My next door neighbor, geographically speaking, at A Cry for Help notes:

Who loves their Dubya the most? Not Texas, but Utah! In fact, there’s only 6 states where our Commander in Chief has support over the 50% mark.

Bil bases his comment on the February 2006 50 State Poll which is bad for the Emperor but not nearly as bad as the March 2006 50 State Poll!

The six state majority support that Bil notes above has dropped to three: Utah, Wyoming, and Alabama (55%, 52%, and 51% respectively) - and Idaho just hits the 50% mark.

Mississippi (MISSISSIPPI!!) is at 49%, Georgia’s at 43%, and Texas (Yes, Texas!) has dropped to 41%. (That’s an 8 point drop since the February poll.)

In New England, Massachusetts hates him the most with a paltry 26% approval rating. (Mass also leads the nation in its contempt for the Boy Emperor. No suprise there.). Maine and Rhode Island tie at 28%; Vermont’s at 29%; Connecticut’s at 32%; and New Hampshire seems to love him best at 35%.

With Baby Bush’s poll numbers floating next to Iraq in the toilet (Former Iraqi PM Ayad Allawi told the BBC this morning that “Iraq is in a state of Civil War“) the GOP is planning to demagogue you into voting Republican this November with the old faithfuls of “base politics”: gay marriage, the Pledge of Allegiance, abortion, and, well, human cloning.

So with the GOP retaining the Congress we’ll have war-without-end, economic meltdown, and a foreign policy in shambles but, hey, at least they won’t clone little baby humans like those evil Democrats plan to do!

I can’t believe I was once a Republican…

I’m not a big fan of the online quiz but there are times when I just can’t help myself. This was one of them:

Yeah, I know I’m a Red Sox fanatic — it didn’t take a quiz to tell me that — but the pic that came along with it was just too cool to resist. And, by the way, Jerry Remy is not one of my idols, I can’t stand the man…

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Also worth a look:

I love Latin… I took three years in High School but learned little more than a few prayers and the odd maxim or two. Every year — and I mean EVERY year — I promise, I vow, I swear that I’m going to sit down with my Wheelock’s and build the vocab and work on the grammar. I never do it…

I’ll go to my grave with the goal of Latin fluency unmet but I still can’t resist websites like these:

Latin Weather Forecasts: The Weather Underground provides current weather and updated forecasts in Latin for people who are just too cool to bother themselves with the English. Another useless site that I find utterly fascinating.

The Latin Lover The official versions of Vatican texts and Papal documents are always promulagted in Latin and then translated into the various modern languages. So who checks the Pope’s Latin? Why Father Reginald Foster, of course. Father Foster ” The Pope’s Latinist” (this is the guy who raps the Supreme Pontiff’s knuckles and says “No, Holy Father, you want the VOCATIVE case here!!”) has his own show on Vatican Radio. The link above will take you to the website. Yet another place where I can waste hours and hours of time…

…into that blogging thing.

I’m a disgrace. I really do love my blog but I’ve neglected the old girl for ages and my 2 1/2 readers are probably cheating on me with some other blogger… Makes me heartsick.

I’ll re-christen AI with a few cool links because writing anything original would exhaust me after the long hiatus:

- Peregrine Watch: 2 live webcams on the Travelers Insurance Tower in downtown Hartford - the longtime home of Amelia the Perigrine Falcon. When she’s not home it can be like watching paint dry but when she’s in residence you’ll be transfixed.

- Ever wonder how to say the Our Father (Thats the “Lord’s Prayer” for you heretics) in Tolkien’s “Elvish”. Gosh, I know I have! Well, here it is.

And it IS Lent, afterall, (which is why I changed the link color to purple…) so if you’ve got that penetential thing going on you can tell your beads in Elvish with this translation of the Hail Mary.

Some people have WAY too much time on their hands….

That is all.

I really want to chime in on the Palestinian elections, but it will have to wait until I have a little more time.

Until then, an appeal.

Let’s face it, the forecast is miserable and while — apart from the Jimmy Fund — I don’t usually plug charities, I have to make a pitch for this one.

The Kinderhilfe Bethlehem (Caritas Baby Hospital) was founded by a Swiss priest in 1952. Today it’s run by the Franciscan nuns and it serves women and children in the Holy Land without regard to creed.

When the Israelis impose travel restrictions (and you don’t have to be Nostradamus to predict a great deal of that in the immediate future) not even baby formula can get through to Bethlehem. So send them a few bucks to lay in some critical supplies before everything goes to hell.

This is something that any Christian, Jew, Muslim, or hellbound atheist could support.

In America, send donations to:

CARITAS BABY HOSPITAL FOUNDATION
420 Lexington Avenue
New York, NY 10170

Ok, so this long break from blogging wasn’t my fault. I was invited to go to Vegas and originally said no - but then I changed my mind at the very last moment and hopped on the plane. And I gotta tell ya, I’m glad I went.

I have a friend in Missouri who is an over-the-top, moralizing scold of the first order. On my first day in Vegas, she called and asked, “Can you feel the sleaze?” Actually, I couldn’t.

Now everyone knows that Las Vegas isn’t Salt Lake City and the city fathers — legitimate businessmen though they may have been — won’t be canonized any time soon, but it wasn’t sleazy. I’d describe it more as Disney World for adults.

Every hotel on the Strip was a self-contained resort. And while you couldn’t escape the money and booze and, ok, sex, you could go to Las Vegas and keep yourself occupied for days without sitting down at a card table. (Although, I have no idea why anyone would want to do that.)

I loved the place and I’d go back again in a New York minute (an awkward reference to the casino pictured above) but a few days in Las Vegas is more than enough.

The constant overstimulation can be exhausting. Lights, money, sex, food, booze, crowds… Stay up til dawn and then roll out of bed by 8 for the breakfast buffet. I played cards — and hit a straight flush, baby! — drank and ate too much and slept a total of five hours. And, as only my bum luck would have it, I ran into a baseball player at one of the casinos but it wasn’t Nomah… You need a vacation to recover from the experience.

And that’s what it was, an experience, but it certainly wasn’t a vacation.

Next time, after a few days on the Strip, I’ll trek out into the Nevada desert to get my bearings before flying back to the real world.

And speaking of the real world… When I left the great Southwest it was almost 70 degrees. When I landed in Hartford it was 4. (That’s FOUR!)

There’s a big sign in the airport that says “Welcome to New England” - it should read: “Welcome back to Winter”

I need a vacation….

I love this country…

Poll: Most Say U.S. Needs Warrant to Snoop

WASHINGTON - A majority of Americans want the Bush administration to get court approval before eavesdropping on people inside the United States, even if those calls might involve suspected terrorists, an AP-Ipsos poll shows.

[snip]

Yet 56 percent of respondents in an AP-Ipsos poll said the government should be required to first get a court warrant to eavesdrop on the overseas calls and e-mails of U.S. citizens when those communications are believed to be tied to terrorism.

Agreeing with the White House, some 42 percent of those surveyed do not believe the court approval is necessary. [Emphasis mine]

Not exactly earth shaking, but a small glimmer of hope nonetheless.

Even in my rock-ribbed Republican days, I avoided the “Law & Order Conservative” types. I was always in the Civil Libertarian wing of the party — now long dead — and I regarded the LOCoS suspiciously.

Their get tough on crime rhetoric justified statism and, to be honest, their fawning deference to anyone in a uniform made me want to puke. These weren’t sovereign, autonomous free men and women, they were angry, fearful little drones who were completely at ease inviting government into any area of their private lives. They gave us the “War on Drugs” and they continue to justify every outrage of the Bush administration with the “safety” canard.

The Law and Order conservatives, breathtakingly ignorant of history and lacking even a cursory knowledge of Civics 101, won the battle for the control of the Republican party. The Civil Libertarians are long gone and the dominant figures, and their “safety” constituency, have delivered the party and our liberties to an emboldened Executive who couldn’t even manage a Baseball franchise…

In my web travels I happened upon a brief article by an Eastern European gentleman who grew up at the height of Stalinism. (I really wish I’d bookmarked the page because I can’t find it now…) He argued that Americans are the most docile people on earth. “Even in the darkest days of repression”, he wrote, “we’d still argue with a traffic cop!” Americans, on the other hand become pale and mute in the face of so-called “authority”.

We have become utterly disconnected from our founding principles. “Rights” which the Founders specified as inalienable – originating from God, not granted by Government –have been surrendered. We stand impotent before a government that spies on Quakers, intimidates coeds, and disappears American citizens for 3 1/2 years without charge, trial, or counsel. A people whose ancestors fought the mightiest empire on earth to preserve their threatened liberties has become a nation of lemmings…

We’re told that we’re a country at war and that our Commander-in-Chief (sic) is keeping us safe and, hey, “if we’re not doing anything wrong then we have nothing to fear.” Bullshit! Because by standing idly by while our liberties are eroded we’re allowing the government to establish weighty legal precedents for the permanent usurpation of our rights. Once they’re gone — or when they can only be exercised via a by-your-leave from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue — then they’re gone forever.

So put away your iPods, shake the video game induced miasma from your brains, and start reading.

This is a good place to start.

Englehart, above, missed the decidedly un-conservative, non-strict constructionist reading of the Constitution exhibited in the current wiretap scandal - but David Corn picks it up here.

Face it, Fox Fans, Born-Again-Georgie makes Bill Clinton seem like Barry Goldwater…

…everything old is new again.

Has anyone noticed the Pope’s wardrobe? I know most people could care less but I think the Vaticanologists and religion reporters are missing a quiet revolution going on right before our eyes. More important, it seems, than what Pope Benedict writes or how Pope Benedict speaks is what Pope Benedict wears.

John Paul liked to dress down. Memories of his mega-Masses call to mind simple, solid color vestments and a no-frills style. Benedict, by contrast, presents as a pontiff straight out of the 18th Century. Consider:

This man likes being pope…

John Paul showed up everywhere in a simple white cassock and sensible brown shoes. Benedict is all about the red velvet cape (mozzetta) and brocade stolls:

And ya gotta dig the pontifical footwear:

But this is the most jarring image of all:

No, the Holy Father isn’t playing Santa Claus - that red, ermine trimmed cap is called a camoura. And as far as ecclesiastical dress codes go, only the pope is allowed to wear one. Thing is, no pope has worn one publically in decades. (Even though John Paul wore the camoura for an official portrait early in his pontificate, he would not have been caught dead wearing one in public. And speaking of dead, John XXIII was buried — over 40 years ago — with a camoura on his head. So there ya go!)

And with the change of wardrobe came an overhaul of Vatican communications. The late pope did his writing in Polish and had it translated into Latin just before its official release. Not so with Pope Benedict. Word has it that official communications to and from the Pope are composed in Latin in the first instance. So popular, in fact, has Latin become that aspiring young seminarians have oversubscribed Latin classes at Rome’s pontifical universities.

And with the uptick in Latin comes the rumor that by next Christmas, Benedict will have restored the Latin Mass alongside the vernacular in parish churches throughout Christendom.

So when that old Cardinal strode out on the balcony of St Peter’s last April and announced, “Habemus Papam!”, he wasn’t kidding!

Out of sheer laziness, I’ll just re-run the Christmas Eve post from last year. On second thought, let’s not call it laziness, let’s call it a blogging tradition:
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It’s Christmas Eve and I’m taking a two day vacation from this pitiful blog.

Whatever you are - Catholic or Protestant, Jew or Gentile, Muslim or Hindu, Democrat or Rebublican, good American or Massachusetts Liberal - I wish peace and goodwill to you all.

“And it came to pass in those days, that there went out a decree from Caesar Augustus, that all the world should be taxed.

And all went to be taxed, every one into his own city.

And Joseph also went up from Galilee, out of the city of Nazareth, into Judaea, unto the city of David, which is called Bethlehem; (because he was of the house and lineage of David:)

To be taxed with Mary his espoused wife, being great with child.

And so it was, that, while they were there, the days were accomplished that she should be delivered.

And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because there was no room for them in the inn.

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.” [St. Luke 2:1-14]

If the Sisters of Mercy knew that I used the King James text I’d get my arse swatted. But, c’mon, it just sounds so much better… “Sore afraid”, ya gotta love it!

Merry Christmas, everyone!