…since before the war? Undoubtedly. It was exciting and dynamic, and totally free of the hip-cynical defeatism seen at so many Anglo-American-led protests. It was great to be in the middle of it all.

Make them be about what the old left used to call “the Workers.” Instead of ignoring race/class divisions, make them the focus. Put the people themselves in charge, instead of the retro-“radicals” of the goatee-and-ponytail set. Make them about saving lives, saving livelihoods, and respecting basic human dignity.

(In case you’re wondering, I managed to take these pix on my still-ill camera with the still-troublesome shutter button. More about this later.)

…was so much fun, I think I’ll do it again:

• Right-wing hate radio: Now even more racist than ever?
• First preachers, now political operatives— just what is it about positions of authority and child abuse?
• One of my alma maters, Oregon State, is dumping its cheerleader squad. For once, no team-name puns here.
• Gene Pitney, one dead rock star who got to live a full life.
• Wal-Mart’s sales, profits sluggish— so much for the almighty juggernaut out to take over the world.
• Went to Drinking Liberally last nite; got to meet that week’s special guest star, Darcy “C.D.” Burner. She’s the highly touted Demo candidate in the 8th Congressional District (the Eastside). She’s smart, witty, and forward-thinking. She’s got a good chance of being a big part of taking back the House this fall.
• While there, one DL participant told me his little conspiracy theory about the U.S. government’s attempt to retain control of the Internet’s top-level domain names. This guy claims the Feds just might be preparing to use this power so they can crack down on lefty bloggers. I’m not so sure the Bushies are that smart. That conspiratorial perhaps, but not that smart.
• Tom Stewart, the former state GOP bigwig and medium-time sleaze, is “protesting” Washington’s estate tax by pulling his corporate offices to Arizona. I won’t miss his campaign-law violations or the ludicrously huge U.S. flag atop his Delridge office building. Now if we could only get the hipster and gay restaurants and bars in this town to stop feeding money to his Food Services of America….
• A longer version of my piece about the Capitol Hill shooting victims’ memorial is in today’s print version of the Capitol Hill Times, but not online, at least not yet.

• Are progressive teachers being witch-hunted by right-wing goon squads?
• My ol’ hometown is located within one of the most populous U.S. counties that doesn’t have a four-year college. That might change one of these years.
• Guess what? Initiative hawker and professional demagogue Tim Eyman’s behaving just like a lying, homophobic bigot.
• Is ex-Seattleite news anchor Lou Dobbs becoming a “mad prophet of the airwaves,” or is it just a big ratings stunt?
• Will right-wing corporate forces soon try to censor the Internet?
• Tom DeLay–out; the system of coordinated corruption of which he was a cog–still in.
• The ought-six Mariners: Looking pretty good, except for the bullpen.
• Daylight Savings Time is back among us, bringing sunsets after 7:30. Damn, it feels good.

…of the Seattle Wonder Bread neon, which for decades drew people toward Seattle’s least-whitebread neighborhood?

Remember when we told you about Adele Ferguson, the troglodyte local political columnist who returned to infamy with a little piece about the goodness of slavery? Thanks to negative national publicity spread by weblogs, her editor has announced her contract won’t be renewed.

What with all the backward-thinking and dumbing-down of the body-politick these days, it was inevitable that someone on the edge of “mainstream” thought would bring up that ultra-right-wing notion that slavery was good for the slaves. I didn’t suspect the one to do it would be Adele Ferguson, the ancient local political commentator whom I didn’t even know was still alive.

…the fake memoir schtick has indeed merged with the older fake Native American schtick.

…really “the last acceptable stereotype?”

Perhaps not. There are still all the old-fashioned racist “jokes” seen on Urban Outfitters merchandise and heard on talk radio, and all the unreconstructed gender stereotypes of ditzy blondes and clueless guys.

Then there’s that perennial hipster-beloved stereotype, the stupid/evil mainstream suburban squaresville rube. You know: The supposed everybody-out-there-except-“us,” the Wal-Mart shoppers, the television viewers, the non-NPR listeners, the sports fans, the meat eaters, and especially the (gasp!) straight white males.

…but “If You’re Not Picky About Color” is now a trademark (see bottom of linked page). I suppose that would prevent the phrase from being stolen as the title of an interracial porno.

…distributed a suspicious flyer in Milwaukee, trying to scare away Af-Am voters.

…American politics will only be healed when sane people take back the Republican Party:

“In a very real sense, the health of our democracy may hinge on the conscience of Republican moderates. Only they can keep their party from being hijacked by crony capitalists and gay-and-feminist-bashing evangelicals. If they stand by and let Cheney reinterpret the free market as a playground for corporations who need not worry about competitive bidding or honest accounting, if they let the fiscal conservatism that was once the hallmark of their party be drowned in red ink, if they stand by and watch the Patriot Act be used to squelch dissent, if they let neoconservative advisers hand our foreign policy over to a militarized corporate elite, then there will be no stopping the continued descent of American politics into the slough of megalomania.”

Glenn Stout has a long but fascinating essay debunking the “Curse of the Bambino” legend, the idea that the Boston Red Sox have gone without a World Series title since 1918 because then-owner Harry Frazee sold Babe Ruth’s contract to the Yankees. Stout claims the “curse” myth dates back only to 1986, and that in any case what drove Ruth, and later Frazee himself, out of Boston baseball was an anti-Semitic smear campaign against the non-Jewish Frazee, led by that notorious race-baiter Henry Ford.

…or at leat I didn’t use to be. But I’m a wee bit perturbed by the Republican partisans’ media leaks of supposed “terror threats” to the Presidential election, which maybe, just maybe, would give the Bushies an excuse to try to cancel or postpone the vote. That would be the end of the World’s Oldest Democracy. Period. Don’t let the GOP even imagine they could get away with it.

…in Ballard starts taking pictures of the Ballard Locks for a photography class, alongside dozens of shutterbugging tourists. He gets harassed, followed, and harassed some more by guys claiming to be Homeland Security agents, who’ve decided he was really staking out terror targets. Could it have possibly been because he looked brown?