I'm thinking something along the lines of "white turned brown," but haven't quite worked it out yet. If you can, please enter in the Comments.

(That's Cheney, in case it's not clear.)

A letter and response from Dan Savage's Savage Love column:

I'm probably the 6,715th person to alert you, but "santorum" was voted the "most outrageous" word of 2004 by the American Dialect Society (www.americandialect.org). One of the judges wrote this on Slate.com: "The Most Outrageous category is tricky; we never agree whether it's the word itself that's outrageous (typically for having some vulgar element, as in 2003's winner, cliterati, for 'prominent feminists') or the concept (as with 2002's neuticles, 'false testicles for neutered pets'). This year the strongest contender was santorum, defined (and heavily promoted) by sex writer Dan Savage--in a campaign to besmirch the name of right-wing Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum--as 'the frothy mixture of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex.' We dismissed one potential problem--that newspapers wouldn't print the term if it won--on the grounds that we shouldn't censor ourselves. And indeed, in the afternoon's voting, santorum did win, but many newspapers simply skipped this category in their coverage."

Congratulations on your success!

Wasting Time At Work


Thank you for the sweet note, WTAW, but Christian humility prevents me from taking credit for coming up with the new definition of santorum. My column was merely the platform from which santorum spewed forth. If congratulations are in order, let us congratulate the Savage Love reader who suggested I honor Sen. Rick Santorum by attaching a new definition to his name and the Savage Love reader who actually came up with the now-infamous "frothy mix" definition when I asked my readers for suggestions. And, of course, congratulations are in order for Sen. Rick Santorum. But for Rick's idiotic anti-sex statements, the frothy mix of lube and fecal matter that is sometimes the byproduct of anal sex would remain nameless to this day. Anyone interested in sending Senator Santorum a message of congratulations or thanks can e-mail him via his website--http://santorum.senate.gov--but e-mail, on an occasion like this, seems a little too informal, don't you agree? So I would like to encourage my readers to send cards and letters of congratulation and thanks to Sen. Rick Santorum, 511 Dirksen Senate Office Building, Washington, D.C. 20510. Rick is thinking of running for president in 2008 and I think we should all encourage him to do so, if only to get our hands on collectible "Santorum!" campaign T-shirts.

Bush and wife attend the "Freedom Ball."

Anyone prevented from bludgeoning gays in the head is obviously having his civil rights--if not his personal safety--violated.

Four members of a local Christian group, Repent America, are facing felony charges in connection with their behavior in the fall during the gay and lesbian community's annual Outfest celebration in Center City.

For allegedly trying to disrupt the event with their bullhorn-amplified, Scripture-based denunciations of homosexuality, they have been accused of criminal conspiracy, incitement to riot, and violating the state's law against hate crimes.

Several conservative Christian groups, including the American Family Association and Concerned Women for America, say the "Philadelphia Four" are being prosecuted solely for voicing their religious beliefs.

"This homofascism has come to our doorstep; it's in America," said Ralph Ovadal, head of Wisconsin Christians United, in a recent radio program. "Christians need to wake up and realize how quickly the walls are closing in on their religious liberties, on their religious duties to preach the gospel."
.....
"Jim Crow has been resurrected in Philadelphia, and instead of being targeted at African Americans, he is targeting Christians," Joe Murray, a lawyer with the American Family Association's Center for Law and Policy, said during a radio program that reminded listeners that Philadelphia is the home of the Abscam scandal and the MOVE bombing.

"If this city were built on a swamp, I'd say it needs to be drained," Murray said, "because it's a dirty city."

Liberals: there they go again with their intrusive, deadly smothering and coddling of our brave men and women in uniform.

The latest meddling from Bill Richardson:

The Governor is proposing that the state pay for $250,000.00 worth of life insurance for every active member of the New Mexico National Guard. The initiative is called the “Taking Care of Our Own” plan. New Mexico will be the first state in the nation to offer this benefit.

How dare Richardson deny the troops their God- and America-given opporunity, after blowing up some raghead carcass and getting maimed in the process, to return home crushed and impoverished and live out their days conversing with Christ via DT hallucinations in an Albuquerque gutter?

How dare he deny the families of slaughtered troops their right to give thanks to Christ and Bush for the godly elimination of their loved one and live out their days in honorable American destitution?

"Death benefit," "tax credit" my ass...What's next? Mandatory gay marriages for every active duty member of the New Mexico National Guard?

Giuseppe Abote writes:

Let me try to keep up with the latest troll spin on this.

1998: Clinton rains cruise missiles on unimportant man named bin Laden; overreacted to embassy bombings in reckless attempt to distract nation from impeachment.

2001: Clinton never recognized the obvious threat to national security posed by '98 embassy bombings; lobbed a handful of pathetic missiles at empty tent like a pussy.

2005: Clinton never even struck at bin Laden in 1998; missiles aimed solely at purported WMD facilities; a collossal error worse than 9/11 and the botched occupation of Iraq.

...what next, trolls?

2006: Clinton pressed launch button while climaxing during oral sex with Lewinsky; damning Whitewater papers and murdered corpse of Vince Foster smuggled in nose cones.

2007: Missiles were not explosives; contained secret plans for joint al Qaeda-Democratic Party terrorist strikes.

2009: Fusillade was aimed at Christ himself; Slick Willie celebrated the bloodbath by conducting a gay wedding.

Well, as CNN (as well as NPR) says, "some Democrats used the opportunity to ask her tough questions." Oh, really? Like, who asked, Why is literally everything that comes out of your twisted little mouth a fucking murderous lie? Why can sounds not emerge from the hole in your lizard-face without human bodies being blown to gristle and bones ground to meal in the jaws of death-machines?

OK, so there was this:

California Sen. Barbara Boxer questioned Rice aggressively before the panel broke for lunch, suggesting her loyalty to Bush and her mission to defend the war in Iraq "overwhelmed your respect for the truth."

Rice bristled at the comment. "I have to say that I have never, ever, lost respect for the truth in the service of anything," she said.

She later told Boxer, "I really hope that you will refrain from impugning my integrity."

What fucking integrity? What about the "inconceivability" of commerical airplanes being used as terrorist missiles? What about the goddamn mushroom-cloud-as-smoking-gun? What about "Bin Laden Determined to Strike Inside U.S."? Why is this woman who allowed 9/11 to happen being promoted to Secretary of State, and confirmed by the Congress?

When is Rice's trial for perjury going to begin?

Democrats make me sick, sick, sick. Fuck these Senators. None of them are ever getting another dime from me.

Not One Dime Day

From Bill Moyers

Since our religious leaders will not speak out against the war in Iraq, since our political leaders don't have the moral courage to oppose it, Inauguration Day, Thursday, January 20th, 2005 is "Not One Damn Dime Day" in America.

On "Not One Damn Dime Day" those who oppose what is happening in our name in Iraq can speak up with a 24-hour national boycott of all forms of consumer spending. During "Not One Damn Dime Day" please don't spend money. Not one damn dime for gasoline. Not one damn dime for necessities or for impulse purchases. Not one damn dime for nothing for 24 hours.

On "Not One Damn Dime Day" please boycott Wal-Mart, K-Mart, Target.... Please don't go to the mall or the local convenience store. Please don't buy fast food (or any groceries at all for that matter). For 24 hours do what you can to shut the retail economy down.

The object is simple. Remind the people in power that the war in Iraq is immoral and illegal; that they are responsible for starting it and that it is their responsibility to stop it. Not One Damn Dime Day" is to remind them, too, that they work for the people of the United States of America, not for the international corporations and K Street lobbyists who represent the corporations and funnel cash into American politics.

"Not One Damn Dime Day" is about supporting the troops. Now 1,200 brave youngAmericans and (some estimate) 100,000 Iraqis have died. The politicians owe our troops a plan - a way to come home. There's no rally to attend. No marching to do. No left or right wing agenda to rant about. On "Not One Damn Dime Day" you take action by doing nothing.

You open your mouth by keeping your wallet closed. For 24 hours, nothing gets spent, not one damn dime, to remind our religious leaders and our politicians of their moral responsibility to end the war in Iraq and give America back to the people.

Please share this email with as many people as possible. Commercial speech must not be the only free speech in America.

Bill Moyers

Judges who have special gold embroideries sewn into their robes are scary enough.

Judges whose special gold robe-embroideries happen to be of the ten commandments are really, really fucking scary.

But what about prosecutors--the guys who actually do the work to get people convicted? Jeffrey Toobin's New Yorker article "Killer Instincts" (note: PDF file)--about corrupt murderer and major asshole Kenneth Peasley, a now-disbarred prosecutor in Pima County, Arizona--planted some very disturbing notions in my mind. Peasley was indicted for deliberately falsifying evidence in a capital triple-murder case which resulted in death sentences for three defendents. Two of the men received new trials, but one of them--Martin Soto-Fong--is still on death row. The deal with Peasley was a combination of intense personal hatred for the defendents, intense ego, and intense hubris. If he knew the guy was guilty and deserved to die, why shouldn't he bend the evidence a little here and there in order to win the verdict that we wanted? He knew he was right. Etc. etc.

Now, there's probably little doubt Peasley is a Republican, or at least a neo-fascist. He's certainly not a "faith-based" person (except insofar as he has faith in the infallibility of his own prosecutorial instincts). But his story planted an image in my mind, of a whole new generation of Christianist prosecutors, trained at Bob Jones University Law School or whatever, who go out into the world to win death sentences against criminals, who see themselves as serving God's Divine Death-Justice, and who see the petty details of the law as subordinate to that Justice? Lawyers who pray on a case, and receive direct personal revelation, from God, of a client's guilt?

I have no knowledge that such a state of affairs has come to pass...but just imagine.