From the Department of the Painfully Obvious:

Sarah Palin is to Barack Obama as The Monkees are to The Beatles.

ash sent that throw-away line to her local paper expecting it to be ignored. Instead, the new editor replied that he "took umbrage" as a Monkees fan only to publish it anyway. Only for the letter to garner grumbling objections - or so she was told, since she no longer reads the local paper - and absolutely no approbation. Which is rather humorous, considering the transparency of the comparison, until you consider the community in which she lives. So ash wrote the following elaboration which naturally was not published.

At some point ash adopted the philosophy - or perhaps simply realized - that she was impervious to intimidation. Short of physical threat, of course, which the following definitely does not constitute. Later investigation confirmed that JC Penney is hardly the only organization to employ the money-making scheme described below, as she addresses the desk clerk destined to open her envelope:

TAWDRY BUSINESS PRACTICES R US

Listen up, you flunkies, you schlubs,  you nameless, faceless clerics yearning to breathe free graduate high school already and enter college, ultimately precluding another assembly-line, boring, tedious job in the billing department of an impersonal, behemoth, bureaucratic corporation:

ash wrote her share of commentary regarding the Lewinsky matter. Unusual but hardly rare for a liberal was her anti-Clinton stance.

Benefit of the Doubt

February 2, 1998

I suspect that she pursued him and that he acquiesced. Nevertheless, the man is a sleaze and, as of his deposition in the Jones suit, a documented liar. His wagging finger is reminiscent of Patsy Ramsey in her media interviews. In my opinion, their credibility is equal.

November 4, ‘98

Several recent letters to the editor have asserted Christianity as "the only path to heaven," based on the word of Christ himself, via the Bible.

Unfortunately, it never occurred to ash to verify what she surmised before the passing of the participants she references. But she did hear horror stories of the mother country.

Here's a letter ash sent to the local alternative weekly, for which she once worked. Perhaps that is why she decided to submit it under a pseudonym.

Whatever this is the "appendage" to is long gone from ash's memory. No other contemporary document appears in her records. At any rate, the all-purpose message does stand alone.

Does anyone note the consistency?

ash didn't write that headline. For some reason, she also signed this letter with a pseudonym.

early 90s

I took great offense at a remark in Toby McDaniel's Jan. 5 column regarding Manuel Noriega and his pockmarks.