Excuse me, I have to go floss. I have steak in my teeth.

11:12:40 PM     leave/read comments []

Spread the news, wake the children and lock up your neighbors!

We at the High Hat are thrilled to buck the odds to deliver this, our third issue. Although we are not on any kind of regular schedule, establishing a regular publication schedule is a goal for 2004, as is a print anthology of the first year.

This issue marks the first High Hat in which we have dropped our political Screeds department in favor of a new section for special features, Potlatch. The Potlatch department for this issue contains Top Tens for 2003 from some of our regular writers as well as a first-time contributor. The Algonquin Kids[base '] Table for Issue #3 will be devoted to discussion of these and other Top Ten lists. We hope you enjoy the lists and the discussion. -from the editors

9:24:50 PM    

Sometimes, you just gotta have it.

9:13:49 PM     leave/read comments []

Vanity Fair article: John Ashcroft is nuts. Mike Harris sez: Vanity Fair article on John Ashcroft from February 2004 issue. Among other things, describes how Ashcroft fears calico cats, how he attended opponent Mel Carnahan's funeral against the family's wishes, how Ashcroft's dad put him at the controls of a plane with no training at age 8, and how parts of Justice Department boilerplate were altered because they conflicted with the Seven Deadly Sins."

Link [Boing Boing Blog]

7:47:47 PM    

Campaign Chairman Lies About Bush Volunteering For Viet Nam

It's amazing how easily the Big Lies flow from the Bush Campaign.

Just when you start debating how much or whether the president's military service record should be an issue in this campaign, you realize that the main reason it's  an issue is that the president and his surrogates just won't stop lying about it.

This morning Bush campaign chairman Marc Racicot was interviewed by Juan Williams on NPR. When asked about the president's Air National Guard service he said, the president's and John Kerry's service "compare very favorably... He (i.e. the president) signed up for dangerous duty. He volunteered to go to Vietnam. He wasn't selected to go, but nonetheless served his country very well..."

He volunteered to go to Vietnam?

Marc, no he didn't.

Does he think no one is listening?

(For some reason Williams, made no effort to call him on it.)

Let's set aside the fact that pulling strings to get into the Air National Guard in 1968 is, on its face, quite the opposite of volunteering to go to Vietnam. When the president signed up for the National Guard there was a check box asking whether he wanted to volunteer for overseas service. And he checked off "do not volunteer."

You know, maybe folks should contact The NPR Ombudsman and let him know that you don't like journalists that are complicit in spreading such heinous propaganda.

Link props to Radio Daisy Pad

4:59:46 PM     leave/read comments []

Japanese crown princess 'exhausted'.  [BBC News ]The Japanese heir to the throne says his wife is feeling the relentless pressure to produce a male child. [Nippon Goro Goro]

Um, folks......it's the father's, um....contribution, that determines the sex of a child.

Of course, this wouldn't even matter if the Japanese monarchy weren't utterly misogynistic.

In comments made on his 44th birthday on Monday, the heir to the Japanese throne said the princess was suffering from the accumulated burdens of motherhood, her official duties and the relentless pressure to produce a second, male child.

....

The lack of a male heir to succeed Crown Prince Naruhito has prompted some politicians to suggest changing the rules to allow a female to succeed to the throne.

But the government is reluctant to start a debate which might call the very existence of the monarchy into question.

Under Japan's post-World War II constitution the Emperor has no political power but the institution is still venerated by many Japanese.

2:32:57 PM