If you're not doing anything, vote for folkbum. It would be cool if he won.

From time to time I pay tribute to my Irish nature, get savagely drunk. Last night was such an instance. It's a kind of ritual for me, as I awake with a few blurry memories of how I got home -- hazy end-of-night at the Palace, a fall off my bike in the slush, quesadilla -- clean myself up and face the world. Its related to that feeling that makes me want to take crazy wild mind-bending drugs, that witch-doctor feeling. It's not the same ritual, but it serves a similar end.

I enjoy a good hangover. I don't enjoy the headache, but the overall feeling brings a kind of clarity to my existence. It feels good, getting distilled, getting slowed down and opened up. Not every drunk produces this feeling, not by a long shot, and this is far from the only reason I drink, but it's one of the better ones I can think of.

Eugene McCarthy and Richard Pryor died, so the air last night must have been thick with spirits. Annual holiday party at A-Stock and Laura's. Good times, great party, fantastic spread. I committed a faux pas with my joint -- I sort of thought that might be pushing it -- but we worked it out. I got to meet S-Stock's fiance, who I liked (and who I liked liking since I always liked Sarah). Julia gave me this awesome shirt. On the front it says "One Wild And Crazy Guy" in kind of tacky glitter lettering, maybe iron-on. On the back is screen-printed "Coach Koenig." Found it that way at Bacons, she did. People seem good overall. The friends are happy.

The distilation, the clarity, the end of the year, the holidays. Lots to write, potentially. My attention flickers. Great ambitions; great revelations slither over the top of my brain and then dip back down. Yeah. I think the first thing that needs doing is getting myself some way to carry my tunes around. I feel like walking and listening, letting the muses pool.

Hey y'all.

So I'm pleased and gratified by the increased commentary of late. I'm all about community and shit.

Something I've been threatening to do for ages is convert this old website to Drupal. It's a system I'm professionaly conversant with (so I can hack it to high heck), and it's got much nicer features for users/visitors, starting with threaded conversations.

I'm going to be staying in NYC for the holidays with a little free time on my hands, and I think I might take the plunge there. I'm trying to think how I can do this and offer y'all something more out of it too...

Suppose I were to set that up, and put it under a more generic name (not outlandishjosh.com, which would remain a part of it, but not be the main thing) and let people set up their own blogs and so forth. Like, way cooler than blogger. Would that be interesting to anyone?

Tomorrow, the GOP will launch attack ads saying Democrats are waving the white flag in Iraq by saying a military victory there is not possible for US forces.

There's some debate about how to respond, a lot of noise out there, but I think this dairist on Kos has it right.

The idea here is not to get Bush. Bush isn't up for re-election. Don't use Republican statements (Hagel, et al) to try and create a bipartisan cover for anti-war Dems. We don't need it. This is about contrast, people. We've got the public consensus on Iraq. The occupation is not suddenly going to get popular because of an ad campaign. Americans aren't going to change their minds and decide they like the war, but they may change their mind about who they want to lead them out of it.

Democrats need to provide a compelling rationale as to why they, not the GOP, should have the job of ending the US occupation.

The message is simple. Republicans (not Bush, Republicans... make them point out the difference; it confuses them to be divided against their leader) are fixated on an impossible military victory in Iraq. They are profiteering off this war, and they lack the will, courage, and insight to understand how to best Al-Qaeda. Then play the Bush speech about how he doesn't think we'll win the war on terror. Republicans, obsessed with Iraq, soft on terrorists.

Democrats understand that real victory in Iraq is up to the Iraqis, and that US troops there are providing a strategic benefit to our real enemies in Al-Qaeda. We want to stop spending hundreds of billions of dollars a year to fund what has become a giant terrorist training camp. We want to stop putting our troops in harms way guarding an occupation based on lies and misinformation. We want to bring our occupation of Iraq to a close so we can get back to Job #1: shutting down international terrorist networks.