DISPATCHES FROM
THE TROOPS
BBBR Resistance
Fighters Write In
April 19, 2001
INFINITE
GRATITUDE TO ALL THE BBBR RESISTANCE FIGHTERS
WHO WROTE IN DURING MY "BLUE PERIOD."
HERE ARE SOME OF THEIR E-MAILS:
The
BardGal Has a New Rant,
And a Great Idea
Subj: Loved Friday's Panda thing!
Date: 04/19/2001 8:39:13 AM Pacific Daylight Time
From: The BardGal
To: divatex@aol.com
OK, so I am
grossly behind! My apologies. Reading the Panda thing just
made me want to see it on film!
Absolutely brilliant!
Did you get the
link I sent you to my
latest rant?
Subj: Re: Loved Friday's Panda thing!
Date: 04/19/2001 4:25:54 PM Pacific Daylight Time
From: DivaTex
To: The BardGal
Dear Tally:
Join the club.
When Chuck was
in Boston for the Marathon, I couldn't sleep AT ALL. I just lay in bed, clockwatching, until I couldn't stand it
anymore, then I'd get up and back to work -- CLEANING, not writing.
Yes, four
months of accumulated dirt is a chore to remove. A major chore, but one that's just about done. YIPPEE!
But now The
Conquering Babe has returned from his travels, and I am feeling frisky and
fabulous, so the BBBR is about to be back up-to-date.
Me, on the
other hand, I remain behind on EVERYTHING.
(Well, not EVERYTHING, but just about...)
I am posting
the link for your latest rant, along with your panda comments. I think it would be hysterical if an
animator took that story and ran with it!
I am laughing just THINKING about it.
Especially the part where the Baby Panda is rolling
around dissing the Resident.
Anyway, take
care, and let me know when we can get together again. I had a great time last time...
Your Fellow
Ranter,
Tammy
WebMistress of BBBR
[DIVA
NOTE: So, how about it? Any animators out there wanna take a whack
at the Panda Piece?]
********************
Fellow Aggielander and Resistance Fighter Karen:
Gives Shot in the Arm, Requests BBBR Uniform
From:
"Karen B"
To:
<thediva@coup2k.com>
Sent: Tuesday,
April 17, 2001 10:40 PM
Subject: the
resistance
Hi Diva-person
I'm not sure I could
handle life in the post-coup
corporate states without your web page.
Thank you for all your hard work!
I'm glad you're there to help counter all the terrible news with
information, activist alerts, and most important, humor. Sometimes it's just all too depressing and I
need something to smile at; that's when I run screaming to your site.
I'm an Aggie, moved from that
bastion of liberal thought to the Deep South (I know, you think I'm kidding,
but everyone I knew at A&M really was liberal...or at the very least, an
independent thinker). After ten years
in Alabama and Georgia, I finally got the chance to move home to Texas and
found out that TEXAS TURNED INTO THE DEEP SOUTH. I left Governor Richards and returned to *Shrub*. It was pretty scary.
When Shrub
stole the presidency and suddenly the entire U.S was the Deep South, I got
really depressed. Hmm, I still am.
I'm trying to
believe that the fight is what matters, not the winning or the losing, but I
have two daughters who will have to live in this mess we're creating.
I'm grateful
your site is there to help me keep some perspective, or at least help me
smile. Now I need a t-shirt; didn't you have
some for a while?
Oh, I found
your site when you printed your
race change. I laughed myself
sick: my friends had been telling me
for weeks that I must be African American cause I was still so upset
over the Selection.
It's past my
bedtime.
Thanks for
being there!
Yours,
Karen B.
Another (tired,
discouraged) Freedom Fighter
From: "The
Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
To: "Karen B"
Sent: Thursday,
April 19, 2001 3:22 PM
Subject: Re: the
resistance
Dear Karen:
I adored your
letter, especially coming as it did from a fellow ex-Aggie. To think:
There are two of us (at least) who are fighting the coup! (I wonder if George the Elder will pull his
Presidential Library from the campus in protest...)
:)
And actually, I
can believe that it changed since I was there.
Nothing lasts forever, as they say, and it's not as though it could have
gotten any MORE conservative...
I was telling
another Resistance Fighter all about my experiences at A&M the other day,
and here is what I wrote to her:
A&M is the
kind of place that makes you choose sides.
There is no middle ground in an environment that conservative. You're either with 'em, or you're against
'em. That's what they believe. I was always a liberal-minded sort, so it
didn't take me long at all to figure out that I was against 'em...
Quick story that
completely sums up the A&M experience:
I was behind on my laundry, and since my dorm only had 1 washer and
dryer on each floor, I gathered up my loads, and headed across campus to the
laundromat. I was wearing black
leggings (they were in fashion at the time), my aforementioned black leather
jingly-jangly boots, and a black shirt.
Well, as I passed through the "quad," a preacher named Josh
(he's famous for his campus evangelism) began screaming about me at the top of
his lungs:
"Do you see
her? Look at her! Do you think she's sexy? That's what she wants you to think! She wants you to believe she wants you! She wants to make you sin! To trap you! She doesn't really want you!
She only wants to use sex to corrupt your soul! To win you for Satan!"
Well, now... Far be it from me disagree with a man of the
cloth... But I was A VIRGIN! I'd never even been to third base, for the
love of Bill! I was covered from neck
to wrists to ankles! And this was my
first year at A&M, so I wasn't quite used to people treating me like a girl
yet, let alone like a whore... Therefore, I basically WENT OFF. I know the Bible backwards and forwards,
inside and out (I have a bit of a photographic memory for things I've read), so
I dropped my laundry on the ground, marched right up to Brother Josh, and
started screaming at him -- about judgment, and about Jesus' admonition against
name-calling (an offense punishable by hell), about lying and bearing false
witness, etc...
Word got around,
so after that I was a BIG target for the KKK (Campus Crusade for Christ --
that's what we deviants called them).
They tried to gang-save me CONSTANTLY.
It got to be rather tedious. But
after a while, I noticed that they were getting more militant -- preaching that
women should not be taking up space in the university, since we were all
commanded to get married and have babies anyway; talking about how god wants
gays to be put to death, and how we should purge homosexuals from our lives --
so I got militant right back. There was
no sitting on the fence for me. I chose
sides.
So you could say,
in a sense, that A&M turned me into a committed liberal.
And I, too,
couldn't stand to see Texas pass from the Governance of Ann Richards to
Shrub. Talk about your nightmare
scenarios! But luckily, My Consort was transferred
out-of-state, so we made a run for the border before things got totally out of
hand (which I've heard they have, at least in my favorite hunk of Texas,
Austin).
Who would have
guessed that I couldn't get away so easily?
Now the whole COUNTRY gets to live the nightmare scenario. YIKES!
But, as you
noted, at least I get to live
it as a black woman. That's the
good part -- getting a brand new gigantic extended family...
And as for T-Shirts...
NOW YOU'RE
TALKING!
T-Shirts? I got a ton of 'em for ya...
Just click on
over to the BBBR Coup Couture Mall
and Banana Republic Outfitters, at: http://www.coup2k.com/mall.html
You can also
get there by clicking on the T-Shirt icon on the Site Navigator in the
left-hand TOC, or at the bottom of any page, of the BBBR.
I still haven't
gotten one for myself yet. I am
thinking (what with dropping all this weight since the coup) of doing one for The Amazing Miracle Republic Diet! I may even wear it to the San Francisco West
Coast Voter March...
Wouldn't that
be the bomb?
Your fellow
Aggie Diva,
Tammy
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
John Has Trouble Getting Into Uniform.
Has NBCi Gone AWOL?
From:
"John M."
To:
<webmistress@gorewon2000.net>
Sent: Thursday,
April 19, 2001 7:16 PM
Subject: I
would love to order a couple of things...
I would love to order a couple of things...
But I keep getting an "unable to display page" when I click on the
item and then "submit" order button.
Any ideas?
From: "The
Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
To: "John
M."
Sent: Friday, April
20, 2001 12:55 AM
Subject: Re: I
would love to order a couple of things
Dear John:
I heard on the
news yesterday the NBCi kind of went belly-up, but I didn't realize that it
would affect the BBBR stores. I tried
testing the order forms, and had the same problem, so I went through the direct
cafepress.com portal instead, and that worked for me. I've changed all the links at the BBBR Coup Couture Mall to go
directly through CafePress now, instead of through the NBCi site.
To use the
alternate CafePress portal:
instead of
going to http://cafepress.nbci.com/bbbr(and whichever number),
try
http://www.cafepress.com/bbbr(whichever number)
If that doesn't
work, another problem may be that your security settings could be configured so
that you can't get onto a secure server, or accept any cookies CafePress is
trying to place on your computer. If
that's the problem, you can always call their toll-free line directly, at
1.877.809.1659, to place your order.
Their hours are (I think) 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Pacific Time.
If all else
fails, send me an e-mail and let me know, and I will send you my phone
number. You can call me anytime except
midnight-8 a.m. Pacific Time (that's when My Consort is sleeping), and I will
work the problem from my end.
Thanks for
wanting to "get into uniform..."
:)
Tammy
"The
Diva"
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
Julie, Link Scavenger
From:
"Julie B."
To:
<thediva@coup2k.com>
Sent: Thursday,
April 19, 2001 8:10 AM
Subject: Can't
find a link, thought you might have it
Hi Diva,
Gotta'
question. Do you remember the attorney's explanation of the Supreme Court
decision on the Selection that went all over the Net? Do you even remember that
guy's name ;-)?
I'm trying to
find the link. It's my urgent mission to silence another GOP ditto-head. I
can't remember the guy's name, let alone his website, and it was the most
cogent, easily-understood explanation of the matter that I saw. (If you're
truly bored and would like some fun, the Republicans needing a swift kick in
the ass are at http://www.patpack.org/;
here's the link to the thread in question:
http://www.patpack.org/board/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic&f=1&t=003517.
My screen name
there is "Missy Vixen". (As you can see, someone doesn't know how to
make a link...)
In case you're
wondering who these nuts are, this BBS is run by fans of a local radio personality
in Seattle, WA. While it's not kicking the Resident out of our house, Pat
Cashman was unjustly fired two years ago this month from another local radio
station. Two hundred people got together and wrote, called, boycotted
advertisers, conducted picketing and demonstrations, and basically brought the
station to its knees financially. (They lost 2/3 of their advertisers in a
six-month period due to our efforts.) We heard the same stuff on the local
level we've been hearing on the national level since November 7th: Give up.
It's hopeless. Don't you have anything better to do with your time?
Pat and his
co-worker Lisa were hired at another local station, we're thankful to say.
I know that the
BBBR may have battle fatigue. I know that I've had it. At the same time,
though, the "Mandatory
Minimums" got me going once again. The only way our voices will be
heard (with a White House and mainstream media determined to filter them out,)
is if we all keep their feet to the fire, and continue to urge others to join
our battle.
I hope that
you're having a great day!
Julie B.
From: "The
Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
To: "Julie
B."
Sent: Thursday,
April 19, 2001 3:47 PM
Subject: Re: Can't
find a link, thought you might have it
Dear Julie:
I think you
might be talking either about Mark
Levine's Supreme Court Q&A, or Vincent
Bugliosi's excellent piece in The Nation.
They are both lawyers, and both have written awesome works on the
coup. Here are the links:
THE GORE EXCEPTION By Mark
Levine
http://www.coup2k.com/supremeqanda.html
NONE DARE
CALL IT TREASON by Vincent Bugliosi
http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20010205&s=bugliosi
And I have
finally left my BBBR Battle Fatigue behind, not that My Consort is back where
he belongs, which is next to me.
J
Thanks for
writing in, and give 'em hell on the boards...
And keep after those "Mandatory Minimums"...
Tammy
"The
Diva"
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
Suzan Pulls Rank
From:
<HelloDollyLama>
To:
<thediva@coup2k.com>
Sent: Tuesday,
April 17, 2001 9:17 PM
Subject:
Alright....buck up GF
I read your
site today and it broke my heart. I
just wanted to tell you how much we need you.
I read you almost every day.
Don't you ever wonder what fuels the right? How did they keep it up for 8 long years? I read Horowitz' piece in Salon yesterday
and I wondered how he sustains the energy.
I have no words
of wisdom. We lost all three branches
of government and the press. But this I
do know: the American people are smarter than I usually give them credit for,
and they are humane. I remember a
"man on the street" interview after they broadcast Clinton's
deposition. He was from Missouri I think...the
"heartland"...and was the blue collar type. He said "I didn't vote for Clinton and frankly don't much
like the man but I watched the deposition and I was struck by how unfairly he
was being treated by the prosecutors.
Seeing it changed my mind. I
felt sorry for him. He should not be
impeached." I was so proud of
"us".
One more story
from the front: I logged onto AOL one
Sat. morning to check my mail and surf around as I listened to NPR. It was the morning of the Elian
"raid." I'd never joined a
"chat" or read bulletin boards but I did join a chat that
morning. The "room" was full
but only a couple of people were talking.
All of them nasty and hate-filled.
One particularly vocal guy was saying "Reno broke the law, she is
lawless, she didn't have a warrant."
Now, being a lawyer and a former public defender I thought to myself
"how could anyone in the world come to the conclusion that Reno, who heads
the largest law firm in the world, would have made a mistake that stupid and
fatal?"
The next
morning, on the Sunday morning talk shows, there was my very own Orrin saying
the same thing! I was aghast. He's a lawyer but its obvious he has never
practiced AND that he allowed his reason and ability to use logic to be colored
by his emotionalism. Trust me. No first year law student would forget to
check to see if a warrant was necessary (it wasn't) or to get one (she did
anyway) if it was. Orrin's agenda was
crystal clear. He wanted to hate
Reno. It had NOTHING to do with
Elian. Nothing to do with Castro. Sheesh.
He threw out family vales to HATE RENO!
A couple of weeks later, Cokie, near the end of the show, was shocked
that the American people overwhelmingly supported Reno. She wanted to continue her diatribe about
jack booted thugs. That was my first
clue that those people have lost all ability to reason outside of the petty
gossip that surrounds them in their isolated world of
"politics".
Luckily,
Americans have not. Two pieces of good news
even today, Bush is putting the brakes on arming Taiwan (I see arming Taiwan as
war-mongering shit) and Powell got the Israelis to pull back to their
pre-Tuesday position on the Gaza strip, another sign that Rumsfeld might not
get his limited nuclear war after all.
There is a part
of all of us where we want more than anything in the world to see Bush fail
miserably. But we have to fight
it. We have to say "if he governs
like a human being, showing some respect for the governed and the rest of the world,
it will be acceptable." To do
otherwise, to allow our hatred for the man (and believe me, I hate him so that
I've come to understand how they felt about Clinton which I never understood
before) would reduce us to the likes of Orrin and DeLay and Lott and Newt and
Rush. It's not worth it. Trust me.
I'm older than you are and I'm pulling rank.
Keep it
up. Your chin, your spirits and your
dander.
Suzan
From: "The
Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
To:
<HelloDollyLama >
Sent: Thursday, April
19, 2001 3:00 PM
Subject: Re:
Alright....buck up GF
Dear Suzan:
First of all,
"Yes, Ma'am!" (Now that Chuck
is home, my chin, spirits, and dander should be more obedient...)
J
Onto the matter
of letting hatred get the better of me:
It isn't that I
want to see Bush fail, although I admit to loathing him as a person, and to
despising everything he stands for -- everything he symbolizes. Nothing would please me more than seeing him
hold to the bipartisan center he campaigned from, where little serious
irreversible damage can be done to America and the world, but I think we all
know now that is not going to happen.
He has campaign contributors to pay off, scores to settle with the
administration that defeated his father, a stolen election to cover up (and
future stolen elections to enable), and a personal stake financially in robbing
the average American not only of their money, but of their rights.
What I do
want is to see him held accountable for his actions, and the actions of
those acting on his behalf, and in his interests. What happened following the election was nothing short of a crime
against America, and no less serious than an act of war, just because it was
carried out by citizens within our borders, rather than foreigners outside of
them.
There is no
statute of limitations on treason, is there?
Well, that is
what I find Bush 'n Thugs, Inc. guilty of.
Treason. And unless and until I
see some evidence of innocence, I'm not trusting the guy, or his co-conspirators,
any further than I can throw them. (I
don't look at all like Demi Moore in "G.I. Jane", so that's
not far.)
How do I want
him held accountable? Do I want the man
dead? No. Not in a million years.
One of my
favorite movies of all time is "The Princess Bride". In this movie, the Evil Prince Humperdink
engages in every despicable act under the sun in his quest for power and
control, and comes at last to meet the protagonist, Wesley, man-to-man. Wesley is weak, but aided by The Princess Bride [Buttercup], and another ally
[Inigo] shows up when all is mostly well, asking "Shall I dispatch him
[Humperdink] for you?"
Wesley's
friend, Inigo, is an excellent swordsman, and would make quick work of freeing
the world from Humperdink's odious presence.
But Wesley turns him down. He
says, "No. I want him to live a
long life alone with his cowardice."
Well, that's
what I want. I want Bush, and his
entire filthy family, both in blood and in deed, discredited. I want them to be the shameful objects of
derision, and the laughing stock of all the world. I want them to live out their days on this planet, knowing that
every decent human being knows they are criminal trash.
And I want them
all to live to be 200.
But that's just
me...
Tammy
"The
Diva"
coup2k.com
PS: I loved your letter!
********************
Carol the Curious,
On Voter March West
From:
"Carol S"
Subject:
Re: CA **********SF VOTER MARCH************
Tammy,
Is
anyone going to record your
speech? I would love to hear
it! If nothing else, will you send me a
transcript? Do you have a topic yet?
Yours
in solidarity,
Carol
From:
"The Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
Subject:
Re: CA **********SF VOTER MARCH************
Dear
Carol:
As
it stands right now, I will be giving a speech at the West Coast Voter March in San Francisco,
of no more than 15 minutes in duration (WHEW!), so My Consort, Chuck, should be
able to get it all on videotape, and then I can either transcribe and post
that, or post the speech (notes) I wrote to prepare, on the BBBR.
And
speaking of Chuck (I always do...), here is an e-mail I received from him, with
suggestions for my speech:
Dear Diva:
I am working on your speech for
San Francisco. Here are the subject
headings I have so far:
Voter Rights in the Next Decade
By Tammy "You're goddamn
right I'm the Diva!" Talpas
I. Voter Outlook for 2002
II. Resistance on the Internet
III. The Role of Peanut Butter in the Fight
for Democracy
IV. Hauptman: Kill Him and Bring His Head To
Me
V. Sleep is For Republican Pussies
VI. The Freepers Hid My Car
Keys
VII. Only Joe Perry Can Save This Country
LVB. Who Really Understands Roman Numerals?
Chuck I
See
why I hate it when he's out of town?
J
Tammy
"The
Diva"
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
Lisa in Canada,
On The "Gore Landmarks" ACTION ALERT
From:
<Lisa>
Subject:
I'm amazed ....
Wow
-- you managed to find a photo of the Gore Park fountain! I promise, I'll get you a more up-to-date one
when I go home later this year. Will
take a pic of Saanich's Gore Park when I get more film.
Just
an update on the links -- Liberal Slant rotates articles off its site to make
room for new ones, so the piece I did on Ian Thomas isn't there anymore. I gave him permission to post a copy at his
own site -- and a beautiful site it is too ... so it might pop up there
soon: http://www.maptricks.com/index1.html
Re: getting more people involved in tracking
down Gore signage... How about putting out an alert at democrats.com? I know a couple of folks who are active with
the party so I'll mention it to them as well.
Cheers,
Lisa
From:
"The Diva (Tammy)"
To:
<Lisa.>
CC:
bob@democrats.com
Subject:
http://www.coup2k.com/alertgorelandmarks.html
Dear
Lisa:
I
am cc'ing Bob at Democrats.com on this e-mail, as you suggested, so he knows
what we are up to.
J
...
And I love the old and
new pics of Gore Fountain, but if you can get a better new one, I'd love to
post it. Canada Rocks!
Tammy
"The
Diva"
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
Cindy in Oklahoma
Finds Gore
From:
<Cindy>
To:
<thediva@coup2k.com>
Sent:
Thursday, April 19, 2001 10:10 AM
Subject:
Gore, Oklahoma
Dear
Diva,
Just
read the Gore Landmarks
article from our Canadian ally, and wanted to let you know that there is a
Gore, Oklahoma located in the eastern part of the state. I'll be there in a couple of weeks, and will
try to get some pictures.
Sincerely,
Cindy
Simms
From:
"The Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
To:
<Cindy>
Sent:
Thursday, April 19, 2001 3:37 PM
Subject:
Re: Gore, Oklahoma
Dear
Cindy:
Awesome! Let me know what you get, and send it in...
One
Diva Salute for Cindy in Oklahoma...
Tammy
"The
Diva"
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
Myra Gives Rob Rogers, His Newspaper,
A Big BBBR Thumbs-up!
From:
"Myra B."
To:
<thediva@coup2k.com>
Sent:
Wednesday, April 18, 2001 10:40 PM
Subject:
B&B
Hi
Tammy,
I'm
sorry you're so bored and bummed and stuck doing taxes alone. I never used to resent paying taxes until
this year, because now I realize that we don't even get a democracy in return
for our money. Hard not to be bummed in
light of that harsh reality. These are
dispiriting times.
But
I regularly depend on your website for news.
For example, I just saw the
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette cartoon and wrote
them the attached letter.
So
be assured that your comments aren't totally falling on deaf eyes.
Myra
[DIVA
NOTE: THE GAZETTE'S WEBFORM IS AT:
http://www.post-gazette.com/contact/comments_form.asp?Mtype=NEWSletters]
My thanks to Rob Rogers and to
the Post-Gazette for publishing his work.
His April 14 cartoon acknowledging the presidential coup was a relief.
It was the rare exception to the obvious rule that post-coup journalists adhere
to, which is not to acknowledge the illegitimacy of the bush regime.
But just because most
journalists are de facto GOP mouthpieces doesn't mean that we voters are fooled
or forgetful. We know we witnessed a crime,
and we know what was stolen from us. We were robbed of our votes not our
memories. And the exceptional journalist that realizes this will have our
gratitude.
Thanks to Rob Rogers for being
exceptional.
Sincerely,
Myra B.
From:
"The Diva (Tammy)" <thediva@respectperfection.com>
To:
"Myra B.>
Sent:
Thursday, April 19, 2001 3:59 PM
Subject:
Re: B&B
Dear
Myra:
Great
letter, and GREAT LETTER!
Thanks
for taking the time to write and cheer me up, and to
write and thank Bob Rogers and the Gazette. Every bit of praise we can send in the direction of people
getting the truth out, even with humor (something I rely on from time to time
myself), is desperately needed.
I
salute you, Resistance Fighter!
Tammy
"The
Diva"
WebMistress of BBBR
********************
Tom the Troubled
With an Eye on World Events,
And Future Marching Orders
From:
"Thomas Paine"