From CNN:
Oil prices soar past $100 a barrel as war escalates in Iran
Based on past experience, I felt it prudent to post this term I coined today on a more-permanent platform as a hedge against the day when, well, it's a long story...
...is at least 45 years old and dates back to a musical revue based on the satirical songs of Tom Lehrer from the 1950s & 1960s.
In these evil times -- especially if you spend much of the day behind a keyboard -- it’s easy to start thinking you’re alone out in the tall grass. That’s why the chance to spend a couple of groovy hours in good company with fellow travelers is a jewel beyond price. Many thanks to Hal (and Andrea) for inviting me to hang out with him, Johnny Million, and Phil Ittner while my wife was off communing with her knitting cult in Chicago.
...to keynote their next Even Bigger Tent Revival.
I am done with the Republican Party.
— James Woods (@RealJamesWoods) March 6, 2026
Between this and Thune’s refusal to pass the SAVE Act, I’m done with these uniparty traitors.
I’m changing my party affiliation to Independent. No wonder President Trump is fighting an uphill battle every day. https://t.co/Qp8zr4y4gA
This pathetic burbling of this broke-brained creature means it is time again for the PSA in which I remind readers of a fun word, coined by Kurt Vonnegut his 1963 satirical novel "Cat's Cradle" , which I began using in a political context all the way back in November of 2009.
The occasion was David Fucking Brooks trying to pass off the post-Dubya spike in "independent" voters as some brand-new constituency which Democrats needed to appease instead of what it obviously was: Republican Bush-voters rebranding themselves as "independent" in the hopes of dodging responsibility for the disasters they unleashed on this country by voting for Bush twice.
From The "Independent" Granfalloon, November 08, 2009:
Nobody knows what “independents” want, because “independent” as a modern political category is a textbook example of what Kurt Vonnegut defined in "Cat's Cradle" as a "granfalloon":
"...a proud and meaningless association of human beings"Because “independent” can mean any-damn-thing, or nothing at all.
