August 24, 2004
Who Needs Politics When We Have Spokes-slugs And Bikini Models?
Now enjoy a light, refreshing Slurm.
According to those people who are in the know, today's big news as is follows:
BUSH: Absolutely. I don't think we ought to have 527s. I can't be more plain about it.
When asked to explain this sudden concern for sensitivity and decorum towards multi-millionaire incumbents and their gargantuan political machines, the White House dispatched an order of bean curd in a Men's Wearhouse Outlet suit to further break it down:
Q: So can we assume that he's also denouncing the content of the ads?
MR. McCLELLAN: You've heard what he said -- he condemns all of the ads, Deb. He could not be more clear in saying that -- and when he says something, he means it.
In the first place, we clearly know that that particular endorsement of Presidential character is flat-out wrong (I think you can make out my point despite the interminable stammering), as we see from this excerpt involving then-Governor Bush:
(GEORGE) WILL: In which case, would you veto the McCain-Feingold bill, or the Shays-Meehan bill?
BUSH: That's an interesting question. I - I - yes I would. The reason why is two - for one, I think it does respe - res - restrict free speech for individuals. As I understand how the bill was written, I I - I think there's been two versions of it, but as I understand the first version restricted individuals and/or groups from being able to express their opinion...
In the second place, fuck that. I'm a minor shareholder in MoveOn.org. They're pretty liberal, I'm pretty liberal. They don't want Bush in the White House, I don't want him in the White House. They are often indecorous, I'm often indecorous. If this country had half as many political parties as there are major brands of refried beans, not every criticism of a politician would have to be seen as a tacit endorsement of the other. As you all know, I'm in an electorally impotent position and have already endorsed Libertarian sex machine Michael Badnarik.
In the third place, isn't this a little overbroad? Does this mean that the Sierra Club can't run ads urging their members to contact the EPA about a proposed corporate giveaway regulation change? The Oregon Grocers' Association from contacting state or local labor agencies to protest the evisceration of overtime benefits? The National Association of Realtors from running ads supporting their inalienable right to drown potential homebuyers in endless paperwork?
This is another metaphorical "free speech zone." Just like some unknown provocation has been used to justify pepper-spraying grandmothers and herding peaceful protestors into razor-wired pens, the simple call for condemnation of a single ad has led to this infantile absolutism. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to make a few more donations that I can't afford.
August 23, 2004
Humor in Uniform
Stop me if you've heard this one before!
It is just me, or is this national treasure trove of chuckles and warm, understanding nods from Reader's Digest becoming a little more radicalized and strident?
1. My husband wore his Army uniform with pride. One day, coming home from the base and dressed in his olive drab fatigues, he stopped off at the grocery store to pick up a few things. While in line at the checkout counter, he noticed a little boy standing with his mother. The boy took one look at my husband in his uniform, and his eyes grew wide. My husband, in turn, gave the young man a crisp salute. The boy was so excited. He pointed at my husband and announced, "Look, Mom, a giant Boy Scout."
2. My husband has served for nine years in the regular Army and three years as a reserve. His latest term ended while he was deployed in Iraq through a back-door draft. However, he's been repeatedly fucked over by stop-loss orders, he's not been allowed to come home for almost a year. As a result, he's had to sue the government for this infringement on his liberty. He also told me that, this one time, everyone had a food fight and there were MRE meatballs flying everywhere. And that's why they call it a "mess hall."
3. Boarding a military transport plane, I noticed hydraulic fluid pouring from the tail section. "Excuse me," I said to a crew member. "Do you know the aircraft has a leak?" "Yep," he said as he continued on his way. "Aren't you concerned?" He shrugged. "Well," I asked, "how do you know when you're out of fluid?" "When it quits leaking," he answered. What an ass. I'm kind of glad that when he returned from his 15-month stint as a reservist in Iraq, he had lost his job at the manufacturing plant and the federal law protecting him was too impotent to do anything about it. Enjoy telling your fluid story at the Jiffy Lube, motherfucker!
4. John, a career Army officer I once met, was jumpmaster for his unit and was taking a few novices up for a drop. The flight was pretty rough, and, after a while, John called off the jump because of high winds. As the plane headed back to base and the pilot pulled off an unusually smooth landing, two of the neophytes got airsick. "How come you could take that rough flight but you couldn't handle the smooth landing?" John asked. "Well, sir," one trainee explained, "we've always jumped out of planes. We've never actually landed in one before." John just laughed that knowing laugh of a wise, professional soldier. To top it all off... fifty years later, they turned down John's application for VA benefits. Crazy world.
Sheesh, guys. Lighten up!
Junk It And Start Over
Read more about me here.
I like the website Memeorandum (even loathe I loathe the root word), if for nothing else that it reminds me what an absolutely futile, gossipy, dimwitted, toolish, and misbegotten enterprise the blogosphere is. Of the 15 or so top commented-upon stories this morning (the number of people attached to each one will only increase as the day goes on), we have:
(1) Dole Questions Kerry's Vietnam Wounds: Roger L. Simon, Mitch Berg, Richard TPD, Steve M., Betsy Newmark, Joe Gandelman, Tim Blair, ArchPundit, Laura Rozen, Dale Franks, Michael Totten, James Joyner, Blackfive, Glenn Reynolds, KJL, Josh Marshall, Ann Althouse, Orrin Judd.
(2) Kerry TV Ad Pins Veterans' Attack Firmly on Bush: Steve M., DemFromCT, The Big Trunk, Glenn Reynolds, Captain Ed, William J. Dyer, Matthew Gross.
(3) Winter in Cambodia?: Joe Gandelman, William Voegeli,Glenn Reynolds, Bird Dog, The Big Trunk, Charles Johnson, Betsy Newmark, Hugh Hewitt, William J. Dyer.
(4) Dole: Kerry owes veterans apology: Glenn Reynolds, Susan Madrak, Bill @INDCJournal.
(5) Why We're Refighting Vietnam: James Joyner, Jesse Taylor.
(6) 'This is what I saw that day': Nick Gillespie, Paul Glastris.
(7) Vietnam Vet Says Has No Proof for Claim Kerry Lied : John Emerson, Jesse Taylor.
(8) Big lies for Bush (Re: Dole's Appearance): Susan Madrak, Richard TPD, Ann Althouse, Dole-ful Loser, DemFromCT, Atrios, Josh Marshall, Larre @LeftCoaster, Harley.
Nothing on the big board about the evisceration of overtime rules (it goes into effect today... are you covered?), nothing about the 5 servicemen who died in the last 24 hours, nothing about any developments in Afghanistan (probably for the last year or so), nothing about the genocide in Sudan.
Of course, had there been an aggregator of sheep-like weblog tendencies in the summer of 2001, it would have probably read: Condit, Condit, Andrea Yates, Condit, Condit, Andrea Yates, initial stem cell announcement, Condit, Andrea Yates, Baltimore train derailment, Condit.
August 22, 2004
Is It Just Me, Or Is Mickey Mouse Intensely Unlikable?
Don't cry for me, I landed on my feet.
Pardon the absence, and thanks for the fantastic, wonderful feedback to the last post. I'll be combing over all the input for several weeks... feh. I'd like to give a shout out to Wild Turkey 101. "Wild Turkey 101: When You Absolutely, Positively Have To Remain In The Fetal Position Until Two in the Afternoon." In any event, it's time to clear some old articles out of the hopper, Scott McClellan-style.
1. There's only one way to reward American workers for their unprecedented productivity, and that's to cut paid overtime for about 6 million of them. Look, the President doesn't believe in class warfare. That's just tacky.
2. All the CEOs in the house love pre-emptive warfare. Hooray pre-emptive warfare! And if, perchance, nearly $9 billion in sweet, nourishing war juice goes unaccounted for, don't worry. It'll turn up somewhere, probably when and where you least expect it.
3. CIA Director nominee Porter Goss is truly brilliant and inspired. If the intelligence agency is going to more effectively interpret foreign information, it needs to warm up first with domestic targets. And think of all the translators we can make redundant if all of the recorded conversations are in English!
4. The President isn't a scumbag, he just doesn't listen all super careful-like to a lot of the mind-numbing blather emanating from the endless parade of human cattle at campaign stops. Wait a minute, strike that.
5. Look, we're usually one of the first organizations to tell the Washington Post to cram it up their collective socialist asses, but we think they're really getting a raw deal here.
6. Interesting story here: Although the early U.S. blunders in the occupation of Iraq are well known, their consequences are just now becoming clear. The Bush administration was never willing to commit the resources necessary to secure the country and did not make the most of the resources it had. U.S. officials did get a number of things right, but they never understood-or even listened to-the country they were seeking to rebuild. See that? A number of things right. Plu-ral. Things.
August 20, 2004
The Sweet Smell of Partial Failure: A HFPST Project
Here's how the new project goes: something starts at a certain level in January 2001. The indicator then significantly deteriorates over the next couple of years. At the last minute, the indicator improves somewhat to be a little less shitty than it was during its nadir. This is cited as proof positive that a turned has corner or that the Administration's policies and programs are working. Areas where I've seen this used include:
(1) Level of violence / troop deaths in Iraq.
(2) Electricity production in Iraq.
(3) Job levels (i.e. "if you re-elect us, by 2006 we'll have just as many jobs as we did when we first took office!:)
(4) Deficit projections / deficit or national debt as a percentage of GNP.
(5) Percentage of persons with health insurance.
(6) Oil / gas prices.
Since I prefer to be barely competent to opine in a number of areas, I'm not much of a single-issue expert. Therefore, I'm not completely aware of specific examples in other areas like the environment, other labor conditions, education, homeland security indicia, etc. I'm sure that there are a number of indicators that are headed south and not returning any time soon, but we'll just call those the "I hit the trifecta" or the "9/11 changed everything" statistics.
Assuming that people out there wants to do some additional research (for additional links and policy areas), I'll be happy to credit you (and your site, where applicable) in a subsequent post should this group project actually work.
Don't Make Me Vanquish Your Ass For a Third Time
You call that a portrait? I look like I'm 70! Truce over!
I know you're thirsty for good news, just like a cross-country rollerblading athlete is thirsty for new Triple X-treme Boysenberry-Vodka-Creme-Soda flavored lo-carb Powerade, now with 13% more electrolytes and 21% more amphetamines 'pep molecules', so here you go (click on #s for the article):
(1) The truce offer was worked out by Mr Sadr and Shia leaders; the conditions were contained in a letter signed by the cleric. Under the deal, Mr Sadr was to order his fighters from outside Najaf to leave the city and local militiamen entrenched around the Imam Ali Mosque to lay down their arms.
(2) Late last week, Mr Sadr agreed to withdraw his Mehdi Army fighters from the holy cities of Najaf and Kufa in tandem with a withdrawal by US forces. Shops and schools are reopening in Najaf as Iraqi police move back in.
(3): "The Moqtada militia is militarily defeated. We have killed scores of them over the last few weeks, and that is in Najaf alone," Brigadier General Mark Hertling, one of the top US commanders in charge of Najaf, told AFP. "Over the past several days, Moqtada's militia has lost much of their stomach for fighting," he said... "We have also destroyed their weapons stores and their offensive capability," he said. "What remains of them, which is a very small force, will take advantage of the governor's announcement to disperse if not disband."
Whoops, that was late May - early June of this year. But I'm sure that today's good news is totally different sounding. Speaking of which, be sure to hit the refresh button on the news every hour or so. Apparently, the Pentagon commenting on hearsay passed down to them from self-interested Iraqi police forces may not suffice for actual news content (for more details, see this rapidly evolving post from Stonecutter at The Agonist).
Ask The President, Part II: Live From Dayton
LISA: Mr. Burns, your campaign seems to have the momentum of a runaway freight train. Why are you so popular?
MR. BURNS: Ooh, a tough question but a fair one.
For this session, I've decided to go with approach #1 (keep the questions/citizen comments the same, alter the answers to reflect a paranoid, hyper-defensive President even though he's in a hand-picked crowd with pre-approved and probably not their own questions). As you can see, it's hardly Prime Minister's Question Time. It's hardly question time at all; most of the time, it resembles a bad infomercial. Plenty of additional ones in the extended section...
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(1) PRESIDENT: And $1900, it gives them more money to pay down credit. It gives them more money to take care of their family. Is that right? What did you do with all that money?
MR. BERKEY: Well, mostly we used it just to pay off some bills, much like most of our friends, because raising a family is very expensive nowadays. I brought my three children. And, as you can see, just feeding them guys took most of that $800. (Laughter.)
THE PRESIDENT: I didn't say $800, I said $1900, dumbass. In any event, how about kicking a little back to the Bush-Cheney re-election effort? Is that so much to ask so in return for allowing your three little pork-pies over there to continue to stuff their fat faces with corn dogs?
MRS. BERKEY: Any kind of an increase is just going to make things tighter. You know, I like to have the money here.
THE PRESIDENT: Shut up now. Other people want to talk.
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(2) MS. SCOTT: I would just like to add that other than that, my family and friends here, and in New York, are praying for you, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Why would you need to pray for me? I'm already President. Things have worked out pretty well... wait.... is there something wrong with me? Did Jesus tell you I have a disease? Spit it out, woman!
MS. SCOTT: And we stand behind you.
THE PRESIDENT: Why behind me? Am I infectious? Wait a minute. Who do you pray to? Where are you going?
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August 19, 2004
Can't Someone Else Do It?
... and tell you when your ass is show-ing!
Until the ultimatum issued by our nation's most decorated soldier, Ted McGinley, begins to bear fruit, I'm going on at outsourcing kick. I will try to have a few excerpts from the "Ask the President" sessions later on.
(1) The picture I selected for my most recent open caption (my own attempt: "I hereby dub thee Sir Had-a-Job") is also getting the photoshop treatment, to mixed effect.
(2) Vance over at Begging to Differ examines the non-overlap between the War on Terror and the War in Iraq. It looks like the "central front" mantra isn't working as well as the White House wizards had anticipated.
(3) Andante at Collective Sigh examines the intersection between the high cost of health care, the red herring of tort reform, and the election. I encourage everyone to utilize the self-help series "Praying Away Kidney Infections."
(4) Newly added Pete at the Dark Window examines some of the most kick-ass secessionist, hyper-patriotic, uber-Christian, vaguely homoerotic developments in T-shirt deisgn.
(5) The fine folks at Demagogue should be one of your primary sources for daily updates on the developing situations in Darfur.
(6) Giblets at Fafblog! produces a scholarly research paper riddled with astrophysics equations and copious footnotes concerning the relationship between missile defense shields and the human quality of forward-lookingness. As far as I can tell.
(7) Heather at Go Fug Yourself (one of my new favorite places) delves into the dowdification craze sweeping Hollywood's young starlets.
(8) Tom Burka at Opinions You Should Have seems to think that the "peaceful protestor" self-identification program proposed by the Mayor of New York City is a silly idea.
(9) The Raving Atheist examines the Meaning of Life, an age-old issue once thought solved by the Monty Python crew in the early 80s, vis-a-vis finite and infinite lifespans.
It's Been Two Months Since Your Last Soundtrack! What's Up?
Jerry Goldsmith (1929-2004): L.A. Confidential, Total Recall, Hoosiers, Poltergeist, Star Trek: The Motion Picture (recycled as theme of Star Trek: The Next Generation), The Omen, Chinatown, Papillon, Patton, Planet of the Apes, Seconds, Seven Days in May and about 250 others.
Elmer Bernstein (1922-2004): Far From Heaven, Devil in a Blue Dress, The Age of Innocence, The Grifters, My Left Foot, Trading Places, Airplane!, True Grit, The Great Escape, Hud, To Kill a Mockingbird, Birdman of Alcatraz, The Magnificent Seven, The Sweet Smell of Success, The Ten Commandments and about 250 others.
Hard to imagine two guys who contributed more to the modern moviegoing experience than these two.
August 18, 2004
Serious as a Pulmonary Embolism
We have just hit Level 15: Yahoo Serious.
(1) Some countries can support us to the hilt in the War on Terror and the War in Iraq, and we can still manage to hose them over. According to an Australian Senate investigation, the FBI did not pass along sufficient information on the planned Bali bombing for them to raise their travel alerts.
(2) Which means it's going to be even worse if you're sauerkraut-eating Saddam-lovers; our obstruction of Germany's successful prosecution of a 9/11 attack collaborator continues unabated. Some material has been released, but the State Department is making it nearly impossible to tie the criminal defendant in with al-Qaeda's leadership.
(3) In Albany, some of the evidence in the sting operation relating to shoulder-fired missiles is being questioned because of.. surprise.. problems with translation. Let's see.. FBI translators fired over whistleblowing.. Army translators fired for being gay.. doesn't seem to be a good time for this particular trade.
(4) One of the centers of the "indefinite detention without any sort of rights" dust-up, Yaser Esam Hamdi, may soon be released. Apparently, the deal involves his return to Saudi Arabia under monitoring and, most importantly, not sue the United States.
(4a) But at least he wasn't the 27th most wanted person on the FBI list and allowed to return to a Syria, a state sponsor of terrorism. Reminder here.
(5) And, of course, one of the only actual terror trials in America, the Detroit proceedings (background here), prosecutors are claiming that the Justice Department torpedoed most of their effective and damning evidence.
(6) At least our British compatriots are having some success as a result of the Khan investigation, even if the well has run dry on that particular source of information. Hopefully they won't need our "cooperation" in the upcoming trial.
I guess the motto has changed from "we're taking the war on terror seriously" to "we're taking the war on terror so seriously that we will jeopardize international investigations and trials to prove to unapprehended terrorists just how crazy we are in the hopes that they will just give it up." Or, using modern commercial parlance: "When you finance a Hyundai or eighty-six a bunch of international anti-terror operations... you WIN!"
GUEST UPDATE: Attention! Sgt. Major Ted McGinley here. I just wanted to say that this is a really good post, free of the amateurish clowning, rampant swearing, and bullshit pop culture references that have fucked up hundreds of posts that have preceded it. Therefore, it is incumbent upon you to bring it to the attention of more popular (and therefore superior and better-looking) blogs than this shithole so that linkage may be achieved. Don't worry about my unexpected appearance causing this weblog to jump the shark, it was born in a post-jump position.
