Thu, 20 Aug 1998

Just read an e-mail, which I won't forward since it's too long-winded to be worth it, but someone having problems with a Microsoft product called up their support line, which charges money, and a lot of it, and doesn't necessarily refund it if they fail to fix the problem, and then called the Psychic Friends Network. A comparison showed that the latter was faster, cheaper, more courteous although, admittedly, the psychics didn't solve the computer problem either.

According to a newspaper story, Chelsea is the glue holding the family together right now. I can just picture it. "Chelsea, can you ask your mother to pass the ketchup?" "Tell your father to get one of his bimbos to pass the damned ketchup!"

Newt Gingrich has been awfully moderate this week. Do you suppose it was that lying-to-Congress thing and that fine he had to pay a while back? Is he still in hock to Bob Dole, I wonder? Now, here's a question. One way in which Gingrich lied was in promising not to orchestrate a spin campaign, which he then did. Now, with which other Congresscritters was he closeted that weekend, and are any of them calling Clinton a liar this week?

I know the first question a reporter asked the defense secretary today was whether he'd seen the movie Wag the Dog, but I didn't hear what the answer was. Now was the bombing because a vacation at Martha's Vineyard turned out to be an inappropriate follow-up to a national almost-confession, sort of like OJ on the golf course? Or was it to put a break in that line-up of Senators and such calling for his resignation, which I don't believe anyone has done since the bombs fell?

A chemical plant in the center of a capitol city. No, nothing dangerous in that choice of target, no sirree billie-bob.

Terrorism is just a license for anything we want to do, isn't it? Yesterday, the Irish prime minister announced a bunch of new measures which he described as draconian, for use against the Real IRA and such. That must be the only time I've heard someone supporting actions use the term draconian, as if it was a positive term. Britain, too, is talking about going back to the good old days of internment, conviction on the word of a single cop, supergrasses, further cutbacks on the right to silence, etc., that brought us the Guildford 6, the Bradford 4, etc etc etc.

Starr is still going to try to match up the semen stain. Is there anything probative in that after Clinton has confessed fucking her? Monica, by the way, is seriously put out because she thinks they had a genuine relationship which he is reducing to mere sex. Poor girl.

None of the people Clinton made lie for him have seen fit to resign. Who was the last person to resign on a matter of principle in this country, anyway? William Jennings Bryan?

Meanwhile, the Russian economy has collapsed and Yeltsin is showing more signs of dementia, and Congo-Kinshasa is about to erupt again, but wait, let's hear some more about that tie!