Mrs. RSI Says Good-Bye

After six hours of Smallville, Mrs. RSI has decided to leave me for Lex Luthor. I thought I made a convincing argument that I was just as evil as Lex. But she apparently prefers evil to be hairless.

My Lai's William Calley Emerges

William Calley of My Lai massacre fame emerged to apologize for the Vietnam War massacre in a speech in Columbus. “There is not a day that goes by that I do not feel remorse for what happened that day in My Lai . . . I am very sorry.”

Actually, I was surprised that Calley was still alive. It turns out that he had been living a quiet life in Ohio and Georgia.

It's probably useful to remember what happened. Here's a version from the "apology" story.

Calley explained [at his court martial that] he had been ordered to take out My Lai, adding that he had intelligence that the village was fortified and would be “hot” when he went in. He also said the area was submitted to an artillery barrage and helicopter fire before his troops went in. It turned out that it was not hot and there was no armed resistance. But he had been told, he said, that if he left anyone behind, his troops could be trapped and caught in a crossfire.

Not leaving "anyone behind" was a euphemism for killing hundreds of unarmed people. Event though Calley didn't serve nearly the time he should have for the horrific crime, the commanders and politicians who put Calley in that position are the ones who should have been punished more severely.

The same way that Dick Cheney, Paul Wolfowitz, and the people behind the Iraq War should be punished.

Death Struggle Near the Bottom of the Height Pool

As regular readers of Red State Impressions probably know, the beautiful Miss Teen RSI has been severely height-challenged all her life. When she was two and three years old, I would take her in for annual check-ups and I could see that her height wasn't even making the low end of the growth charts. I was always touched that kind-hearted nurses would fudge the numbers to make me feel better. But my daughter was short, short, short.

And it wasn't all the cigarettes we had her smoke as a baby either. Miss Teen just has short genes. Mrs. RSI is only 5' 2 1/2" inches and Grandma Marlene is barely 5'2." Once when Miss Teen was about seven, I explained to Miss Teen why she was doomed to a Randy Newman life by having Mrs. RSI and Grandma Marlene stand together.

But denial was strong. Miss Teen still felt like she was going to have the big growth spurt that would get her up to 5'5."

Fortunately for Miss Teen, her best friend E-Teen is even shorter than she is. Because Miss Teen hit puberty relatively early, she had a little growth spurt that got her up to 5'0." This was the height of her dad's ambitions for Miss Teen and I'll always been grateful to the gods of genetics for letting Miss Teen get to five feet. But now that E-Teen has hit puberty herself, she's been catching up and looked like she was getting ahead when she wore the right shoes and had the right hair-style.

But yesterday, Miss Teen and E-Teen had the short girls version of the shoot-out at the OK corral when they stepped on the scales with their other friends watching. The competition was tough and the results had to be verified several times. Personally, I'm just glad that blood wasn't spilled.

However, it turns out that Miss Teen is still one "silly centimeter" taller than her rival. Congratulations to Miss Teen. She always had it in her.

The Big Health Reform/Civil War Analogy

There's a good chance that I'm engaged in wishful thinking here, but my gut feeling is that health reform is going to pass with a public option. What makes this extraordinary is that Obama has been fighting the health care battle the same way Shelby Foote said the Union fought the Civil War--with one hand tied behind his back.

Obama could be doing rallies with 70,000 plus people. He could also be taking the fight to the Republicans and the teabaggers in a highly partisan manner. But Obama hasn't taken those weapons out of his holster yet.

And it doesn't look like he's going to either.

To me, it looks like Obama and the Democratic leadership in the House and Senate are grimly determined to win the health care fight on Obama's terms of reasonable discussion and reaching out to the other side.

And I think they're going to win it on their terms.

I Read Robert Novak

Right-wing journalist Robert Novak died from cancer today. Novak was a super-asshole of the highest order, but his column was a good read and Novak was one of the few conservatives who had some skill in dealing with facts. I was thinking about him yesterday and wondering if his cancer had gone into remission. It's sad to see him go.

No Surprise! Gun Guys Have Militia Ties

No surprise here. The guy who organized the gun display at the Obama townhall in Phoenix is a talk-radio host with ties to members of the Arizona Viper Militia who were convicted of plotting to blow up government buildings during the 90's.

What's been happening is that the activism of the Glenn Beck/teabagging/super-small government "near fringe" has inspired the really dangerous people on the right to come out of their caves.

I hate to be pessimistic, but it doesn't take a genius to see that one of these militia idiots is going to use spraying an Obama rally with his AK 15 as his suicidal "exit strategy."

Oh No! Tiger Lost!

Maybe the Tiger slump will go on forever now. I can't believe Tiger Woods lost the PGA tournament to a nobody like C. E. Yang from somewhere on the Korean peninsula. Talk about choking. It must have crushed Tiger's confidence to go from one shot ahead of Yang to three--yes, three--shots behind at the end.

I'm not saying that Tiger's career is over yet. But we have to face facts. Tiger Woods has entered thirteen tournaments this year and has only won five. That's not even 50%. If he was coaching the LA Lakers and had that kind of record, Woods would have been fired by now.

Tiger also entered four major tournaments and didn't win a single one of those.

None! Nada! Zilch!

And the way Tiger choked away the PGA tournament was particularly sad:

This time, Woods made one mistake after another over the last four holes, mostly with his putter.

"I did everything I needed to do, except for getting the ball in the hole," Woods said. "Just didn't make the putts when I needed to make them."

"Just didn't make the putts"--what an obvious euphemism for "I choked big time."

Obviously, Tiger's career as a major league golfer is over. I just hope he retires before he starts embarrassing himself like that Michael Jordan guy.