Reason 1,347 Why I Love Michael Moore

?You’ve got the Bush Administration using [the events of 9/11] in such a disrespectful and immoral way,” he adds. “Using the deaths of those people to try and shred our civil liberties, change our Constitution, round people up. That’s not how you honor them, by using them to change our way of life as a free country.?

-Michael Moore on ’60 Minutes’ tonight

When is the last time anyone had the simple courage to just say that publicly? That the administration and their cronies are using the dead of 9/11 to advance their political agenda? We are so cowed, so afraid, that even that basic fact goes unsaid in public debate.

Go Mike.

Today I contributed $100 to the Howard Dean campaign. I must say, it’s one of the most positive things I’ve done in a while. I’ve never given any money to any political campaign, ever. But I love the upbeat, strong energy of Dean and his campaign, and it’s something I need right now. Getting rid of George W. Bush should be a high priority for anyone who cares about the future of this country, and I believe strongly that Dean is the guy to do it.

I love the fact that they peg fundraising to match (or exceed) similar efforts on the Republican side. It raises money, raises supporters’ consciousness about the importance of fundraising, and gives the right wing a poke in the eye. All good stuff.

The last six months have been overwhelmingly negative for this country. Let’s do something positive.

Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life

As I’ve said before, I’m one of the few people who actually enjoyed the first “Tomb Raider” movie. This one was widely promoted as being much better than the first, probably to bring in all those who thought the first was a steaming pile of dung but were willing to give it another go.

I’m not so sure.

This is definitely a more standard action picture, and director Jan de Bont (who was Paul Verhoeven’s cinematographer for years) knows how to give us bold visuals. Angelina Jolie’s face remains, at least for me, one of the wonders of the cinematic world. But I think it’s the movie’s slickness, its “professionalism” in terms of the action genre, that makes it less fun than the first. The tone is way too serious for the rather silly goings-on depicted on the screen.

It’s still entertaining, and better than most of the dreck that passes for “action movie” these days. But I missed the ramshackle funkiness of the original movie – not making fun of itself, but not taking anything too seriously, either. And none of de Bont’s action sequences has the swoopy, lyrical quality of Lara’s mansion bungee scene in the first movie, for example.

I would definitely see another “Tomb Raider” movie. But mostly for Angelina, not her all-too-uneven surroundings.

The fact that I loathe Bill Bennett should be obvious, considering I wrote one of my “100 Things” largely about him and his ilk:

39. I believe most of the world’s ills are caused by people who think they know what’s best for someone else.

So is it any wonder I sat seething before the television tonight, watching Bennett slither out from under his gambling problem by smacking softballs lobbed by Tim Russert.

After what could only be called a skillful dodging of the gambling question (“I’m just like everyone else”), Bennett felt free to pontificate on a range of issues. He mentioned 9/11 about five times when talking about Iraq, smiled with glee over the deaths of the Hussein brothers, said a president should be given the benefit of doubt in a war, and conceded that some gay people may lead relatively perversion-free lives, but that “marriage has been devalued enough without doing something else to weaken it.”

Hateful right-wing weasel.

Why does the President hate our flag so much?

Bumper stickers

Also over at DailyKos, they are coming up with bumper sticker ideas for the Bush/Cheney ’04 campaign. Some good ones:

Compassionate Colonialism
Are You With Us, or Against US?
“Re”-Elect Bush
Bush/Cheney 1984
Reselect the President
The Buck Stops Over There
Bush in ’04: Or Else
No Billionaire Left Behind
What Would Jesus Bomb?

and my favorite:

Thanks For Not Paying Attention!

Bush Approval: Raw Poll Data (from a comment on DailyKos)

Sometimes a picture *is* worth 1,000 words.

Sometimes when I’m tying my shoes, I think if I ever stop and think about what I’m doing – what the steps are – instead of just doing it automatically, I’ll forget how.

Joe Lieberman: Republican Tool.

In honor of the 2003 Bulwer-Lytton Contest winners announced last week, here’s one of my unsubmitted attempts at writing an entry:

The old grandfather clock in the oak-paneled hallway of Critchwick Manor intoned the hour, its haunting chime echoing along the parquet floor, out the stained glass window depicting the Battle of Agincourt and traveling down to the moors where Geoffrey stood, stalwart, his hazel eyes blazing as he thought of the lost years he had spent without his one true love Belinda, staring into the mist longingly for what seemed like an eternity before muttering at last to himself and no one else, “What the hell was that noise?”