I know it’s early to ring in with the verdict of history and I know there’s room for reasonable debate. But I feel pretty sure that this will indeed be the epitaph of George Walker Bush, 43rd President of the United States (to our everlasting chagrin and shame). Hopefully the crimes committed by he and his cronies will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law, and the nation will reach a consensus on exactly how disastrous the past eight years have been – largely, I would point out, through acts of will, not acts of God. While others will compiled fuller lists, and while I intend to steal mercilessly as I compile this, what follows below the fold is my recitation of the sins of W:
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Blog
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Worst. President. EVER.
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Really interesting MLK clip
Apparently, someone at the BBC unearthed this snippet of an interview with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., in which he is asked about RFK’s 1964 prediction of a Negro President within 40 years. King says he wouldn’t be amazed if it came sooner. (Interesting that RFK was right within 4 years… not a bad piece of prognostication!)
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America the Beautiful
A stirring rendition, courtesy of Beyoncé at HBO’s “We Are One” Inauguration Concert.
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Noted with approval
emptywheel makes an excellent point we don’t hear enough, in commenting on the US Airways crash into the Hudson. Noting that no one died and indeed injuries were comparatively slight, emptywheel reminds us that “This Miracle Brought to You by America’s Unions“.
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Back on Track
Weight this week | Change since last week | Total change 335.4 | -6.2 | -33.0 Blood Pressure | Systolic | Diastolic * | 112 | 80 This was a better week from the viewpoint of weight loss — nearly three times as better, in fact. Even better, my blood pressure seems to be improving as well: This week, the BP was 112 over 80, enough of a drop that my doctor considered taking me off the rampiril. (He didn’t, though. The recent fluctuation has been enough to warrant further treatment.) I can’t complain about 33 pounds over five weeks. That’s a lot better than I would ever do on my own.
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Words Fail Me
From the “sunset interview” in People (as quoted at Shakesville):
Which moments from the last eight years do you revisit most often?
THE PRESIDENT: I definitely think about the families I’ve met of the fallen soldiers—about the compassion, love and determination of the families, to make sure that the Commander-in-Chief hears their stories and knows their pride.
I think about throwing out that pitch at the World Series on [Oct. 30] 2001. My heart was racing when I got to the mound. Didn’t want to bounce it. Didn’t want to let the fans down. My heart was pumping so hard, I wasn’t sure if I could lift my arm. I never felt that anxious any other time during my presidency, curiously enough.
I cannot get my head around the self-absorption and (literal!) small-mindedness of this man who would be — who has been and regretabbly still is — President of the United States. January 20 cannot arrive a nanosecond too soon…
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Holiday Weight Loss
Weight this week Change since last week Total change 341.6 -2.4 -26.8 After two weeks of holidays, my total weight loss was 4.6 pounds. While that represents a falling-off of my original rate, such is to be expected. And at least I can say I lost weight during the holidays, which is something uncommon in America. I’m hoping that, with school back in session and me more on a regular schedule, I might up that rate a little bit.
My blood pressure hardly changed at all, which was disappointing after several weeks of strong improvement. Of course 120/86 is still better than 180/120(!) and even than 120/90, though barely. My doctor put me back on ramipril last week but it hasn’t seemed to have an effect yet.
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My walking routes
Part of my new regimen is exercising, which for me is going to mostly (entirely?) be walking. Using a cool google maps feature/app called gmap-pedometer, I’ve computed the walking distance for various routes around my home. All of these are, for the moment, hypothetical, until it gets warmer out. And I will add others as they occur to me.
- Basic Hun circuit (1.086 mi.)
- Southern circuit (0.776 mi.)
- To Palmer Square (1.577 mi.)
- To the Dinky (1.832 mi.)
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How to Save a Life
Weight this week Change since last week Total change 344.0 -2.2 -24.4 Just like JD, I often think of that song… Anyway, if you’ve been reading our story so far, you know that an aching tooth sent me to (of all places) the cardiologist’s office. He mandated a number of lifestyle changes to help me stem off a heart attack. First and foremost would be to lose weight … a lot of weight, in fact, and as fast as possible.
Without mandating anything, he suggested I see a local weight loss clinic (Princeton Weight Management Center), an office affiliated with Health Management Resources, Inc. (hereafter HMR). HMR has 25 years of experience in doctor-managed weight loss and has a track record of bringing down weight by 100 pounds or more, safely. It’s a bit pricey but it’s a full-service weight management program.
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The Toothache That Saved My Life
In mid-October, I had a toothache. As anyone who knows me is aware, this is far from an unusual occurrence. In fact, ever since grad school, my teeth have been an utter mess and I don’t seem able to get a handle on the situation. So every once in a while I suffer a toothache and have to cope with it, which I usually do by dosing myself with 1000 mg’s of Motrin at regular intervals until I can see my dentist.
During this particular cycle that turned out to be on 2008 October 24. I visited my usual dentist and laid out my agony. He wasn’t surprised, either, especially since my last x-rays had revealed an old crown that was on the verge of failing. Naturally, we both assumed this had happened and that the old cavity lay exposed to new decay. He tapped around my mouth for a few minutes (and after a lifetime of instructions not to stick sharp metal objects in one’s mouth, a visit to the dentist is guaranteed to be harrowing), and came to the unexpected conclusion that the crown had held. In fact, there was no sign of decay anywhere near the tooth that was hurting.
Somehow being told that did not cause the pain to go away.
The dentist probed a little more and discovered significant decay on the wisdom tooth nearby. In a shocking (yet disturbingly common) case of bad wiring, the pain signals from that tooth were being reported to my brain as coming from the healthy tooth. This “misplaced pain” is a known phenomenon in dental medicine. In fact I’d previously suffered a bout of it with a different wisdom tooth, so in retrospect it wasn’t all that shocking. In the earlier case, I’d popped over to the oral surgeon, he pulled the tooth, and I lived happily ever after (at least, until this new problem).
The receptionist placed a call over to the same oral surgeon and, quite luckily, he had a slot open right then. Even better, he was within literal walking distance from the dentist’s office. So I pulled on my jacket, pulled out the iPod, and hiked over to the surgeon’s, where I was immediately seated and my vitals taken pro forma.
And that‘s where the story took an unexpected turn…
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