According to Gallup, Bush’s approval rating is the lowest of any president in March of their 2nd term – 45%.
Here are the ratings for presidents as recorded by Gallup in the March following their re-election:
Truman, 1949: 57%.
Eisenhower, 1957: 65%.
Johnson, 1965: 69%.
Nixon, 1973: 57%.
Reagan, 1985: 56%.
Clinton, 1997: 59% .
Bush, 2005: 45% .
From January 2003:
COLMES: …And before you respond, let me just put up what the pope says.
“No to war,” says Pope John Paul II. “during his annual address to scores of diplomatic emissaries to the Vatican… ‘War is not always inevitable,’ he said. ‘It is always a defeat for humanity.’”
Are these a bunch of wild-eyed liberal loonies?
HANNITY: Yes.
UPDATE: And O’Reilly’s view of the Pope? Why, he’s a "Saddam Enabler".
The goal of the project is to visit each of the latitude and longitude integer degree intersections in the world, and to take pictures at each location. The pictures and stories will then be posted here.
Here’s a photo and story from the GPS convergence location of 36°N 80°W, which is roughly 2.8 miles (4.4 km) NNE of High Point, Guilford, NC, USA — it happens to be pretty close to where I live. The photo is looking east from that spot:
27-Dec-2002 — After going to 36N 78W , I decided to drive to 36N-80W (I had already been to 36N 79W). Like the other two visitors said, this is a pretty easy one to get to.
I drove into the townhouse complex, Watermark at Oak Hollow, and followed the road to the closest point I could get to driving. I parked about 200 to 250 feet away. I walked between two townhouses, down the lawn to the edge of the lawn. At this point, I saw a large branch on the ground just past the edge of the lawn. As I moved closer to the confluence spot, I discovered that the confluence was right next to the branch. You can see from picture #1 where the branch had broken off and fallen. I walked around a little to get all zeros on the GPS and then took my usual four pictures facing north, east, south, and west. After taking pictures, I walked up the hill back to the car and drove home.
This is pretty weird.
The Des Moines Register is saying that Jeff Gannon (the White House conservative "journalist" who was allowed into the White House press pool although he had no journalistic experience and was in fact a gay male escort who advertised his services on the Internet but that’s okay because his real name was James Guckert and he asked softball questions of Bush anyway)……
. . . is really named Johnny Gosch:
Gosch was 12 years old when he was abducted in 1982 as he delivered newspapers in his West Des Moines neighborhood. His mother, Noreen Gosch, and her hired private investigators later concluded Johnny was kidnapped by a pedophilia/child pornography ring.
Then (one theory goes) GannonGuckertGosch was trained by the CIA to be a male escort/spy, then given a job as a White House escort to reward him for his service and/or silence him.
Curiouser and curiouser.
The Rude Pundit is really enjoying all this dead Pope news:
The Rude Pundit doesn’t want to hear about fuck-all else: no damn Abu Ghraib attack, no damn Tom DeLay-is-evil bullshit, and certainly not a fuckin’ word about the WMD intelligence report that says we’re all fucked. Who the hell needs that? Don’t harsh the Rude Pundit’s Pope corpse buzz.
No, that’s all noise, man, it’s all bullshit, it’s doin’ nothin’ but gettin’ in the way of hearing over and over and over and over and over what a great fuckin’ Pope corpse this is, how we all love the Pope corpse. How the Pope corpse chased away the Commies, how the Pope corpse loved all the brown people. Fuck, man, can’t we send the Pope corpse on a world tour? Can’t we mummify that fucker and let it visit every fuckin’ country the living Pope visited and even the ones he didn’t get to? Aw, shit, it’d be amazing: hourly updates of the Pope corpse’s time in Tanzania or Ecuador. Goddamn, how the natives would be thrilled to have a Pope corpse there. C’mon, Rome, don’t bogart the Pope corpse.
Matter of fact, the Rude Pundit wants the Pope corpse to be re-animated, to become the zombie Pope, going on a rampage, eating the brains of abortion providers, homosexuals, and warmongers, because the Pope’s approach to the "culture of life" was so fuckin’ consistent, man, it was so steady, bein’ against genocide and contraception. Opposin’ the Iraq War and women priests. Shit, we all read what we want into the Pope corpse, taking the good with the bad, but, oh, man, the zombie Pope’ll show us all what’s what. He’ll be eatin’ some fuckin’ flesh, man, that’s what a zombie Pope’d do – enough of those dry, tasteless eucharists – let’s get real and juicy here. He is risen.
And when we finally capture the zombie Pope and put him in the ground, the Rude Pundit wants a twenty-four hour a day Pope corpse-cam in that tomb, so we can all watch the Pope corpse rot on a special CNN channel called "Watch the Rotting Corpse of the Pope." And it won’t just be the decaying flesh of the Pope corpse on the channel – no, it’ll be nonstop people tellin’ us all how wonderful the Pope corpse is, how to this day the Pope corpse still inspires them by never giving up, rotting so gallantly in front of us to teach us all the mysteries of dying and, well, fuck, rotting.
Yes, sir, nothin’ else matters when there’s a Pope corpse around. Don’t let that fucker rest in peace.
Rude Pundit, as you might realize, is not one for mincing words.
Thank God for James Dobson’s Focus on the Family. Without it, I wouldn’t know have discovered this informative article about how to talk to my teen about sex:
First, put a paper bag over your head. Then, speak slowly and clearly.
So far, I’m not impressed with the advice. Should I cut out eyeholes or not?
Ah, don’t you wish talking to your teens about sex was an easy task? It’s not, and there’s no use pretending it is. However, it’s critical that you do it. Don’t believe the fallacies.
The phalluses? Huh?
If you don’t talk to your kids, the only information they get will be from their uneducated friends, or the distorted media.
Yeah. I hate it when Brian Williams opens the evening news with one of his heart-to-heart sermons about the birds and the bees.
So it’s up to you to put on that smile and go for it.
Nothing will weird a teen out more than a smiling parent talking to them about sex. But where should we have this conversation?
Not at a restaurant. You’ll already feel a bit self-conscious talking to your teen without having any other potential eavesdroppers.
Right. "See, son. Let’s say this hot dog is you . . . and this onion ring is your girlfriend . . ." Doesn’t work.
Most teens seem to be more receptive to talking about difficult things at night. Take advantage of this by "tucking" them into bed. Sit on the edge of the bed and begin. The dark room helps you as well.
No, this is way too icky. A parent, tucking in their teenager? And then sitting at the bedside, talking about sex? In the dark?
Er, hello? Social services?
Curl up on the sofa, pop a bowl of popcorn, fix their favorite beverage and go for it.
Hopefully, your incredibly long arms will be able to reach the microwave and the refrigerator from your curled-up position on the sofa.
Break out the pool cues, the puzzle, the Scrabble game, the Ping-Pong table, the foosball … whatever gets you talking.
Scrabble! Now that’s an idea. Try to spell dirty words. "’Cunt’ — that’s 11 points. You do know what that is, don’t you, honey?"
Be sure that nothing is planned for early the next day, that the phones are turned off and that there’s little chance for interruption.
Because presumably, your teen will be traumatized for life at that point…
Well, that takes care of the "where". Now please tell me "when" I should have this conversation.
When they start to ask questions. This can be at any age. When a child asks a specific question, answer the specific question. Don’t evade it.
When my 4-year-old son asked, "What is a virgin?" (spawned by "round yon virgin" in the carol "Silent Night"), his father said, "I don’t know." I told him, "Someone who hasn’t had sex." He said, "Okay," and left the room without asking what sex was. Later he told me I was his primary source of sexual information because he knew I would always be straightforward with him.
"Years later, he called me from his cell phone. He was about to perform oral sex on his girlfriend, and wasn’t sure what to do. Being his ‘primary source of sexual information’, I was able to talk him through it, step by step. We laugh about it now."
When they are 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. If your teen hasn’t asked you any questions by the time he or she is 14, set a time to talk.
Just be sure it is in the dark, and it is in his or her bedroom, after they are tucked in. And be sure to smile.
Always. Talk about sex freely, openly and honestly in your home. Be the place where your teen comes for information first, or to check out information they’ve heard from their friends. Experts say that discussing sexuality on an ongoing basis helps teens have a healthier view of sexuality and postpone sex until marriage.
And when they ask you whether you waited until marriage to have sex, lie. The rest of the time, be honest.
Well, that’s all good advice, but some of you may still not sure how to go about it.
Often parents use available material as a way to begin. Some will use a news event, a movie or television show as a discussion starting point.
Terri Schiavo works. She works for any topic these days.
Others might take a book like Just Like Ice Cream to discuss the choices someone else made.
Right. Be sure to enroll your teen in the Christian tradition of discussing other people and looking down at the wrong choices they made.
Ask your teen to give you written-out questions ahead of time. This will give you an opportunity to prepare.
Answer the questions honestly and forthrightly. However, do not answer personal questions about you and your spouse unless the questions involve concepts rather than specifics.
They may, for example, wonder why they appear (as a small baby) in your wedding pictures. Tell them to shut up, and ask questions involving concepts rather than specifics.
Now, what should you actually say?
In my research with high school girls, I discovered that sex ed classes taught many girls the functionality of sex but not the responsibility, and vice-versa. Either way, the results were often disastrous. Girls who had healthy affection from their fathers, as well as a balanced education of sexual function and responsibility were far less likely to become sexually involved.
Ask your teens to share with you the new terminology and the definitions. Get their input on how they feel about the new wave of oral sex, "hooking up" and "friends with privileges."
Take copious notes. You may actually learn something from your teen.
Today’s award goes to Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) who said, on Sunday:
I don’t know if there is a cause-and-effect connection but we have seen some recent episodes of courthouse violence in this country. Certainly nothing new, but we seem to have run through a spate of courthouse violence recently that’s been on the news and I wonder whether there may be some connection between the perception in some quarters on some occasions where judges are making political decisions yet are unaccountable to the public, that it builds up and builds up and builds up to the point where some people engage in – engage in violence.
What is wrong with this statement? Just about everything.
First of all — what recent spate of violence in the courtroom? Sure, there was that guy in Atlanta, but one incident does not a "spate" make.
Secondly — the reason that guy went off and started killing people was because he was on trial and was going to be found guilty. It had nothing — I repeat, nothing — to do with "judicial activism" or anything like that. And to make that "connection" is laughable political grandstanding in a ridiculous attempt to tie that event to the nomination of more conservative judges. Is Cornyn that stupid, or does he think the American people are that stupid?
Thirdly, so what are you saying John? The *cough* spate *cough* of violence in American courtrooms is understandable? Would you like to see more of it?
UPDATE: Matt Yglesius probably has it right when he says that this is all about intimidation. The congressional conservatives are trying to sell you "protection", along the lines of "Gee, that’s a nice federal judiciary you have there. Be a shame if something happened to it."
Why am I not suprised at this?
CultureKitchen‘s experience with an eating disorder caused her to examine an aspect of L’Affaire Schiavo that most everybody else ignored — the body and the Bible. Read it if only because it is one of the best titles to a blog post ever written.
Majikthise is so right (and cute) when she writes:
The Republicans seem awfully blase about medical care for the disabled patients who want to live…
Doctors Lobbying to Halt Cuts to Medicare Payments
WASHINGTON, April 3 – Doctors are mobilizing a nationwide lobbying campaign to stave off cuts in their Medicare fees as Congress hunts for ways to rein in the soaring cost of the insurance program.
Because of a quirk in federal law, Medicare will cut payments to doctors by 4 percent to 5 percent in each of the next six years, Bush administration officials say.
"This is a very difficult problem," Michael O. Leavitt, the secretary of health and human services, said last week. "Unless something changes, there will be quite substantial reductions in physician fees."
Doctors said that if the cuts took effect, they would be less likely to treat Medicare patients because the payments would not cover the costs of care.
Dr. Nancy H. Nielsen, the speaker of the House of Delegates of the American Medical Association, said the cuts "would have a devastating effect on access to care" for elderly and disabled patients.
Here.
Nope. No Jeff Gannon.
Question: What’s more pathetic than standing in line at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles for 60+ days in order to be one of the first to see what is sure to be another really bad Star Wars movie?
Answer: maintaining a blog about standing in line at Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles for 60+ days in order to be one of the first to see what is sure to be another really bad Star Wars movie.
UPDATE: By the way, there is a phone booth there. Feel free to call these stand-in-liners. They know that the number is making its way over the Internet, and they think it is awesome that people are calling them. The number is (323) 462-9609. Be nice.
This is funny.
The conservative "journalism" website WorldNetDaily has posted a story here about CBS’s plan to make a Terri Schiavo made-for-TV movie:
CBS is rushing a Terri Schiavo TV movie into production so that it can air the biopic during the May ratings sweeps.
[…]CBS’ Terri story reportedly will feature "Felicity" star Keri Russell to star as America’s tragic heroine and Dean Cain of "Lois and Clark" as the husband who relentlessly seeks an end to her life.
Now please look at how the story was originally reported here on the Defamer blog:
Today, CBS has announced plans to rush a Schiavo biopic to air during May sweeps, with Keri Russell to star as America’s tragic heroine and Dean Cain as the husband who wants to let her die in peace.
Notice how "as the husband who wants to let her die in peace" (Defamer blog) becomes "as the husband who relentlessly seeks an end to her life" (WND). Nice lilttle language flip-flop.
But there’s one more thing: it isn’t true! There is no Keri Russell-Dean Cain TV movie about Terri Schiavo. The Defamer blog post was apparently an April Fool’s Day gag, which WorldNutDaily (with its high journalistic standards) swallowed (and edited) hook, line and sinker.
Heh.
