1. Human Intelligence from Motown: The Detroit Red Wings' (hockey team, for you cynics) owner is talking publicly about maybe building a new arena near the places where the Tigers and Lions play, in upper downtown Detroit.

2. QB Brett Favre looks as if he could become the Roger Clemens (baseball) of football. Brett can come back somewhere, and pitch. But if I owned a team, I would invest in a promising 22-year-old instead.

(But I am far from owning a football team. If I could afford a football team, I probably would field a fencing squad instead, and spend the rest of my dough on drumsets and pitching machines.)

If you and I had a conversation, I might say that I am a Christian. But if I did not use these exact words: "I have accepted Jesus Christ as my personal lord and savior," you might scoff. If you were a 21st century American christianist, you would scoff.

And, if I did not say this christianist cliche in the following accent: "Ah hay-uv ayyukseptud Jaysuz Krahst ay-uz mah persnul lo-wurd ay-und sai-vyur," you probably would suspect me, at the least.

These cliche words do not appear in the Bible, and this comfortable HICKY accent has nothing to do with anything. (Jesus spoke Aramaic, Hebrew, and probably Greek.)

I cringe when I hear (e.g.) G.W. Bush say, "Ahmo," when he means, "I am going to." I die inside when I hear ignorant American talk show callers talk about Jesus as if He were Dale Ernhart III.

I myself have an arguably HICKY northern American accent, but I have learned some grammar, and have tried hard to communicate.

These idiot christianists and right-wingers might do the same. But they have not done so. They flaunt their cliches and their ignorance and their lack of learning as if it were More American and More Christian.

Barf!

Kind of grumpy, though. Andrew Leonard, are you English? We think you are an American who lives in California. Did you pick up "on holiday" when you lived in Hong Kong? (possibly a legitimate excuse)

Do you say, "Happy Christmas," or "Merry Christmas?" Do you pronounce your Rs? How do you say your vowels? Does your "English" fall within the guidelines of the Patriotic American Official-English-Language-Only movement?

Inquiring noses want to know.

P.S. I am thinking about changing my Poster Name to "MISTER GRUMPEE (tm) - He knows EVERYTHING, and EVERYTHING makes him GRUMPY!" c. 2006 by timbuktom. What do you think? aMERRYcan CHRISTmas, all you True Patriots!

Please just look at this guy when he appears on TV. He sweats, grins, and drops names. Maybe he is smart compared with the nice older, simple man who bags groceries or G.W. Bush, but come on, you guys!

He never could get the nomination, never even could come close.

A few Republican Conventions ago, I remember seeing him giving a speech, looking straight into the TV camera, grinning and lying. Obviously lying. Even he knew he was lying. No pretense about lying.

He believes lying is happily normal. He has admitted as much, and he believes that anyone who does not realize that (about lying) is simple-minded.

Everybody who ever has spent five minutes listening to him already is bored with him. Nobody except maybe the nice older, simple man who bags groceries and G.W. Bush ever would pay sustained attention.

..and we have good-but-Off-Topic ideas? Okay:

If any kid in your family joins the US Army (Marines, Navy, Air Force, Coast Guard), the Army (etc.) could order your kid to torture somebody.

And then the kid could be arrested and court-martialed, and maybe tortured, if he or she refused the order.

I have ten nieces and nephews who are just the right ages for the military. None of them have joined up. They have good jobs and good scholarships and high school to finish, and so on.

Plus, nobody in the Timbuk family encourages them to join. My nephew TimbukHank is much better off in Kalamazoo than in Faloojah.

What the heck are we going to do if they bring back the military draft? This is NOT like Vietnam. During Vietnam, most of us went, because our country asked, and because everybody else had to go too. Now, it appears that Tio Torture is asking, rather than Uncle Sam.

Canada is not just for cowards anymore.

Good Article + Great Posts!

1. W. Bush may well set off a nuke, maybe one of those mega-bunker-busters, against the Iranian nuclear facilities. He has nothing holding him back. He has nothing, actually, except two more years. Only a refusal by the military could stop him.

So, please impeach him. During the course of W. Bysh's impeachment, we will pick up enough evidence to nail Cheney too.

2. Great Posts Here: cbzd's all-but-poetry; USERNAME reminding us about Ross Perot, and making us wonder if maybe Bush has naughty pictures of Al Gore and John McCain as well; wmhoog on religion, but keep in mind that the fundamentalists are infinitely gullible; and Dave Robinson For President!

...but it was a different time in the USA. Jerry did not start any wars. He let one war end.

I was the only proto-Yuppie in the whole city of New York who voted for Jerry Ford, because he was my old Congressman from Michigan. The Wall Streeters tolerated me as an exotic species back then, as they now tolerate Chinese and Indian immigrants.

Probably, it was better to pardon Nixon for his petty burglary, to let us move on. But now we need to impeach and imprison for gross torture, perjury, and malfeasance, to let us move on.