Dear Doctor,

I went into Village Hall yesterday to apply for a zoning variance to raise chickens so I could afford the cosmetic surgery like Sue Lowden’s I need and they just laughed. What should I do now? Do you take dandelion wine?

Signed,

Sagging Chin(s)

This bit of unintentional fun is brought to you by the good advertising folks at HuffPo.

A new voice for Geico?

What I like most about the web it the ability to provide content specific advertising that, in this case, is out of context. Many of the comments heap scorn on Geico, though I don’t fault the company’s actions. What Douglas (aka Lance Baxter) did was stupid, as he admits, and Geico is correct in distancing itself.

Frankly, what bothers me most is that FreedomWorks, which received D.C.Douglas’ call privately, elected to make it public, including releasing Douglas’ home phone number and inviting its members to complain directly.

FreedomWorks Matt Kibbe has the gall to then complain about hate speech, noting a 9/11 bomb threat to Freedomworks he said media ignored, and to call for civil discourse. Was releasing Douglas’ home phone number civil? No.

No word yet from Douglas on the temper of those complaints Kibbie spurred on.

Amazing creativity and well past time for a little fun. Trip on over to Vimeo and enjoy more.

http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=7146136&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=&fullscreen=1

Battle of Branchage from seeper on Vimeo.

Are you disaffected because hope didn’t come true with the wave of a hand? If you drop out of the political process, what happens?

Those tea party mobs win. Those who obstruct win. Those sophists who lie win.

Hope endures only if you persist in its pursuit.

This week, my sister, my wife and I held a quiet discussion with my 83-year-old father. He’s been diagnosed with ALS. My sister, Karen, earnestly worked through a Five Wishes living will workbook.

He likes banana cream pie. Our daughter-in-law has been making sugar free pies for him.

To hell with sugar free.

Does it strike you that Mexico is suffering from the same violence the US prohibition era spawned: Capone on steroids? Daily Kos has an interesting take.

Two men hanging from a highway overpass fighting for turf, the right to sell someone north of the border some marijuana. Does this make sense?

The problem is, can we reach a more sensible drug policy in this current era, driven by moralist prohibition politics and “get tough on crime” intransigence? Most of state prison spending is related to substance abuse.

Health care reform is stepping, staggering forward.

Will the ugliness of the debate end? Unfortunately, it’s just as likely that the ugliness has just begun.

The Washington Post’s Dana Milbank reported this morning on a shameful commentary from Sen. Tom Coburn, R-OK:

“What the American people ought to pray is that somebody can’t make the vote tonight,” he said. “That’s what they ought to pray.”

Milbank relates Coburn’s comment to Sen. Robert Byrd, D-WV, who has been in ill health. Coburn watched expressionless as Byrd shouted “Aye” on the vote and pumped his arm triumphantly in the air, 60 votes assured to move the health care bill forward.

It’s really a challenge to listen to Coburn’s type of hateful speech from people who profess to be Christians. It’s difficult why they fail to understand how the parable of the Samaritan applies to assuring health care for their neighbors. No nonsense accepted about the Samaritan being an individual act of charity; Christ delivered the parable to enlighten a people not a person.

I’m not sure which story from Sarah Palin’s visit to Salt Lake City is more telling.

1. That Sarah had a hairdresser called to the Monaco Hotel  and then stiffed her fee, tip and even the valet parking ticket.
2. That the Costco where she went for a book signing removed tomatoes from the shelves.

An aide for the jet-setting Sarah Palin book-signing bus tour (yes, that’s an oxymoron, isn’t it) did ask for an invoice after being called on #1. Rhonda Halliday of Images Hair Studio and Day Spa says she’s giving Sarah the benefit of the doubt that this was just an oversight. Hmmm, things you could do with dye to make someone seem more like themselves.

Just 550 people showed up for Sarah’s book signing at a Costco. Customer Helen Rappaport thought well that, despite the crowded parking lot, that she was able to get to the pharmacy counter without waiting. But then, she couldn’t buy tomatoes.

Thoughtful Costco management had removed tomatoes from the shelves, seeing as how someone from Minnesota, home of Pawlenty, Bachmann and an embarrassed Humphrey family for God’s sake, chucked a tomato at Sarah Palin during her Mall of America appearance. Rappaport had no such intention; just wanted some grape tomatoes.

Now that was thoughtful of Costco management. But, just thinking and being familiar with Costco, you know that they have pies!

Sen. Richard Lugar, R-Ind., has been a reasonable voice on Iraq and Afghanistan. This morning on CNN he suggested we put aside the debate on health care reform so Congress can focus on the “essentials,” the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Just the US has lost 928 people in Afghanistan and 4,367 in Iraq since these wars started.

Yet, we see 45,000 Americans a year die due from indifference to health care reform.

Which issue is more essential?

Should terrorists from Guantanamo be tried in criminal courts in New York?

What more ignoble than to be hauled into courts, their attacks on the innocent treated as murder and the vanity of warrior stripped bare.

Matthew Yglesias makes a great point that the criminal versus the war approach unravels the terrorists conceit. Read more here.