Hell Yeah!

My man Dr. Gonzo came out this week screaming coherently for Kerry. Seems like his recent years in the wilderness breeding attack dogs and shooting stuff has been good for him, and from what I understand even his liver is finally deriving some benefit.

His diaries, sold at auction in the 1990's, included self-admonishments to "smoke more" and "cultivate intensity". He's a cultivated libertarian, or possibly libertine, with a tongue made sharper by time.

From this glorious, riotous piece:

Some people say that George Bush should be run down and sacrificed to the Rat gods. But not me. No. I say it would be a lot easier to just vote the bastard out of office on November 2nd.

And again:

"Only a fool or a sucker would vote for a dangerous loser like Bush," Dr. Thompson warned. "He hates everything we stand for, and he knows we will vote against him in November."

Thompson, long known for the eerie accuracy of his political instincts, went on to denounce Ralph Nader as "a worthless Judas Goat with no moral compass."

"I endorsed John Kerry a long time ago," he said, "and I will do everything in my power, short of roaming the streets with a meat hammer, to help him be the next President of the United States."

I haven't forgotten about blogging about blogging, but I had to mention this. The endorsement of the author of Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas has to count for something.

His criticism of Ralph Nader has something to it, too. In a normal election, Nader's aimless pursuit of high office, carrying his odd, green-ish aspirations would be charmingly Quixotic. In this election he's a spoiler, and he'll draw votes that by rights should go toward whacking W. into the long grass.

Consider: If Nader had conceded early in 2000 and thrown such weight as he had behind Al Gore, would we be biting our nails today, praying not that the right man gets in but that the wrong man can be extracted from the White House?

Ralph has four days to do the right thing. Although personally I don't think it matters whether he stays or goes--GWB is history either way, as long as the election is run comparatively honestly.

But it's a good indication of what sort of man Nader is that he's still willing to tilt at windmills knowing that 537 of his supporters could have made the difference between Al Gore and 1100 dead Americans, to say nothing of other nationals.

Speaking of which--what the hell was on this person's mind?

According to the news article where I first read about him, Shosei Koda was carrying about $20 in cash when he boarded a bus in Amman, Jordan, to go to Bagdhad, an unplanned extension of his trip to the Middle East.

It's hard to feel so conflicted about someone who's probably going to have his head brutally sawn off ("beheaded" is a whitewash term used to spare readers the full horror of the murder), but what the ₤µ€λ was he thinking?