I admit it; I'm a little stressed.

There's a lot going on right now. The revolution is headed into uncharted waters. My life is taking unexpected turns into unknown territory. Business is booming. It's also cold as hell out here, and we're running out of wood.

There's a lot going on.

Politically the season is officially on. I've been doing some work with a couple of old cohorts on Future Majority. It's principally the creation of Mike Connery and Alex Urevick, who I know through MFA, and through hanging out while I lived Brooklyn, etc. We're pretty close, and I've started helping get the site really cooking as a project for Chapter Three.

This is going to be an interesting cycle. The way I see it there are three strong challengers from the Democratic field, and any one of them (Clinton, Edwards or Obama) could win, and there are plenty of lesser-known possibilities who could come up and surprise everyone. The question is who do we want to send?

My sense is that the real action this year is issue based, rather than candidate based activism. This lets us tie in with Speaker Pelosi's Congress, and to push the potential candidates into creating stronger and more powerful campaigns.

It's a lot of work. There's a lot going on.

Personally I've made some steady progress. Since I am my own ride into town, I've made it to the gym for two weeks straight. This is a good thing.

However, I've yet to effectively branch out into public life here, although I am getting a feel for town. Walked around and checked a few places out on Friday. It was early (I was killing time waiting for Mark to finish his Lifeguard shift) so nothing much was happening, but it did feel good to be my own presence in the world.

This is a smart move; electable is the word that comes to mind.

She should be getting it out on YouTube.

So as you know I got a pickup. I got insurance. I gotta get it once-overed again by a local mechanic and go to the DMV, but basically I'm in business.

Here's the proof:

Thus far the effects have been that I've gone to the gym five times in a row, gotten groceries thrice, and cooked dinner twice -- all way up over last years numbers. Whether or not this will help me stimulate a localized social/romantic life remains a question of my initiative and will, but it feels immanently possible.

So I did my part and watched the State of the Union last night. Reading the coverage I find myself once again out of step.

• I thought that on the whole Bush's speech was nice, although he's clearly getting worn down and sort of cranky. Get the president a juice box and someone get Condi to take a nap.
• Substantively it was pretty stupid, both politically and policy-wise. Although that's been covered elsewhere, in brief by embracing themes like Health Care and Immigration Reform, Bush is alienating some substantial subset of his remaining support. He also proposed things -- like subsidized opt-in insurance -- that are terrifically ineffective.
• Did no one else see him grab Speaker Pelosi's tit at the end???
• While I liked how he started off on calling out CEO pay, and I like that everyone seems to think it was a tenacious response, Jim Webb's ditty felt stiff and boring to me, like a high school teacher giving a lecture. I like his reasoning and tough, brass-tacks bearing, but I prefer it seasoned with some passion.

Anyway, I'm pleased that Bush had to thematically go our way on Health Care, Energy and the like. That matters. When it comes to making programs happen, the President actually can't do anything. As easy as it is to forget this after the last six years, the President actually doesn't make the laws, at least not according to the Constitution.

This means his stupid proposals are just that -- empty talk -- but the subject of that empty talk bodes well for people like me who savor the notion of energy independence, universal health care, universal net access, and an economy that embraces the notion of service rather than servitude.

UP YOUR LEVELS, RASTA!

Mine has taken nicely (clarity: that's Mark's). You can see my semi-circle towards the end of the above slideshow.

This is the best metaphor for how we roll: Voltron. Each individual spaceship/robot tiger is a formidable beast, but when we pull together we become a super ass-kicking machine.

The notion of a "blogger ethics panel" is a sort of big inside joke, and it's a nice snarky comeback when people in the traditional media wail over the tone or reliability of some content from the "fever swamps." After all, it's not as though members of the traditional press, especially the political press, have any sort of actual leg to stand on.

And so fair enough. Joe Klein doesn't get to lecture Atrios. Reasonable people agree.

However, I have an issue in that I don't really want Joe Klein as my yardstick. I like reading blogs, and I do it because there's real information there. As this is the first political cycle where the medium will be fully embraced (even Hillary comes out swinging with live webcasts), I expect we'll see a lot of trickery.

And that's a shame. It's a shame that people who carry the title blogfather will go and say things like:

As a historical note, I was semi-involved with the Draft Clark effort. Markos and I had formed a consultancy group in January of 2003. I liked Dean; he Clark. We agreed that whichever hired us first we'd both work together on that campaign.

After they were hired, Jerome did not disclaim, but promoted Dean heavily. Markos posted that he did "some technical work for Howard Dean," while helping to spread the word as well*. Somewhat misleading, I have to say.

Ah! But James Carville does the same thing! It's true, you're right, and as we said Joe Klein owes Atrios a million beers, but see that's why I don't listen to James Carville or Joe Klein, and haven't for several years now. They're both in their own way egotistical shills. Klein and Carville I mean. Armstrong and Moulitsas? Well, the jury is still out.

Escalation is underway:

ome 25 U.S. troops in Iraq were killed in a single day this weekend, making it the third bloodiest since the war began....

Twelve of the 25 were killed in the crash of a Blackhawk helicopter northeast of Baghdad. Some were killed in Anbar province by Sunni insurgents. Five were killed in Karbala, in Shiite territory... In the current phase of operations, as more troops move into Baghdad, the increase in troop strength is less significant than the increase in the tempo of operations. As the U.S. military becomes more aggressive, it will incur more casualties.

I picked up this because of an AP piece in the local paper that I read while getting lunch. It quoted a couple anonymous Iraqi officials on how good American intel was, “The Americans don’t act on rumors but on accurate intelligence..." Yeah, right, buddy.

Anyway, those troops killed in Karbala were trying to have a meeting to make security plans. The meeting was blown up. Not a good sign.

The rest of the Stratfor analysis is semi-bunk. They posit a few hypotheticals, and opine that Sadr may be playing into Bush's hands, as the Decider is ostensibly trying to restart "the political process" by threatening militia organizations with a crackdown.

First of all, I find it hard to believe that this is Bush's actual goal. I think his goal is to run out the clock on his term in office without having to face the consequences of his actions. This escalation is best understood less as a "surge" and more as a "punt."

Home tattoos.

This is one of the oldest things we as people do: we cut our hair and draw on our body (and pierce things) and (eventually) wear specific clothing as a means of signaling our cultural identity and expressing ourselves.

Now that I've got one...

One of the young rockers from the dojo made that. Pretty sweet.