Now It Begins

What a week–first the Bush Administration starts sabre-rattling with Iran over the possibility that their president-elect was one of the hostage-takers at the 1979 embassy seizure in Teheran. Now Justice Sandra Day O’Connor is resigning, setting the stage for a wholesale nuclear option meltdown in the Senate. No doubt about it, Bush will look to replace this moderate swing voter with a hard-line right-winger. Sadly, the Democrats will squawk loudly only to roll over in the end, as they always do…or maybe not. Either way, buckle your seatbelts. Bush never misses a chance to avoid a confrontation.

Ted Rall Subscription Service

Joe asks:

Are you still doing the email subscription service for $10 a year? I can finally afford it but lost the info, could you post the details on the blog or send it to me? Thanks.

Indeed I am. I usually do this at the end of the year to make things simple, but anyone who wants to join the Ted Rall Subscription Service here at the midway point of yon fiscal year may do so, either by sending $5 (for the last half of 2005) to:

Ted Rall
PO Box 1134
New York NY 10027

Be sure to include your email address with your payment.

or sending the dough via PayPal. For the latter drop me an email at chet@rall.com.

What you get:

3 cartoons a week plus a column, delivered in many cases up to 3-4 days prior to their official publication date directly via email–plus occasional freelance stuff that never gets posted to the website.

Stranger Reaction

Sandy from Utah writes:

My nephew Tom in Kansas sent me your article. Thanks for putting into words what many of us are feeling. I was with Quakers that held signs of peace and pleads for not invading Iraq. The fact that everything has been mismanaged and costly in terms of money and mostly lives continues to sicken me. However, you missed an important point: This is slowly becoming a Bush war with an invitation for a “Holy War”. I live where Evangelicals are plentiful and their mantra remains joyful. Yes, these new age “Christians” are pleased that Muslim are dropping along with our Amreican hero/ soldiers…go figure? I fear that REAL trouble hasn’t even shown its ugly face. Thanks for your well written article….please keep it up.

Reading the above makes me shudder in fear that many Americans are clinically insane. Could it be true? Does anyone really want a holy war between the Christianists and Islam? What good could possible come out of it? Still, it’s obviously a phenomenon that we need to keep track of.

A Libbie Quandry

Dave writes:

On one hand, you have upholding the protection of First Amendment rights for the press and the protection of confidential sources for journalists. On the other hand, you really, really want to know who was involved in leaking the identity of Valerie Plame, with the fervent hope that it shows a direct path back to Karl Rove and the Oval Office…
What’s a liberal to do?
Personally, I think this is why douchebag of liberty, Bob Novak isn’t being bothered in all this. No liberal would really give a rats ass about protecting his rights. (Proper credit to Jon Stewart and the Daily Show for providing the greatest nickname in all of political punditry)

Ah, so true. The other quandry: standing up for the New York Times’ Judith Miller’s right to protect confidential sources while ignoring the fact that she played as important a role in getting us into Iraq as Karl Rove.

The Stranger

The Stranger, the alternative weekly newspaper in Seattle, has asked me to write a piece reacting to being proven right about the war in Iraq.

Yes.

Bill notes:

I watch and listen to the right-wing corporate media outlets just to get a feel for what kind of propaganda or distraction they are trying to present. The latest has got to be that girl from Alabama who disappeared in Jamaica. I feel bad for the girl and her family but how the fuck is this national headline news? I noticed that Fox seemed to be the first to lead with this story and the rest of the corporate media just seemed to follow suit. Nothing like a missing blonde haired girl to distract people from being outraged about a failing war that’s losing support.

You’re right about Fox. Even cynical moi was amazed to see O’Reilly spend the better part of 20 minutes on the Aruba story on the same day that Republican Congressmen were calling for the Gitmo concentration camp to be shut down. Paranthetical: Closing Gitmo would merely lead to more outsourcing of torture. Closing BUSH down is the best way to start restoring some semblance of decency to US foreign policy… State-controlled media has traveled so far down the path of total obeisance that it’s now forced to ignore the day’s top story in favor of manufactured tripe.

New Books

I’m currently working on a new book about Central Asia called “Silk Road to Ruin.” That’s due out in January. Due out around the same time will be “Attitude 3: The Subversive New Media Cartoonists,” with an emphasis on artists whose work appears online. And those of you who have been clamoring for a straightforward collection of my cartoons, the sequel to 2001’s “Search and Destroy” comes out next year. Title is: “America Gone Wild.”

Beyond that, anything is possible. I’m talking with one publisher about doing a graphic novel adaptation of a European play (gotta be coy here, sorry). I’m also due to start a project I’ve been researching for years, an all-prose novel. And there’s also a possibility of doing a foreign policy follow-up to “Wake Up, You’re Liberal!”, which focused on domestic issues. Of course, I’m always open to requests, should you have one.

Merchandise Update

Much-beloved Agitproperties.com, home to El Busho T-shirts and posters, has sadly gone under. I’m considering putting up some TR merch (T-shirts, mugs, etc.) at another site–well, first I’d have to find such a site–but before I spend a lot of time on this I’m wondering whether enough people would be interested to make such an endeavor worthwhile. So…if you’d buy a Ted Rall T-shirt or somesuch item, please email chet@rall.com…but only if you’d really, actually buy one. I do not want to hear from you if you’d consider buying one, or think seriously about buying one.

Ronald Reagan, Still Undead

Jim writes the following:

Dear Ted,
While channel surfing last night, I caught the Dicovery Channel’s show on “The Greatest American”. They polled Americans (on AOL.COM) and declared that Reagan was the greatest American ever. It made me sick and slightly disorientated to think that people would vote that way. Agh !
If you have not seen it, Here is the link to AOL’s site:
http://tv.channel.aol.com/greatestamerican
Best regards, and please keep it up !
PS: It is great to see your cartoons in the [name of publication deleted to stymie neofascists]

Lord knows that any praise for Reagan is praise too much but I wouldn’t assume that these results reflect the general viewpoint of the American public. These results reek of the sort of fake write-in campaigns conducted by right-wing bloggers (vote early, vote often, vote online) to make it seem like their icons and idols are much beloved by the public. Would Clinton beat Reagan in such a (legit) poll? Probably not. But George Washington probably would.

I Don’t Normally Do This, But…

People send me lots of suggestions of stuff to post to the blog, but most of them are redundant to stuff I’ve seen elsewhere or just plain suck. This reaction to Piehole’s speech last night (“Mission Accomplished II”), however, rates an exception:

I imagine you may receive a bit of mail looking for you post or link to stuff. But please consider doing either with this short essay I wrote, which you can find on leftbankblog.blogspot.com.
Thanks a lot,
Joe Farbeann

A Tale of Two Americans
June 28, 2005-
One American strode boldly into the Ft. Bragg military base in North Carolina to deliver a speech about a war on an abstract concept.
A second American was nearby in a similar setting, a navy brig in South Carolina.
The first American surrounded himself with U.S. troops, cynically using them as political props so that he could justify keeping them at risk in a dangerous occupation in a hostile land in order for the first American’s friends and campaign contributors to make a fortune off the occupation.
The second American was surrounded by the U.S. troops that have been brutally interrogating him for over 3 years, denying him his 5th Amendment rights and Geneva Convention rights. His interrogators are subverting the rule of law and trashing human rights and the American way because he is thought to be an “enemy” in the war against the abstract concept, and the government lacks the evidence to formally try him.
The first American put the second American where he is. The first American is responsible for authorizing the kidnapping of the second American, who, despite numerous court rulings ordering him to be set free, remains in confinement. The first American is the real criminal while the second American must still be considered innocent according to what at least used to be American law.
The saga of George W. Bush and Jose Padilla continues. While one still needs to be held accountable for systematic torture and illegal war, the other has already been held accountable despite not being convicted, let alone charged with a crime.
For those who still believe in constitutional and human rights, this is a most critical juncture.