A Tough Roe To Ho-- And A Tough Ho To Row

      As if watching the debate last night between Kerry and Bush (or would that be carrion Bush?) wasn't absurd enough, I rather inexplicably found myself watching poor Neil McDonald's interview yesterday with the all-licens'd prevaricator of political hatred, Ann Coulter, on the CBC's Face to Face.   It was a horrifying experience. McDonald-- a reasonable, deliberate journalist-- seemed to make the mistake of confronting She Of The Jagged Lips (you can choose which ones) with facts and studies and quotes, as if it were somehow possible that he might be able to have a civilized discourse with her. 'Twas not to be.   She steamrolled over facts, over details, over even the basics dimensions of polite conduct, making President Bush's charging of Charlie Gibson seem a mere bumping of elbows.   It's no secret that Coulter's a fire-breathing hag, but watching her in an extended session as she issued her sulphurous and racist spew (insulting not just those ever-targetted Fr-ehh-nch, but also Canadians), I couldn't help but wonder who pissed in her genetic pool. She's Barbie with Hitler's disposition, a twisted, hostile, ignorant loon who talks so much about America but evidently thinks America should only consist of people that think (and I use that word guardedly) exactly as she does. And there is poor Neil, nobly trying to carry on a serious interview, she barking at him like some rabid Cerberus as he tries to finish a question, trying, that is, to be courteous and professional, and only barely concealing his exasperation.   I pitied him, having to deal with this embodiment of political and spiritual Turret's syndrome.   I swear, that malignant tumour of a woman makes Goneril look like Anna Karenina.

      In other stuff: did any of you wonder what was up with Dubby's reference to the Dred Scott decision in the second debate? Well, read this, and then this, and be appropriately distressed. It's been one of the underlying urgencies to the defeat of President Bush that he might be able to stack the Supreme Court and so remake jurisprudence in his own image, a prospect that in itself should scare the bloody bajeebus out of those of sound mind. Yikes. See also this interesting piece from Thomas Friedman on the Republican addiction to 9/11.   Sometimes I really do wonder how much the Shrubberies simply can't see the wood for the trees, and how much they've desperately convinced themselves of their delusions.   I'm just praying that Birnam Wood is indeed moving. By the way-- you want some wood, Mr President?

      Totally unrelated: there's a good reminiscence and reconsideration of Derrida in today's NYTimes. Maybe it's a good time to remember how easily things can be deconstructed--- and deliberately misconstructed. Sometimes, I wonder if Derrida felt like the accidental Doctor Frankenstein of contemporary thought, releasing a creation that would become so perverted and misunderstood. Jacques, methinks your former speeches have but hit our thoughts which may interpret farther.