I was listening to NPR Thursday, and I heard president bush talking about the proposed pipeline to supply Iranian gas to India and I couldn't believe the phraseology our president used:

"Our beef with Iran is not the pipeline, our beef with Iran is in fact they want to develop a nuclear weapon and I believe a nuclear weapon in the hands of the Iranians will be very dangerous for all of us," said Mr Bush.

Yes, you heard correctly, the President used the term "beef" to describe our disagreements with Iran. That is pretty freakin awesome. I am just surprised I haven't seen any shows or blogs pick up on it.

Also, on to other odd political items. There is a bathroom stall in my school with a bunch of political graffiti in it. It has everything from quick "Bush sucks" to long diatribes about socialism (My school is full of poli sci, public administration, international relations, economics, etc majors).

Someone saw all this political graffiti and responded "What happened to graffiti about bjs in bathroom stalls?"

To which the response written: "The market was flooded with bjs"

That is so nerdy and so hilarious.

I will now apoligize to nonnerds who read through my entire entry and did not find those amusing. Hope all is well with everyone. Stressful here. 5 weeks to graduation. Bye

Happy Birthday (e:maureen)!!! hope you have a great day

You know it is time to do dishes when you drink your morning oj out of a bowl because you ran out of cups

In a nostalgic mood tonight.

Stalked a lot of people I use to know on LexisNexis and Google.

Wonder if anyone/who does that to me.

All of the hits on my name as a phrase come from articles I wrote for my friend's now defunct website, articles I wrote for my internship at CAGW, quotes in my undergrad school newspaper, the abstract for my undergrad thesis, and a petition I signed for Arrested Development. (e:strip) is not on there as I have not put my last name in any of my journals (a conscious choice, both so people I have/do/will work for cannot find this and because I don't want everyone who knows me to know about my journal (even though if they are clever in what they search for, they can find it))

(e:maureen) was here the past couple of days. It was nice seeing her and I had a good time while she was here. We saw V for Vendetta . Not sure how I felt about it. Thought it wasn't that great til the end and I really enjoyed the ending. I am a sucker for melodrama. The movie prompted me to buy two CDs, Rolling Stones - Forty Licks (Street Fighting Man was in the closing credits) and Antony and the Johnsons - I am a Bird Now (Bird Guhl was played on the jukebox in the movie). I am listening to the latter now. His voice in Hope There's Somebody is just chilling. I had heard about the album on NPR. And wrote about it previously (e:jessbob,124)

First day o' frisbee tomorrow. should be good. I should go to bed. Happy belated b-day (e:mk).

Warm nights always make me feel weird and bring back a lot of memory feelings.

Called out again by (e:mk) on posting. Not posting in over a month is a bit long. I will try and give you the run down on what has happened. First, congrats to (e:mk) on "basically officially" becoming a teacher. Second, happy b-day to (e:jill), hope you had a great day.

On to what I have been doing the past month. I just got back from Georgia, where I spent my spring break with Siv, Jess and Dum. It was a really good time. Finally got to meet siv's gf lucy. She is really nice and I really like her. Hanging out was just how it always was, so much so that last night when I went to bed, I got a bit sentimental for living in Park Bethesda, specifically late spring junior year and the summer between junior and senior year. Not any specific incident, just the feeling of the warm air and just hanging out. While there we went to (among many burrito places including chipotle and a place that actually tasted better than chipotle) an exhibit at the Atlanta Civic Center of human bodies preserved and with their skin removed so you can see all of their different systems, nervous, muscle etc. It was really creepy and cool at the same time. We also went to the Georgia Aquarium which is the world's largest aquarium and has two whale sharks (the world's largest fist). It was really cool. Overall, it was a great trip.

Also, this past month I got a job for when I graduate. I will be working in the NYS Division of Budget, on the newly formed Public Authorities Budget office. I am really excited about it, it was the job I wanted most. What the office will be working on is looking in to public authorities, like the thruway authority and Buffalo Control Board, which have come under a lot of scrutiny lately for taking on a lot of debt with little oversight. To interview for it was a really intense process. They brought all of the candidates, there were 10 for 6 positions, out to albany for 3 days and we interviewed with a bunch of high level people, including both deputy budget directors and heads of different sections in the Budget office. It was both cool because we were interviewing with some pretty high level people, but it was also pretty terrifying because all you are doing is interviewing and going to receptions (including one at the Governors mansion which was really cool, the governor wasn't there) where are you are mingling and have to be on all the time. Luckily, they made the decision pretty fast and I got a call the next day from the Budget Director personally offering me the position. I am superexcited about it, but it will be really intense. First, most people start in may or june but because my program doesn't finish until june 30th, I have to start late and I graduate on a friday and have to be at work the next monday, which will be pretty stressful. For the first 8 months I will be in the public authorities budget office, for the next 8 months, I will be in the budget office's debt unit to look into the bonds that the authorities are issuing and then for the final four months, I will actually work in a public authority helping them to work with the budget office. After the 2 years, I negotiate my position in the budget division. I am looking forward to starting and hopefully it will be as good as I think it will be.

One thing I am not looking forward to is the rest of this semester. I have a bunch of papers to work on that will all be a pain in my ass. Ugh. I guess it was only a matter of time before I had to do work in grad school. Well I better go get on that because it is not getting anymore done now. Talk to you later
Jesse

For all of you hipsters who are into Arctic Monkeys (looking at you (e:hodown)) the band that is opening up for them in the States is my friend's band, the Spinto Band, [inlink]jessbob,122[/inlink] You should check them out They are really good, and if you do happen to catch the arctic monkeys in the states (I know they are coming to NYC, Boston, Toronto, Philly and DC) come early, it will be worth it.

The Washington Post today had an article about former Georgia Congressman Bob Barr, a VERY conservative congressman that lead the impeachment charges against Clinton, and how he has been highly critical of President Bush's eaves dropping program.

In the article Bob Barr says, "Are we losing our lodestar, which is the Bill of Rights? Are we in danger of putting allegiance to party ahead of allegiance to principle?"

I am so glad he is calling out conservatives on this. I saw soooo many people in DC (republicans and democrats) just blindly tow the party line without thinking for themselves about whether it is actually in line with their beliefs. If it is in line, fine, you can believe what you want to believe. But at least think about it.

At the conservative conference that he said this, Barr got the following response, "But nobody said anything in the deathly quiet audience. Barr merited only polite applause when he finished, and one man, Richard Sorcinelli, booed him loudly. 'I can't believe I'm in a conservative hall listening to him say [Bush] is off course trying to defend the United States,' Sorcinelli fumed"

If Bush isn't being conservative (which I believe he isn't, the party of individual rights - B fucking S), then he should be called out on it. Just cause he comes from the same party does not automatically mean you should support everything he does.

Read the article for yourself, "Bob Barr, Bain of the Right?"

Little peeve of mine came up today and I have heard the mistake made many times. I just want to clear the difference between Hindu and Hindi

Hindu is an adherent of Hinduism (the religion)
Hindi is a language (from India that Hindus may speak)

People cannot speak Hindu and People cannot be Hindi

Here is a Washington Post editoral on the NASA communications person that (e:ajay) posted about

Regarding the whole God/religion issue that has been discussed a lot here lately, here is an interesting piece on NPR that I heard a few months ago by Penn Jillette (the tall one in Penn and Teller) on his belief that there is no God. It is interesting not in that it has some deep philosophical insight, but in how this belief that there is no God informs his approach to life.