Hammer Mill Days

That looks like Rigel over there. And Arcturus. And Canopus. No, wait. That's Canoli, a most unusual deep space object. Instead of a molten nickel core, it's filled with almond paste. And that dusting of what looks like dry ice? Powdered sugar. Oh, hi. Just getting our bearings here out in deepest, darkest space. Kind of hard to do without a map - yes, I'm looking at you , Marvin (my personal robot assistant), who left the map case under his workbench back home. Right, so ... chartless, clueless, and nearly devoid of rocket propellant, Big Green is meandering its way to the first stop on our interstellar tour in support of Cowboy Scat: Songs in the Key of Rick , which is charting in the Crab Nebula this month, I hear. (Yes, I read the trades.) How did we get into this pickle, this sitch, this hot water, this plate of spinach? Well ... it all started when we hitched a ride on the charred remnants of the comet ISON as it made its way out of the solar system. It's kind...

There are few things in life more certain than eventual bipartisan agreement on screwing large swaths of our fellow citizens. While I'm glad there won't be a repeat of the government shutdown / debt ceiling self-immolation ritual, this pattern of gradually ratcheting up the austerity gets very tiresome after two or three cycles. This time, the unemployed get thrown under the bus. What a great way to save money - take food out of the mouths of people who have been down on their luck for more than a year. Freaking 7% unemployment and they're acting like the jobless are just plain lazy. That's a truly criminal level of ignorance on the part of elected officials. One thing, though. Let's dispense with this notion that the Republicans are somehow against raising taxes. This has been thoroughly debunked since the House went red three years ago. Even before they took office, they killed the "Making Work Pay" tax credit, costing families like mine another $800 ...