What Do I Know?

Storm Surge

So, all day we've been watching the weather reports from Louisiana, keeping an eye on the forecast for our relatives there.

The weather here was providing some nice atmospherics. Clouds hovered all day, and finally this afternoon, I heard the rare sound of thunder, and lightning cracked once. Then it started raining.

But intent on the weather forecast on another continent, we ignored what was happening right outside until it was almost too late. The water rose, and rose, and rose...until our garden was flooded, a brand new river making its way past my flowerbeds and into the stream bed, usually dry, at the bottom of the garden.

The front was flooding, too, with about six inches of water right outside my office window:


The potted geranium usually sits under the front porch, but the water washed it away. That green patch is a bushy plant about three feet wide. Two slugs have sought dry ground on top.

The water came within one inch of coming in my front door, as the dog and I discovered when we looked out:

My husband opened the side gate, which diverted enough water that the level went down in front.

But the raging river in the back yard widened:

Our garage is full of water, but that's happened before, so we keep water soluble things up high.

Our neighbors strolled down the street in their wellies and crocs, said they'd never seen anything like it. The old man next door who's lived here forever said this hasn't happened in 30 years. Our next door neighbors called the emergency rescue squad—they just moved in last week and must have thought they bought a dud.

I called my daughter in Louisiana, right in the path of Hurricane Gustav. "Guess what? We're almost flooded." She thought I was lying to get attention.

The water has started to recede now. I've no doubt we're definitely the lucky ones, when it comes to flooding from storms. The residents of New Orleans and South Louisiana have my complete sympathy. Having water almost come into my house is a frightening experience—though the dog thought it was great fun to have a river in her back yard.

There's normally six nine (I just measured—the water was 8 inches deep!) inches between the door jamb and the ground, which I used to think was strange, but now I'm grateful. Those six nine inches kept the water from entering our house today.

 

Inexperience vs Inexperience

Not all inexperience is created equal.

When Barack Obama was a child living in Indonesia, his mother would wake him up at 4 a.m. to study American history. When Sarah Palin was growing up in Alaska, her father would wake her up at 3 a.m. to go hunt moose. In high school, they both played on state-championship basketball teams, but Palin went on to compete in beauty pageants and study journalism at the University of Idaho, while Barack Obama went to Columbia to study international relations.

While Barack Obama was a community organizer, Sarah Palin was a sports anchor for the local news. While Barack Obama was president of Harvard Law Review, Sarah Palin was a member of the PTA board.

While Barack Obama was a state senator representing the interests of 200,000 constituents in Illinois, Sarah Palin was mayor of a town of 8000 residents. When Barack Obama was elected to the U.S. Senate, Sarah Palin was running the budget of her small town into the ground by building a sports complex on disputed land.

While Barack Obama was running for president, being briefed by advisers on everything from foreign policy to health care policy to trade, Sarah Palin began serving as governor of Alaska, a state with 600,000 residents.

While Barack Obama was participating in debates with a half dozen other well-qualified candidates, Sarah Palin was trying to have her ex-brother-in-law fired from his job as a state trooper. While Barack Obama was accepting his party's nomination for the president of the United States, Sarah Palin was having her first job interview with John McCain for the job of vice-president.

While Barack Obama and Joe Biden were touring a bio-fuels plant in Pennsylvania, Sarah Palin was enjoying her first visit to "this part of the country."

Which candidate would you rather have in the Oval Office when Putin calls at 3 a.m.?

VP Choices: Vetting the Petsitters

John McCain's choice of Sarah Palin to be his vice presidential nominee is baffling on so many levels I don't know where to start.

But it just occurred to me, I know my petsitter better than John McCain knows Sarah Palin. They met once, in February 2008, for 15 minutes. He talked to her on the phone for five minutes when he was considering her for his VP nominee. Then he had her to his house (one of them) in Sedona to talk about the job.

My petsitter came highly recommended. I checked her references, talked to people who used her, and then spent a half hour talking to her on the phone—weeks in advance. We set up an appointment for her and her partner to come to my house, where I judged her suitability to the job, and my dog thoroughly vetted her by sitting on the sofa next to her and licking her face whenever she wasn't looking. (Once I saw she was okay with that, I pulled the dog down, and made her behave.) They stayed for over an hour, and didn't seem to mind at all the many questions I asked, or the exhaustive details I shared about my dog and her habits.

But I care a lot about who I entrust my dog to. I would never leave her with someone who might forget to show up. (One of them spends the night here, mainly because I can't bear to think of the dog home alone at night.) Or someone who didn't know, for instance, that my dog likes to eat the blackberries out back, or that she hates it when male dogs try to have their way with her.

Yet John McCain seems to think it's okay to leave the country in the care of a woman he only met once, for 15 minutes, in the event he should die in office—a not entirely unlikely scenario for a 72-year-old cancer survivor.

I'm glad I'm not John McCain's dog, because if he's willling to risk the country in the hands of an unvetted VP nominee, who would he leave his dog with?

Observations of a Western Europe Road Trip

Driving through Tirol in Austria.

• If you drive on the autobahn in Germany, you must have your wits about you. Cars come up very fast behind you, so lane changes should not be undertaken lightly. You also have to have a European car. American cars just aren't made for the fast driving and even faster breaking.

• Bavarian houses look like cuckoo clocks.

• German radio is mostly talk. And the talk is mostly about Obama. I only exaggerate slightly: blahblahblahObamablahblahblahObamablahblahblahpopstarblahblahblah
presidentblahblahblahObama.

• Do not try to eat on a Monday night in Luxembourg. You may be able to drink beer, however.

• It is hard to go anywhere in Western Europe without being reminded of the Allied presence during WWII. Americans were once the coolest cats around.

• Grown men actually wear lederhosen, with no apparent self-consciousness. Grown women dress like Heidi.

• German food is very scary. Even with a menu guide—especially with a menu guide—it's a frightening prospect for a vegetarian or vegan. Fortunately, Italy is near enough to Bavaria that there are good Italian restaurants. And my Italian is better than my German.

• Austria and Luxembourg have the cheapest gas of the countries we drove through. Germany has the cleanest toilets. Try to go before you cross over into France.

• If the tea available at their roadside service areas is any indication, the French reputation as gourmands is greatly exaggerated. (The filthy toilets are perhaps an indication all is not right in the gastro-intestinal tracts of the French.) 

• The BBC World Service likes to pull pranks. They actually announced that John McCain had chosen Sarah Palin as his running mate. We were laughing so hard we almost lost control of the Volvo.

I Have a Dream

I woke up at 4 am to hear some soaring rhetoric. I turned on the TV and boy, was I disappointed. First I heard about how awful John McCain is. I already knew that. Then I heard about a grocery list--lower taxes, lower health care premiums, an army of teachers. Still not what I was looking for. 

Finally, about 2/3 through the speech, I heard it. All the happy talk that attracted me to the Obama campaign in the first place. The dream that Martin Luther King had 45 years ago resonated with me more than hearing about how my health care premiums will be lower. 

But I'm definitely in the minority. All the pundits, both on TV and in pajamas, seem to think this was the Best. Political. Speech. Ever. 

Personally, I preferred the one four years ago. 

Yes, I know "there are those who dismiss such beliefs as happy talk." And believe me, no one will criticize McCain more than I will over the next few weeks. But I want my candidate to about something, about something beyond the here and now of partisan politics. 

A lot of Americans were once beaten and lynched when they tried to vote for president. Partisan attacks seem so petty compared to this:

America, we cannot turn back. We cannot walk alone. At this moment, in this election, we must pledge once more to march into the future. Let us keep that promise — that American promise — and in the words of Scripture hold firmly, without wavering, to the hope that we confess. 

Happy talk. But much more moving than tax codes and fuel efficiency standards.

Vote From Abroad

If you're an American citizen living abroad, you have the right to vote. It doesn't matter how long you've lived here, or where your last residence was. (Unless you're a convicted felon, and then some states won't let you vote. But I doubt that applies to you.)

Go to VoteFromAbroad.org and follow the instructions. (If it doesn't work in Safari, use FireFox.) Then print out the form and mail it to the address they provide, which is different for each state.

You don't have to be a member of Democrats Abroad to use this site, though they did create it. They don't keep track of your info unless you join Dems Abroad at the same time, and then only your contact details.

If you are a member of the Armed Forces, you can use this site, even if you live in the U.S.

If you think you are registered, but aren't sure, apply again—you will not get in trouble for trying to re-register, and many states weed out voters who haven't voted in the last two years. You can go to CanI Vote.org to find out if you're registered.

Do it soon. The deadlines for each state for applying for a ballot and sending your ballot back are here. (pdf)

If you don't receive your ballot in time, send in a Federal Write-in Ballot. (pdf) 

Now, bookmark this page and send it to your friends living abroad.

Introverts Unite!

While many of my friends are heading out to Denver to participate in the Democratic convention, I'm sorta glad I'm not going. I applied to be a Dems Abroad blogger, but wasn't selected, probably because they figured out that I'm an anti-social introvert who would rather have several teeth pulled than attend a large convention.

So I'm going to the Bavarian Alps instead. The edelweiss is in bloom (maybe) and the mountains aren't yet covered with snow, so I can hike and drive and enjoy myself without having to make conversations with hundreds of people every day. Particularly since I don't speak a lick of German, I'm looking forward to that last bit.

I'll be back very late on Friday. The dog is looking forward to having the undivided attention of her dog sitters, who take her for three walks every day and give her pets and snacks and think she's the best dog in the world.

Can you believe anyone would think that about my dog?

I guess that's because she's not the least bit anti-social and introverted.

Where Were They on the War?

This is why Joe Biden almost gets a pass for his vote for the Iraq War Resolution. From David Corn:

One of Biden's better moments came in the run-up to the war with Iraq. In the fall of 2002, the Bush administration, claiming Saddam Hussein had amassed loads of WMDs that he could hand to al Qaeda for attacks against the United States, was demanding that the House and Senate grant Bush the authority to invade Iraq whenever he wanted. Rather than cave to Bush, Biden, the chairman of the foreign relations committee, worked with Republican Senators Richard Lugar and Chuck Hagel to craft an alternative: a resolution that would allow Bush to attack Iraq only for the purposes of destroying Iraq's WMDs and only after seeking UN approval. If the UN withheld permission, Bush would have to come back to Congress and prove that the threat was so "grave" that only military action could eliminate it. This was a wily legislative maneuver that could have averted a war. (And Biden told me and Michael Isikoff during an interview for our book, Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War, that he had received backdoor encouragement from Secretary of State Colin Powell.) But Biden's bipartisan measure was ultimately derailed by a fellow Democrat: House minority leader Richard Gephardt, who essentially accepted the White House's blank-check approach. After Gephardt did that, Republican senators told Biden, How can we be to the left of Dick Gephardt? "I was so angry," Biden later said. "I was frustrated. But I never second-guess another man's political judgment."

It was still a bad decision to vote for the war. But in Washington, things are often more nuanced than they seem, and there's a lot going on behind the scenes that many people aren't aware of.

There's a big difference between gung-ho support for a war, which is what Edwards, Bayh and McCain offered, and passive support, which was Clinton's position, and spirited resistance, which is what Biden attempted.

And then of course there are those who voted against the war.

While I would have preferred a solid war opponent on both sides of the ticket, it won't pain my conscience to vote for Obama-Biden the way it did to vote for Kerry-Edwards.

Decency

I didn't wake up early to see who the VP nominee was because there was little doubt that it had to be Biden. The Obama campaign would never have let speculation run this rampant, as it has over the last week, if he'd been planning to choose another nominee. It would have been too embarrassing for Biden if Obama had gone with someone else after Howard Fineman called it for Biden earlier this week, for instance, and after I posted this on Monday.

How do I know this? They quickly squelched a rumor on Thursday that a big event was being planned in Indianapolis for Saturday, home of Evan Bayh. They didn't want the speculation to go too far in that direction.

Other campaigns haven't been as considerate of their potential VP nominees. The McCain camp is letting rumors persist that he's chosen Romney, for instance—though it's clear that decision is by no means a done deal. Kerry's campaign, likewise, couldn't keep the Gephart speculation down, and an erroneous newspaper cover exists to remind us all how close he came to being Kerry's VP selection.

Why does this matter? Because the close secrecy that the Obama campaign has maintained on this wasn't just to prove to the media that they could outsmart them. It was about decency.

You can argue whether Biden is the best pick. Although I would have preferred Kathleen Sebelius, I realize she had real drawbacks, and choosing her while Russia is bearing down on Eastern Europe would have been seen as a blithe insistence that Obama himself was more than equipped to deal with Russia on his own. While I think he is, the press would have nailed him on that. Digging in on that point wasn't worth the risk.

And when you start adding up the pros and cons, Biden comes out ahead. Plus, he's a genuinely charming man, if first hand accounts can be believed. (I put a lot of stock in first hand accounts, which is why I never really was thrilled about either Kerry or Gore.) I like charm, as long as it's not vacuous or calculated.

So when I saw confirmation on the Obama website that the ticket was Obama-Biden, I couldn't resist. I pulled out my credit card and gave another $50. Because I'm proud to support a decent campaign.

Friday Cow Blogging

The Secret Lives of Cows

These cows were hiding under the railway tunnel near Bourne End. They didn't mind us walking around them.

Afterward they got up and danced around.

Prophecy

A good night's sleep, and a peek at Larry King, have given me the following insights:

Who's not going to be Barack Obama's VP:

Bill Richardson. He hasn't shaved his beard.

Hillary Clinton. Paul Begala just said she wasn't, and he should know: the Clinton camp can't keep their mouths shut.

Who's likely to be Barack Obama's VP:

Joe Biden. I'll bet one of my houses on it.

Plus, I had a dream last night that Barack and Hillary cut a video together, announcing that Biden was the choice. I haven't been able to find it online yet, but I'm sure that dream was prophetic.

Safe as Houses

Typical Edwardian house in suburban Britain, spared demolition—for now.

Houses, houses everywhere...all this talk of houses, and people who have so many they can't keep track of them...yes, some people just own too many houses. The problem isn't the people running for president; it's the ones on my street.

Bear with me. Please.

With the housing market the way it is now in Britain, people don't want to sell, or buy—housing prices have fallen, and may fall further, but they're still extremely high.

So the thing to do, in my neighborhood at least, is to completely gut your house and rebuild. In a half square-mile area, there are at my count six houses undergoing such extensive renovation, in one case rebuilding from the ground up. Two are located next door to each other, and another is across the street from those two. A massive renovation project involves several vans, lorries, and other vehicles, all of which must park on a street built for residential traffic only.

The last three times I tried to drive down my street, I had to turn around and detour due to the road being blocked.

It's very annoying, and with the house next door having just sold, I worry that it too could go under the scaffolding and become another reno nightmare.

Many of the houses here were built around the turn of the century—the rail line came out here in 1906, and a building boom started. Now those houses are worth a small fortune, but not because they're lovely old homes—they are, but they're also sitting on land that's priceless. Zoning laws prohibit new building—unless it's Tesco. So people tear down perfectly good homes and build modern versions of the same house.

The newer houses all fit in the architectural scheme around here—Georgian brick and fake half-timbered houses seem to be the most popular replacement styles.

But they just don't have the well-loved look of the older homes. Inside, they'll have modern kitchens, up-to-date plumbing, and state-of-the-art insulation. It will take far longer for the ivy to climb over the new brick, for the clematis to snake over the siding, than it took to demolish century-old timber.

Britain is a place that adores its past, but sadly, the past is falling victim to posh.

McCain Family Fictions

Those McCains! They can't stop lying. From family recipes, to drug addiction, and even the existence of siblings—and now, they've brought Mother Theresa into their web of lies.

This makes Bosnia look like a child's scribblings; Rielle Hunter look like a boy's brash boast.

Other politicians are, quite simply, out of their league when they try to lie. Remember Barack Obama mixing up the name of the German concentration camp his uncle helped liberate? An infant could have done that.

Lying about Mother Theresa handing you a baby in an orphanage? That's big league. I think Cindy McCain should be nominated for a Pulitzer, or at least the RITA.

Me, I'd give anything to have that sort of imagination. Not to mention the chutzpah.

Wednesday Foodishness

It being Wednesday and all, I updated my poor neglected food blog. Yesterday. Tuesday. But I'm letting you know now, since I'm out all day and otherwise would have nothing to blog about.*

I wish I could blame it on having a wisdom tooth removed, but my lack of posts over there is due to laziness more than pain, although there might be something more relevant to the fact they're called wisdom teeth.

I am feeling less wise than ever.

*Whenever I travel all day I write in my head a lovely post about Britain's motorways, and the thought-provoking signage I see. Maybe one day.

More Biden

Watch this and tell me Joe Biden isn't Al Sharpton, only...cleaner?

Biden?

I haven't said as much as I'd have like to about the possible vice-presidential choice on the Dem side. Although I think I've made it pretty clear that, if and when Barack Obama calls me for my advice, I'll tell him I think Kathleen Sebelius is far and away the best choice.

That said, I've been mulling over other possible alternatives, especially last weekend when my friend, also a political junkie, was here. During one of our long walks we examined the pros and cons of all the possibilities and came up with the most likely choice. And that was Joe Biden, Delaware Senator and motormouth extraordinaire.

(But I mean that in a good way.)

The signs are starting to point in that direction—though who knows, anything could happen. (And actually, something big did happen: Russia invaded Georgia, suddenly sweeping domestic issues to the back yard, and upsetting the gentle game of croquet that was the VP speculation.)

I still think Kathleen Sebelius has huge potential in the Democratic party. I think she'd really be a better VP than anyone else who's been mentioned, including those who've held the position before. She really shines at administration, budgeting, nuts and bolts economic issues, heath care—oh shoot. I've gone and talked myself back into hoping against hope she's the pick.

Oh well. If this is true, and Biden is the nominee, it really isn't such a bad thing. And remember: he was the one who put together the alternative to the awful Iraq War Resolution, which almost all of the possible candidates voted for or spoke in favor of. Except Obama. And Sebelius.

And, you gotta admit, Biden makes McCain look like an imbecile. I'm cool with that.

Pretty Fiction in the Sand

I don't intend to jump on every instance of failed "truthiness" that John McCain is guilty of, but this one seems particularly egregious. It's one thing to fabricate a story about a prison guard drawing a cross in the sand, but to tell it at a forum on faith?

Ugh.

The background: After McCain told the story Saturday about the sympathetic prison guard in Hanoi who quietly drew a cross in the dirt to indicate solidarity, a DailyKos reader grew suspicious. Turned out the story was almost identical to one written by Alexander Solzhenitsyn in a series of stories about the Soviet Gulags, published in America in 1973, prior to any mention by McCain. Meanwhile, McCain did write a comprehensive account of his captivity in May, 1973—but oddly, never mentioned his moment of Christian solidarity—despite what seems like the perfect opening:

Some guards would just come in and do their job. When they were told to beat you they would come in and do it. Some seemed to get a big bang out of it. A lot of them were homosexual, although never toward us. Some, who were pretty damned sadistic, seemed to get a big thrill out of the beatings.

After that passage, he goes on to talk about communication, and how it sustained him. Still no mention of his communication with his Christian sympathizer. (Note: I highly recommend reading his article in US News. It tells a lot about the origins of his current mindset, including his views on "peaceniks" and his belief "that negotiation was not going to settle the problem.")

It also turns out that McCain—or his co-author, Mark Salter, is a big fan of Solzhenitsyn. Wouldn't he have remarked before if his story and one Solzhenitsyn told were so, uhh, similar?

His story should have been scrutinized before now—I mean, how plausible is it that a North Vietnamese prison guard—in a country that practices Buddhism—would secretly be a Christian sympathizer? And moreover, one who was familiar with the cross in the dirt story, which was first recounted in 1541? I didn't think prison guards were that well read—wasn't that sort of the point about Communism?

I've been known to stretch the truth, but even I would have to balk at such an implausible tale.

Friday Cow Blogging

When I went to Althorp, Princess Diana's family estate, a couple of weeks ago, I slipped off the main path toward the fence, in search of photogenic Herefords. As I stalked them with my Nikon, I felt like a paparazzi, pointing and shooting at will while the poor creatures went about their daily routine.

I felt like scum later, but I got some good photos.

Weird Stuff My Dog Eats

Foraging for fruit in unlikely places.

Some time ago I noticed the fuschia flowers were turning into berries. Then the other day my dog discovered them—I found her with her nose buried in the fuschia plant. I called out to my daughter, who was on her laptop in the living room, "Quick! Google fuchia berries and see if they're poisonous!".

In seconds, she came back with an answer: No. And she'd found a page that said "My Golden Retriever loves to eat fuschia berries."

This has been another episode of Weird Stuff My Dog Eats.

Summer, I Hardly Knew You

So much for summer. I woke up this morning to warm radiators and frost in the pasture. The Met Office reports it was 9.3C last night in High Wycombe. That's about 48F.

Fortunately I never put my sweaters away for the summer.