This is not a diary of political importance.  It has no relevance to any state or national races and nothing to do with foreign policy.  But it might have some relevance to how we feel about the General State of Stuff - at least it did for me, enough that I feel it's worth sharing.  

An hour ago, my girlfriend and I completed our Saturday grocery shopping at one of the Trader Joe's stores in San Francisco.  Although TJ's is relatively unknown in other parts of the country, here in the Bay Area, it's an institution whose funky organic-cooperative roots are still evident despite its commercial success -- grocery shelves still carry hand-made signs, you bag your own stuff, and Hawaiian-shirted staffers ring brass bells to send messages.    

So we get home and start unpacking the groceries:  meat, fresh veggies, yogurt, Zinfandel, pita bread, etc.  Pulling out a package of turkey breast, my partner scowls and asks for today's date.  "Today would be the 26th."  "Well, the packaging here says `Freeze or eat by Aug. 24."  

Dear President Bush:  

Please allow me, as a life-long Republican with a PhD in Dictionary Science, to thank you for your unwavering support of the Federal Marriage Amendment.  

Yes, I am aware that the amendment did nothing to actually protect anyone's marriage.  And I saw that the bill's defenders provided no credible evidence that any marriage or family would be harmed by the provision of equal rights for same-sex couples.    

But those aren't the real issues at stake here.  What's really important is that you stood up in principled defense of one of the most vulnerable and maligned segments of our society: Definitions.

In case you thought getting rewarded for failure was an incentive program reserved for the highest levels of the Bush administration, two words:  sadly no.  

According to a report in today's WashingtonPost.com, the policy extends - feign surprise here - across the breadth of the defense contracting business, where shoddy work is not merely ignored or glossed over.  It's actually rewarded in the form of performance bonuses.   From today's article:  

In its study of 93 contracts, the GAO found that the Defense Department paid out $8 billion in special award and incentive fees, often without regard to performance. In many cases the projects were behind schedule, over budget and experiencing significant technical problems.

That WaPo-ABC News poll that came out today on Bush's approval ratings - it's just been updated with polling statistics on how Congress is faring.  And it's not good news for Republicans.  

The recap:  Bush's numbers have dipped further to a new ...well, what's the opposite of zenith? .. ditch, sinkhole, mineshaft?  In the "worst showing in Post-ABC polling since he became president", Bush has dropped another 3 points in the past month to an approval rating of 38%, with 47% registering  strong disapproval of Bush's handling of the presidency -- more than double the 20% who strongly approve.

But what kind of corollary effect is this having on his elected party-mates?   If it's not a coat-tail, is it a pair of concrete wingtips yet?  

Holy Darwin fish!  Those four-legged swimmers you see on the back of Subarus and other progressive cars -- they aren't just for mocking the Creationists anymore.  They're now the stuff of science, per a new discovery of a 375-million-year old fossil.  

And if you haven't heard about it yet, you will soon - it was on PBS's NewsHour and it's already in Time magazine.  

Per an article in today's New York Times.  
Scientists have discovered fossils of a 375-million-year-old fish, a large scaly creature not seen before, that they say is a long-sought missing link in the evolution of some fishes from water to a life walking on four limbs on land.

You didn't think they were going to stop at The War on Christmas, did you?  
Or The War on Christians, or The Attack on Marriage, or The War on the Easter Bunny?  

Now, the Christian right-wing has dragged out its old warhorse - The War on The Family - and, this time, the group in its gun-sights are the unmarried, as well as those who tarried just a bit too long before fulfilling their Biblical obligations to marry and reproduce.      

Of course, The War on The Family was branded and packaged decades ago, and 30 years later, is getting a bit long in the tooth.  Time for a infusion of fresh invective, a new crisis to fabricate, a new enemy to identify.  

Recently, there have been several superb diaries, including this and this, commenting on the persecuted-Christian juggernaut, asking how in the name of Sam Harris -- in a country where Christianity is espoused by the vast majority of the population  and an ever-higher percentage of those in the highest positions of government -- could any Christian make such a claim with a straight face?  

How, indeed.  There must be something about religious fundamentalism that gives rise to the persecution complex.  What makes it such an elemental part of right-wing faith, even to the point where Christians will conjure up persecution where it doesn't exist?  

This diary is my take on the phenomena as the inevitable concoction of both Tribalism and Sloth.  And the most interesting -- and heretofore unnoticed -- part of the equation is the latter.    

Dear Prolifer:

First, let me thank you for your tireless efforts to have fertilized eggs equated with actual human beings.  It makes me feel so grown-up, like those folks with differentiated cells and all.  And it's made such a contribution to the abortion and stem-cell debates.  

But the real reason I'm writing is to express my appreciation for all your work on behalf of us expelled blastocysts - you know, the 50% of fertilized eggs that are naturally aborted by the woman's body, usually before she even knows she's pregnant.  

There are so many angles to the Domenech story that it would take a month to plumb their full scope and measure.  But the one that fascinates me the most is the response of the RedStaters to the discovery and proof of plagiarism on the part of their own founder and wunderkind, Ben Domenech.  

I'd never been to the RedState site before, but - in the immediate aftermath of the Domenech debacle -- I was curious to see how the self-proclaimed arbiters of personal morality would react.  The crusaders for personal responsibility and accountability.  The decriers of `identity politics'.  The proud defenders of, you know, Judeo-Christian values and stuff.  

I admit it.  It's a big news day and here I am posting trivial crap about the new comment-rating system.  The frontpagers are addressing issues of substance and import -- go there for things that really matter.  This one is about feelings, and nostalgia and maybe a little bit more.  

One, I miss the old system.  I feel it in my bones.  Even more, I feel it in my muscle memory: the ache and the absence.  
Two, I'm going through the stages of loss -- anger, grief, denial -- and it's not because I can't deal with change.  Or maybe it is.  Or maybe it's more like I can't deal with this new loss of choice and -- what's the right word?  -- precision.  

Let me refresh your memory.  (Oh, how long ago it already seems.)
0 - Troll
1 - Unproductive
2 - Marginal
3 - Good
4 - Excellent

As anyone who monitors the religious right-wing knows, distortion and misrepresentation are their stock-in-trade.  Nowhere is this more true than with the Dobson propaganda machine known as Focus on the Family.  

From outright lying about medical research on sexual orientation to claiming anti-Christian persecution if stores dare to say `Happy Holidays' - their deceit is legion.  And there has been little opportunity to fight back because Dobson is not eager to hear anything other than his own unchallenged voice.  But wait.  

FoTF recently created a Website devoted to spreading "The Truth".  It's filled with the usual crap by right-wing fundies and anti-abortion, anti-sex and anti-gay activists, but here's where our story - and our opportunity -- lies.  The site contains a forum for reader response, where people like you and me can counter their deceit with facts.

Story on the flip.