…and vote your conscience.
Due to a Diebold error, the president of choice for our nation’s shadowy overlords was accidentally revealed.
Full story at The Onion.
Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 2008 Election Early
I don’t know about you, but I feel like a weight is off my shoulders.
UCI President Pat McQuaid sent a letter today to all ProTour teams and officials.
To me the letter is pretty forthright and meant to hit the Amaury Sport Organisation hard, a direct and open challenge to the ASO’s decision to exclude Astana from all their events.
This one is heating up fast, folks.
UPDATE: Just a few more thoughts…
What happens next if ASO tries to call UCI’s bluff (if it even is a bluff)? Will a similar letter go out regarding sanctions if ProTour riders participate in the Tour de France? Consider Le Tour with no doping controls—probably Christian Prudhomme’s worst nightmare. Will ASO have to scramble to find someone to take over all the things the UCI provides? Is that even possible?
And something else: why the hardball only with ASO and Le Tour? What about the Giro d’Italia and RCS Sport? Long-time pissing contest between UCI and ASO or something else?
Looking forward to answers to these questions and so many more.
Last night, after the Oscars, Jimmy Kimmel one-upped Sarah Silverman and Matt Damon. I don’t think there’s any way those two can beat this one…
…but I’d love to see them try.
The Harrison Ford cameo pretty much puts it over the top.
I think many of us who enjoyed the Spider-man films were disappointed with #3, especially after the wonderful second movie, one of the best comic book films ever put to celluloid.
Jay Garmon, one of my favorite bloggers, has his own take on how the movie should have gone, and I find myself very much in agreement.
As Jay points out, this is another reason why perhaps science fiction writers should be in charge of Hollywood.
Would that I could live in the alternate universe suggested by this article from SF Signal, where science fiction writers and lovers are in charge of Hollywood. Several interesting takes on how to fix Hollywood, as well as where we stand right now in regards to Science Fiction television and film.
While the article might not be of especial interest to all my readers, I had to point it out, simply for John C. Wright’s declaration:
“Okay, maybe I would order them to put Firefly back on the air.”
Amen, brother, amen.
Last week, during my article on Naomi Wolf’s 10 steps towards fascism, I mentioned…
“…That the highest judiciary in the land seems silent on most of these issues, or gives tacit approval to Bush’s actions, should send a dagger of ice-cold fear into every American’s heart…”
Well, today it appears I am once again proven right (would that I were not), and they twist the dagger yet again, for the Supreme Court has refused to review a case that the American Civil Liberties Union brought against the Bush administration for their patently illegal wiretaps of American citizens.
To say that I am disgusted at how our Judicial Branch has completely abandoned their duty as a check on the other branches comes nowhere close to the feelings of loathing I have right now regarding the outright cowardice and sloth of the Supreme Court. If any case cuts to the heart of our current Constitutional crisis, this is it.
Shame on you, Justices, for abandoning your oaths without even a comment, or at least a pitiful rationalization for your failure of duty. You represent the worst aspects of government, and I thought Bush and his enablers in Congress already had that honor sewn up.
Looks like the Union Cycliste Internationale isn’t going to take the ASO’s ban of Astana lying down. The most significant part of the story to me is:
“McQuaid pointed to Astana’s in-house clean-up as proof of the team’s intentions. Astana is now led by Johan Bruyneel and features none of the riders that made up last year’s scandal-plagued season.”
Maybe Johan was right after all, and it’s just politics. I didn’t realize the team was completely new with none of the old riders. I’m rooting for the UCI in this one. To ban last year’s Tour champion and 2nd runner up for no good reason, with flimsy excuses of “image” when they haven’t taken action against any of the other teams that tarnished the image (like Rabobank), smacks of some kind of petulance.
Further reports to come as events unfold in this battle.
Johan Bruyneel says that the Astana team’s exclusion from the the 2008 Tour de France is just politics, and the team is the victim of a continuing struggle between the Union Cycliste Internationale and Tour de France organizer Amaury Sport Organision.
I say disingenuous, Johann.
Astana left the Tour last year under the cloud of Vinokourov’s doping scandal, and the ASO says the team can’t be trusted. I’d have to agree. The only caveat I have is that no team on the Tour can be trusted. Does anyone out there actually think that Rasmussen is the lone Rabobank rider to have doped? (yes, yes, I know it wasn’t “proven” he doped, but come on)
However, Bruyneel has implemented the same anti-doping measures on the new Astana team that CSC has been using for a few years, and the team roster barely resembles last year’s. New manager, new riders, new procedures—is Astana really the same team as last year?
With riders like Contador (Winner in 2007), Leipheimer (3rd in 2007 and winner of the 2007 Tour of California), and Klöden (2nd or 3rd in 2006, depending on if you consider Landis the winner), all contenders for the overall in 2008, I wonder if ASO is doing a bit of creative field-clearing for other (hopefully French) riders to take the title? Or are they just tired of Bruyneel managing the winning riders for 8 of the last 9 years? Chances are, with the Astana lineup, he’d have won again.
On top of my post the other day about Naomi Wolf’s 10 steps towards a fascist America, Keith Olbermann weighs in with similar sentiments on a recent Special Comment:
Would that the rest of America would turn on their brains and wind up the creaky gears of critical thinking and see exactly what Bush and his enablers in Congress (and I mean both Republicans and the legions of cowardly Democrats) have done to this country. Olbermann is usually right on the money and straight into the heart of political hypocrisy. Americans should join him and twist the knife deeper.
Nothing sums up the inherent creepiness of George Lucas penchant for retconning his Star Wars saga than this hilarious Horny Werewolf Day card/cartoon.
I remember sitting in the theatre in Santa Barbara in 1983 and suddenly finding out that Leia was Luke’s sister. I could feel the palpable “ewwwww” going through the audience that night, and it was obvious to most of us that despite his claims to the contrary, Lucas had not planned this from the beginning.
If he had, he was basically admitting that Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back deliberately had incest as strong undercurrents…
…and I shudder again.
