An Author's Perspective

3 New Fiction Stories

2008-05-08T22:42:37Z

Greetings, all! For those of you not in the know, my first short story collection is coming out next year courtesy of Brown Paper Publishing . In the meantime, each of the short stories is going to be published in their literary journal, which you can either purchase or download. The journal looks great, but for those who prefer to read on their computers, the publisher also provides each of the featured story online at no charge. If you want to purchase the print journal, click here . For those...(read more)

Who's Serving Our Troops?

2008-05-04T14:05:31Z

It's time to sit down and have a very frank talk about the contractors responsible for servicing our troops in Iraq. Thus far, America as a whole has generally looked the other way on a variety of issues, choosing quiet outrage when tens of billions of taxpayer dollars go missing, when reports of rape in companies in Iraq pop up, when reports of contractors playing football with bricks of hundred-dollar bills (more taxpayer money) show up, etc. I could go on. I could, really! It's not that...(read more)

Al Franken: Tax Dodger?

2008-04-30T14:37:32Z

At first, looking at the most current information by the Republican Party (and from incumbant Republican Senator Norm Coleman himself), it looks like Al Franken is a tax dodger, a hypocritical liberal who has gone out of his way to not pay his taxes. Even CBS picked up the story from the Politico and it suggests that this could possibly be a problem. There's only one problem: Al did pay all of his income taxes, he just did it in the wrong state. And here's another thing: why, exactly, would...(read more)

Sean Penn is an Idiot

2008-04-28T14:28:39Z

Sure, Sean Penn's a great actor, but when it comes to other issues, he's about as dense as granite (that means "very" if Sean Penn happens to be reading this). He's going around the country as we speak talking about the wonders of biofuels. Biofuels are nothing to write home about. At the stage they're currently in, they're not very energy efficient and they have a tendency to drive up the costs of other food-based products. Is there potential? Absolutely. In fact, with...(read more)

The Island of Garbage

2008-04-25T01:48:30Z

To be fair, it's mostly an island of plastic. And if you've heard about it, you're one of the few. Despite the fact that this particular island is twice the size of Texas , very few people even know it exists, unless you live on a shore in the western Pacific Ocean where the garbage has a tendency to wash ashore on. How was it created? Natural ocean currents have a tendency to gather the garbage from various parts of the Pacific Ocean and take all of it to one particular place, where...(read more)

Earth Week: The Denial

2008-04-22T18:03:35Z

I'm going to write about this once more later in the week, but for now take a look at this link: How Do We Know Humans Are Causing Global Warming? The point of this particular post is mainly a very simple argument and that is this: nothing short of catastrophe will convince the skeptic movement at this point. It's literally impossible. The IPCC, in their eyes, is one big bureaucratic conspiracy, and the scientific "establishment" is flat-out wrong. There will never be enough evidence...(read more)

Earth Day/Week: The Inhofe 400

2008-04-21T23:07:44Z

Let's talk about Global Warming Denial within the U.S. Congress, specifically Senator Inhofe. For those of you who don't know Senator Inhofe, he gained a lot of media attention for releasing the "Inhofe 400," a list of 400 scientists who allegedly believed global warming was false. There's only one problem: most of the 400 have been thoroughly debunked. Not only have a majority of the scientists been completely debunked for various reasons, still more are actually coming out...(read more)

Some Earth Day/Week Articles

2008-04-21T03:40:46Z

Given it's Earth Day/Week (depending on who you talk to), I thought I'd pick out a few of the best articles I've found on Climate Progress that might be of interest. NY Times Magazine -- ... is full of junk. Don't bother reading it, and by the way those little articles about global warming you see occasionally? Try to avoid those, too. What relatively little journalism remains at this point is focused entirely on Obama's "bitter" comments. This is a good article for...(read more)

Weekend Homework #5

2008-04-18T16:24:59Z

Well, here we go! It's time for the weekend homework, and this week I'm going to provide you with a number of links to Web sites that you can use again and again. I'll try and do this again in the future, but for now, this will give you a great head start. Bookmark these. Climate Progress -- Run by a scientist who's actually conducted empirical research on global climate change, this is a great resource. He's funny, intelligent and has no problem calling out Democrats or Republicans...(read more)

Bush's War

2008-04-10T17:39:46Z

Patriotism is not blindly following leaders. Patriotism means finding the truth and always questioning, no matter what. What's happening in Iraq belongs to the Bush administration. No presidential administration will ever come close to this one, but that won't stop neoconservative historians from whitewashing history. I strongly encourage you to watch Bush's War on Frontline. Know the truth behind this war, and understand that the Bush administration will not fix this problem. The Bush...(read more)

McCain's MLK "mistake"

2008-04-07T03:10:00Z

John McCain's vote against Martin Luther King Day was no mistake, and you need to understand this because race plays a BIG role in the modern conservative movement. It plays a big role because the modern conservatives first began in the late 50's to play on the racism of white Americans in order to turn what was once a very tiny sliver of the Republican Party into what we now know as the GOP. There was a time, in the mid-fifties, where white voters in the south were just as likely to vote...(read more)

Dissecting a Hit Piece

2008-04-03T14:11:39Z

Let's have a little fun today. Today we're going to take a look at a conservative hit piece in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and we're going to dissect it. We're going to take it apart and examine it much in the same way you might examine a frog in Science class. Why do we examine frogs in science class? Why, to learn from them, of course! So it goes with this particular editorial. We're going to learn about it so we can more readily identify hit pieces in the future (and there...(read more)

Tales of a Fragile Surge

2008-03-25T16:52:58Z

The total count of American soldier deaths in Iraq has officially reached 4,000. While John McCain runs around the country convincing people the war in Iraq is going well (and having quite a few "senior moments" to boot), the reality on the ground is much, much different. The fact of the matter is the "surge" is creating some decreased level of violence in Baghdad, and this makes sense: when you put 30,000 more troops in an area, obviously things are going to improve. But what...(read more)

McIlheran's Follies

2008-03-23T22:52:51Z

I think from now on I'm just going to dedicate my Sunday post to correcting the flaws in columnist Patrick Mcilheran's editorials. Why? Because there are so many, of course! That's flaws, not editorials, for those of you slightly confused. This week, Patrick made the same dubious claim that there was a connection between al-qaeda and Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Let me state something unequivically to you: Patrick MciIheran is a liar. He is flat-out lying to you and I'm not afraid to...(read more)

5 Years in Iraq

2008-03-20T20:40:56Z

There's not better way to celebrate the 5-year anniversary of the illegal Iraq Occupation than with a birthday cake of truth. Yes, fine citizens, it's time for you to come to grips with the painful truth that often coincides with this particular type of mistake. In this, case, the mistakes came from our so-called "experts" on the Middle East who helped cheerlead us into war. No doubt you know a lot of people right now who still argue that, given the facts involved, the U.S. had...(read more)

Barack Obama

2008-03-18T18:26:00Z

So far, the most outrageous "scandal" to hit the Obama campaign has been his relationship with a man by the name of Tony Rezko, and the Clinton campaign has gone out of its way to make the most of this. There's only one problem: Obama has no problem confronting this "scandal." Not only has he confronted it, he's gone out of his way to PROVE his innocence. Recently, he sat down with dozens (dozens!) of reporters at the Chicago Tribune and literally answered EVERY question...(read more)

Newt Gingrich Fun

2008-03-17T19:36:23Z

If you've been to a Starbucks in the past year, you've probably noticed that each cup has a quote from a celebrity or quasi-celebrity (or just an interesting person). Why Starbucks asked Newt Gingrich to contribute to this program is beyond me, but I think it's worth a laugh. And given the current state of our financial system, I think we could all use a laugh right now. Here's his quote: "On the battlefield of ideas, winning requires moving toward the sound of the guns."...(read more)

Weekend Homework #4

2008-03-14T19:57:50Z

It's nice out, so spend some time outside. But it's going to rain this weekend, too, and before you turn on your TV set and kill a few more brain cells, catch up on these particular treats (I even included a video to help you cope with all the words!) House passes FISA legislation -- And not only that, it DOES NOT include immunity for the Telecom Companies. Immunity was almost a guarantee until people started getting active and making phone calls and sending out emails. If you were a part...(read more)

Live From Darfur ...!

2008-03-12T21:08:48Z

... It's Thom Hartmann ! Yes, that's right: Air America Radio's most popular liberal radio host is going to be broadcasting LIVE from Darfur this Friday. Unfortunately, those living in Milwaukee know better than most just how horrible it can be to be stuck with nothing for blow-hard conservatives on the radio (Mark Belling and Charlie Sykes, just to name a few). The good news? You can listen to Thom Hartmann for FREE just by going to AirAmerica.com. Here are the details: When: Friday...(read more)

Condi Rice and Osama bin Laden

2008-03-09T16:32:29Z

What's the connection between the two, you ask? Well, for starters, they're both extremely incompetent. Make no mistake about it, Osama bin Laden is an egomaniac with relatively low intelligence when it comes to terrorism (he was NOT the mastermind of the 9/11 attacks. He funded them and gave his "blessing," and little else). To learn more about just how fallible al-Qaeda truly is, I suggest you pick up a copy of The Looming Tower by Lawrence Wright. The book outlines al-Qaeda's...(read more)