• Welcome to the Corduroy Appreciation Club - An impressively devoted social club. These people do right by their corduroy.
• Jewish boy became Nazi mascot to survive - Amazing story, if true (which it probably is–historians supposedly have concerns about a nine-month gap in it, but everything else seems to add up).
• News: How the Cops and Courts Turn Abused Spouses Into Voiceless Victims (Seattle Weekly) - Does legitimate fear of a serious threat ever not turn into reactionary policies that go too far?
• FOXNews.com - Chuck Norris Endorses Mike Huckabee for President - Politics | Republican Party | Democratic Party | Political Spectrum - This might increase Huckabee’s standing among that ever-important demographic–stoned dorm-room voters.
• Mike Huckabee’s record | Salon.com - Not only does he have Norris in his corner; he has skeletons in his closet.
• YouTube - Voices of Uncertainty - Nicely done video in support of the writers’ strike, using management’s words against them.
• Amount of space required to transport the same amount of people by car, bus or bicycle | Frostfireseeds.com - These visual depictions have been around Seattle a lot lately as there was recently a vote on a transportation measure. They’re pretty remarkable.
• Is That Legal?: If It Was Torture in Mississippi, Then It’s Definitely Torture, Right? - a 1926 Mississippi court classified waterboarding as torture.
• The Economic Consequences of Mr. Bush: Politics & Power: vanityfair.com - Joseph Stiglitz’s critique of Bush’s economic policy.
• The Associated Press: Damon Named People’s `Sexiest Man Alive’ - My favorite headline of the day.

Artwork from the Corduroy Club

Monday, November 5th
-Pervez Musharraf receives a congratulatory phone call from David Addington.

Tuesday, November 6th
-Dennis Kucinich pushes for a House vote on his articles of impeachment for Dick Cheney. In the office of the Vice President, David Addington hands a bristling Cheney a pledge the latter signed when Chris Dodd put a hold on the FISA immunity bill:

Wednesday, November 7th
-Lynne Cheney speaks about the stories in her memoir, Blue Skies, No Fences, at a Washington D.C. luncheon. An article describing the event in the Stafford County Sun states that “[i]t was a time when the adults did not hesitate to teach values and proper social morés of honesty, hard work, and patriotism.” Explains Cheney: “We were taught never to write anything down. And if you were going to strap someone to a table, cover their mouth with a towel, and pour water on their face, you know, just so they would think they were drowning, you didn’t do it in your hometown. Preferably, you had someone else do it, like Syrians or Uzbekis.”
-She also recounts a period in their courtship when Dick decided he wanted to date other people. Her relatives “circled the wagons,” decking her out in the finest outfits to make Dick jealous. Asked for more details, she says, “I dressed up as a schoolgirl. Even back then, there was no one Dick would rather screw than our nation’s children.”

Friday, November 9th
-Citing an obscure provision of the Patriot Act, Pervez Musharraf has barbed wire and troops placed around the home of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto. Asked his thoughts on the maneuver in an opinion poll, Michael Mukasey is undecided.

Saturday, November 10th
-The Asia Times reports that the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran has been held up for a year by Dick Cheney’s office, which wants one that will better support their aggressive positions toward that country. Now that the NIE will be released, word is that the Administration will attempt to classify large portions. “Right now, we’re on two fronts,” explained a Cheney spokesperson. “If we fail to classify the NIE but succeed in classifying the Constitution, we’ll consider it a victory.”

Sunday, November 11th
-The New York Times reports that the United States can’t account for 190,000 small arms that were shipped to Iraq. President Bush, however, remains confident: “The market will find a solution. The real concern is making sure that the terrorists aren’t receiving arms from Iran.”

Another day, another dollar short for the young Supes. (They’re down seven now, if you’re counting.) Sunday night saw the Detroit Pistons win 107-103 before a raucous, lunchbox-toting crowd at the Key. (The first 10,000 fans received these party favors, which they used as makeshift thundersticks in an exciting fourth quarter.)

The Pistons were entertaining as always, in both play and antics. Rasheed Wallace, the Clown Prince of Motown, was in top form, barely suppressing his pre-game urge to dance during the national anthem, knees bouncing and arms jiggling like a little kid who needs to pee. Once the Pistons intros were finished, he stepped in the middle of their arms-on-each-other’s-backs, swaying circle (for those who haven’t seen it, imagine a rhythmic rugby scrum) and performed what appeared to be an amped-up version of the Hammer Dance. He then threw his warm-up shirt about twenty feet in the air, tucked his jersey into his underwear, left the straps of his shoes unsecured to flap about, and took his customary, honorary Ron Artest spot at the scorer’s table (where he frequently sat during breaks in action, including while Flip Saunders spoke to the team during some timeouts). (Update: My friend Brad pointed out that not only did ‘Sheed skip out on some of Flip’s timeout instructions, he likely did the same with the halftime speech: He was the first Piston out of the locker room by five minutes, time he spent launching left-handed three-pointers. Is this typical?)

On the court, the Pistons starters were as advertised, with ‘Sheed providing his usual combo of long jumpers and long-armed defense (is there a player in the league with a more disparate combination of long arms and small hands?), Rip Hamilton displaying his trademark midrange virtuosity (and throwing in a few three-pointers for good measure), Antonio McDyess out-craftying even Sonics craftmaster Nick Collison, Chauncey Billups playing his bullying style of offense, which consists mainly of dribbling and hip-checking until he sees a shot he likes, and Tayshaun Prince filling in the blanks. But once again, the dagger came from a bench player. Jarvis Hayes joined the likes of Linas Kleiza, Eduardo Najera, Marcus Banks, and Matt Harpring in coming off the bench to demoralize the young Sonics with jumpers. (Alas, Mouhamed Sene’s countryman, Cheick Samb, owner of one of the league’s coolest names and freakiest physiques (7′1″, 195), didn’t get in the game.)

As always, the Sonics competed and provided glimpses of a bright future, wherever that might be. Particularly fun to watch was Jeff Green, who tallied his second consecutive game of high-teens scoring. Green’s style is a bit retro–he plays like one of those high-scoring, high-flying forwards from the 70s and 80s (e.g. James Worthy, Connie Hawkins), who displayed little in the way of fancy dribbling and who finished with swooping finger rolls or hook shots, or with stiff-armed dunks, ball held high and in front of them, hand barely touching the rim.

His fellow rookie, Kevin Durant, displayed more flashes of brilliance, including at the defensive end, where he appears to have stopper skills when he puts in the effort. And Kurt Thomas, in his Sonics debut, played a fairly flawless 20 minutes, grabbing rebounds in traffic and draining midrange jumpers.

Finally, P.J. Carlesimo continues to experiment wildly with his lineups. A hobbled, lumbering Robert Swift played 12 excruciating minutes, much to the disdain of the Key faithful, who groaned whenever he touched the ball. It looks like it could be a long road back for Wild Bobby Ginger, who even after that will have a long road to being a good NBA center. And Earl Watson, who P.J. acknowledged played extremely well against Utah (11 assists and 2 turnovers in 23 minutes), collected the letters D, N, P, C, and, again, D (no vowels for you, Earl, and do not pass go!). Future Idaho Stampede stars Sene and Mickael Gelabele weren’t even in uniform. Here’s hoping the Supes will have a win before their coach settles on a rotation.

I was chatting with my friend Nirav the other day and our discussion led us to the following question:

Since waterboarding serves as a sort of truth serum (why else would we use it to fight terror?), and since presidential candidates have a tendency to equivocate, obfuscate, and generally be less than truthful, shouldn’t we waterboard candidates during the debates to make sure they’re being honest with the American people?

What’s a little temporary discomfort if it ensures they’re telling us the truth in a time of war? (Though, as Nirav said, and I feel the same way, “seeing Dennis Kucinich waterboarded might make me cry.”)

Should we waterboard our candidates during debates? Vote in the poll here.

Congrats on your first win as an NBA coach, Reggie Theus.

The Sonics were unable to close out another one last night (is Kyra Sedgwick still unsigned?), losing to the Sacramento Kings, 104-98. Wally Szczerbiak, whom I’d declared more or less done after the first two games, poured in a game-high 32, knocking down jumper after jumper. It was damn fun to watch, but I worry it’s fool’s gold–he still moves like an old man, and in 32 minutes of play (yes, 32 points in 31 minutes!), grabbed just two rebounds and had zero assists, steals, or blocks (give him credit for taking a charge, though). Considering that last night’s shooting display was an aberration (he’s much more likely to shoot around 45-50%, not last night’s 75%), having Szczerbiak on the court for long stretches might not be the best thing.

As the folks at Wages of Wins have repeatedly concluded from their research, a player’s scoring average is typically way overvalued in determining his ability to help a team win. (While I don’t always agree with them, they appear to be the only ones who run their data through regression models to figure out which stats actually best predict wins.) You could argue that Carlesimo doesn’t have anything better to roll out there, but I’d like to see a few more minutes for Jeff Green (he played only 10 last night), despite his offensive struggles.

Finally, it appears Damien Wilkins has come back to earth. He’s becoming what Sonics’ fans feared–your teammate in a pick-up game who gets insanely hot and then is convinced that he should be the one taking the shots for the rest of the afternoon, long after they stop falling.

I leave you with a couple of videos. First, a behind-the-scenes look at the Sonics, courtesy of a dude named Elie Seckbach, who apparently has won an Emmy and a Golden Mike, but who seemed a little too in love with his own questions for my taste (he came across as a combo of a giggly, jock-sniffing undergrad and Sacha Baron Cohen’s Bruno). Still, you get to hear Delonte and Swift (nicknamed “Wild Bobby Ginger” by some friends of mine) explain their tattoos, and get a sense of how young Kevin Durant really is.

And second, a little glimpse of the beginning of Reggie Theus’ coaching career:

A ton of links today. Now go forth and vote.

• The Return of Superfly - This one’s been around for a long time, but if you haven’t read it already, you should. The real Frank Lucas is way, way more interesting than the Denzel character. A demerit to the screenwriter, or to whoever made the decision to make Lucas less fun. Here’s a choice excerpt: “A couple of days later, eating at a T.G.I. Friday’s, Lucas scowled through glareproof glass to the suburban strip beyond. ‘Look at this shit,’ he said. A giant Home Depot down the road especially bugged him. Bumpy Johnson himself couldn’t have collected protection from a damn Home Depot, he said with disgust. ‘What would Bumpy do? Go in and ask to see the assistant manager? Place is so big, you get lost past the bathroom sinks. But that’s the way it is now. You can’t find the heart of anything to stick the knife into.’”
• A Conversation Between Frank Lucas and Nicky Barnes - Money 2007 — New York Magazine - More Frank Lucas.
• Music review: Jay-Z, “American Gangster,” hip-hop, rap | Salon Arts & Entertainment - Bomani Jones, also a sportswriter for ESPN, gives a glowing review of Jay-Z’s new album. Which leads to perhaps the biggest reason for my disappointment in American Gangster. All the previews–at least the early ones–were set to Jay-z’s Heart of the City, one of my favorite songs, which got me too fired up and distracted me from the fact that it’d likely be just another cliche rise-and-fall flick, the gist of which my friend Sujan and I accurately predicted in a brief, off-handed, online conversation (Denzel as stately and misunderstood; grudging respect between him and Russell Crowe; filmmakers congratulating themselves for appreciating moral ambiguity through heavy-handed devices, etc. That said, it’s still worth seeing–well shot, Denzel’s good, and kept my attention for 2.5 hours, which is no small feat.). Also, I know everyone loves Reasonable Doubt, and I love it, too, but I feel like production’s underappreciated in the evaluation of rappers’ ouevres. Everyone hypes early work for the realness and rawness (the production on Reasonable Doubt is really good, no doubt), but I’ll be damned if I don’t love some top-notch hooks and beats almost as much as lyrical mastery. I’m what’s wrong with hip-hop! Someone tell Nas, Talib Kweli, Bill Cosby, etc.
• Mr Nice: An Autobiography - Google Book Search - Another fascinating kingpin, this time in the pot trade. This is one of my favorite books.
• Flickr Photo Download: shilshole_32 - Found on Slog. What an awesome picture.
• {mikeoliver.org} » Blog Archive » The First Thing We Do, Let’s Kill All The Lawyers - The situation in Pakistan is pretty awful. This is what you get when you base your foreign policy on the idea that “you’re with us or you’re against us.” 13-year-olds are more nuanced in choosing their friends. But this post contains one of the funnier lawyer jokes I’ve read (in the comments) and also a photograph that makes a riot gear beating look like a b-boy dance circle.
• Jamaica’s Powerless, Oppressed, Terrorized Homosexuals Plan to Take Over Planet, Destroy Life on Earth | Slog | The Stranger | Seattle’s Only Newspaper - Dan Savage publishes the author’s e-mail address, so at least maybe they’ll take over her inbox.
• Let airport staff ‘kill’ baddies for better security - tech - 06 November 2007 - New Scientist Tech - You can’t read the full article without a subscription, but I found the teaser interesting enough.
• Law.com - Retroactivity for Crack Sentence Cuts Debated - Pretty much everyone agrees that the sentencing disparities between crack and cocaine were based on bad science (and some good old-fashioned hysteria (meth, anyone?)), and that they created massive racial disparities in incarceration. So the Sentencing Commission finally decided to fix them. But the good ol’ US DOJ opposes making the fix retroactive.
• Justice Dept. Voting Chief Apologizes But Persists - washingtonpost.com - More fun with our DOJ, in honor of voting day.
• National Popular Vote — Electoral college reform by direct election of the President - Also in honor of voting day (a holiday everywhere else): a credible plan to rid ourselves of the problems of the electoral college. The idea is that each state pass a law dictating that their electoral votes be given to the popular vote winner as soon as a majority of states have the same law on their books. Brilliant way to bypass the virtual impossibility of constitutional amendment, and can be done over time. Thanks to Nirav for the link.
• Genetic breakthrough could give dandruff the brush-off, claim scientists | the Daily Mail - Not quite the great scientific advance we’ve all been waiting for, but not bad, I suppose. Interesting how they went about it, with a giant vat of yeast, some liquid nitrogen, and a powerful computer. It sounds like a bad 80s movie.
• A Corona, Please, and Don’t Hold the Lime - New York Times - It’s a health code violation for a bartender to touch the lime that goes in your drink with his or her bare hands. Who knew?

Monday, October 29th
Michael Mukasey refuses to answer whether the President’s invocation of “olly-olly oxen-free” may, as the President asserts, properly confer upon his subordinates immunity from the nation’s laws. “I’d need to read up on that,” explains Mukasey. “It may depend on whether the situation involves enemy combatants.”

Tuesday, October 30th
-Karen Hughes, undesecretary of state for public diplomacy, announces her resignation. Among her accomplishments was a “listening” tour of the Middle East in which she advised Saudi women to learn to drive to make themselves more sympathetic to Americans and asserted, “to preserve the peace, sometimes my country believes war is necessary.”
Said Condi Rice: “she will obviously leave a very big hole.” We consulted an expert for an explanation: “I believe what Ms. Rice is saying is that Ms. Hughes has Goatse’d America.”
-The Los Angeles Times reports that Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates has come to the conclusion that bombing Iran may be counterproductive. Our intrepid reporter scours the Pentagon recycling bins (Shhh—don’t tell Dick they’ve gone green!) and is able to find Gates’ original list of conclusions:

Note the reference to Petraeus’ diminutive
stature

Thursday, November 1st
-The Washington Post publishes an article about the contents of Donald Rumsfeld’s memos, which he termed snowflakes (a nomenclature that created tension with General Peter Pace, who refused to read them on the grounds that they sounded “too gay.”) Cheney is irate, and tracks down a suntanned and well-rested Rumsfeld at the Podhoretz compound, where Don and the boys are engaged in a circle jerk around a map of Iran and a miniature model of the Enola Gay. Cheney smacks Rumsfeld on the back of the head. “Snowflakes melt, dumbfuck. Memos don’t. We oughta get you on a waterboard.” At the mention of this last word, Rumsfeld achieves orgasm.

Friday, November 2nd
-At a Dallas luncheon, Dick Cheney implies that Hugo Chavez is the President of Peru. When asked later about the gaffe, he insists it was based on the best intelligence available at the time.
-The same speech is interrupted by protesters. Afterward, a fearful Secret Service supervisor apologizes to the VP, who is surprisingly forgiving. “As long as none of the lunches were eaten by schoolchildren, you did a good job in my book.”

What was “America’s Mayor” for Halloween? Vote in my online poll!

As many of you know, the Seattle Weekly has given me a press pass for the upcoming Sonics season. Here’s my first Key Arena dispatch:

Opening night–on perhaps closing season–saw no shortage of pageantry: cannons (or something) boomed; Sonics mascot Squatch descended from the ceiling waving a sparkler; and as his name was called and the arena erupted into cheers, young Kevin Durant jogged calmly to meet his teammates, unfazed, his assassin’s heart beating an even 60 per. There was nothing in the way of the dancing and skipping that many players perform on their high-five gauntlet run, just the calm confidence of a man expected to turn around a franchise and fully expecting himself to do so. Of course, the periodic “Save our Sonics” chants and the presence of Clayton Bennett in the owners’ suite reminded us that the wiry rookie may be less franchise savior than masses’ opiate. But as opiates go, the kid’s alright.

On this night, all the kids looked alright, and even a few of the veterans, too. The Sups lost to the Phoenix Suns, 106-99, but they played with or above their opponents for the better part of three-and-a-half quarters, until around the time Marcus Banks drained three three-pointers in a row. This happened one night after Eduardo Najera and Linas Kleiza killed the Sonics in the fourth quarter with their two-man, three-point game. If the trend continues, 8th men around the league are going to be circling games against the Sonics on their calendars. I can just picture Casey Jacobsen rubbing his hands together during warm-ups: “I feel like I’m good for an even 20 tonight, guys!”

I’m sure Phoenix was rusty, this being their first game, and also probably not too motivated to play the Sonics, but the latter’s new collection of long-armed athletes did seem to disrupt the former’s vaunted offense. Steve Nash had an uncharacteristic seven turnovers, and Jeff Green, Johan Petro, Durant, and others got their hands on some implausible balls (insert Reggie Evans joke here).

In the end, though, the Sups struggled with turnovers (again) and simply don’t have much of a half-court offense. It looks like the mainstays will be Durant jumpers and Wilcox dunks (let’s hope the Damien Wilkins isolations are just an early season blip)—both easily taken away, particularly when Durant isn’t strong enough to get himself open or establish post position (he struggled with Raja Bell’s physical play in the second half). Besides Durant, the newcomers don’t look like they’ll add a lot of offensive punch: perhaps it was nerves, but Green’s offensive game appeared in need of refinement. His handle was loose, his jumper unreliable, and his left hand MIA. Conversely, Delonte West is a nice athlete and a killer going to his left but doesn’t seem to have much use for his right. (Wilcox never finishes lefty either, nor has Durant so far, for that matter. They should all take lessons from the seemingly ambidextrous Collison.)

But the worst of the newcomers was clearly Wally Szczerbiak, who looks like he’s going to need two jerseys for each game–one for his back, and another for the giant fork sticking out of it. (These green double-threes are about as close as he’ll come to the Larry Bird comparisons that followed him out of college.) I remember when he could actually move, when his amazingly consistent jumper was complemented by competent agility (he was an All-Star in 2002). But against the Suns and Nuggets, he looked like an old man playing his kid in the driveway, moving at half speed on stiff legs, trying to create shots by backing his defender down, butt way out to keep quicker hands away.

Enough of the negatives, though: for the second night in a row, the team was fun to watch. Durant had an outstanding offensive half, Weezy hit some difficult turnarounds, the rookies took charges, and the players brought more intensity than the Sups have seen since the 04-05 season and more exuberance than since the early Kemp and Payton days. They remind me a little of their amateur counterparts at Montlake—they play hard, fast, and sometimes a little sloppy, but you usually go home feeling like you got your money’s worth.

Today being November 1st, I’d be remiss not to wish a happy birthday to the late Barry Sadler, writer and performer of the famous song, “The Ballad of the Green Beret”.  It’s a bit of a silly ditty, in my opinion (with lyrics like “fearless men who jump and die” and a dead Beret whose only request for his wife was that their son also become a Beret (nothing silly about soldiers’ sacrifices–just the simplicity of the presentation here)), but a catchy one, and something of an anthem for the folks Nixon eventually called the “silent majority”.

Not to sound like too much of an ironic hipster, but I must say that it’s among my favorite of the rock era “patriotic” songs (the melodies of Mellencamp and Springsteen, while anthemic-sounding, were obviously more bittersweet and protestive; Lee Greenwood’s and Hulk Hogans songs just suck; and while I love Marvin Gaye’s rendition of the national anthem and Ray Charles’ “America the Beautiful” (both great songs, in my opinion), their era is a little less clear, given that they were written so much earlier). Being among my favorite rock era patriotic songs is a dubious honor, but “Ballad of the Green Beret” remains on my ipod and I still enjoy its martial drumrolls and romantic visions of simplicity (”trained to live off nature’s land”) and selflessness (”he has died for those oppressed”), regardless of the degree to which they match(ed) reality, or to which I’d support the missions on which said Berets are sent. Mainly, I like to use it as a tongue-in-cheek, out-of bed-soldier song for my girlfriend and various floppers at our apartment.

Of course, my ability to do this is partly a product of relative youth and historical ignorance; I didn’t live through that time and thus don’t associate the song, on a visceral level, with support of the Vietnam war. I wonder if I could be similarly charmed by a song that became a rallying cry for Iraq War supporters today. I doubt it.

Anwyay, here’s Barry, doing his thing:

According to wikipedia, Sadler decided to give away the rights to the song while sitting in a hospital bed, recovering from surgery for an infection he developed from a punji stick (a wooden spike smeared with feces—funny, they didn’t talk so much about the feces part on the guided Cu Chi Tunnels (haha–I know) tour in Vietnam, though you could fire various automatic weapons at the National Defense Firing Range there). His 1967 autobiography (I checked it out yesterday) doesn’t seem to make any mention of this–at least not on a quick reading of the relevant chapter–so it’s probably apocraphyl.

His post-Ballad life is more interesting than anything else, if wikipedia is telling the truth. (It’s been hard to find much info anywhere to flesh out their fascinating sketch.) After making some money with his serialized novels of the mythical soldier Casca (who stabbed Christ during the crucifixion and is condemned to remain a soldier until the Second Coming), his life got really interesting (I’ll just copy directly from the article):

Later in life and after serving time in prison for fatally shooting Nashville songwriter, producer, and manager Lee Emerson Bellamy, Sadler moved to Guatemala City in the mid 1980’s and often hung out at a bar/restaurant called La Europa (also known as Freddie’s Bar for the German proprietor). He continued to publish the Casca books (mostly using various ghostwriters), produced a self-defense video (which was never released) and even helped with vaccination programs in rural villages. But it was often believed that he was involved in selling arms to the Guatemalan military or arming the Contras in Honduras and Nicaragua.

It was in Guatemala City that he was shot in the head one night in a taxi cab. He was airlifted to the States by friends from the Soldier of Fortune Magazine, where he was hospitalized and remained in a coma for several months. He died little more than a year later in his mother’s house in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. The circumstances involving his shooting remain a mystery. It has been claimed that he committed suicide, that he shot himself accidentally while showing off to a female companion, and that he was assassinated for allegedly training and arming the Contras. It is also possible that he was simply a victim of random violence.

An interesting dude, that Barry. Perhaps a little crazy. I doubt he and I would’ve agreed on much (even excluding ‘Nam—can’t say I’d be down with the Contras or Guatemalan military), but I think it would’ve been fun to sit down with him and chat. Anyway, happy birthday, soldier.