, my dog is eating things she made” or my latest fascination with beaver dams.
7. Stew’s memorial is set for Tuesday at 1 p.m.
8. With a tip of the hat to Beth, this is just bizarre.
9. If you truly want to be disturbed, read Jack Ketchum because the monsters aren’t the things you need to be afraid of.
10. We have Guitar Hero for the kiddies. I feel my life will never be the same.

An excerpt from the eastside.

But nooo. We don’t do that here in Tennessee. Instead we keep the drama going by crying foul over how or why Smith’s email to a public official about public business was released to the public as a public record. (yep, there’s a conspiracy in there somewhere.) Some are taking issue with A.C. Kleinheider, who broke the story and won’t reveal his source because he promised not to reveal his source. You’ve absolutely got to question the character of man who keeps his word. I mean who does that anymore? (And for the record, I think it was a member of Governor Bredesen’s staff in the Bunker with a candlestick.)

But why does the source matter? Are we launching a federal investigation into who embarrassed Robin Smith now that we’re all finished up with the ass of Roger Clemens? We need the source to testify before congress? Or do we just need to know so we can ensure that source never sits at the GOP table with the cool Republicans anymore?

I mean what is it with our party leaders and their seemingly uncontrollable need to engage in these pointless, juvenile never-ending “I know you are but what am I” battles? Can’t someone just call “Infinity,” so we can get a grip, grow up and move on to real-life stuff?

Or is this important in some way I don’t understand?

Just read the whole thing.

From My Confined Space

Charles Manson and his followers still hold an odd fixation for me. So does Son of Sam.

It’s my age, I have no doubt but I’m thinking that one of the first books, after “In Cold Blood” by Truman Capote which was first, that I read as a very young and peculiar child was “Helter Skelter.” I begged my mom to read it. Being it was the 70s and people weren’t so nuts back then, she thought I was reading and as long as I was doing that, she had no problem giving me the book. She read it first though.

Susan Atkins, a terminally ill former Charles Manson follower, has been denied a compassionate release from prison, the California Board of Parole Hearings said Tuesday on its Web site.

Atkins, 60, has been diagnosed with brain cancer and has had a leg amputated, her attorney said. In June, she requested the release, available to terminally ill inmates with less than six months to live.

The board’s decision came after a public hearing on Atkins’ request. It means the request will not be forwarded to the Los Angeles Superior Court that sentenced Atkins.

The court would have had the final say on Atkins’ release.

Known within the Manson Family as Sadie Mae Glutz, Atkins and four others were convicted in connection with the deaths of five people, including the actress Sharon Tate, in August 1969.

If you were wondering, Atkins is the one that stabbed Sharon Tate in the stomach. She’s going to remain in jail.

UPDATE: To reply to some of the comments left, I’m not advocating for her to be released at ALL. I want her to spend her days in the slammer. I was relaying my fascination with the case as a child because it scared the bejesus out of me at that age.

I ran into an old friend yesterday at the doctor’s office. I know, that’s where we go to socialize. Shut up.

Anyway, I haven’t seen him in about 2 1/2 years and he said he was visiting. I asked where he was these days.

“Baghdad,” he replied.

I didn’t say anything. I honestly didn’t know what to say.

He informed me he was working in the private sector. Then he started to tell Squirrel Queen and I about the Iraqi people.

“Never compliment them on anything because they will give it to you,” he said. “I’ve had this happen several times and they always give me whatever it is I comment about. You have to be careful about that.”

He went on to talk about that it was dangerous and about that many of the Iraqi people he has met thought, due to Saddam Hussein’s reign, that Iraq had been victorious during the Gulf War.

He talked for a long time. I had my foot propped up due to Igor the mean-assed spider biting it and just listened to what he had to say. He also cited that he didn’t think American Main Stream media was getting all of the stories right. I asked what he meant and he said that they only got CNN, Fox and Al Jazeera where he lived. A lot of the soldiers there as well as those living, as he is, in the private sector, thinks there needs to be more educational programming about the tribal factors in the area. He also said that Iraqis were lovely people.

When he left, he said it was a brisk 114 degrees.

I really have no comment on this conversation from a political perspective. It was a private thing between old friends. I do think there is always going to be things that we don’t know or we don’t understand. Cultures are different. I’ll be honest, I was shocked to hear he had taken this path. I just didn’t expect it.

And I also had a moment of blinding jealousy. I would give anything to start a new adventure into areas that I’m desperately afraid of. I know, “Newscoma, DAMMIT, you don’t want to go to Iraq!?!!”

No, not really. I don’t but in a way I do.

My envy came from him talking about the culture, the way people survive despite terrible odds and obstacles. The way that life continues in despair. How he felt he was making a difference?

Yes, for a moment, that’s something I wanted to be swimming in.

Could I make a difference?

First of all, my dear readers who have sent me such kind emails, tweets and have asked me some great questions, let me take a moment to navel gaze and tell you of the Spider Bite tragedy. At least I think it’s a tragedy.

My vote is the only one that counts.

I didn’t see the spider but the bite isn’t as big as this picture that I found online. It’s on the top of my foot and looks more bruised than this one but remember we got to the doctor quick. He told me what I’d been bit by because I had no idea. I thought I might have bruised my foot or something. I’m not a medical professional. I did have a little experience with this before due to Killa who suffered much more than I have when she was bit last year. I think it is inadvertently because of her, seeing her go through hell last year, that made me get to the clinic pronto.

I just knew I was feeling weird and my foot swelled up like a golf ball and my leg started cramping about an hour in. And I felt weird. Thus far, I’ve only had abdominal and leg cramps. We caught this in time before it did any real damage although Day 2 has been much rougher than Day One.

So I went to the doc who told me “That’s nasty” and then gave me some scrips and promptly went home to get nauseous. Ahh, nausea how I adore thee. (The Summer of 2008 will go down in Newscoma’s life as the one where I burned out due to excessive overload. I’m going to be as gray as Phil Donahue by the Fall.)

The only thing I can tell you is my experience as I don’t know yours.

A.) I’m glad it wasn’t a brown recluse. Those bites rot your skin.

B.) It feels like someone has hammered a railroad stake into the bottom of my right leg where the point has settled in my hip.

C.) The cramps are from this suck. Truly a big old cup of suckage.

I wish to apologize to the Gods. I must have been a bad girl with Steve Austin, strep throat, my chief staff writer out this summer, the black widow bite, the canceled vacation and other various things.

The GOOD NEWS: As terrified as I am of spiders, I can say that this didn’t kill me and I didn’t completely freak out. Good does come out of bad things. And, to be honest, it could have been much worse.

NavelGazing Coma. That’s my middle name today.

The Internet is a fun place.

I’ve established that I though Count Chocula lived in the toilet, and that I would scurry past that bathroom at any passing. Avoiding it as much as possible.

Read the whole thing at Big Stupid Tommy’s.

I haven’t weighed in on the New Yorker cover that caused such a stir yesterday. I don’t know, spiders were eating on my foot and I was a bit distracted.

My first thought was pretty much what Joe Lance wrote about. I thought of the Tennessee GOP and how Bill Hobbs’ recent actions have formed some of this. Did I see the satire? Yes I did. Did I think it was funny?

No, not really. Lucille Ball also doesn’t make me laugh. And I hated the Titanic movie. Just saying.

With that said, Joe said this:

The Tennessee Republican Party has created no small stir with its less-than-ironic attempts to paint Senator Obama and his wife as terrorist-connected America-haters. I thought of the TNGOP immediately when I saw the New Yorker cover. I wonder if the artist had them in mind.

A sad part to this story is that those targeted truly won’t get that they are the butt of the joke, and will fail to see themselves as the asses they have been, despite this clever mirror that has been held before them.

I don’t think people being upset is wrong at all. I also know that political satire can turn on a dime. I can’t help but think that Jeffraham made a good point.

The one thing about offering change is reacting differently that what is expected. I’m not discounting that the cover was offensive but let’s remember that the same artist, Brian Blitt, did these covers. That’s was political cartoonists do. In news, at least, if you have everyone hating on you, you did your job well.

Images from The Huffington Post

We are still living in the world of weapons of mass distraction. For Tennesseans, we can see the stamp of the Tennessee GOP’s smear campaign working here. The deep wounds that have been created by some of the GOP’s antics have hit a national audience. I don’t like it but it is what it is.

But less remember that the GOP is working on untrue stereotypes of Barack Obama. Which is no different that being Captain Obvious and saying that John McCain is old.

Let’s move on and get back to the issues of $4 bucks for a gallon of gas, Iraq and health care.

This election has become like the television show “Big Brother” and it shouldn’t be. Creating drama where this isn’t any. We have too much at stake in this country.