Rand Paul and Mike Lee. The Rise of theTea Party Elite

I find it more than a little ironic that two of the three key Tea Party victors yesterday can most accurately be described as “elites”. Highly educated, well-connected, and wealthy, and of course white, they fit the much-maligned “elite” moniker to a tee. I guess if you say enough stupid things and make enough ridiculous promises it’s easy for the electorate to overlook who you actually are, where you actually come from, and where you’re planning to take them.

A little too ironic. Yeah, I really do think…

Many thanks to the wonderful editors at Wikipedia for the following information.

Michael Shumway Lee (born June 4, 1971)
Early life and education
Lee was born in Mesa, Arizona on June 4, 1971. His family moved to Provo, Utah one year later when his father, Rex E. Lee, became the founding dean of Brigham Young University's J. Reuben Clark Law School. While Lee spent about half of his childhood years in Utah, he spent the other half in McLean, Virginia, a suburb of Washington, D.C.. His father was serving first as an Assistant U.S. Attorney General (overseeing the Civil Division of the U.S. Department of Justice during the Ford Administration) from 1975 until 1976, and then as the U.S. Solicitor General (charged with representing the United States government before the Supreme Court during the first term of the Reagan Administration) from 1981 until 1985.

After graduating from Timpview High School (Provo, Utah) in 1989, Mike attended Brigham Young University as an undergraduate student, receiving a B.S. in Political Science in 1994. He served as BYU's Student Body President during the 1993–1994 school year.

Legal career
After graduating from BYU's J. Reuben Clark Law School in 1997, Lee served as a law clerk to Judge Dee Benson of the U.S. District Court for the District of Utah. The following year, he clerked for then-Judge Samuel A. Alito, Jr., who was serving at that time on the U.S. Court of Appealsfor the Third Circuit Court in Newark, New Jersey. After finishing his clerkships, Lee joined the Washington, D.C. office of Sidley Austin, where he specialized in appellate and Supreme Court litigation. Several years later, Lee returned to Utah to serve as an Assistant U.S. Attorney in Salt Lake City, preparing briefs and arguing cases before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit. He served as general counsel to Utah Governor Jon M. Huntsman, Jr. from January 2005 until June 2006, when he returned to Washington to serve a one-year clerkship at the U.S. Supreme Court with Justice Alito.

Rand Paul
Randal Howard "Rand" Paul (born January 7, 1963) is an American ophthalmologist and politician.
Paul is a member of the Tea Party movement who describes himself as a "constitutional conservative." He is the son of Republican Congressman and former presidential candidate Ron Paul of Texas. Paul first received national attention in 2008 when making political speeches on behalf of his father.

A graduate of the Duke University School of Medicine, Paul has been a practicing ophthalmologist in Bowling Green, Kentucky, since 1993, and established his own clinic in December 2007.

Early life and education
Rand Paul's parents, Carol Wells Paul and Ron Paul, married in 1957. Rand was born in Pennsylvania in 1963. He has four siblings: Ronnie, Lori, Robert, and Joy.
The Paul family moved from Pittsburgh to San Antonio in 1965, eventually settling in Surfside Beach, Texas in 1968. In 1976, Rand Paul's father was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives. Paul attended Baylor University in Waco, Texas from fall 1981 to summer 1984. According to a current Senate campaign consultant of Paul's, Paul was enrolled in the honors program at Baylor, and had scored approximately in the 90th percentile on the Medical College Admission Test, though no documentation has been provided to support these claims. During Paul's time at Baylor, he became a member of the NoZe Brotherhood, which would later become an issue in his run for the United States Senate. Paul never obtained a degree from Baylor, however, instead leaving early when he was accepted into his father's alma mater,[15] the Duke University School of Medicine, where he earned his Doctor of Medicine (M.D.) degree in 1988 and completed his residency in 1993.

Personal life
In Atlanta, Paul met Kelley Ashby, a Rhodes College English major. Paul and Ashby were married on October 20, 1990, and moved to Bowling Green, Kentucky, less than 30 miles (48 km) from her hometown of Russellville, Kentucky, in 1993.

The couple have three sons: William, Duncan, and Robert.

Christine O'Donnell's Top Ten Negative Impacts of Masturbation

10) Makes Glenn Beck's chalk stick to his hand

9) Limits the opportunity for unwed teenage mothers to earn $30,000 per abstinence speech

8) The Koch brothers haven't found a way to make money off it yet

7) Doesn't allow Sean Hannity to focus while interviewing Sarah Palin

6) Grows hair on your shower head

5) Keeps teenage boys away from their video games

4) Drives up the price of zucchini

3) Sends well-paying sex worker jobs overseas

2) Smears the speech notes written on your hand

And the number one negative impact of masturbation...

1) It's hard to earn more than $5,800 a year when you've always got your hands in your pants.

The more things change, the more things stay the same?

The second album I ever purchased was Steppenwolf Live, released in 1970. I spent countless hours listening to the incredible live versions of the band's well-known classics like The Pusher, Magic Carpet Ride, Born to be Wild, and Hey Lawdy Mama. But the song that has stuck with and remained so relevant to me over the years is Monster. I treasure the song for its power and beauty but at the same time, am so disappointed that although we've moved on 40 years, the lyrics could have easily been written today.

Perhaps what rings even more true today than the lyrics themselves, and seems eerily familiar, is John Kay's introduction to the song: "Well, while he's drying off back there, what it's really all about is that, despite the things that are wrong in our country there are too many good things worth saving to let the whole thing go down the drain. So, I think we should get together as much as we can and bring about change".

The more things change, the more things stay the same?

Monster
Words and music by John Kay, Jerry Edmonton, Nick St. Nicholas and Larry Byrom

Once the religious, the hunted and weary
Chasing the promise of freedom and hope
Came to this country to build a new vision
Far from the reaches of kingdom and pope
Like good Christians, some would burn the witches
Later some got slaves to gather riches

But still from near and far to seek America
They came by thousands to court the wild
And she just patiently smiled and bore a child
To be their spirit and guiding light

And once the ties with the crown had been broken
Westward in saddle and wagon it went
And 'til the railroad linked ocean to ocean
Many the lives which had come to an end
While we bullied, stole and bought our a homeland
We began the slaughter of the red man

But still from near and far to seek America
They came by thousands to court the wild
And she just patiently smiled and bore a child
To be their spirit and guiding light

The blue and grey they stomped it
They kicked it just like a dog
And when the war over
They stuffed it just like a hog

And though the past has it's share of injustice
Kind was the spirit in many a way
But it's protectors and friends have been sleeping
Now it's a monster and will not obey

(Suicide)
The spirit was freedom and justice
And it's keepers seem generous and kind
It's leaders were supposed to serve the country
But now they won't pay it no mind
'Cause the people grew fat and got lazy
And now their vote is a meaningless joke
They babble about law and order
But it's all just an echo of what they've been told
Yeah, there's a monster on the loose
It's got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watchin'

Our cities have turned into jungles
And corruption is stranglin' the land
The police force is watching the people
And the people just can't understand
We don't know how to mind our own business
'Cause the whole worlds got to be just like us
Now we are fighting a war over there
No matter who's the winner
We can't pay the cost
'Cause there's a monster on the loose
It's got our heads into a noose
And it just sits there watching

(America)
America where are you now?
Don't you care about your sons and daughters?
Don't you know we need you now
We can't fight alone against the monster

© Copyright MCA Music (BMI)
All rights for the USA controlled and administered by
MCA Corporation of America, INC

Two Republicans went campaigning at the garbage dump...

I went to the dump yesterday to drop off my trash and the two Republican candidates for state rep in my district were there campaigning. (I must admit, the choice of venue was a stroke of brilliance.) Facing off against each other in the upcoming primary, they vied for who could be the most "fiscally conservative". Of course, any thinking person knows this is simply conservative code for underfunded schools, horribly skewed tax codes, crumbling infrastructure... Couldn't quite decide which was more repellent, their tired rhetoric or the rancid stench of the trash heap.

I'm going to run off and burn their campaign literature now, but I'll leave you with a much more eloquent riff on our conservative friends via Iggy -- Hey look me over, lend me an ear, I'm a conservative! Enjoy.

I Gotta Go!

With the release of Android 2.2 I'm going to get a new mobile device and FINally stop whining about my iPhone. Now I just have to find someone willing to buy my iPhone so I can cover my $125 termination fee.

So if you're interested in a 16 gig 3GS iPhone, DM or @ me. Of course, you would have to be ok with the fact that the battery runs out by 3:00 in the afternoon, it doesn't run Flash (the most ubiquitous video player on the Web), it only works with AT&T or T-Mobile, and the user agreement insists that Steve Jobs has the right to bend you over at any given moment and have his cantankerous way with you. (It's probably a good thing I'm not in Sales.)

But if you're ok with all that, $125 and it's yours. Or if you would prefer a t-shirt featuring the image above visit t12lve.

Orwell Was Here

I'm convinced that Al Qaeda's long term strategy is to simply keep the U.S. engaged in perpetual war. It doesn't matter where or with whom - Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran , Eurasia, Eastasia - all that matters is that our resources are wasted and our attention is diverted away from the issues we really need to address in order for our country and society to prosper and grow.

The strategy is proving incredibly successful. In constant fear, we continue to fund our perpetual wars with little debate, and then fight tooth and nail over the supposedly devastating costs of funding health care, education or infrastructure, the very things that will help us flourish.

Maybe we are just too easily distracted. Or perhaps we just let ourselves get distracted because we're unable or unwilling to face and develop solutions to the really hard challenges we face. I don't know the answer but I have a sneaking suspicion there are some folks holed up in the caves of Afghanistan snickering at how easily we are led astray.

Black Country Rock

I saw The Kids Are Alright over the weekend and was blown away as Bowie's Black Country Rock practically leaped off the soundtrack. It has to be 20 years since I heard it. How is it that I could let something so wonderful and loved slip out of site for so long? Logged onto iTunes and downloaded The Man Who Sold The World and have been basking in it since. Cmon and dig some Black Country Rock...

Wild Kingdom

On a recent walk I came across a disturbance in the pond. A snapping turtle had come up from below and latched onto a female mallard. Its jaws clamped on the Mallard's breast the turtle struggled to pull the bird under. As the turtle thrashed and pulled, the bird bounced up and down in the water like an angler's bobber. Craning its neck toward the sky and beating its wings, the bird willed itself to fly.

Some say animals are incapable of experiencing emotion, that people simply project their own emotions onto them. I'm not so sure about that.

NY Times drops the ball

The Times really dropped the ball on this one. Calling out the administration without mentioning the media's role in this debacle? I expect better from the Gray Lady.

Faster Than a Speeding Blog