July 12, 2004
IN LOCAL NEWS
SUNDAY: 12 innings, sunburned knees, a new plastic batting helmet, a previously owned, gently used (way too gently—12 innings, dog!) game ball generously lobbed our way by outfielder Rolo Avila, but no win. Sam's theory: "DJ Boston is on the disabled list, so nobody could hit a home run!"
Reading this, I realize I will never have to read a whole bunch of other things, even though I have no idea what those things are. Those four people who have been maintaining that New York is not morphing into LA will have to step up their game severely if they want to be taken seriously.
MONDAY: Our reflex is to hate but today we congratulate. Serializing a novel, for free, is dope. And I can't hate on this year's choices.
But my hate runs alongside my love like one of those ill-fated bad guys shadowing Bond's Hovercraft, poised to jump aboard and get smoked by Jimbo's Personal Utility Rocket. On today's Brian Lehrer show, two pollsters, one Republican and one Democrat, were being quizzed on news that Tom Ridge is fitna to bumrush the election in the case of terrorist attack. (Before I hate, it bears mentioning that his request is procedurally appropriate. There are provisions in state law for delaying elections in extraordinary circumstances, but nothing on the books to address chaos surrounding federal elections. [At least this time they're asking permission to countryjack us, one's imaginary friend thinks in a moment of cold comfort.] And, as Madrid suggests, a terrorist attack will affect election results. Since the easy money is on Bush if shit blows up in early November, a postponed election would likely not benefit Bush.)
Lehrer asks the Democlaat if strategists are gaming out the odds for a post-attack election and, if so, who they pick to reap the biggest benefit. The dishwater donkey offers the same Clintonian demurral he's dropped twice already—"I am sure all three of us here today hope and expect that the elections will proceed as planned"—and then adds that he doesn't know a "single strategist" imagining contingencies like terorrist attacks and cancelled elections. One can only conclude the strategists he pals about with LIVE IN FUCKING CANDYLANDISTAN. Who isn't thinking about outcomes like this?
I can only hope things get better when Ned Sublette appears today on Leonard Lopate. His book, Cuba And Its Music, is a fricking monsterpiece and his pre-publication preaching at the 2003 EMP was some elevated shit.
I have to wait till erybody—I mean ERYBODY—is out of the house before I can put on Jacki-O.
