The Heretik

MY NOVEL IS DONE

TODAY'S NOVEL in six words: No means. No ends. Only beginnings.

COLD DAY IN HELL EDITION Will you share your story today in six words here?  Have fun. Thanks

REDEMPTION SONG

CAN A MAN ever redeem himself for a life of murder and other crimes? Does the punishment of death belong rightly with god or with man? Tookie Williams will die by lethal injection administered by the State of California?  Williams founded the gang known as the Crips.  Are we morally crippled if society exacts vengeance by putting him to death?  Williams has changed his life and been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts?  Is anything lost by his death?  Share your opinion, have a drink, leave a link.  Franz K is pouring at the bar tonight. 

TUESDAY MORNING UPDATE Gone, unforgotten by some, unforgiven by others. Who knows best? Who is the better for Tookie Williams' death?  We will all be dead soon enough.

"TRUTH"

MY “TRUTH” MAY NOT BE YOUR TRUTH and yours may not be mine. The nature of existence is a continuing drama between voices competing to tell what each believes is most true.  The peril of our time is we believe only The Other is untrue in this time when more than ever all the world’s is a stage.  On that proscenium of the heart, on that private promontory of the soul, some voice speaks quietly to each of us as the sea boils around us.  The fortunate few hear what others say but are unafraid to admit that inner voice their own and what conscience says is true.
 
HAROLD PINTER JUST WON the Nobel prize and his Nobel speech is noble prize enough for those who will read and hear it. Here just a bit.

Truth in drama is forever elusive. You never quite find it but the search for it is compulsive. The search is clearly what drives the endeavour. The search is your task. More often than not you stumble upon the truth in the dark, colliding with it or just glimpsing an image or a shape which seems to correspond to the truth, often without realising that you have done so. But the real truth is that there never is any such thing as one truth to be found in dramatic art. There are many. These truths challenge each other, recoil from each other, reflect each other, ignore each other, tease each other, are blind to each other. Sometimes you feel you have the truth of a moment in your hand, then it slips through your fingers and is lost. . .
But as I have said, the search for the truth can never stop. It cannot be adjourned, it cannot be postponed. It has to be faced, right there, on the spot.

A QUESTION REMAINS Your truth is yours and mine is mine.  What faith we have alone in whatever form will guide us in the fallible form of this world.  How much would the world differ if we accepted our limitations and our powers and our truths as our own and had no need to force them on anyone else?  What is your truth today?

MY NOVEL IS DONE

TODAY'S NOVEL in six words: "End Is Near Show" is postponed.

GLASS HALF FULL/HALF EMPTY EDITION Will you share your story today in six words here?  Have fun. Thanks

LIEBERMAN BLOWS

Lefty Leonardo di Luna’s more lefty sister Louise lamented the loss of Joe Mentum.  “Lieberman says he wants a war cabinet for Bush.  They must have all the little wars stored away, ready to be pulled out.” Then she laughed. “Oy,” she muttered.  Lieberman blows.  Look what he says.”

Lieberman, whom the Bush administration has praised repeatedly for his war stance, defended the president. "It's time for Democrats who distrust President Bush to acknowledge he'll be commander-in-chief for three more years," the senator said. "We undermine the president's credibility at our nation's peril."
There was no immediate response from the White House or congressional leaders.

"I hope Bush does form that war cabinet," Lefty Louise said."I'd help him get in that cabinet.  Yeah, I would. The little putz.  Then I'd shut the door on him fast.  And throw away the key." 

OLIVER WILLIS says: It wasn’t enough that Joe Lieberman has betrayed his party again and again and again, but now he’s decided that speaking out against the war isn’t acceptable.

THE HERETIK NOTES Lieberman might be happier if there were just One True Party, as long as he were near the top of it.  Perhaps something Bush is lodged in Lieberman's throat and the words we are hearing here are the echo of Ari Fleischer: Watch what you say, watch what you do.  Which in the case of Lieberman here might be: Watch what you say, watch who you do.

QUESTION OF THE DAY Who would the Democrats run against a Republican 2008 ticket of Joe Lieberman and Zell Miller? 

LARGER QUESTION How big can the big tent be before the only thing holding it up is hot air from overinflated egos like Liebermans?  On the Republican side, when will Coulter issue a fatwa on Republican "moderates?"  Having had her fill of libruls and traitors, when will she begin to dine on the Republican youth?

AND THE LARGEST QUESTION What time is Lefty's Lounge Open?  Answer: Now.  So stop in for a drink and leave a link.

THE RULING OF THE CLOWN COURT

CRUEL IS THE NEW BLACK  Cruel and unusual is blacker than black.  Check your watch?  What century is it? It feels like 1692 all over again.  Hope this won’t scorch your skirt, but what time can we expect the burning of the witches to start? The Heretik in me needs to know.  Me no like fire.  Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition.  Okay. Maybe we’re not there yet.

SOME GUY STEALS MAIL  gets caught, gets fined.  The thief also gets ordered to do one hundred hours wearing a sandwich board with his crime announced on it. People don’t throw rotten food at him, not at the start.  He doesn’t get too much abuse, not  in the first few hours.  But as he spends his time on the corner with his court ordered ankle bracelet in place, he feels like Quasimodo looking for the kindness of an Esmerelda as the abuse begins.  On the second day, the same kind people who saw him the first day are comfortable with the idea that he is uncomfortable.  A crowd gathers and heckles him. On the third day somebody has bought ad space on the sandwich board.  Below where it says I stole mail, it now also reads: Your mail never gets stolen at Federal  Express.

IF YOU DO THE CRIME you must do the time.  And now you must endure the humiliation.  Rehabilitation of the criminal is so retro, but not so retro and true as the new shame, circa 1692. 

JUSTICE IS NOW BOTH PUBLIC and publicized, private shame has now been privatized.  People who were comfortable tossing insults the second day start hurling food the third day.  Fed Ex isn’t happy when tomato sauce runs down their logo.  The next day a deal is brokered.  Insults are free.  Fed Ex logo water balloons are sold on the fourth day.  Only licensed balloons may be hurled at the chump in the sandwich board that says the guy stole mail.  Balloon throwers are told to aim the balloons at the sandwich board, not the guy’s head.  The next day the producers realize the hit show comes the more times the guy takes a hit to the head.   The ratings go through the roof.

SIGNS OF THE NEW JUSTICE and judgement are everywhere.  Banishment may make a comeback.  Shut up, O’Reilly.  And get the hell out of here. Think about which of your neighbors are worthy of scarlet letters of your choice. Fucking A.  Really.  September Eleventh changed everything.  The word is those who engage in rude language in public places will be chained in a small closet until the smallest mind makes the biggest stink.  Legal drug abusers may expect the harshest prescriptions. Pot smokers are advised they may be stoned for more than the time of their crimes.  Criminal trespassers should expect to be stomped.  Brought to you in prime time by Doc Martens.

CRIME MAY NOT PAY but justice is expensive. And it takes, like, time.  And time is money.  So more corporate partners in justice are being actively sought. Just to defray the costs.  The original plan where corporations could pick the crimes they wanted to be associated with has had some public relations problems.  No corporate sponsors could be found for the white collar crimes.  Viagra denies it was ever part of sponsoring sex crimes. Thank god that wasn't us.  Human nature takes comfort in the discomfort of others.  Cruel black is the color of the ancient reptilian heart.  So we slither forward  or is it backward?  What cruel and unusual punishments could you come up with and for what crimes? We all have it in us.  Now who will let it out.

MY NOVEL IS DONE

TODAY'S NOVEL in six words: Mission Accomplished again. Iraq, withdrawal, "victory."
CUT AND RUN WITH IT EDITION Will you share your story today in six words here?  Have fun. Thanks

LIAR, LIAR

A POLITICIAN LIES and pays an immediate price.  It could happen.  Maybe not.  Maybe people will forget a politician said he was drafted for a baseball team.  Maybe people have forgotten a president wasn't drafted for service, but might have um fudged the details on his National Guard service.  Maybe the good folks who forgot about that haven't forgotten Biden (D-MBNA) plagiarized most of his last presidential campaign.  Oy.  Do lies matter and are there any consequences?
 
TRUE CONFESSIONS or not.  Take a minute here to confess a lie you told about yourself to make yourself look better.  No lie. It would be hard for someone like you to tell a lie to look better because you already look soooooo good.  I am not lying.  Not that much. 

IF THE HONEST truth is that you have never lied to make yourself better and I know you are a saint, make up something good about yourself here.  If you have never lied and I know you never would, here is a good example of how to be bad. Lie to me now.  Tell me you love me.  Or not

MY NOVEL IS DONE

TODAY'S NOVEL in six words: Turkeys on table, not around it.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING EDITION Will you share your story today in six words here?  Have fun. Thanks

MY NOVEL IS DONE

TODAY'S NOVEL in six words: Who hears talking out the ass?

Will you share your story today in six words here?  Have fun. Thanks