Our Top Story Today--Carnivorous miniature daschund discovered in Alton! Linda Floyd, of our fair city, was admitted to St. Anthony's health center for traumatic loss of her big toe. It seems that here 1 year old miniature daschund gnawed it off while she was asleep; Ms. Floyd did not feel this taking place due to nerve damage in her foot secondary to diabetes. Apparently the pet was curious about a bandage on the toe due to a hangnail, and just got carried away. Key quote, from Ms. Floyd's daughter, Elizabeth:
"It's hard to take in when you walk in a room and there's a dog eating your mom."
That's why I call daschunds "four-legged low-slung bite generators." Let's go to press!
Or, if you have Real Player, there's NPR's version from 2002--which includes Bob Edwards reading the opening and the closing statements. Somehow, the readings have never sounded the same since Bob Edwards left NPR.
Best take on the Charlie Crist engagement news comes from Trish at The Pensito Review. The entire post is wholesome snarky goodness, but the opening paragraph is the best part:
Pull out your wallets, kids, and prepare to wager. We’ll need two separate pools. One is for the person who most closely predicts how soon Charlie Crist, 51 and gay, will call off his engagement to Carole Rome, 38 and not quite divorced yet, if John McCain doesn’t pick him as his running mate. The other is for how long the marriage will last if McCain does pick him, or alternatively, if Charlie goes through with it just to prove he’s not gay. Which he is. Gay.
Personally, I'm taking in the awesomeness of an engagement announcement from a public figure to a woman who isn't even divorced yet. No backlash from the media as yet, though the announcement is still very young; but Gayapolis is taking a suitably jaundiced view:
Of course, the human heart is curved like a road through the mountains, so what do I know? Maybe it's love. And maybe it's just a joyous coincidence that Crist has found it at exactly the same time that McCain is looking for a running mate.
OK, I'm in. I say McCain picks Rick Santorum as his running mate, as a sop to the Christianist Right, on July 26, then on July 27th, Crist announces, with regret, that his engagement is off. You heard it here first.
Page Six!
We start off with Madeline Stowe:
Though not seen much these days, in the 1990s she was all over the big screen in Revenge, The Last of the Mohicans, and Twelve Monkeys. She also campaigned for John Edwards in December of last year, according to Wikipedia.
Our equal time beefcake is at Nancy's demand request--Chris Noth:
Mr. Noth is most recently known for his recent work in HBO series Sex and the City, but he has also been a stalwart on two different Dick Wolf series portraying detective Mike Logan.
This week's Floyd R. Turbo Award: In a battle-royal smackdown of Teh Stupid in July 1st's Belleville News-RepublicanDemocrat we feature frequent FRT winner Ron Sutterfield vs challenger Jim Shively!
Jim writes:
I've got some news for Eckert, homosexuality is not the same as racial or ethnic diversity. Racial and ethnic origins are something one cannot choose and diversity indeed improves the community. To give the homosexual the same status and Eckert's remarks make me want to throw up.
These people chose that lifestyle, a proven fact. The liberal media has constantly reported, and many have accepted their faulty reporting, that homosexuality is a born-with or genetic trait. However, the substantive genetic research has proven that, "Preferential homosexuality is not found naturally in any infrahuman mammalian species." (W. Gadpaille in Archives of General Psychiatry). Joseph Nicolosi, clinical director of a clinic in Encino, Calif., says, "There is no basis, neither hormonal nor genetic, which seem to play a determining role in homosexuality."
A nice play there, trying to tie the tired "lifestyle" trope to some pseudo-intellectualizing. I did check into the article he cites, and there is indeed a paper by Dr. Gadpaille--published in 1972. Jim conveniently ignores subsequent work verifying the genetic basis for same-sex preferences, and Dr. Gadpaille himself ignores work in dolphin research (noted over a decade before his paper) that dolphins engage in same-sex coupling, which calls into question his scientific objectivity. Maybe I should write back and stand back for the cranial explosion.
Ah, but Ron-bo is not going down to the challenger without a fight:
These five liberal justices think our enemies are entitled to U.S. constitutional rights. What a kick in the face to all Americans and to all U.S. soldiers who died to preserve our rights for all Americans. How totally absurd to offer their constitutional rights to terrorists.[...]
the choice is clear. Continue down the liberal path to socialism via a liberal Supreme Court, or preserve what's left of American culture and the ideal of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
In a time of war these five justices have perpetrated an act of treason against our great country. This a perfect example of the kind of change we'll get with Obama -- change that will weaken and destroy.
Ooooh, scary lib-ruls that actually believe in the Magna Carta and habeas corpus! Really, it's the brain-dead conservative set that is ruining this nation, not justices trying to uphold some semblence of the law.
Pick your winner in the poll below!
Your moment of unity:
Cairo and Mocha sleep in the window box of our Florida house, 2004. I've run this shot several times before but I still get requests for it.
