No time for love

here do old Beats go to retire? GZO Jones headed for Brazil. We've found scant documentation that he can even keep a beat, but that has nothing to do with the fact that Jones always makes deadline and, one way or another, never shies away from a question. He likes to consider himself some sort of missing link between the 1950s and the new century. We like to consider that he works cheap.

Dear Dr. Jones,

So last time you said that the prez wouldn't have talked about the moon if Sadam had been captured first ... then, Saddam gets captured and the prez adds Mars. What's going on? What say you now?

Signed,
I Gotta Know

Dear IGK,

What can I say? Poets, priests and prognosticators sometimes falter. Your TV weatherman can't accurately predict anything that he couldn't find out by sticking his head out the window. So why is your good doctor held to a higher standard?

All you math nerds out there will recall that chaotic systems are susceptible to initial changes, no matter how small. For you math slackers, that's what is popularly called the Butterfly Effect. Hey, if politics isn't a chaotic system, I don't know what is.

Seriously, though, the same reasoning holds true from before. This is all just revving of the election-time engine. I heard someone rationalize Howard Dean's recent Bon Scott-esque tirade by saying that, and I quote loosely, "We can't have another election of Hum-drum vs. Dum-dum, because Dum-dum will win again."

Truer words were never spoken, and Dubya's "strategery" of schlock-rocket to the moon will score him big points if he carries it off. And the American public will just cheer their little hearts out when they see a man (or foxy lady) on Mars. At least, until the little green men with ray-guns follow the astronauts home. Then we'll all wish we were Saddam – safe and sound behind bars somewhere.

Meanwhile, what about the missing weapons of mass destruction? The dubious contracts with Halliburton? The vanishing civil liberties? The ever-lower taxes for rich people? The lack of comprehensive health care?

For some reason, those things no longer seem to register with the masses. So just sit back, folks, and watch "reality TV" and make your botox appointment while your planet goes straight to hell.

– Jones