That's One Hell of a Family Reunion!
I would encourage all who see this webpage to do a little bit of digging to make sure they are who they say they are, but so far I don't see any reason to think otherwise.

Is this election year polarized or what? But then again, I know lots of people who don't like their cousins.
- posted by Jon @ 8:38 AM

 
How Does He Do It?
I just don't get it.

In a warped way, this is almost admirable. Here's the guy saying that voting against him will leave the country vulnerable to terrorist attacks, and yet he accuses John Kerry of using scare tactics? In fact, in this same article, while Bush is talking about the others scaring voters, the evil mastermind is playing up the World Trade Center attacks in the campaign press junkets.

How does he get away so easily with accusing others of doing the things he does so well? How does he get away with blatantly falsifying his opponent's stance to make his look better? How is it people can't see it? Are people really buying this?

Well, if so, then maybe the USA deserves to have a Karl Rove, er, George W. Bush in charge. And while we're at it, maybe we can work Jerry Springer, Geraldo Rivera and the American Idol judges into the cabinet.
- posted by Jon @ 3:13 PM

 
R.I.P. Kal-El
Christopher Reeve died this past weekend.

In some ways, one couldn't be blamed for thinking this would never happen. He had seemingly been so tireless in resuming his life after his accident, in working for finding a cure for paralysis, in pushing others to perform research and supporting the cause. And after all, he had been Superman.

But in the end, life can be cruel and nine years after the accident that not just changed his life, but the world, he finally proved to be mortal. Still, in those nine years, he achieved what many wouldn't achieve in a lifetime. He pushed the boundaries. He gave people in the most hopeless of situations a new hope. And he made things happen that may not have happened without his presence.

Christopher Reeve vowed that he would walk again. It didn't happen, but he did fly. More importantly, he helped other people to fly with the inspiration he gave to them.
- posted by Jon @ 10:27 PM

 
Things Heating Up...Where The Hell Are We?
Yeah, I know...we're smack in the middle of debate season. There's a little over 3 weeks until the presidential electon. The "October Surprise" may have occurred with the latest report on Saddam's WMDs (or lack thereof). Bush says this. Kerry says that. FactCheck.ORG (not com, Mr. Vice President) keeps them in line. So where's all the new entries from us?

Gimme a break, eh? It's a lot to go over!

Or is it really? Although the two presidential debates have been different formats, Bush and Kerry, but mainly Bush, have repeated the same lines ad hoc. But while Kerry's repeated lines are done to deflect Bush's inaccurate attacks, Bush's repeats the same lines and attacks contained in his truth bending political commercials. If I hear him go off about "Wrong war, wrong place, wrong time" anymore, I'm going to have to pull an Elvis and blow up my TV screen.

Still, I do find the charges that Bush and company spin against Kerry to be disturbing. His campaign seems to think they've hit on a foolproof tactic: to use actual Kerry quotations against him. And it would be a great tactic too, if only they weren't taken so far out of context.

The Bush campaigners, and of course Bush himself seeing as he's George W. Bush and he approves these messages, seem to think that Americans will gladly take these things at face value. That when they see John Kerry say, "The winning of the war was brilliant," they won't know or bother to check that the whole quote was "I think they clearly have dropped the ball with respect to the first month in the after -- winning the war. That winning of the war was brilliant and superb, and we all applaud our troops for doing what they did, but you've got to have the capacity to provide law and order on the streets and to provide the fundamentally services, and I believe American troops will be safer and America will pay less money if we have a broader coalition involved in that, including the United Nations." That's a statement well within the boundaries of what Kerry claims his position has been all along.

Oddly and ironically enough, Dick Cheney gave Americans the key to seeing all these distortions by saying that going to factcheck.org will show how his relationship with Halliburton was misrepresented. But the funny thing is, the site will also reveal just how badly they also distorted John Kerry's statements.

Ultimately, there is one thing to consider. If these tactics of misrepresentation and exaggeration are the lengths George W. Bush will go to to achieve re-election, what do you think he might do, or might have done, to testimonies, reports and other documents to push forth an item on his presidential agenda?
- posted by Jon @ 11:53 PM