Monday, May 16, 2005

Dang. Monday.

Had to bury another cat this morning, so that now I've got a matched set of little rescue kitties sleeping in the dirt next to the too-small stray I took in while Janet was out of town last August. The great irony: Janet went out and got the two littermates to "cheer me up" after the little one gave up and died.

Both have now been hit by cars. Pixie survived long enough to reach the emergency vet, who told us she was paralyzed with no meaningful hope of recovery. The good news is she got pain medication and we were able to comfort her during the euthanasia.

We have a fourth cat: Janet went and got him from the shelter about a month ago because Pixie was acting so depressed after Prez was killed.

*Here's a survey that will start your week off right, he said sarcastically: (E&P) "New Survey Finds Huge Gap Between Press and Public on Many Issues"

*From the NYT's review of the final Star Wars episode:
"This is how liberty dies - to thunderous applause," Padmé observes as senators, their fears and dreams of glory deftly manipulated by Palpatine, vote to give him sweeping new powers. "Revenge of the Sith" is about how a republic dismantles its own democratic principles, about how politics becomes militarized, about how a Manichaean ideology undermines the rational exercise of power. Mr. Lucas is clearly jabbing his light saber in the direction of some real-world political leaders. At one point, Darth Vader, already deep in the thrall of the dark side and echoing the words of George W. Bush, hisses at Obi-Wan, "If you're not with me, you're my enemy." Obi-Wan's response is likely to surface as a bumper sticker during the next election campaign: "Only a Sith thinks in absolutes."

*Newsweek backtracks on its Koran desecration story... because the Pentagon denies it? This is just so ... wrong...