Just in case someone is trying to tell you that waterboarding by the Bush administration should be given credit for the killing of Osama bin Ladin, here’s an expert, U.S. Sen. John McCain, refuting that notion. If you don’t want to read about it by clicking the link, here’s the video of and excerpt from McCain’s Senate speech:

Just to show what kind of political nerd I am, I recommend you bookmark, as I did, The Monkey Cage, recently named “Blog of the Year”. It’s a site that collects and discusses actual political science rather than “truthiness” about politics.

Finally, Bob Marley is still dead but we remember him on the anniversary of his death with this clip from Jimmy Fallon’s show:

Last night, my daughter chided me on Twitter for going outside to watch the storm but I bet she would envy me this morning’s lovely smell of fresh rain and wet vegetation (take that, Tucson). I Thunder Up’d for the fifth game of the OKC vs. Memphis series. Tonight, I think I’ll go on the roof at OKC Museum of Art. Tomorrow seems like a good night for Live on the Plaza and a peek at the newly opened Saints, brought into being by Red Cup friend Patrick. I had an intimate and relaxing dinner with Soartstar at the India buffet this week and listened to some really very good jazz Monday night at Prohibition Room at the Gold Dome (Proom is, btw, moving soon). As for local politics, I’m amused that Gov. Mary Fallin tells all of us to vacation here in Oklahoma and then takes off for the Bahamas for her own R&R, then comes back to cut higher education by 6% and ask state universities not to raise tuition for her daughters. Oil company executives, among the highest paid in the nation, tell Congress that they need their oil subsidies during this time of record high profits (in the billions and billions). If Republicans didn’t hold so much power over women’s vaginas, it would be hilarious.

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Before I get to bloviating about the subject of bloviating, this is a video of Herbie Hancock and the classical pianist Lang Lang collaborating on a performance of Rhapsody in Blue by Gershwin, which, in my humble opinion, is one of the 10 best musical compositions of any genre in all of history. In this version, Hancock sneaks in some jazz stylings layered onto the classical composition and a “perfect” performance is the result. This has very little to do with anything except that I want to introduce my readers, few though you may be, to a website: Brain Pickings. I consistently find interesting things on this site on a daily basis, including the following video.

While I’m recommending other websites, please please please bookmark TED talks, which, I believe, is one of the most important places for you to expand your view of the world and enter the realm of thought and ideas. It really is a remarkable resource and if you watch one a day you will — honestly and no shit — become a better person for the effort.

Now, back to “bloviate”. Here’s the internet dictionary definition:

blo·vi·ate (blv-t)
intr.v. blo·vi·at·ed, blo·vi·at·ing, blo·vi·ates Slang
To discourse at length in a pompous or boastful manner: “the rural Babbitt who bloviates about ‘progress’ and ‘growth'” (George Rebeck).

There are world class bloviaters, of course, and we all know the names of these obnoxious, self-involved crashing bores. The names of Mohamar Kaddafi and Achmedinajad in the Middle East come to mind, as does Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez in Latin America. In the United States, whether or not you agree with his perorated hate and falsehoods, Rush Limbaugh certainly is up there in the top 10 world-wide.

What brings this up as a topic for this blog is a world-class but little known bloviater right here in Oklahoma City. His name is Phil. He’s a big man, riding that line between grossly overweight and morbidly obese. He drives a blue Volvo station wagon. His favorite bloviation topic is almost always mass transit in OKC, specifically light rail. Once he gets started, I want to chew off my own ears and curse the day God decided to make that physically impossible for me. No amount of insisting that I agree that light rail would be a good idea for this metro area will make him stop talking. I have often tried to politely be released from his conversational grasp and find it impossible. As one measure of his level of obnoxious, he was “86’d” by Galilleo’s some years ago after an incident in which he almost shut down the restaurant with the smell he left in the men’s room and the stink he raised when the line for use of the room had backed up disastrously because of the amount of time he’d tied up the facilities to the point that patrons and staff were pounding on the door. For me, personally, there is even more difficulty because he’s one of those people who ask my legal opinion and then tell me the many ways in which I’m wrong. You see, he’s involved in a multi-year dispute with his siblings over his mother’s inheritance and thinks I must agree with him that all the law, the courts and all lawyers are bloodsucking idiots and if I don’t agree then I am not worthy of being regarded as a human. None of which, of course, prevents him from approaching me with his “stuff” the next time he sees me nor from being offended when I say I don’t especially enjoy his company. All this because he’s back to spending hours at the Evil Empire Starbucks at 65th and N. Western, where I occasionally go for a break in my day. If you see me, eyes glazed and furtively seeking a “way out”, please rescue me. Come tell me my mother’s dead or that my house is on fire or that I’m urgently needed in surgery. Anything will do. I’ll return the favor, I swear I will.

Finally, a commercial break. Generally, I don’t like advertisements, but this one is brilliant!

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While I’m recommending websites, I’m mesmerized by the jaw dropping trainwrecks depicted on WTF Tattoos. I would favor legislation requiring any tattoo requested after 10 p.m. be preceded by a viewing of this website.

For some local nausea, try Sally Kern, and when you look at the story, make sure to read some of the comments that indicate how others view our state. Ugh! I’ll just bet my Mom and daughter agree like totally and 100% that it’s OK for women to earn less money since they just tend to want to be at home. And the bill PASSED! Because, of course, ending affirmative action by our state government will end racism and discrimination against whites. I feel so safe from sharia law now, I’m just raring to restrict abortions. Oh, wait! We did that, too.

I couldn’t find the embed code, but Gawker posts a video of 50 male actors faking orgasms in film. For some reason, I found it hilarious and especially the looks on the face of the female partners that I would characterize as “really?”. Anyway, enjoy, and at the bottom of the blogpost is a list of the 50 films from which the clips are taken. I think I should mention that me finding this posting is an indicator of how I use the internet: I started with posts about Nevada Republican U.S. Sen. John Ensign’s expected early resignation from office tomorrow as a result of the ethics inquiry into his role in paying off his former best friend after “happily married” and “family values” supporting Ensign cuckolded his top staff member.