Wow. I guess Taco Bell should rework that mildly amusing commercial involving a guy walking down the street with fajitas. Instead, he could walk out of a bar and find himself confronted by angry police officers who demand that he hand over his tasty dinner. Truth is stranger than fiction, eh?

At some point, someone in the administration is going to wake up and think, "my god, what have we let happen" with respect to North Korea. The latest? North Korea is going to launch another missile. This after the top-gun style flyby and the previous missile launch and the restarting of the nuclear reactor. As someone who's always thought we needed to deal with the NK issue head-on, the silence from the White House is deafening. Just look at the press conference from March 5:

Q Is the United States now resigned to seeing North Korea develop a nuclear arsenal?

MR. FLEISCHER: No. The position of the United States, along with our allies in the region, is just the opposite, that it's important to make certain that there is a denuclearized Peninsula. And that's why we're working so hard on this, and why we have called directly and publicly for North Korea to dismantle its nuclear programs.

That's why we're working so hard on this? So hard on this? How delusional could these guys be? Let's roll the tape from last night:

Q: Mr. President, thank you. Another hot spot is North Korea. If North Korea restarts their plutonium plant, will that change your thinking about how to handle this crisis, or are you resigned to North Korea becoming a nuclear power?

Bush: This is a regional issue. I say regional issue because there's a lot of countries that have got a direct stake in whether or not North Korea has nuclear weapons.

We've got a stake as to whether North Korea has any nuclear weapon. China clearly has a stake as to whether or not North Korea has a nuclear weapon. South Korea, of course, has a stake. Japan has got a significant stake as to whether or not North Korea has a nuclear weapon. Russia has a stake.

So therefore I think the best way to deal with this is in multilateral fashion by convincing those nations that they must stand up to their responsibility along with the United States to convince Kim Jong Il that the development of a nuclear arsenal is not in his nation's interests, and that should he want help in easing the suffering of the North Korean people, the best way to achieve that help is to not proceed forward.

We've tried bilateral negotiations with North Korea. My predecessor in a good-faith effort entered into a framework agreement. The United States honored its side of the agreement; North Korea didn't. While we felt the agreement was enforced, North Korea was enriching uranium. In my judgment, the best way to deal with North Korea is to convince parties to assume their responsibility.

I was heartened by the fact that Jiang Zemin, when he came to Crawford, Texas, made it very clear to me and publicly as well that a nuclear-weapons-free peninsula was in China's interest.

And so we're working with China and the other nations I mentioned to bring multilateral pressure and to convince Kim Jong Il that the development of a nuclear arsenal is not in his interests.

That's not a policy. That's not even an appropriate answer to a question asked about whether we are resigned to North Korea becoming a nuclear power. So the answer, I suppose, is yes. And that's a big problem. And one that can't be blown away in a unilateral action, like Iraq. Where is the red line, and what are we going to do when we reach it?

For the past few weeks, after I discovered that my office had an official "drug cabinet" for the relief of headaches, etc. I've been popping a couple aspirin a day. Why? Well, every year or so some study comes out which shows that people who take one to two aspirin a day have reduced risk of something. Cancer, heart attacks, you name it. So today, after I took my two, I looked at the bottle and was surprised to find that the expiration date was 6/99. That's right. Almost four years old. Needless to say, I'll be taking my own aspirin from now on.

Here's a great thought. I remember back to the days immediately following September 11, and having discussions with people over this very subject. The thought was always the same: if the terrorists get us to change the way we view our country, they've already won. In many ways, the current dismantling of our liberties can be traced to John Ashcroft, but I'm not convinced that, in the absence of a horrible terrorist attack, he would have behaved any differently. The main problem is that the idea of America, of freedom and justice for all, is not a pragmatic one. It would be far easier to require everyone to have an id card that tracked where they went and conversations they had so that we could quickly identify "trouble-makers" and deal with them accordingly. Terrorism couldn't survive in such an environment. Free speech couldn't either.

The trouble isn't how far down the slope of the repression of civil liberties we slide. The trouble is sliding in the first place. The fact that some Americans would consider torture to be a viable option for people we "don't like" is disturbing. I don't have a problem with a national ID card system, for instance. ID card used to show someone's age are a good thing. That said, using ID cards to track people and to profile them is simply wrong. Libertarians attack the method (ID cards) because they can smell the potential for abuse. The problem, however, is the abuse itself. When we have representatives in the government who believe profiling is good, who believe that internment of citizens was fine and who think that we should be able to revoke someone's citizenship without their say-so, that's a problem. It's un-American.

Sure, such a system is ripe for exploitation. But that's not the point. America isn't about efficiency, or pragmatism: it's about freedom. If problems occur, we can deal with them. Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. But now, more than ever, we need to be vigilant about the restrictions our own government is placing upon our liberties. Liberty demands nothing less.

I picked up a copy of the AP stylebook yesterday for work. I had been growing tired of attempting to recall obscure facts from 4-5 years ago when I used to edit my college newspaper. Nicely, though, several of the facts I'd recited in past days were correct, when I flipped through the book. Nothing used to give me greater satisfaction than to challenge an especially arrogant writer who'd claim "this is how it's done in...(insert name of other stylebook like MLA, Strunk & White, etc.).." and then slap them with the AP stylebook, icing it off with a comment that we weren't an English professor, we were a newspaper.

Flipping through it takes me back...Bat proved too elusive for all concerned.

I told some friends and family the other day that Ohio has just ratified the 14th amendment. I spoke too soon, perhaps. From the article:

It seemed like a slam-dunk resolution to fix an embarrassing, 135-year-old blemish on Ohio's record, said state Sen. Mark Mallory, D-Cincinnati.

After all, who would oppose finally ratifying the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing equal rights to all citizens? Mallory got the entire 33-member Ohio Senate to vote for the resolution and sign on as co-sponsors Feb. 25.

In the Ohio House, it's quite a different story.

There, a handful of conservative Republicans say they're all for equal rights but don't like how judges have used the 14th Amendment in cases such as Roe v. Wade, guaranteeing a woman's access to abortion, or in a federal court ruling last year that said reciting the Pledge of Allegiance in California schools was unconstitutional because it includes the words "under God."

Later in the piece, the ultimate irony is revealed:

Ohio ratified it in 1867, but in the next election, Democrats, who had campaigned against the amendment, won a majority in the legislature, and in 1868, the legislature rescinded its ratification.

Ohio is the only state that has not ratified it.

So, although Democrats fought tooth and nail in the mid 19th century to prevent the ratification, now Republicans are the ones (the party of Lincoln, remember?) who feel it's not a good idea. This in the state that was the setting for Uncle Tom's Cabin...wow. Talk about a national black-eye. I'm glad I don't live there.

How do you make a good morning even better? Just add salt bagels! I had a co-worker pick one up for me and things are looking brighter than ever. Man, I love that taste...combined with cream cheese it's the perfect breakfast.

Yes, it's that time again: time to enjoy our favorite Felcher & Sons employee: Terry Tate, Office Linebacker. For your viewing pleasure, we've managed to scoop together some of the choicest clips, all uncensored, all in quicktime format and all sure to break your funny bone. Here we go:

• The Streaker
• Draft Day
• Terry on Vacation

Remember, all are uncensored, inappropriate for children, needlessly violent and very very funny. Draft Day in particular is priceless.

No, I'm not talking about wasting time by going to metacritic and attempting to reduce every piece of artistic work to a 1-100 scale. Or going to my work's website in an attempt to curry my favor. I'm talking about the brand-new lycos 50 blog. That's right, the site that can out-zeitgeist google zeitgeist just launched a blog to comment on the trends affecting your life and mine.

Why actually engage in pop culture when you can do a quick glance and get all you need to know? Or, thanks to the blog, pick up a cool trend like MC Hawkings' Crib before it gets uber-popular;for some reason the name Hari Seldon comes to mind...

So I found this lying around on the CIA Terrorist Busters webpage. Why am I reminded of the following?

Dr. Egon Spengler: There's something very important I forgot to tell you.
Dr. Peter Venkman: What?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Don't cross the streams.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Why?
Dr. Egon Spengler: It would be bad.
Dr. Peter Venkman: I'm fuzzy on the whole good/bad thing. What do you mean "bad"?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.
Dr. Raymond Stantz: Total protonic reversal.
Dr. Peter Venkman: That's bad. Okay. Alright, important safety tip, thanks Egon.

If they get to carry around unlicensed nuclear accelerators on their backs and suck UBL and his cohorts into tiny little boxes that they'll store in a basement, I want to sign up.