Yesterday, the 4th of July, was my wife's birthday.  She says she was about 9 before she figured out that all the parties and fireworks weren't just for her, but doing the red-white& blue on the 4th  has always been her favorite.  We live close to Yorktown, less than 10 minutes on a normal day, so we took our newly 2-year-old daughter to for the festivities.  After the several minor mishaps that always happen when travelling with children, a democrat-hating store finally pushed us over the edge and we went home to drink our own Pabst Blue Ribbons.  

Looking at the (tag:SOTU) diaries tonight and the comments attached, it seemed like they could be so much more useful if we had a way to comment directly on the text.  The information war is asymmetrical: The president can give a speech to millions, but responses from the many  are hard to find.  We can change that.  

This can be done with the Scoop commenting interface.  In threading mode, it allows for fine-grain criticism of the written text of a speech and provides opportunity to make sure every bit gets documented, examined, criticised and challenged.  We have enough eyes and a set of varied enough interests that we could write some good diaries on every part of it.  

If we used something like this to focus the energy we put into commenting, we could collaboratively produce relevant criticism to the entirety of the speech.

I know gas prices have fallen recently, but energy is still important.  And driving is still a significant chunk of it.  Maybe a good way to think about the costs of driving around and to put it in front of people's faces is to post what it costs.

Driving in my Subaru cost me $22.93 for my last 250.5 mile tank.  I divided it out by 2293/250.5=9.153 c/mi and wrote it on the back of my receipt and taped it to my window.  It is a small thing, but it keeps me mindful of what I'm spending on driving wherever I go and maybe it would help others think of their driving.

Maybe a money/distance metric would help the Hummer drivers feel like the losers they are (220 c/gal / (10mi/gal)=22 c/mi) and help people think more about what driving costs. (Oh: I can walk to my polling place for free, but we all need to do whatever we can to get this 655,000+/-300K genocidal administration out of office.)

Back during the Codpiece Strut, the headlines were touting the end of the war, with the Whitehouse itself pushing its message:

President Bush Announces Combat Operations in Iraq Have Ended  --whitehouse

On serving in the White House:

Don't divide the world into "them" and "us" Avoid infatuation with or resentment of the press,  the Congress, rivals, or opponents. Accept them as facts. They have their jobs and you have   yours.

On life:

First law of holes: If you get in one, stop digging. -- (Anonymous)

Keeping your bearings:

Don't think of yourself as indispensable or infallible. As Charles De Gaulle said, the cemeteries  of the world are full of indispensable men.

For one thing, the list makes clear that today’s Donald Rumsfeld has to be the Bizarro-opposite-guy to whoever wrote these rules. -- David Brin

I live in a red state.  We do have a Dem governor, but I've got George Allen, John Warner, and Jo Ann Davis as my national representation, and it gets worse as it gets more local.  I see no hope of ousting them, and from their responses to my letters, I understand my concerns are of no concern to them.

Would becoming a Republican In Name Only and working to make my de facto representation represent me be better than standing on the sidelines with the Democrats?

CNN's inane poll earned recommended diary and I at least needed an antidote to:

Why do you think John Kerry wants to filibuster Samuel Alito?  

Conviction      40%  

Politics      60%  

So, Why do you think Bush wants the Iraq War?

Darksyde had a fantastic Santa diary that tapped a nerve on dKos about atheism.  It earned 500+ comments disputing atheism , agnostiscism, religion and all.  Wade in.

What I want to know here is how atheists raise their children to be good atheists.  How that is done in other religions is easy compared to atheism.  Our society is not supportive of atheism.  We athiests can't lazily go to atheist temple each week and enroll our kids in bible-skepticism class, and expect some atheist preacher to counsel them.   Values are political:

I know there's lots of diaries on Bush's 35% job approval rating, but what I want to know is who these people are.

Some live around me (66% Bush voters here in VA-01), but I'm seeing lots less "W'04" and ribbon magnets.

As Digby said, he's already lost the anti-torture, anti-dictator, anti-gulag votes.

Who is left? Corporate piggies? Fundies? The stupid? Warmongers? Satanists?  What would it take for Bush to lose what's left of his base.

I expect the media to give us a bunch of dumb suggestions about what the democrats should do.  

What Scathingly Dumb Ideas(tm) are they going to suggest?

The above (if it's an ImageShack frog, click through to see "Superhero Tim Kaine, the Taxman!) is the fourth such mailing Jerry Kilgore has sent me.

And the fourth spur for me to send more money to Tim Kaine through http://raisingkaine.com/.  Don't get mad, get even: Support your candidates!

I just donated another $10 to Tim Kaine's campaign through http://raisingkaine.com/ because I hate the glossy fliers I get from his opponent.  This one is the third different negative mailing I received from Jerry Kilgore:

-- (Wow. I thought the thumbnail would hold up, but there's lots of Kossacks. No matter, click the frog and it will show you the kilgore ad anyway) (Note that the 327 is photoshopped in, but the ARM & LEG may not be.

I urge you to try something similar -- For every rotten ad by your republican's campaign, donate a few bucks to the person you want to win.  Advertising execs says advertising pays.  Make advertising cost.

The rest of the flyer is below the fold, if you care to see.

There are thousands of post-hurricane, High resolution NOAA satellite pics at the following links.

http://ngs.woc.noaa.gov/katrina/

http://ngs.woc.noaa.gov/katrina/KATRINA0000.HTM is the index map,

http://ngs.woc.noaa.gov/katrina/089I30C_KATRINA.HTM has Bay St Louis, MS

http://ngs.woc.noaa.gov/katrina/090I29O_KATRINA.HTM has some NO.

And on this pic off Grand Isle, http://ngs.woc.noaa.gov/storms/katrina/24415548.jpg up near the bridge you can see "HELP' spelled out on the road a few times.

The graphics are huge, and High resolution, but if you know your way around NO, you might be able to see places you care about.

It looks awful.

I'm not happy about it, but this administration, that hasn't been able to admit any mistakes isn't really planning on substantially leaving Iraq.  Democratic alternate success plans aren't what they think they need, and they aren't going to change the course.  They think they are doing just fine, and they just need to stay the course.  

Like unsustainable tax cuts intended to drown the government in debt, the quagmire of Iraq is part of some grand strategy that, if only we were irrevocably committed to, would achieve world domination for the US for years to some.

I just read a bit about Rumsfeld's 10-30-30 strategy for military action. Google: 10-30-30+iraq

• 10 days to seize the initiative
  
• 30 days to defeat the enemy
  
• 30 days to redeploy

I hadn't seen this timetable before, and I wonder if it was something I missed.

What do you think of "Catch Osama?" on a tshirt, bumpersticker, etc?

I'd like to pimp a couple old diaries of mine:

Diary categorization works now -- A community hack for organizing dKos.  --  Examples:

* CategoryAction

Insty-fliers from dKos Diaries -- A simple hack for disseminating dKos work outside of the internets on paper. -- Examples:

* Flyer: American "Ghost Detainee"

Why do I think these diaries of mine merit pimping?....

Senator George Allen (R-VA) sent me the response below in reply to my plea for not affirming Gonzales.

I'm not happy, but it is good to know just how well my senators represent my interests.  Feel free to rag on my pro-torture national representation:

• George Allen,
  
• John Warner,
  
• Jo Ann Davis. (VA-1)

I haven't heard from Warner yet, but if I do I'll post it here.

Is there any CategoryVirginia news or CategoryVirginiaMeetups you are arranging? Virginia districting information is here: http://dlsgis.state.va.us/congress/congressPlanDir.htm