It was a beautiful day and would have been perfect for riding, if only my first bike wasn’t still in San Francisco and the new one wasn’t still in the store, unpurchased.

The nice man at the UPS store here in Ann Arbor tells me it will cost roughly $150 to ship my Bianchi from San Francisco and it has to be put into two boxes. It cost over $400 new. So I suppose I’ll have to do it.

From the movie Born Yesterday, starring William Holden:

‘The whole history of the world is the story of the struggle between the selfish and the unselfish … all that’s bad around us is bred by selfishness … sometimes selfishness can even get to be a cause, an organized force, even a government, and that’s called fascism.’

Amen.

It’s been a very nice, temperate few days in southeastern Michigan. The high humidity of a week or so ago seems to have abated for the moment. No rain in the past few days. The highs have been mild, in the low to mid-70s. The sky has been a perfect shade of bold azure. The conditions remind me a lot of good Bay Area weather. The squirrels are back out in force again, tormenting the poor befuddled beagle and making their daily appearances at the back patio for bread. I haven’t been able to enjoy the weather (or do much else) because I’ve been fighting a harsh tonsil inflammation (and my seasonal allergies, which have inexplicably returned after a couple of months in abeyance) for the past several days. We did go out briefly yesterday, because I had to pick up my paycheck at the university cashier’s office. We considered getting in line for Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 9/11,” but the line, while not around the block, was definitely not short, and I still wasn’t feeling all that well. Maybe next weekend.

So, let’s see if we’ve got this straight.

Virgin USA has its corporate headquarters in New York, but its flight ops headquarters will be clear across the country in San Francisco.

They need to hire 3,000 people from pilots to baggage handlers in the next year and start running ‘low-cost’ operations to compete with JetBlue and Southwest sometime in 2005.

They haven’t decided which planes to buy and no routes have been announced.

So their first order of business?

Why, « spending millions to secure naming rights to Candlestick Park in San Francisco », of course:

‘Mayor Gavin Newsom, in his hunt for new revenue for the cash-strapped city, has proposed entering into a naming rights agreement for the ‘Stick with the San Francisco 49ers who play their home games at the city-owned stadium. The football team, in turn, would make a deal—and probably some money in the transaction—with a company that wants to put its moniker on the wind-blown stadium in the southeastern corner of San Francisco. The mayor’s office now has five companies interested in competing for the sponsorship deal, according to Newsom administration officials. They are: Virgin USA; banking giant Wells Fargo & Co.; Monster Cable Products Inc. in Brisbane; Macromedia Inc., a San Francisco internet and multimedia software firm; and Organic Inc., a digital services firm in San Francisco.’

How ‘bout a three-way deal? Name it Organic Virgin Monster Point. But I digress.

I am mildly curious why an airline with no pilots, planes or routes is negotiating with the City of San Francisco to spend millions to put its name on a crappy football stadium.

Sounds like they’re already off to a great start …

From the Jack Ryan 2004 Website:

‘Jack Ryan on the Defense of Marriage:
‘I believe that marriage can only be defined as that union between one man and one woman. I am opposed to same-sex marriages, civil unions, and registries. I believe that we are all equal before God and should be before the law. Homosexuals deserve the same constitutional protections, safeguards, and human dignity as every American, but they should not be entitled to special rights based on their sexual behavior. The breakdown of the family over the past 35 years is one of the root causes of some of our society’s most intractable social problems-criminal activity, illegitimacy, and the cyclical nature of poverty. As an elected leader, my interest will be in promoting laws and educating people about the fundamental importance of the traditional family unit as the nucleus of our society.’

From The Smoking Gun:

‘In what may prove a crippling blow to his U.S. Senate campaign, divorce records reveal that Illinois Republican Jack Ryan was accused by his former wife, actress Jeri Ryan, of pressuring her to have sex at swinger’s clubs in New York, Paris, and New Orleans while other patrons watched. … The salacious charge leveled at the politician was made by Jeri Ryan, who has starred in TV’s “Star Trek: Voyager” and “Boston Public,” in a court filing in connection with child custody proceedings (you’ll find a portion of that heavily redacted September 2000 document below). The performer alleged that she refused Ryan’s requests for public sex during the excursions, which included a trip to a New York club “with cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling.” … The Ryans were married in 1991 and, in November 1998, Jeri Ryan filed for divorce citing “irreconcilable differences.”’

The court filing also states that Jeri Ryan fell in love with another man after she and Jack started having problems, but before the divorce went through.

Traditional. Republican. Family. Values.

Don’t let the door hit you on the backside on your way out, Jack.

Hello, Senator Obama.

PS: Tristero sums things up nicely:

‘The GOP: home of public sex orgy lovers (Ryan), high-stakes gamblers (Bennett), drug addicts (Limbaugh), adulterers (Gingrich, Hyde), avowed Hitler admirers (Schwarzenegger) and racists (Lott).’

He adds that if that seems an extreme characterization, it’s a drop in the bucket compared to what the above slings on an hourly basis.

A group of right-wing ‘bloggers, responding to President Gore referring to them as ‘Brown Shirts,’ have proudly donned the mantle and are featuring a logo on their sites which has a photo of Sturmabteilung leader Ernst Roehm on it. A swastika was on there as well, but was removed because it was ‘offensive to some.’ They wear the logo as a badge of honor and slam any naysayers by hiding behind a cover of ‘it’s only satire.’

They also say it’s in the tradition of gays calling themselves ‘fags;’ co-opting the insult robs it of its sting.

While I’m all for that (and it has the added benefit of taggin’ ‘em so you can immediately know they’re fascists without havin’ to read their claptrap), I wonder if they really know what they’re doing? I doubt it.

After all, surely any intelligent individual would pause and think long and hard before identifying (even in the cause of ‘satire’) with the movement which was principally responsible for the deaths of over 50 million people between 1933 and 1945. Right?