born live love die

Monty is gone.

Monty was a rat, a pet rat, Bookzilla’s pet rat.  She had two, Edgar, named for Edgar Allen Poe, and Monty, named for Monty Python.� Monty took sick during a camping trip to the San Juans.� Bookzilla’s mother and stepfather go out there every year to some land they own and camp there.� They take the rats because the rats go with Bookzilla from house to house.

Monty came back from the camping trip and was obviously ill.� Bookzilla’s mother and Bookzilla took Monty and Edgar to the vet.� Edgar didn’t show all the symptoms of Monty.� Monty was not very mobile.� The vet said that it was some sort of respiratory infection.� I think that was true because Monty would hunch up and huff.� He was not doing well.

Bookzilla handled the illness very well.� Her mother talked things over with her and a limit was set on how much money would be spent on them.� Bookzilla seemed to understand boundary we set for pets.� Pets are not people and they can’t tell us what is wrong.� Vets can sometimes help them, but many times, multiple invasive procedures can’t help them, but merely prolong the pet’s suffering.� Part of the treatment for both Edgar and Monty was an antibiotic to be administered thrice daily.

Bookzilla had a viral infection yesterday, a high fever last night, and it seemed to return this afternoon.� She didn’t play with Monty much today.� At bed time, Bookzilla went into give them their medicine and found Monty in his cage.

I think there was some bewilderment about what to feel.� She held him for a while, and we talked about how he had not been doing well, that he wasn’t feeling the pain any more.� Grief is hard to handle.� It comes in waves.� If it were constant, it would be easier to process.� But there are times when you think that you should feel something, but it isn’t there.� Then when you don’t expect it, sadness comes pouring in and swamps you.

I told her about my first pet, a cat, and how I liked that cat.� The cat died, hit by a car while crossing the state highway, M-40, on which we lived and on which cars traveled at high speed.

We talked about burying Monty and making a grave stone for him.� There is a small grovish area in back of the house in which we shall inter him.� Bookzilla said that she wanted a gravestone.� I offered to get some concrete and make a gravestone and she said that it was a good idea.� While we were talking, she moved with her emotions, sad and pensive in turns.

I told JMan about Monty.� He was a little lost about how to feel.� When I was his age, the girl, Barbie, from across the street was killed by a car.� She ran across M-40 and was hit by a car.� She didn’t look, or didn’t comprehend the speed of the car.� She was seven.� I was at my aunt’s house at a sleep over and my oldest brother came over to tell me.� He tried to prepare me for bad revelation, but I was nonplussed by it.� I have always wondered why I didn’t feel more at the time.� When I was in my teens, a boy who was my bitterest enemy died and I mourned the loss for a long time.� Mostly I mourned not being able to apologize for all the ire and hate I had felt toward him.� JMan struggled with his feelings, knowing that he should feel sad and wondering why he didn’t feel sadder.

Bookzilla talked to her mom on the phone and then said she wanted to go to bed.� I went in to tuck her in and I wanted to say something to somehow connect to her.� I asked her if it seemed unfair that Monty was gone so quickly.� She said yes.� I said that I understood and that it was too young for her to have learned this lesson already.

After some reflection, I think I have better things to tell her.� I will tell her that Monty will live as long as she remembers him.� I will tell her that Monty will always be a part of her.� I will probably think of other things to tell her.

It was “Welfare for White People Day” today.  What?  You didn’t get yours?

NASA on Thursday gave a multibillion-dollar contract to build a manned lunar spaceship to Lockheed Martin Corp., the aerospace leader that usually builds unmanned rockets.The nation’s space agency plans to use the Orion crew exploration vehicle to replace the space shuttle fleet, take astronauts to the moon and perhaps to Mars. Unlike Apollo and earlier spacecraft perched atop rockets, it will be reusable. NASA estimated the cost at $7.5 billion through 2019 for likely eight separate spaceships.

That is almost $1 billion per spaceship.  Wanna bet that it goes to about $4 billion per and there are less than eight spaceships delivered?

Most goverment spending goes to the white middle class in the form of government contracts.  A majority of that money goes to Southern States.  I think I get it.

Keith Olbermann throws down on Rumsfeld. Nuff said.

Feeling morally, intellectually confused?

The man who sees absolutes, where all other men see nuances and shades of meaning, is either a prophet, or a quack.

Donald H. Rumsfeld is not a prophet.

Mr. Rumsfeld’s remarkable speech to the American Legion yesterday demands the deep analysis—and the sober contemplation—of every American.

(more…)

What is going on in Salt Lake City?

A crowd of thousands cheered Salt Lake City Mayor Rocky Anderson for calling President Bush a “dishonest, war-mongering, human-rights violating president” whose time in office would “rank as the worst presidency our nation has ever had to endure.”

The group - including children and elderly and some hailing from throughout Utah - then marched to the federal building Wednesday to deliver a copy of a symbolic indictment against the president and Congress for abuse of power and failure to uphold the U.S. Constitution.

Utah was the reddest of the red.  Mr. President, when you lose Utah, it is time to go into exile.

Bookzilla is sleeping comfortably now. Earlier, she was burning up. Fever in children can be alarming and it can come on so quickly. Two nights ago, she coughed a little after going to bed, but I didn’t think that much of it. Yesterday afternoon, when she came back from a day trip, I could see in her eyes that things weren’t right and touched her forehead to my cheek. Her forehead was warm, but not overly so.

I took her home and put her to bed. She slept for more than an hour. She got up and we sat on the couch watching a TV show. She looked sort of deflated. My kids are like that when they are sleeping or sick, like some of the life has gone out of them. I could tell that she was not appreciating the show’s humor and checked her temperature. 104.5, although the same thermometer had me at 97.3.

I got a washcloth and some ice water and put it on her forehead. My mom always did that for me when I had a fever. Bookzilla said it felt good. I don’t remember having fevers like my kids have. These fevers come on quickly and are gone in a day. These are body responses to viral infections, and it seems that my kids have them more often than I had them, or at least remember having them.

I put her to bed at 9 pm with a little ibuprofen. My theory is that the body elevates temperature to help antibodies hunt down and kill the viral agents, but that at some point, the elevated temperature needs to be brought down to help the patient sleep.

It is after 1am, I just checked her temperature, and it is down. If it were up again, I would stay awake and put cold cloths on her forehead. She seems to be sleeping well. I will keep her home later today so I can make sure that the virus is past.

Watching the kids, it seems that for each moment of crisis, the only thing that exists at that moment is the crisis. But they pass with time.

I’ll let the record speak for itself.  From Hardball:

TONY BLANKLEY, WASHINGTON TIMES:  Well, sure.  But I think, you know, the two interesting things about this, one, why didn‘t Colin Powell, if he didn‘t call the president and say hey my number two is the guy, the president was out there on a regular basis saying I didn‘t know who did it, we‘re going to try to get to the bottom of it, and the secretary of State knew because Armitage, according to this book which I‘m sure is accurate told him.  So, I mean, that‘s sort of an amazing fact, if in fact that did happen.

The other piece of it…

O‘DONNELL:  Meaning that Colin Powell should have given the president and the White House a heads up.

BLANKLEY:  The fact that Taft is, you know, a lawyer at the State Department called Gonzales and said we have got some information you might be interested in, as soon as Powell sees days and weeks later that Bush is still thrashing around saying I don‘t know who did it, wouldn‘t he get on the phone and say hey, boss, it‘s my guy who did it inadvertently?  Apparently there‘s no indication that ever happened.  So that‘s kind of a stunning phenomenon.

Blankley is out there trying to establish the idea that Bush was clearly not in the know about what was going on.  Bush is the titular head of government.  It is his responsiblility to know.  Blankley is trying to smear Powell by asserting that Bush was telling the truth.

The truth is that Bush was wrapped up in coverup and was trying to spin it.

As a parent, I am always on the lookout for teaching moments, those times when I can use an incident or question to make a point.  I try to use a socratic method, but that isn’t always possible.

Bookzilla is curled up on the sofa watching a Nova show on Katrina.  I can’t watch it because it will make me mad, and I don’t want to start the day mad.

I was able to tell her that one of the things that government is supposed to do is help those who need help during times of crisis and that the government failed the people during Katrina.

I rarely quote an entire post from another blog, but Kevin Drum says all that needs to be said. Take it away, Kevin.

TOO CLEVER BY HALF….Guess what? The end of the federal government’s fiscal year — September 30 — is rapidly approaching, and George Bush’s minions have had a brainstorm: federal bureaucrats should put off as many purchases as possible until October so that this year’s spending looks nice and frugal. After all, we don’t want any headlines about skyrocketing government spending just before the midterm elections!

Alternatively, if no actual purchases can be delayed, just delay payment for services already rendered. Like, say, for Medicare services:

The bureaucratic brainstorm was straightforward — simple-minded is, perhaps, a more appropriate description — don’t pay doctors, hospitals and their army of auxiliaries tending to indisposed old folks and the afflicted disabled for their labors in the last nine days of the current fiscal year. Instead, send them a check for what you owe them, sometime after the first of October, the start of the government’s fiscal ‘07. In essence, those doctors, hospitals et al. are making an involuntary loan of nine days’ pay without interest.

That way, point out the gleeful budgeteers and Medicare pooh-bahs, all of whom presumably are glowing with health, Uncle Sam’s Medicare tab this fading fiscal year will be $5.2 billion less than it otherwise would have been. Or at least would seem to be $5.2 billion less — in Washington, as we all know, appearance and reality are not invariably the same phenomena.

Apparently, these people genuinely think that no one has ever thought of this trick before. And they’re right, as long you don’t include every sales manager and CFO who’s ever lived. Needless to say, that $5.2 billion will get tacked right onto next year’s budget, so it’s not like we’re saving anything. It’s just that we don’t have any elections next year.

Honest to God, every time you think these guys can’t get any more puerile, they do. It’s like having a bunch of scheming high school freshmen running the country.

Newsweek has an article up about rebuilding levees in NOLA.  The article makes a point that the Dutch have been living with this for a long time and that most of the Netherlands is below sea level.  Here’s the wrap up.

Vrijling, for one, can’t understand what the Corps is going to study for so long. The technology already exists and has been tested over decades in the Netherlands. He says Dutch and American engineers, working together, would need only “a couple of months” to draw up a detailed plan. “If we had the will and one month’s money from Iraq, we could do all the levees and restore the coast,” says Ivor Van Heerden, a Louisiana State University hurricane scientist who warned for years about a Katrina-like disaster. “We can save Louisiana. It is very doable.”

Just one month’s money from Iraq.

Read the whole thing.

Sebastian Mallaby ends his op-ed piece with this:

By beating up Wal-Mart and forcing it to focus on public relations rather than opening new stores, Democrats are harming the poor Americans they claim to speak for.

Since it was his obvious starting point, read the whole thing to see how his logic bending gets him to this point. I would take it apart for you, but it is like hunting cows with a high powered rifle.

Update: I went back and read his column again, and this sentence appears in the first paragraph:

They (Democrats) understood the danger in bashing corporations: Voters don’t hate corporations, because many of them work for one.

Mr. Mallaby is obviously not acquainted with the finer points of “Take This Job And Shove It”.  What a moron.