Category: default || By jt3y

I'm not saying that he is, but I'm not saying that he isn't.

It's just that I've never seen Don Rickles and Dick Cheney in the same room together at the same time, and I don't know for certain that they're not the same person.

You can judge for yourself by examining the photographic evidence assembled by the Tube City Almanac's crack investigative team (or is that the investigative team that's on crack?):



All I'm saying is, don't be surprised if the next stump speech that Cheney makes starts with the words, "Hello, dummies."

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Speaking of photographic evidence, Martha Rial's photo of Laura Bush in the Post-Gazette the other day creeped me out. I'm not sure what was creepier; the Orwellian vibe that the President's giant floating head gave me, or the thought that Dubya might be ready to swallow the First Lady whole.

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Generalissimo Francisco Franco is still dead, by the way. And if you get that joke, you're older than I am.

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McKeesport City Council has unveiled the official portraits of the late Joe Bendel, former mayor of Our Fair City. Pat Cloonan's story in the News has several nice touches:

(One of the portraits) is a family picture taken for Joseph and Rosemary Bendel's 20th wedding anniversary, but abandoned four years ago in the old Carter DeNino studio along Shaw Avenue and Huey Street in downtown McKeesport due to damage from at least one footprint.

"We were in there with the Historical Society," Councilwoman Ann Stromberg recalled. "The place was in a shambles. We were ready to leave, and found it in the kitchen. There was a footprint on it."

But, the councilwoman said, city Administrator Dennis Pittman took it upon himself to restore it.

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The Democratic Party of Georgia has crafted a fairly decimating response to Zell Miller, that shrinking violet, which hoists him with his own petard. You need a Flash player to view the short video.

Conservative pundit Andrew Sullivan calls the President's remarks Thursday night the "second best speech I have ever heard George W. Bush give," but characterizes Zell Miller's speech on Wednesday as full of "slurs," "smears" and "calumny," and Cheney's speech as one of "bromides and denial."

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I exchanged some very nice email with Professor Michael Madison, author of Pittsblog, regarding his column about Pittsburgh's image and my subsequent critique. Frankly, I was rather flattered that he felt I was worth responding to.

When you see the amount of bile that gets spilled on the Internet, it's nice to know that there are still diamonds among the lumps of coal.

And of course, it's nice to know that there's still lumps of coal, like this rebuttal that was posted on Madison's Web page about yours truly:

Micheal, I wouldn't worry about this maniac's opinion. Quite frankly though his thoughts are pretty much par for the course in Pittsburgh. And the reason newcomers have problems in our city is because of freaks like this. The guy read what he wanted to read in your post. Summary? The gene pool in Pittsburgh is stagnant. Mike

Let's see: Ad hominem attacks? Check. Name-calling? Check. If only he had dropped Kerry's name a few times, I would have thought this was Zell Miller. And for good measure, Mike apparently has spelled his own first name wrong. His rhetorical skills leave me spellbound.

For the record, I'm not what's wrong with Pittsburgh. I'm what's wrong with Our Fair City. My research indicates that Mrs. Adele Spritzhaven, 78, of 713 Reifert St., Bon Air, is what's wrong with Pittsburgh.

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Speaking of Our Fair City, some of you have wondered what's up with this affectation. Well, it's all part of my secret plot to improve Our Fair City's image by increasing its ranking on search engines.

So far, it's meeting with some success. Searching Google.com for the search string "Our Fair City" now returns the City of McKeesport home page as one of the top 30 choices.



Bwwaa-a-a-ha-ha-ha!

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Alert Reader Arden informs me that the Man from Lake Wobegon is still on the warpath over the President, as evidenced by this opinion piece that originally appeared in the liberal magazine In These Times:

The party of Lincoln and Liberty (has) transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk.

Ooof. Paging Mr. Keillor, Mr. Garrison Keillor: Zell Miller is waiting for you in the lobby. With dueling pistols.

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For those of us with a comic strip jones, "Josh Reads The Comics So You Don't Have To" is a very funny site.

Also, I stumbled some great online editorial cartoons (also very liberal) by David Craig Simpson at his Web site called "I Drew This."

Maybe I'm late to the party, because David Simpson apparently has been doing a Web comic strip called "Ozy & Millie" for several years; a quick search of the Internet turned up a devoted legion of fans.

Well, you know us Pittsburghers; we're always late for everything. The gene pool in Pittsburgh is stagnant, after all.

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To do this weekend: It's the traditional last week of operations at (cue Andy Vettel Jr. voice) "The One and Only Roller Coaster Capital of the World!" My alma mater's marching band appears in tonight's "Fall Fantasy" parade on the Kennywood midway, along with bands from Carrick High School, Schenley High School, Perry Traditional Academy and Forest Area High School. Croatian Day is Saturday.

Kennywood will also be open for "bonus" weekends through Sept. 19, while "Phantom Fright Nights" run Fridays and Saturdays in October. Call (412) 461-0500 for details.

Also: Clairton NAACP holds its Labor Day picnic from 12 noon to 8 p.m. Monday at Clairton Park Lodge.