Hey James. I went to Comic Con

Living in San Diego definitely has it perks. One of them comes once a year in the form of Comic Con. I don't have much to add to what you can see in the photos, except that it was crazy and fun, I got lots of free stuff, and I've already pre-registered for 2009.

Nixon Goes to China

It's been over a year, so why not?

I recorded today's Countdown with Keith Olbermann because I wanted to see his interview with special guest, Scott McClellan. For the entire hour, with the exception of the last segment where he summarized the hour with John Dean, he exchanged insightful back and forth with the former Bush Press Secretary, who demonstrated a great deal of candor discussing the events of the last seven years including the "rush to war", the "complacency" of the response to Hurricane Katrina, the WMD "propaganda", Fox News as a media-outlet and the culpability of senior White House staffers who indeed leaked the identify of a CIA agent.

It's fitting, no, it's necessary for me to comment on today's interview because Mr. McClellan is indeed one of the reasons I now live and work in California. Rather, it's because of Scott McFuckington (as a friend and I would come to refer to the press secretary during the Plame debacle) that I could no longer abide the lies and mistruths that seemed to be issued continually from our nation's capitol. For two years, I thought I was going mad because I thought only a few took notice of the unrelenting and inconsistent realities. In his interview tonight, Mr. McClellan commented on the permanent campaign mentality the persisted throughout his tenure at the White House and its intent of dividing and trivializing the opposition.

Others will analyze this better, but for me it is cathartic. It's coming full circle. I wasn't going crazy, they were deceiving me. They should have (and could have) reacted faster to the hurricane, but instead chose not to. And today, I got a little bit of closure to some of this -- which I've learned that is a rare and precious gift.

New for me? I live and work in San Diego. I work in a little R&D group for a little startup implementing Linux device drivers -- I have the perfect job for me. I even get paid. And since I get paid I decided to become a new home owner. A new, first-time home owner. As weird as that is, as I was smoking a cigarette (most of my best stories involve me smoking a cigarette) outside work, I walked across our parking lot and noticed a door with a familiar logo. You see, that's why I had to comment today. Look at my first blog posts and you may see why. It has all come full-circle.