general petraeus

Until October 10th

In an effort to counteract my truly outrageous soda intake, for the next month, I will drink only water.

My hair has now gotten as absolutely long as it ever has since I first became self-conscious of my receding hairline. My mother always urged me to keep it long, but there's nothing so unattractive as the half-covered baldness. Short hair has always suited me better anyway, more so now that the peak of my hairline is so pronounced, but I've decided that it might be time to experiment a little. I'm growing my hair out until further notice.

I stumbled across this little tidbit: Mischa Barton played Vicky Austin in a film adaptation of Madeline L'Engle's A Ring Of Endless Light a few years ago. I'm horrified. Vicky Austin is one of those female protagonists you don't mess with; this is the equivalent of Goldie Hawn playing Elizabeth Bennet in Pride and Prejudice. It just boggles the mind.

I just learned today that MoveOn.org's New York Times ad, "General Petraeus or General Betray Us?" (clever!) was written and sent in long before the General had even written his statements on the war in Iraq. The ad states, essentially, that General Petraeus has said a lot of vaguely positive things about the war in Iraq in the past, so he must be in league with the White House and Bush, and therefore is a traitor to the American cause. The reason House Democratic leadership hasn't denounced the ad is that some Democratic Congressmen asked MoveOn.org and similar organizations to start kicking up a fuss about Petraeus. I'm not sure if I really believe all of that last bit, but one way or another: by not denouncing the ad, the Democratic party has essentially stated that any leadership figure who supports the war, or even feels positive about the war in any context, is a traitor.

One more reason I'm not voting Democrat this year.

Y'know, it's really remarkable that a country that hates their Republican President this much could still not necessarily be convinced to vote the other way in each election. It takes a special kind of leadership to achieve something like that.