micah holmquist's irregular thoughts and links

Welcome to the musings and notes of a Cadillac, Michigan based writer named Micah Holmquist, who is bothered by his own sarcasm.

Please send him email at micahth@chartermi.net.

Holmquist's full archives are listed here.

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Sites Holmquist trys, and often fails, to go no more than a couple of days without visiting (some of which Holmquist regularly swipes links from without attribution)

Aljazeera.Net English
AlterNet (War on Iraq)
Alternative Press Review
Always Low Prices -- Always
Another Irani online
antiwar.com (blog)
Asia Times Online
Axis of Logic
Baghdad Burning (riverbend)
BBC News
blogdex.net ("track this weblog")
bobanddavid.com
BuzzFlash
The Christian Science Monitor (Daily Update)
Common Dreams
Cryptome
Cursor
Daily Rotten
DefenseLINK
Democracy Now
The Drudge Report
Eat the Press (Harry Shearer, The Huffington Post)
Empire Notes (Rahul Mahajan)
frontpagemag.com (HorowitzWatch)
globalsecurity.org
greenandwhite.com
Guardian Unlimited
Haaretz
The Independent
Information Clearing House
Informed Comment (Juan Cole)
Iranians for Peace

Iraq Dispatches (Dahr Jamail)
Iraqi Democrats Against Occupation
Iraq Occupation and Resistance Report (Psychoanalysts for Peace and Justice)
MetaFilter
MLive
Mr. Show and Other Comedy
The Narco News Bulletin (blog)
NEWSMAKINGNEWS
The New York Times
Occupation Watch
Political Theory Daily Review
Press Action
Project Syndicate
Raed in the Middle (Raed Jarrar)
random-abstract.com
Reuters
Salon
The Simpsons Archive
Simpsons Collector Sector
Slate
Sploid
Technorati ("search for mth.blogspot.com")
thi3rdeye
United States Central Command
U.S. Embassy Baghdad, Iraq
venezuelanalysis.com
War Report (Project on Defense Alternatives)
The Washington Post
Wildfire (Jo Wilding)
wood s lot
www.mnftiu.cc (David Rees)

Blogs that for one reason or another Holmquist would like to read on at least something of a regular basis (always in development)

Thivai Abhor
As'ad AbuKhalil
Ken Adrian
Christopher Allbritton
Alli
Douglas Anders
Mark W. Anderson
Aziz Ansari
Atomic Archive
Bagatellen
James Benjamin
Elton Beard
Charlie Bertsch
alister black
Blame India Watch
Blixa
Blog Left: Critical Interventions Warblog / war blog
Igor Boog
Martin Butler
Chris Campbell
James M. Capozzola
Avedon Carol
Elaine Cassel
cats blog
Jeff Chang
Margaret Cho
Citizens Of Upright Moral Character
Louis CK
Les Dabney
Dack
Natalie Davis
Scoobie Davis
The Day Job
Jodi Dean
Dominic Duval
Steve Earle
Eli
Daniel Ellsberg
Tom Engelhardt
Lisa English
Faramin
Barbara Flaska
Brian Flemming
Joe Foster
Yoshie Furuhashi
Al Giordano
Glovefox
Rob Goodspeed
Grand Puba
Guardian Unlimited Weblog
Pete Guither
The Hairy Eyeball
Ray Hanania
Mark Hand
harveypekar.com
Hector Rottweiller Jr's Web Log Jim Henley Arvin Hill Hit & Run (Reason) Hugo Clark Humphrey Indri The Iraqi Agora Dru Oja Jay Jeff Lynne d Johnson Dallas Jones Julia Kane Blues Benjamin Kepple Ken Layne Phil Leggiere Brian Linse Adam Magazine Majority Report Radio Marc Maron Josh Marshall Jeralyn Merritt J.R. Mooneyham Michael Scott Moore Bob Morris Bob Mould Mr. Show and Tell Muslims For Nader/Camejo David Neiwert NewPages Weblog Aimee Nezhukumatathil Sean O'Brien Patton Oswalt The Panda's Thumb Randy Paul Rodger A. Payne Ian Penman politx Neal Pollack Greg Proops Pro-War.com Pure Polemics Seyed Razavi Rayne Simon Reynolds richardpryor.com Clay Richards Mike Rogers Yuval Rubinstein
Steven Rubio
Saragon Noah Shachtman Court Schuett The Simpsons Archive Amardeep Singh Sam Smith Soundbitten Jack Sparks Ian Spiers Morgan Spurlock Stand Down: The Left-Right Blog Opposing an Invasion of Iraq Aaron Stark Morgaine Swann Tapped (The American Prospect) tex Matthew Tobey Annie Tomlin Tom Tomorrow The University Without Condition Jesse Walker Warblogger Watch Diane Warth The Watchful Babbler The Weblog we have brains Matt Welch
Alex Whalen
Jon Wiener
Lizz Winstead
James Wolcott
Wooster Collective
Mickey Z

Friday, June 17, 2005
 
A well thought out post that I most certainly did not make up as I went along

When I read about or see people like Ben Feguson and Ben Shapiro, I think my parents should have named me Benjamin and I should be a hack idiot. That way, I'd have been living the good life for a decade or so now.

These people aren't intelligent and they deserve to be laughed at every bit as much as the prez or Sean Hannity. I guess it really isn't fair to pick on them just because of their age, but to talk about being "fair" with them is perhaps the first mistake a person could make. Or maybe it is second behind agreeing with them.

Some examples of the intelligent thinking these two fine young men engage in and receive praise...

Ferguson's book It's My America Too: A Leading Young Conservative Shares His Views on Politics and Other Matters of Importance contains a chapter on the greatness of NASCAR that contradicts itself on why people love the spectator sport series. At one point, it is because everybody can relate to driving and at another it is because virtually nobody knows what it is like to drive that fast. Now potentially a singular argument could be made out of this, or Ferguson could say that different people enjoy it for different, even opposite reasons, but then Ferguson says people don't like watching basketball because they have played it, as if nobody watches basketball on tv or in person and everybody who has played a game or horse knows what it is like to dunk the ball or play in the NBA.

Ferguson goes on to say that NASCAR drivers aren't overpaid like say football players, as if NASCAR drivers don't make large amounts money, and wouldn't like more. I am probably giving too much credit to Ferguson, but assuming he has actually thought this out, I would have to conclude that he thinks incomes not being widely known means they are small.

Ferguson also suggests that NASCAR is all about going out and doing it at the competition and that coaches and such don't play as big of a role. Yeah right. Crew chiefs, mechanics and pre-race preparation are highly important

Part of me thinks Ferguson should just come out and say he likes the whiteness of the events, but I suspect that is just the liberal in me talking since I find auto racing to be boring.

Now there is Shapiro, who I think is an astute mind for wanting Palestinians to get the hell out of Dodge and for writing, "One American soldier is worth far more than an Afghan civilian." Most won't say the simple downhome red state things that he says even thought they are true.

Now he is promoting a book of his entitled Porn Generation: How Social Liberalism Is Corrupting Our Future. I haven't read the book but from the looks of things I have to once again give him credit for not solely blaming "Hollywood," but I do have to wonder how bad the problem is. Twenty years ago you could see Madonna's underwear on MTV. Now you can see Gwen Stefani's. Call me when she isn't wearing any.

***

I didn't mention this yesterday, but the real problem with Durbin's comments and most of what has been said in response is that it assumes America is so great that it is shocking that it or its representatives could ever do anything wrong. Yeah this is a perfect country and it always has been. Don't you know that historians have now proven neither slavery nor Native Americans ever existed in the land of the free.

***

Rush Limbaugh (June 16):

You know, everybody is talking about Senator Durbin... worried about the temperature at G'itmo, air conditioners being turned on and then turned off and the prisoners so beside themselves they're laying in the fetal position; they're pulling their hair out! I will tell you that no matter what. No matter what the temperature gets to at G'itmo, it's definitely cooler than it was at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco when the Clinton administration burned it to the ground. Come to think of it, I don't remember Durbin saying anything about that when it happened. He may have. I just don't remember it, and I think they blasted music for weeks when they tried to get the Branch Davidians to come out of that compound, did they not? And I thought they brought in big lights to shine on the compound during the night, all intended to keep them from sleeping. Didn't they do that at Waco? Where was Dick Durbin when this domestic torture was going on? These were US citizens the Clinton administration was targeting, including women and children and babies -- and they eventually burned them out with tanks, the Waco invasion... it was much hotter there than it ever is at G'itmo...
I can't find anything on Durbin commenting on the Branch Davidian siege via a quick google search for "waco" "branch davidian" "dick durbin" and Dems, like most people, generally weren't as angry about what happened on April 19, 1993 in Waco, Texas as they should have been, so Limbaugh is probably right and it is safe to assume that Durbin, who was in the U.S. House in 1993, is hypocritical.

Great one there Rush! You can't see that dirty deeds of the U.S. government due to being too busying bashing Democrats. Yep, it is only bad for the U.S. government to torture people when the Dems, not the GOP, are in power.

It is moments like this when I am really proud to say that I have never voted for a Democrat or Republican. Now if I can just convince more people to stop doing so.