About that debate

View 705 Monday, December 12, 2011

I worked on fiction over the weekend, and made considerable progress. I was going to go for a hike with Niven today, but it’s raining, and looks to be raining all day.

I suppose I ought to comment on the Republican debate of last Saturday. It was hardly a game changer. It is reported to have had the largest number of viewers of all the debates, and of course it was the first one after the elimination of Herman Cain as the not-Romney candidate, leaving Newt Gingrich as not only the leading non-Romney, but as a front runner well out ahead of the field.

This would normally have been the time to concentrate on Newt’s personal relationships, but there was a problem: Diane Sawyer hasn’t really a taste for that sort of thing. George Stephanopoulos was the Clinton War Room Bimbo Eruption manager, which gave him plenty of experience but perhaps of the wrong kind to prepare him for that kind of attack. The best he could do was to ask if character and personal relationship history was relevant to the office of President. The responses were about what one would expect. Everyone said yes, of course it’s important, and Newt was straightforward in admitting fault and seeking forgiveness. The other candidates gained character points.

One major attack on Gingrich was that he was a professional politician, while Romney, though experienced in government, was not. Newt rather deftly disarmed Romney on that issue by pointing out that had Romney won against Ted Kennedy in 1994, Romney would have been a professional politician too. That didn’t harm Romney but it does negate the issue.

Another was that Newt had proposed mining the Moon. To which Newt replied that we blinking well ought to be mining the Moon. His lines came pretty well right out of A Step Farther Out. He diidn’t say he’d rather spend the money mining the Moon than hiring bunny inspectors, but he could have. He’s still a space cadet. As any President with vision ought to be.

All told, no one was harmed, Newt came out looking better than when he went in. The polls show no confidence in Obama’s ability to manage the economy. And the election continues. So do the bunny inspectors, lousy schools, bailouts, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and the rest of it.

Does anyone remember a DOS game called Battles of Destiny? It came on a 5 ¾ floppy, and I don’t seem to have a copy any longer. [See below; have it, and thanks.]

I have fiction to work on. And it’s lunch time. There’s a lot of interesting mail I’ll get to after I write.

2330: I did a few hundred words and a good scene for Anvil.

Battles of Destiny

Hello Sir,

Battles of Destiny can be downloaded as freeware from the original makers web site:

http://www.holistic-design.com/?page_id=133&did=7

A pdf of the manual can be found here:

http://www.hotud.org/component/content/article/44-war/19797

E. Lee Bohannon

Which works just fine in DOSBOX. Thanks!