Happy Furry Puppy Story Time with Norbizness

Grand Old Captions: Day 3 of the Ongoing Crisis

Still haven't seen/heard a goddamned minute of the convention, of the wrap-ups, of the discussions, of the Today Show tie-ins, of the reactionary talk show wrap-ups, or. Just sweet, binary blogospheric hearsay. And yet, I delusionally consider myself well-rounded. Who knew?

Well, I'll be dipped. Grandpa from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre got hisself cleaned up. Looks like he still craves the taste of blood, though.

But... if you're on stage... who are those guys? Oh. Dear. Lord. We're too late.

I thought that my prodigious embezzilitude from my fighters lo these many years was unrivalled, but these splendiforous crackers have put my historonical financial misdeeds to shame! Four more years!

I'm grating enough, I'm disingenuous enough, and.. gosh-darn it, people convincingly pretend to half-like me!

Jim Kelly? The guy that quarterbacked four straight losing Super Bowl teams? On behalf of the Republican party, can we undo that handshake?

[token unfunny caption] The Administration in a nutshell: just admit that it's "ring," you intransigent fuckers!

*** WEATHER ALERT ***

The fat white thing is the hurricane. The skinny green thing is Florida.

To anyone on the Florida coast, or even inland for that matter:

Board everything up and get out. The current National Hurricane Center prediction is here: to wit, the forecast has Hurricane Frances making landfall Saturday morning near Vero Beach (middle of the Florida coast, although the cone of possibility ranges from Miami to Pensacola), with winds of 145 mph. For any newcomers to the area, that's the same wind speed as Hurricane Andrew in 1992.

Seriously. If you're still reading this, get your ass in gear and head north. Visit scenic West Virginia or brisk, exciting Canada. Tell your friends.

Bread, Circuses, and Captions

For those of you keeping score at home, discarded convention captions that you can use for yourself include: "You're a funny teleprompter. That's why I read you last.", "But Mommmmm, these Bloody Marys are using well vodka!", and "10-6-9-er! 10-6-9-er! We got hippies in the city! We need back-up plungers NOW!" There's some non-convention photos in the extended entry, and a practice one right here on the main page, but feel free to caption any of the pics in the captions, or tell me which caption pleased you greatly...

Oh, honey, not the blue plaid tie. It really makes you look ridiculous.

Look, everyone! I'm in the manufacturing sector!

[Give it a whirl, readership!]

Come let me take you on a party ride, and I'll teach you, teach you, teach you... I'll teach you the electric slide.

I may not be the sharpest tool in th' shed, but I'm beginnin' t'suspect that sumbitch ain't really the Vice President.

I Tried Witnessing to Pauly Shore, But It Didn't Take

Who knew "Bio-Dome" would turn out to be a career peak?

(See Also: Kurt Warner Memorial Post. Pretty much the same thing.) OK, my eternal nemesis, you win already. I promise never, ever to listen to what a celebrity has to say about anything apart from their immediate movie/music project ever again. [Stephen] Baldwin tells gossip site Pagesix.Com, "I'm there to support the man I believe has the most faith. That's who I'm voting for. I believe the next president should be a guy who is being led by God. I believe there is one guy, and that's the guy I want to vote for."

If that's the case, Steve, may I suggest as presidential timber one of the many schizophrenic homeless wandering in and around Republic Park in Austin? These guys are so in touch with divine will, they don't even have to pray. God pretty much tells them what to do, right on the spot, with what they call "command hallucinations."

In addition, in order to spiritually atone for playing Barney Rubble in The Flintstones: Viva! Rock Vegas, he's bringin' the good news to X-treme evangelical youth in Texas: “Good luck, man,” the teen told Baldwin as he stood to leave. “I don’t need luck, bro,” Baldwin said grinning. “I’ve got Jesus.”

Then Jesus must be the worst agent in the world. Let's take a sampling... Fly Boys? Six: The Mark Unleashed? In My Sleep? Target? Shelter Island? Firefight? Lost Treasure? Silent Warnings? Deadrockstar? Greenmail? Slap Shot 2: Breaking the Ice? Spider's Web? Dead Awake? Protection? That's just in the last three years! Tell Jesus to put some of those fly-by-night production company reps into voice mail. Damn!

At least he drops some political eschatology on their domes before leaving: “‘If the impossible is now possible,’” he recalled thinking after the terrorist attacks, “‘anything’s possible. And if anything’s possible -- my wife’s a born-again Christian, I’ve been reading the Bible and I’ve been praying to the Lord to like, tell me what this is all about -- then Jesus could come back tomorrow.’" It ain't Saul on the road to Damascus, but it's poignantly touching in a Gen-Z kind of way. And violently, flesh-drippingly disturbing. I guess, in the case of Rapture, the Threesome Collector's Edition DVD will be missing some audio commentary.

Of course, we're all waiting for the inevitable follow-up story concerning the direct mathematical relationship between his faith level and the percentage of movies he's in that go straight to Eastern European quasi-video...

The World Outside Of Madison Cube Garden

When inside the chamber, you will only think of cocktail parties and designer band-aids...

If two countries, the Pentagon, and the economy falls apart, and nobody can be distracted long enough from Michael Moore's appearance at the convention to notice, does it really happen? Don't worry, HPFST will still provide the portal to stories about...

... the economy: The Conference Board, a private forecasting group, said its measure of consumer confidence fell to 98.2 from a revised 105.7 in July. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast a fall to 103.5... Most analysts expect job creation to have picked up in August, however, with a consensus forecast for 150,000 new jobs. (In July, the forecast was 228,000, we ended up with 32,000 and downward revisions for three previous months).

... the peasantry lucky duckies: There were 35.8 million people living in poverty last year, or 12.5 percent of the population. That was 1.3 million more than in 2002. Children made up more than half the increase -- about 800,000. The child poverty rate rose from 16.7 percent in 2002 to 17.6 percent... More people lacked health insurance as well -- about 45 million last year, or 15.6 percent, compared with 43.5 million, or 15.2 percent the previous year.

... the damaging leaks in spy investigations: The premature disclosure (of the Pentagon spy case details) has caused problems for investigators, according to numerous law enforcement officials speaking on the condition of anonymity because the probe is ongoing. "This has severely hampered their investigation," one law enforcement official said. "It's impossible to tell what might have been lost because of all this."

... the utter surprise that a sham sovereignty handover hasn't led ro absolute serenity in Iraq: The concentration of attacks in those areas is a reminder that the fiercest and most organized opposition to U.S. forces and the U.S.-backed interim government continues to be in Sunni-dominated cities, such as Fallouja. Nationwide, U.S. forces are being attacked 60 times per day on average, up 20% from the three-month period before the hand-over.

... the parts of Iraq nobody talks about: Much of Anbar Province [is] now controlled by fundamentalist militias, with American troops confined mainly to heavily protected forts on the desert's edge. What little influence the Americans have is asserted through wary forays in armored vehicles, and by laser-guided bombs that obliterate enemy safe houses identified by scouts who penetrate militant ranks. Even bombing raids appear to strengthen the fundamentalists, who blame the Americans for scores of civilian deaths.

... the security situation in Afghanistan: The U.S. issued a travel alert for its citizens in Afghanistan after weekend bombings that killed at least 19 people in the capital, Kabul, and in Paktia province... A bomb explosion on Saturday at a religious school in the southeastern province of Paktia killed 10 people, including nine children, the UN said.

Care to guess which one of the above links has made it over to the cool kids' table? If you guessed the band-aid story in the sensory deprivation chamber caption, give yourself a shot of Goldschlager. And keep drinking.

Can't Bear To Watch: RNC Captions, Day 1

In looking through today's photos, I realized that there's no way to caption a First Daughters photograph without a phenomenon the elders call "The Cheapening." So here's some other crazy-ass motherfuckers:

How did this pantload get so portly? Some say it's decades of sloth and inhaling deep-fried banana and peanut butter sandwiches, some say it comes from eating a fresh baby every morning-- I'm saying you just don't know (explanation here).

Whew! Glad I got out of that year-long coma just in time for the convention! I didn't even have time to remove this giant button! What'd I miss?

And now, the report from the President's brother concerning this year's margin of victory...

There there, sweetie. When Grandpa goes totally mecha, you may have your brain implanted in a giant robot panda bear.

I wanna swim the deepest ocean, be poetry in motion on a Paris night, yeah

We cannot get Tunnel Vision, nor be Semi-Tough in the War on Terror. We must maintain a Silent Rage, a resolve like Blue Steel, as we battle this scourge, a thing I call The Entity, as we try to achieve a Reversal of Fortune. Don't like the platform? Well, we're Married To It. What's the matter, people? Don't you recognize my body of work?

Life's Little Ironies

(photo courtesy of the Church of Latter Day Shrieking Bigots)

Today's moment of Republican convention sunshine, lollipops and inclusivity is brought to you courtesy of today's severely unhinged invocation speaker, Mormon counselor-- she can't be a priest, after all-- Sheri Dew (link thanks to Atrios):

On seeing a picture of girls raised by two gay men: What kind of chance do those girls have being raised in that kind of setting? What will their understanding of men and women, marriage and families be? Is there any chance that, as adults, they could expect to marry and enjoy a healthy relationship with a man, including rearing children together?

On herself: I just turned 50 years old, and I have never married. That was not my intention, and it has not been my choice. When someone asks me why I have never married, the simple and truthful answer is that nobody has ever asked me.

You may be tempted to feel sorry for her (but don't say "Well, I'll marry her"... that in itself is an ironclad, unbreakable promise in Utah and Idaho), but the personal disclosure was right after she compared the rise of civil unions to the rise of Hitler. Not because they want to put breeders in concentration camps, of course... it's just a silly analogy. Don't take it so seriously! It could have been the rise of George Lopez for all she cares!

Maybe I'm just dense, but can somebody remind me again why there exists the curious creature known as a Log Cabin Republican? Someone once compared it to "Chickens for Colonel Sanders," but it sounds more to me like "Civil Rights Activists for Bull Conner," "Seals for Seal-Clubbers," or "Mormons for Politically Active Evangelical End-Time Christians Who Think That Mormons Are a Dangerous Cult."

Ask The President #4: Fond Du Lac, Wisconsin

For thine is the power, the flavor, and the sharpness, forever and ever, amen. Go Pack!

It's only the fourth session, and it's already starting to sound monotonous (The first three installments are here, here, and here). As a result, I'm leaving the quotes from the President intact, and changing up the questions so they don't sound like they're coming from a bunch of scared, girthy automatons. A little pre-game fun with parentheticals before we begin:

I also want to thank my friend, Tommy Thompson, for serving our country so well. (Hissing) Thank you, T. They still remember you. (Insanely loud hissing) He's done a great job.
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(1) PRESIDENT: (to the business owner/host) Why? Why did you hire 73 people? Just to be a nice guy?

MR. COLWIN: Because if I didn't, you would have never come here and received this complimentary memorial cheese sculpture of your dearly departed Springer Spaniel, Spotty. And.. er.. because stuff is growing.

THE PRESIDENT: There you go. The markets are growing. Did the tax cuts help? He's a sub-chapter S corporation. In other words, we cut his taxes. Why? Because if he's got more money in his pocket he's going to plow it back into the business, which means you're likely to keep your work. In this case, 73 more people found a job -- that's what's important.

MR. COLWIN: That and I managed to buy my mistress a green-and-yellow Mustang convertible with the Brett Favre custom package. (Laughter and applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: Pretty simple now. It helps. Tax relief helps.

MR. COLWIN: She'll actually sleep with me now on a regular basis.

THE PRESIDENT: Now, are you going to make investments this year?

MR. COLWIN: Well, winter's coming up. She really wants a fur coat. Something soft, she says. I feel like my nuts are in a clamp.

THE PRESIDENT: Wow, that's good. Yes, let me -- let me explain what that means. (Applause.) See, that's really good news. But let me tell you what investment really means. He just said he's going to buy fabricating equipment.

MR. COLWIN: Yeah, that's it. It'll show up as "fabricating equipment" on the tax return.

THE PRESIDENT: I don't know who you're buying it from. It would be a good chance to put a plug in for them. (Laughter.)

MR. COLWIN: Some Ukranian guy is the middleman, I don't ask where the goods come from. I don't need to know. I'm not fucking with the Ukranian mob.

THE PRESIDENT: Well, that's important. And that's how the economy grows. And the tax relief plan we passed said to Joe, we're going to help you make the decision, because if you make the decision to buy plant and equipment this year, you get a little extra tax break. Isn't that right, Joe?

MR. COLWIN: That's what this scary looking IRS auditor looking over my shoulder says.

THE PRESIDENT: Now, you're supposed to be doing more talking than I am. (Cries of "Who's your mistress? Is it that girl at the diner?") It's your business. (Cries of "Not any more!" and "Wait till Eugenia finds out!")
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(2) PRESIDENT: Now, let me introduce you to Tim Rice. Tim, thanks for coming. Tim is a guy who works here at Mid-States, right? How long have you worked here for, Tim?

MR. RICE: I started in May, sir, following graduation from University of Wisconsin. It's always been a dream of mine to get stuck in this dairy quagmire.

THE PRESIDENT: Congratulations on getting out of college. Barbara just graduated, too.

MR. RICE: Is she available? (Applause.)

THE PRESIDENT: He started in May. It's a pretty good sign, isn't it? The economy is growing; otherwise he wouldn't be starting in May. He might have been starting in May of 1997.

MR. RICE: What? 1997? Do you have any idea what you're saying?

THE PRESIDENT: Thanks, yes. (Two people clap) I know I'm prying into your business, but are you making more money now than you were.

MR. RICE: Absolutely. I was a student, dumbass. (Laughter.)

THE PRESIDENT: That's good. Like, one dollar more? Two-times more?

MR. RICE: What are we, living in 1928? (mocking) "I'm getting a shiny quarter every day." (/mocking) Wait.. is that peppermint schnapps I smell?
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More in the extended entry...

What Happened To The Vanquish?

Have you been good, kiddies? Well, I don't care, here's the link to the new Get Your War On.

The Further Adventures of Toddler Norbizness

Circa 1974-1976:

(1) Holy shit! It's raining in Houston! A glorious miracle!

(2) I liked Frito pies and apple juice so much, I later bought the respective component companies.

(3) This picture has a happy ending; another family came and picked me up a couple of days later.

(4) Aren't colicky new sisters the most fun in the whole wide world?

This whirlwind pictorial session brought to you by the Committee For Unawareness That A Heavily Protested Convention Is About To Happen.

Nuk-u-lar Hellfire, Schmu-ku-lar Hellfire

So I was on the phone with the despicable, empty-headed capitalist running dog President, and he was all like (pursing lips in mock desperation) "Please don't kill me."

(Excerpts stolen shamelessly from The Poor Man and Demagogue)

Showing none of the alarm about the North's growing arsenal that he once voiced regularly about Iraq, he opened his palms and shrugged when an interviewer noted that new intelligence reports indicate that the North may now have the fuel to produce six or eight nuclear weapons.

Look, he shrugs what he means and means what he shrugs. Is he letting a playa play? Is he showing remarkable restraint in not hating the playa, but reserving judgment on the nuclear game? Is he pulling a Bobby Knight/Clayton Williams and likening the inevitability of nuclear proliferation to that of the weather's, and insisting that we sit back and enjoy it?

He said that in North Korea's case, and in Iran's, he would not be rushed to set deadlines for the countries to disarm, despite his past declaration that he would not "tolerate" nuclear capability in either nation. He declined to define what he meant by "tolerate."... "I don't think you give timelines to dictators," Mr. Bush said, speaking of North Korea's president, Kim Jong Il, and Iran's mullahs.

As for a matter of basic history, you don't think you do what? Was Saddam not a dictator? Was there not a timeline involved? At some point, you have to marvel at the genius this new modified pre-emption. This seems like a rational foreign policy if you were, say, Nepal. Countries whose arsenals of weapons had been destroyed a decade ago and who couldn't deliver the goods even if they had them should be invaded, bombed, and built back up again, but countries with actual ICBMs and nuclear weapons can be effectively deterred with missile shields. Then again, I guess Kim Jong Il never tried to kill his dad. I never fully take the Hamlet Factor into account when trying to explain a $150 billion morass.

But I guess trying to make sense of this sort of head-scratching buffoonery is pointless when you're dealing with a popular wartime President.

A Few Cinematic Weekend-Dampeners

He's like half-a-Vinny Testaverde.

Only a couple of selected items from the Weekly Recap. Feel free to highlight other tidbits that made you wince in the comments; there's plenty to choose from...

(1) Bruce Campbell, Lynda Carter and David Foley have joined the cast of SKY HIGH as superhero teachers for director Mike Mitchell and producer Andrew Gunn. Dave Foley as a superhero? According to IMDB, he's known as "Mr. Boy." I personally thought that he would reprise his role as Hecubus from Kids in The Hall.

(2) Sarah Carter will star with Paris Hilton, Simon Rex, and Paula Garces in NATIONAL LAMPOON'S PLEDGE THIS. Carter will be playing Kristen, a Brooklyn native all too excited about sorority life at South Beach University. This sounds less like a movie idea than a clever internment plan to allow America to rectify its horrible celebrity choices from the last couple years.

(3) Nicholas Turturro ("NYPD Blue") will play a quarterback in THE LONGEST YARD, starring Adam Sandler, Burt Reynolds and Chris Rock. God, it just gets worse and worse. By the time these casting halfwits are done, the original will look like La Dolce Vita by comparison. By the way, isn't Nick Turturro like 4'11" or something?

(4) Zhang Ziyi is in final negotiations to play the title character in the film adaptation of MEMOIRS OF A GEISHA. while Ken Watanabe has signed on to play the male lead. Gong Li, Michelle Yeoh, Youki Kudoh and Koji Yakusho also are in final negotiations to join the cast. It sounds like a great cast... but isn't Zhang Ziyi Chinese? Aren't geishas Japanese? Is this going to be for the let's-see-if-we-can-cash-in-on-the-excremental-The Last Samurai-because-all-Asians-look-like American audience?

(5) Sam Raimi is in talks with New Line Cinema for a project titled FREDDY VS. JASON VS. ASH. In the proposed sequel, Freddy and Jason would go up against Ash from the EVIL DEAD series. I still think this Ash would be more compelling. Can supernatural serial killers stand up against the various water attacks of the Squirtle family?

That's it, I'm starting on an Alien vs. Pikachu script this weekend.

Your Composite RNC-Credentialed Blogger

In fact, we rock just as hard in our own way as Motorhead does. I'll bet you never thought that a stuffy old conservative would ever throw in a Motorhead reference, huh? Well, prepare to have your mind blown over and over again by our unwavering commitment to continually rock!

Ladies and gentlemen, your 2004 Washington Wizards...

(1) Basic demographics: average age is 35 years old (29 if you take out Roger Simon), approximately SPF-30, male.

(2) Describe your blog briefly. A bittersweet mélange of foreign affairs, electoral politics, ad hoc humor, the Cleveland Browns, journalism, law, poker, Urban Republicanism, indie music and single-malt scotch dedicated to re-electing George W. Bush.

(3) How do you plan to cover the convention -- what kind of content can readers expect? We're totally going to go behind the scenes and publish stuff you can't get anywhere else. That is to say, photographs of the dirtiest, most anarchical protestors with captions that read "Is this what has become of the left?" or "No War for Soap!" Also looking for an interview with Marvin Bush, the blogospheric equivalent of getting Garbo to talk.

(4) Why should people read your coverage? Because I'm told that I rock.

(5) What's the biggest gap in convention coverage by mainstream media in prior election years? There were no conventions in any meaningful sense before the advent of weblogging. Conventioneering has undergone a transformation, like the rebirth of Osiris (crickets chirping). I mean, it's like Mick Taylor taking over after Brian Jones died. Rock!

(6) What did you learn about blogging a convention from the Boston coverage? That the overarching lameness of the Democratic candidates poisoned the commentary of the already sycophantic, toadying, useless anti-Bush quadrant of the blogosphere. My readership has confirmed what I've known innately since I was a microscopic embryo deserving of full legal protection: those people emphatically do not rock.

(7) Which presidential candidate do you plan to vote for in November? As a well-educated conservative, I'm planning on carefully calculating the economic, environmental, foreign policy, and cultural costs and benefits of another four years of this administration, then get a frontal lobotomy and vote for Bush (makes Satan sign).