Short version: House Republicans are spineless, backstabbing bitches. And that's coming from someone who thinks the proposed bill was terrible and should have failed.
From the perspective of lawmakers, there's a classic collective action problem. Every Congressman (with the exception of the diehards like Kucinich or Paul), has been convinced that the bill is necessary. However, they also know that it's exceedingly unpopular with their constituents. The optimal outcome for any individual congressman is the same: the bill passes while they vote 'No' and then run on it. This is what Congressional Whips are for.
However, there's a bigger problem. If either party can get away with letting the majority of their members vote against it, then they all benefit, since the party can run nationally against it in 2010. So Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Majority Leader Steny Hoyer met with Minority leader John Boehner to come up with a scheme to get the bill passed without endangering their incumbents. The members of the party with the safest seats would vote for it, letting the 40% who were in trouble safely vote against. Each party would deliver 50-60% of their membership, keeping either side from getting demagogued badly for something that they both believed necessary.
Pelosi delivered: 60% of Democrats voted for the bill. 33% of Republicans did. Boehner apparently screwed up his count, since if he had delivered a few more he might have been able to get it passed with majority Democratic support. Keep in mind how cynical this is. He (and the rest of the caucus) believes this bill is absolutely essential for the health of the American economy. But he was perfectly willing to promise support, then stab the other party in the back by voting no at the last second, panning to run against 'the 700 billion dollar giveaway to corporate fatcats' in 2010. And what was the figleaf given for the betrayal, the willingness to sink the economy? Nancy Pelosi was mean to Republicans in her floor speech.
So where does Congress go now? I'm reminded of an ancient fable. During wartime, a Greek king was holding court one day when a mystic showed up with twelve scrolls of prophecy that held the key to winning the war . After proving that they were perfectly accurate, she demanded a staggering sum of gold for them. The king refused, saying that they weren't worth that much. So the prophet grabbed a nearby torch and set one of the scrolls on fire. She then repeated the same price for the remaining eleven scrolls. Again, the king refused. So once more she incinerated one of the scrolls. This continued until after burning the sixth scroll, the king gave in and paid the full price. Because he knew it was necessary.
You know what really grinds my gears? The French language. What's up with all of the unnecessary letters everywhere? It's fricken' annoying. I never know where to stop speaking syllables. I mean look at the title of this entry. Why is there a goddamn 'z'!? What does that do!?!?!? I'll tell ya...it fucks with Americans. I'm sure this is how this ridiculousness started:
Pierre: [in a sleazy French accent] Hey Philippe. Do you know how we can fuck with those silly Americans? Philippe: [in a sleazier French accent] No Pierre...please tell me how. [Philippe fixes his beret.] Pierre: Let's add a bunch of letters to the end of our words. Then they won't be able to pronounce them and we can laugh at them...hohoho. Philippe: Great idea. Now lets smoke cigarettes and masterbate to unshaven women.
I mean take a look at the French word for yes...'oui'. There is no 'w' and there is no 'e'...how can this word be pronounced 'we'! There's not even a consonant in that word! And please tell me how the letters 'eaux' combined to make an 'o' sound. What the fuck! There is a simpler way Frenchies. The worst part is that it's not just one consistent letter at the end of a word either. Examples:
coup d'etat - pronounced: coo de ta (fuck you 'p' and fuck you extra 't') faux pas - pronounced fo (as in: 'fo'shizzle my nizzle') pa (as in: Your ma and pa are rednecks.) la langue française suce des boules d'âne - pronounced 'the French language sucks donkey balls'
Now I know that there are a bunch of fat Spedo-wearing Parisian huggers out there that will say, "Hey Daytrader...don't make fun of the French language...it's a Romance language." What does that even mean? A Romance language. I don't see the French language inviting me over to its house for a candle-lit dinner followed by passionate love-making on a bed covered in rose petals; nor do I see it giving me a back rub while I watch a rerun of the Giants beating the Patriots in Super Bowl XLII in my boxers, because those are the only two things that register as romantic in my brain.
And to top it all off French language, you don't even call French fries 'French fries'. Instead you call them 'pommes frites'! Now you're just being assholes. Well thanks to terrorists (and with an assist from the South) French fries are a thing of the past, now we have Freedom Fries, and every letter is pronounced. So suck on that fuckeaux.
[Uh... I guess if you actually want my advice, e-mail me here... ]
[?!??]
Dear OC,
I'm an early twenty-something guy, and I've been with my girlfriend for 2 years now. On the surface, everything seems fine, only I find myself wondering whether this is really the relationship for me. I get the impression that you have a successful relationship with your wife Suzi, and I was wondering: how did you know that she was the "best" for you? And how do you make the differences in your personality work?
- Confused in California
---
Dear Confused...
Uh... so you actually want my advice? You've read my previous columns, right? I'm kind of a dick to everyone who I give advice to. Also lots of people I don't give advice to. You still want my advice? Very well!
I struggled with this question at first. I was thinking of how to address the question of how I knew Suzi was "best" for me, because I never really thought of it like that. I wanted to come up with a way to say that Suzi wasn't "best" without making it sound like I settled for her, because that isn't what I mean. What I mean is that I didn't approach my relationships by trying to maximize the girl potential, but rather find someone I could be happy with, blah blah fucking blah blah, right?
Suzi took a look at this question, thought for 5 seconds, and gave me the correct answer: "He's afraid of commitment."
Forehead slap, right? Of course that's the answer. 20-something guy, in a serious relationship, possibly for the first time, starts wondering if this is the "best" girl he can get... you are afraid of commitment! So now that you have your answer, see if that changes the way you think about your relationship.
"Yes, you ALMOST want to look away, but can't. It reminds me of when I watch Ricky Gervais in "The Office"
or "Extras" and half cover my eyes or wince, while laughing, as
pathetically unqualified characters try to fake their way through
life."
Who, oh who, could the author of this quote be talking about?
I had another lovely political discussions with my mom yesterday (who I totally don't think is a bitter, bitter woman, by the way), where she re-iterated her opinion about the presidential election. All four candidates, on the Democratic and Republican side of the election, are bums. They are scoundrels and phonies and scumbags.
I think this an overly cynical point of view, but it's not like she doesn't have a point. Obama did ride on the coat tails of Pastor Wright to the top of Chicago politics, and then dump him like a used Kleenex when he got inconvenient and, you know, insane. The only way Biden can keep himself from plagiarizing other people is by saying the first stupid thing that comes to the top of his head. And McCain, well...
But Palin is different. She's more than just your typical politician with a few scummy things in her past.
She is stupid. Dangerously, incredibly stupid. And dismissing all of them equally misses this point.
Pack it in, guys. Satire is over. They win. No reason to try to be satirical anymore. Just move on, find something else. [OC discusses the original cover here.]
This presidential campaign has easily been the most hilarious of my lifetime (older readers are welcome to chime in), but in the last week, like a sitcom run out of ideas and desperate for ratings, it's gone from hilarious to batshit fucking insane:
You and I own 79% of AIG. And right after winning Time's "Person of the Year", things are looking up!
John McCain wants a timeout in the presidential campaign because he's losing really badly of the economy. Funny, it seems like just a week ago he was talking about how strong the fundamentals of our economy were. Bonus Round! Events not important enough to suspend campaigns: Civil War, Great Depression, WWII.
But what can he do to save the Republic? Take it away top McCain surrogate Lindsay Graham! "McCain supporter Sen. Lindsey Graham tells CNN the McCain campaign is
proposing to the Presidential Debate Commission and the Obama camp that
if there's no bailout deal by Friday, the first presidential debate
should take the place of the VP debate, currently scheduled for next
Thursday, October 2 in St. Louis."
Just how scared is their campaign about having Sarah Palin face questions, even if they're so easy a special needs third grader could answer them.? Let's look at the pool report from Politico:
"McCain then looked around the room and gestured as if to welcome
questions. The AP reporter shouted a question at Gov. Palin ("Governor,
what have you learned from your meetings?") but McCain aide Brooke
Buchanan intervened and shepherded everybody out of the room. Palin looked surprised, leaned over to McCain and asked him a
question, to which your pooler thinks he shook his head as if to say
"No.""
Tired of waiting for the electric car that you won't be able to afford anyway? Wanting to start biking around town, but daunted by the distances, physical exhaustion, and buckets of awkward sweat? Ladies and gentlemen, your chariot as arrived.
That, my friends, is an electrical-motor assisted bicycle.
With a twist of the handlebar, the 400 W motor on the back wheel hub scoots you forward at a top speed of 20 miles per hour for up to 20 miles. Want to extend your range? Save the battery and give it a little pedal every now and then.
I racked up nearly 2000 miles on my old bike when I was commuting in
the northeast. When I moved to Texas, I was confronted with two
problems. First, it is pretty much hot as balls here all the time.
It's almost October, and its nearly 90 degrees outside right now. And
second, there are no shower facilities at my current place of
employment. So, I could either show up for work covered head to toe in
sweat, or drive and be covered in shame. Unpleasant as shame is, it
smells much better.
Football might be the world's most misunderstood sport. To a casual viewer the game feels random and jumbled, giant men slamming into each other with no rhyme or reason. When a big play happens it is exciting, but most people, even football fans, might have a hard time explaining what the men slamming into each other did differently this time that made the huge play possible.
Of all the major team sports, football is by far the most complex. There are
more men on the field, the action happens faster, and the way we watch
it on television obscures more than it illuminates. The camera (and
the viewer) follows the football, but much of what happens to make each
play possible happens away from the ball. Did you see how the wide
receiver got open down the sideline? Or who threw the crucial block to
make that long run possible? Only if it was caught on camera, and only
if you know where to look.
Sometimes it seems like the people who love the game the most understand it the least. Check out the Hall of Fame sometime: fully one third of the players in the Hall of Fame are either running backs or quarterbacks. These positions make up, at most, 3 of the 22 positions on the field at any given time. Does this give anyone else the impression that maybe even "educated" football men don't really understand the contributions of everyone on the field?
In his Tuesday Morning Quarterback column on ESPN, Gregg Easterbrook helps make his readers better football fans. He highlights the hidden ways that football games are won, and also seeks answers to the ways in which the game does not make sense.
A typically illuminating paragraph from this week's column:
"Minnesota cornerback Antoine Winfield sacked Carolina quarterback Jake
Delhomme, picked up his fumble and ran it back for six points. TMQ
suspects this play was an uncalled "automatic" -- if Winfield saw a
certain alignment, he was free to blitz. On the play, Delhomme only
looked to his left, with Winfield coming from his right. The Vikings'
corner left his man uncovered, but Delhomme never looked that way. From
film study, Minnesota coaches must have noticed a formation or
down-and-distance situation in which they were certain Delhomme would
never look to his right."
The viewers at home saw the play happen, but TMQ is able to see the play and figure out what made this play different from the others where the quarterback wasn't forced into a fumble. Insights like this help lift the cloud of brutality and violence from football and help to reveal the intelligence and insight that goes into every play.
It is this same gift for insight that Easterbrook applies to the world outside of football in his column. In between highlights from the previous weeks games we'll find TMQ commenting on the hot topics of the day like global warming, vehicle fuel efficiency standards, and, this week, government bailouts of investment banks:
"[A]ttached to the bailout is no requirement that the AIG top managers
who lavished money on themselves, justifying it on decisions now known
to be "inexcusable" (Paulson's word), give up any of their bonuses,
which are now effectively tax-supported. At the moment of the Treasury
Department's maximum power over AIG, the federal government asked
nothing of company officials. Essentially Treasury said, "We propose
the taxpayers give up $85 billion, and you give up nothing." The Bush
administration sure drives a hard bargain! This is the same basic
agreement -- $700 billion in return for no concessions about pay -- the
White House now wants to reach with the financial industry as a whole."
I couldn't have said it better myself. And in a column ostensibly about football, no less!
Plus, TMQ has a running segment on the "Obscure College Score of the Week." Really! How great is that?
Let's get this out of
the way right from the top: Yankee Stadium is, by almost any measure, a
pretty crappy stadium. One might even go so far as to call it a
shithole.
A few weeks ago I went to my first game at Minute Maid
Park, nee Enron Field, here in Houston. It is a beautiful facility.
Every seat has a great view of the field, the concourses are spacious,
and the place feels new and clean and bright. Walking through Yankee
Stadium, on the other hand, feels kind of like hanging out in the
basement of a factory. The concourses are dimly lit. Everything is
dark painted concrete. It looks worn down, tired, and old.
So
why did I spend nearly four hours last night fighting back (very manly)
tears watching the last game that will ever be played on that field?
When
the Yankees move next door, it will be the near-completion of a
transition the Yankees started after 2001, aka The Greatest World
Series Ever Played (TM). I took for granted how good I had it as a
baseball fan at the end of the 90s. When that team started to break
up, I just assumed that the new generation of players would slide in
and keep the good times rolling. But the new collection of
traveling All-Stars never approached the level of chemistry and
performance that the team assembled at the end of the 90s had. Jason "The
Stache" Giambi and Alex "Frosted Tips and Lip Gloss" Rodriguez
outperform Tino Martinez and Scott Brosius on the stat sheets, but it hasn't translated into rings.
It isn't the post-season
failures that bother me, though. Well, they bother me a little, but
only once have I felt worse after a post-season loss than I did last
night, a regular season victory over the Orioles. What hurts is the realization
that I failed to properly appreciate success when it happened. I
watched exactly 3 minutes of the 1999 World Series. I saw the final
out, and shrugged as the Yankees mobbed each other. The Yanks winning the World Series was the
natural order of things, like Star Wars movies being great or Democrats
in the White House. Why were we getting all excited about it?
But
now I know the truth: the Yankees will probably win another World
Series in my lifetime, but I will never see another team like the one
from 10 years ago. And one by one, the connections I have to the glory
years are being broken. The Yankees started their run in 1996 as underdogs. Then they became the favorites, and then a dynasty. Now they are hardly even a baseball team anymore. They are a business, moving into their new corporate headquarters across the street.
When the Stadium closed last night, I
was able to hold back my (very manly) tears. God help me when Mariano Rivera retires. I will weep openly.
At least it is in William Wegman's rarely-seen short film "The Hardly Boys in Hardly Gold." The movie, shot on location in Maine, is a wonderfully amusing parody of Franklin Dixon's "Hardy Boys" series of mystery novels.
As is made clear by the film's poster, the Hardly Boys are hardly boys; they are girls and dogs. Wegman, best known as the photographer who dresses his weimaraners up as people, takes the dogs-as-people motif into the space of narrative filmmaking.
The film introduces to the Hardly family, who own an inn in Maine that is open during the summers. Father Hardly is an avid fisherman, mother a golfer. This leaves the Boys, and their good friend Chip, to practice sleuthing. We are told that, during the previous summer, the Boys saved the town of Rangely from a cruise missile threat.... what kind of nefarious scheme will they face this year? Whatever it is, the Boys, armed with a scientific rock analyzer and heightened dog powers, will surely be up to the task.... or will they?
Why Haven't I Seen It?
Clearly you didn't live with me in college. A VHS copy of this movie made its way into our dorm freshman year (by way of the somewhat mythical figure that is Karl Voigtland), and we watched it and watched it and watched it. We made everyone we knew watch it.
Despite making it into Sundance, the film is not one you are just going to stumble on randomly. Thankfully, the DVD was released this year, complete with audio commentary and all those bells and whistles. It is now available from Amazon and Netflix.
Why Should I See It?
What do you have to lose? The runtime is about 30 minutes, so it's not a huge chunk of time. If you are a Netflix member it's a no-brainer, just add it to your queue. If you know me and live close enough, simply make a phone call -- I will watch this movie anytime, anywhere.
Seriously, if you are into off-kilter humor, dogs, the Hardy Boys, or just plain absurdity, it does not get much better than this. Wegman's monotone narration and voice acting really seals the deal.
[This entry is long, and I am irate. You have been warned.]
When a horse named Barbaro started the 2006 Preakness Stakes, he was a heavy favorite. Barbaro had already won the Kentucky Derby, and some horse racing experts were predicting that he be the first horse to win the Triple Crown since Secretariat.
There are bettors that like to bet large sums of money that huge favorites like Barbaro will "show" - that is, finish in the top three. A typical payout is that, for every $1 that you wager, you'll get 5 cents back. To make serious money, a bettor must lay out an incredible amount of cash. A $100,000 bet would win you $5,000. In horse racing circles, there is a name for these types of bettors. They are called bridge jumpers.
Barbaro did not win the 2006 Preakness Stakes. He did not place, and he did not show. He shattered his leg before the first turn, and despite several surgeries, he had to eventually be put down. The bridge jumpers were left to deal with the consequences of their decision.
[Dear Margo is published on Thursday and Fridays on Yahoo! news. For the original columns, click here and here.]
Dear Margo OC,
This is a new problem for
me, but it may be more common than I realize. I have been in a great
relationship for a year and a half. We're both very happy. In fact, my problem
is not with him. Before we started dating, I was involved in an on-again,
off-again relationship with a manipulative, controlling, possessive man.
Although it never got physical, he had every sign of an abuser. When we finally
broke up for good, he essentially had another woman lined up and ready to go.
(We're talking the next day!) That made the breakup a lot easier to take
because it was immediately clear that he hadn't cared for me as much as he had
professed. I feel like I dodged a bullet. However, two years later, I'm still
looking for his car and trying to glean every little morsel of gossip about him
I can find. I don't know where my head is with this mild obsession. My
questions: Why am I so interested in what this toxic person is up to after what
he put me through and why do I even care? What do I do to cut the strings and
forget about him?
--- WANTING TO FEEL APATHETIC
----
Dear
Pathetic,
I truly
struggled with answering this question.I mean, isn't this the classic "girls like bad boys" cliché?How could I, your ever humble advice
columnist, hope to solve a dilemma that has troubled relations between men and
women for all of time?
Inspiration
came from an unexpected source. Pathetic, do you watch "The Hills"? The Suze
watches it, and, despite my best efforts, I can tell you lots and lots about
it.There is a character on the show
named Audrina (yes, The Hills is a "reality" show, so Audrina is technically a
real person, but trust me: they are all playing characters).Audrina has an on again, off again boyfriend
named Justin Bobby. Justin Bobby, much like your ex, is a classic douchebag.He has no discernible job or skills, doesn't
shave, rides around on a motorcycle and is a complete dick to Audrina.You would think that Audrina, being a quite
attractive young woman who isn't shy about posing for nude photographs on the
internets, would not have any difficulty landing a suitor who isn't a complete
douchebag, and yet, Audrina continues to be enamored with Justin Bobby and his
douchebaggery.
After
having the chance to observe Audrina, who finds herself trapped in a
relationship much like the one you were in, I feel I know what your problem
is.You see, Audrina is an idiot.She is dumb.She is shallow and stupid and pathetic.My guess is that you, Pathetic, are also stupid.
Okay,
so we've answered the "Why" of your question, but now for the "What": what can
you do to forget about him? It seems clear that the answer is "stop being an
idiot".But if it were only so easy,
right? Much like a soft, doughy couch potato, your brain needs exercise.Your brain may never be the mental equivalent
of Mr. Universe, but you can certainly do a sit-up or two.My suggestion? Try working the Sunday New
York Times crossword.Take a couple of
hours, have some reference books at hand, and work your way through it.
----
Dear Margo OC,
I'm at a loss as to how to deal with my husband's behavior. He's never been an
animal person, and I get that, so when our family pet suddenly died I knew he
wouldn't mourn much. What shocked me was his blatant disregard for my grief. I
flat-out told him I needed some comfort, I'm in tears, and he said, "I'm
not in a comforting mood." Basically, he left me alone to deal with the
vet, the remains and the children. I tried writing him a letter saying that I
know he does not understand my grief, but as my husband I expect him to be
there when I need him. He ignored my letter and appears to think that if he
ignores this it will go away. Is there any hope or any way that he'll see that
while we won't always agree on something, sometimes I'm going to need his
support anyway? Or should I just find another support system? --- STILL QUITE SAD
----
Dear
Quite,
It is
one thing to not be an animal person, and another to ignore your wife when she
is grieving, however foolish you think that grief may be.There is nothing further you can do regarding
your husband other than go back in time and not marry an asshole.
----
Dear Margo OC,
When I married
"Phil" two years ago, I was in heaven. It was the culmination of
several wonderful years of living together. But at the time we were married, my
husband was unemployed. He'd had a not-so-rewarding experience in his last position
and wanted to take some time to reevaluate his path in life and his spiritual
purpose. Being the supportive wife and knowing he had substantial savings, I
said fine, take the time you need. Now, two and a half years later, the savings
are gone and there is no motivation on Phil's part to get a job. He says he
cannot spend his life being "miserable" in a 9-to-5 job seeing how
disappointed I am in my current job, and he feels "something big" is
coming up spiritually. Now my savings, the money I had put away for a house,
has dwindled by the thousands in an effort to maintain some semblance of the
life we once enjoyed. Phil meditates all morning, then walks around town or
goes to lunch with his friends while I work to pay the bills. I have no sex
drive anymore, which is taking another toll on our relationship. He says that
if I feel that disappointed in him I should divorce him, but wishes I would
stick with him through this "tough time." I feel that he is not
fulfilling his obligations as a husband, either financially or emotionally. I
feel more depressed and alone than ever before, but do I have the right to tell
Phil to give up his spiritual quest because I don't have the money to support
him anymore? ---
DIRECTIONLESS
----
Dear Directionless,
I suggest you have a spiritual awakening of your own: you
are a mark, and you have married a con man.If not a con man, then at least a very selfish person who has put his
own happiness above your own.You said
it yourself: he has seen how disappointed you are with your current job, but
rather than make any attempt to take some of your burden off, he uses it as a
further excuse to "meditate" (which I interpret as alternately watching porn
and Maury paternity test results while you are at work) and otherwise neglect
his duties to your marriage and to you.
DTMFA. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go "meditate."
----
Dear Margo OC,
I have been in a long-term
relationship with a man (over eight years). I've always wanted to get married,
and he has always been unclear about his intentions. This man has been verbally
abusive, non-supportive and very selfish. A month ago I moved out of our house
and into my own apartment. Now he wants to get married, claiming to see the
error of his ways. We've been seeing a counselor, both individually and as a
couple. I love this man; however, I have a lot of wounds that need to be healed
before I can be engaged to him. How can I forgive him and love again? How do I
trust him to not go back to his old ways? How do you know that you love someone
and are not just feeling a strong sense of need for them? --- AMBIVALENT
----
Dear
Ambivalent,
You
might want to try the Sunday Times Crossword, too.
Recently, my commute has become a bit more stressful. Gas is hard to come by these days in southeast Texas. Most of the gas stations in the Houston area are still without power, and the ones that do have power have lines up to 3 hours long. Supplies are tight - 20% of the gas refining capacity in the US is located here, and has been knocked out of operation. Even once the power is back, it will take a week or two for supply to get back to normal.
I've been spending much more time than usual thinking about where the needle on my gas gauge is pointing. Also, I've been thinking about how much it sucks that a huge metropolitan area like Houston has such an embarrassingly sparse mass transit system. How bad is it? Well, according to the Houston Metro trip planner, it would take me almost an hour and half to travel the 8 miles between my office and my apartment by bus. By train... oh right, there is no train. If only I had a car that didn't need gas...
Against this backdrop, Chevy unveiled the production model of the long-awaited Volt. The Volt is another step in the stutter-step evolution of the electric car, some of which has been documented on this site. The short version: GM introduced the EV1 in the 90s, but quickly killed it off to focus their efforts on the production of highly profitable SUVs. As the 00s have progressed and cheap plentiful gas has become a thing of the past, consumers have turned on GM, shunning their SUVs and turning fuel efficient hybrids like the Prius into sensations. Oops!
The Chevy Volt is supposed to correct this mistake, and be the next step forward in the evolution of transportation. A plug-in hybrid, the vehicle has the ability to run for 40 miles without using any gasoline at all. When the batteries are tapped out, the gasoline engine kicks on to charge the batteries and keep you moving.
So, apart from my distaste for zombies, what is my problem with this new electric car? Well, nothing, really - except that by compromising, they've doomed it to failure.
The EV1 had a range of 75 to 150 miles on a single charge, and the estimated sale price was $34,000 for the base model (EV1s were never actually sold - this was the price used to compute the monthly lease price).
The Chevy Volt, on the other hand, will only have a 40 mile range, and retail for $40,000. The problem is the inclusion of a gasoline engine. Electrical energy storage has been sacrificed to make room for the gas tank and engine, and the added complexity of the system is adding to the cost.
The potential for an electric vehicle based on today's battery technology is staggering. A vehicle with the same energy storage as the EV1 would have a range of 180 miles! Or, conversely, put in less batteries, drop the gas engine altogether, and decrease the cost.
The problem is, this calls for a change in how we think about our vehicles. We want the cars we buy to be everything for every occasion - take the kids to soccer, drive it to work, have sex in the back seat with prostitutes, go on vacations, vent your frustrations on the roads at high speeds, get the groceries, and make up for the insufficient size of your genitals.
This is an American attitude. The car, as demonstrated by the success in Europe of Smart Fortwo, does not need to be all things at all times. The Volt is trying to conform to pre-conceived notions of what a car should be, instead of changing them. That's too bad, because the Chevy Volt will likely be just another promising failure.
Regular readers of this site have no doubt noticed that we've had a few guest bloggers in recent weeks. Turns out I know people who don't already have their own blog!
If you find yourself filled some combination of rage and envy because you aren't joining the roster of distinguished ObscureCraft contributors, let me know. Tell me what you want to write about and we'll see what we can do.
Sometimes, you can be so depressed that nothing seems to have a spark. You can appreciate humor, but it won't make you laugh from deep in your gut. But occasionally something so phenomenal happens that it's all wiped away in an instant. Life has obviously been a bit topsy-turvy lately, but this is one of those things. The money quote:
"The pastor whose prayer Sarah Palin says helped her to become governor of Alaska founded his ministry with a witchhunt".
This is not a metaphorical witchunt, or a crusade. This guy actually accused a woman of causing car accidents with magic. In fact, he demanded she leave town or repent, whipping up the public to stone her. "Public outrage eventually led the police to raid her home, where they
fired gunshots, killing a pet python which they believed to be a demon."
I'm just going to go ahead and quote the last couple paragraphs here because it's too ludicrous to even attempt to paraphrase.
"It was during that these sermons that Mrs Palin, who was then
preparing for her gubernatorial run, was anointed by Pastor Muthee. His
intercession, she says, was "awesome".
Her June 8 speech was to mark the graduation of students from the Wasilla Assembly of God's Masters' Commission, which, as Pastor Ed Kalins explains,
believes Alaska will be the refuge for American evangelicals upon the
coming "End of Days". After her speech, Mrs Palin was presented with an
honorary Masters' Commission diploma."
And then you stop to think about it, and the smile is gone from your face.
Freedom of religion is obviously a founding principle of our democracy, and I'm certainly no stranger to some of the weirder evangelical groups. From elementary to middle school I went to a private 'Christian' school where we were taught that the earth was six thousand years old, the rapture was imminent, Christians were a persecuted minority under direct and constant attack, evolution was a lie from Satan to deceive the unwary, and more. In fact, the other things were much more interesting. There's an entire subculture that grew from at the intersection of urban legends and evangelical belief structures. When you place blind faith in not just the Scriptures but in other people's interpretations of it, questioning the source just isn't common. So urban legends get a new spin and are used as examples of the wickedness of the world. Some of the things taught to me by teachers were that people commonly place AIDS infected needles in the coin returns of payphones, and at the mall homosexuals will place rohypnol in drinks if you don't pay attention constantly.
Some of this was intended more as parable than literal truth, but literalism is their worldview. It teaches blind obedience rather than informed submission. It teaches not to ask questions. And in its most extreme form, it ends in witch hunts.
This is the kind of person who may end up a heartbeat away from the presidency. And that heartbeat has advanced age and a history of melanoma. Make no mistake, that is not considered a negative by a substantial chunk of the evangelical population, and is the reason they'll work so hard for it. Winning an election would be near impossible for them, and they know it: they're the persecuted minority after all.
Tired of listening to bands with talent, ambition, and who play their own instruments? Tired of bands that are actual bands? Then join the Katrina and the Hurricanes fan club!
Show your support with a button or refrigerator magnet, now available in the ObscureStore.
Once in awhile, I come across an idea that seems so obvious, so plain, and so in tune with how I think, I can only shake my fists at the sky in fury. That idea should have been mine!
Although it is hardly alone on the internet, this is the best website documenting all the things that are younger than presidential candidate John McCain. Some of the things I was genuinely surprised to find are younger than John McCain? The microwave oven, zip codes, and penicillin.
But chronicling items younger than John McCain is nothing compared to what the sick twisted mind at this website is up to. I Miss My Mommy is a blog ostensibly written in the first person by Trig Palin, the Downs Syndrome afflicted newborn of vice-presidential candidate/Miss Wassilla 1984 winner Sarah Palin. Almost as amusing as Trig Palin wistfully lamenting why his mommy left him ("Cause I'm a librul [...] Mommy haytes libruls") are the comments from readers enraged by the existence of the site itself. Some of my favorite comments:
"I have 3 members of my Family that have learning issues, you make me sick!"
"You, the moron behind this blog, get a life. If you can't do that, go masturbate at pictures of Michelle Obamanation or Barbara Streisand or Maria Cantwell." [How do you masturbate at pictur... wait, never mind.]
"Just to let you know, I've flagged this blog as offensive and this
little liberal sewer is getting eviscerated on Digg, where I've also
advocated everyone to flag this blog. It honestly doesn't surprise me
to read such crudity coming from the minds of the Left. Not anymore." [Eviscerated on Digg? Heavens no!]
I would die of happiness if I could get anyone to comment on my blog with that kind of vitriol. Seriously. Somebody post here and tell me how much I have offended them.
And finally, since we here at ObscureCraft want to follow in the steps of MSNBC and try to shed our liberal bias, I give you my favorite Obama site. Here to mock his idolization by his followers that is completely out of proportion with anything he has actually done for the country so far: BOIYNB.
You know what really grinds my gears? Andy Samberg. What moron decided that you had any comic ability. On Saturday nights all I want to do is get drunk off of Long Island Iced Teas such that I can find the humor on SNL bearable. It usually works (Although every now and then there is something so un-funny that even my drunk ass can't break a smile, but that doesn't happen too often.) But then when the screen goes black and I see the words "An SNL Digital Short", I want to get a gun and blow my face off. (It is for this reason that I have cut back to 5 LIITs instead of my usual 8.) Andy, no amount of alcohol can convince me that you are funny.
Fans of yours (i.e. people with an IQ below 40) think that your style of "comedy" is akin to that of Adam Sandler. Listen, just because you're a Jew with the initials A.S. doesn't make you funny. Your first "movie" Hot Rod grossed approximately the same as Sandler's first film Billy Madison, which was released in 1995 back when the average price of a movie ticket was $4.35. In 2007 when your piece of crap film came out the ticket prices were on average 50% higher. I'm sure Hot Rod and all of your fine acting in Laser Cats (BTW there are sequels!) helped you snag the lead voice role in the animated blockbuster Space Chimps (yeah, I hadn't heard of it either).
So Mr. Samberg I ask you to stop subjecting me to this type of retarded comedy. Try something else. Why not try your act in the Middle East? I'm sure that you could show them how great life is in the Western World. If that doesn't work, I'm sure you can get a job with the Blue Collar Comedy Tour -- they're always looking for horrible comedians. Or better yet, why don't you sit down and watch one of your Digital Shorts after you've had 8 Long Island Iced Teas pumped into you. Don't worry, I'll make sure that the shotgun is within reach.
The price of gas according to a sign in the medical center area of Houston, TX following Hurricane Ike.
[I do not think this sign is real, but I did not Photoshop it - I think one of the attendants was playing a joke. Note that regular is more expensive than plus.]
[The following is an excerpt from "The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle" by Haruki Murakami you may find relevant to today's climate of political discourse. -ed]
About two years after I married Kumiko, Noboru Wataya published a big, thick book. It was an economics study full of technical jargon, and I couldn't understand a thing he was trying to say in it. Not one page made sense to me. I tried, but I couldn't make any headway because I found the writing indecipherable. I couldn't even tell if this was because the contents were so difficult or the writing itself was bad. People in the field thought it was great, though. One reviewer declared that it was "an entirely new kind of economics written from an entirely new perspective." Soon the mass media began to introduce him as a "hero for a new age." Whole books appeared, interpreting his book. Two expressions he had coined, "sexual economics" and "excretory economics", became the year's buzzwords. I couldn't believe that anyone who wrote these articles understood what Noboru Wataya was saying in his book. I had doubts they even opened it. But such things were of no concern to them. Noboru Wataya was young and single and smart enough to write a book no one could understand.
People in Texas hate bagels, and they hate cinnamon bread. All the bread in the entire store was sold out, except for those two items. Plenty of bagels and cinnamon bread left!
Elderly women hate Mexican tomatoes. An elderly woman approached me in the produce section with a bag of tomatoes. "Excuse me," she said. "Can you tell me if these tomatoes are from Mexico?" I read the packaging for her and told her they were from San Antonio. Satisfied, she put them in her cart.
When a hurricane is approaching, purchase beer. The woman in front of me at the checkout counter spent $212 on groceries. $1.50 was for a PowerAde. The rest was for 15 cases of beer; 9 Bud, 6 Corona.
I got this email from Suzi at 8:39 AM this morning: "It's 9/11. How did we miss this?" Oh, the Suze - if you had only waited another 32 minutes your email would have been so much greater.
Yes, how DID we miss this? Oh, right, because I'm about to be swallowed up by a hurricane. Well, no matter. 9/11 is here. And he's 7! What a big strong boy you've become, 9/11. Your father, Rudy Guliani, must be so proud. He can't stop talking about you.
What's that, 9/11? You got me a present? Why, you are the day that keeps on giving, aren't you!
Well... holy crap, this present is awesome. It's a free Rockband download of "Charlene (I'm Right Behind You)" by Stephen and the Colberts!
Well, 9/11, I feel kind of bad, I don't have anything nearly as great for you... all I have is this video of Matt Damon describing Sarah Palin-for-VP as the plot of a really bad Disney movie.
Okay, 9/11, I do have one more thing. It's kind of personal, so I hope you like it. Remember that time, way back when you were first born, that you still meant something? Before you were used to manipulate our fears and twisted into a political ploy for conservatives, or as the plot for terrible Oliver Stone movies, or to sell memoribilia? Yeah, I know, it feels like long ago. But I found this earlier today. Something true about you that hasn't been worked over or spoiled in the last 7 years. A true tale of heroism. I hope you like it.
The spot: Jerry Seinfeld is walking through the mall, eating a churro. As he passes a discount shoe store, he sees billionaire software developer Bill Gates inside trying on shoes. Seemingly confused why billionaire software developer Bill Gates is purchasing discount shoes, he goes inside to investigate. Cut to interior of the store. "Jerry Seinfeld?" billionaire software developer Bill Gates inquires. "Churro?" comes the reply, as Jerry no longer seems interested in why billionaire software developer Bill Gates is purchasing discount shoes. Instead, he sets about re-sizing and stretching Bill's shoes, and making... observations. This banter goes on for 60 seconds. Eventually they leave together, at which point Jerry Seinfeld asks some questions about future Microsoft development projects, including whether or not computers will be made to be soft and chewy like cakes so that they can be consumed while working. We then get a set of title cards over some vaguely circus-inspired music:
"The Future." "Delicious."
The ad closes on the Microsoft logo.
In college football, large football-factory schools like Ohio State will often schedule games against vastly inferior opponents to help them pad their record and standings in national polls. During these games, the football factory school will attempt to score as many points as possible. It is not unheard of to see a school up by 30-40 points in the second half and still throwing the ball deep, frantically trying to run up the score to make the win more impressive in the eyes of national poll voters.
(What does this have to do with this commercial? Simmer down, I'm getting there.)
During their undefeated 2007 regular season, the New England Patriots adopted this approach while playing other NFL teams. Up with a comfortable margin, the Patriots would continue trying to score as much as possible rather than adopt a conservative, run-out-the-clock approach. ESPN.com writer and Patriots fan Bill Simmons calls these late scores "Eff-You Touchdowns." The point of scoring was no longer to improve their standing, but rather to rub their superiority into the faces of their opponents. They were the unstoppable juggernaut.
Well, after watching the above ad, I think that I have seen the world's first Eff-You TV Commercial.
What other explanation is there? The ad is inexplicable. Watching it for the first time, I had no idea what they wanted to sell me. In fact, the word Microsoft is not said until 70 seconds into the 90 second spot.
Is the ad supposed to be humorous? Then why hire Jerry Seinfeld? He's hasn't been funny in years. There was exactly one unfunny episode of 30 Rock ever made, and it was the one he guest starred in. He doesn't make jokes, he is a joke. And he doesn't exactly get back on track with this ad. I chuckled mildly once. ("Is this your toe?" "No." "Then what is it?" "Leather.")
And even when they do get around to talking about Microsoft, they don't actually talk about real products or features. Instead, it's computers that are soft and spongy like cake and billionaire software developer Bill Gates shaking his rump.
Now, compare this ad to the ubiquitous I'm a Mac, I'm a PC campaign that Apple has been running since 2006. In the place of unfunny ex-comedian Jerry Seinfeld is funny comedian and hobo expert John Hodgman. The ads are funny, concise, and iconic. And, most importantly: the ads actually talk about Apple products and services! No foolishness about sponge cake computers. Instead we hear about the genius bar, or time machine, or how easy it is to switch from PC to Mac, and on and on.
Three years in, Apple has made some headway. Since 2006, Apple has jumped from a market share of 6% to 14% and Windows Vista is such a dud that Microsoft has to trick people into even trying it. Microsoft would seem to be on the decline.
That is until you remember that, despite these gains by Apple, Microsoft is still the dominant force in PC market. And that's what this ad is all about. It is a message to Apple.
"Make all the cute little ads you want. We're still the juggernaut. We're still the champs. We don't need a great ad campaign to get our products or our name out there. In fact, watch this: we're going to launch a completely confounding ad campaign starring our awkward founder and possibly the least funny man in show business today. It won't matter. Eff you, Apple."
Sure, Jesse put up a poll so that we could democratically decide what the name of our Rockband would be, but you know what? Adam and Rose didn't listen to the poll results, so neither will I. Fuck democracy. Democracy can't do shit against my Illustrator skills.
ObscureCraft has a new RSS feed that combines posts to the blog and select photographs from my Flickr Photostream. The old RSS feed will not get the new content. So, if you want to keep getting these truth nuggets everyday along with the occasional picture, you'll need to re-subscribe by clicking on the RSS icon in the sidebar. That's the big orange thingy.
On Saturday, Jim recounted on his webble everything that is wrong with today's Yankee "fan".
"...[W]e are sitting a few rows behind a douchebag in a home Mariano jersey
(with name) and a blue "26 time world champions" hat. Underneath the
jersey he is wearing one of those dark blue t-shirts with "Damon 18"
emblazoned on the back in white."
There are plenty of reasons to not be a Yankee fan. The old stadium, steeped, marinated, and barrel-aged in tradition as it is, is kind of a shithole, and the new stadium will require a credit check to get a hot dog. The inflated (and oft-cited) payroll leaves fans and non-fans alike with unreasonable expectations - success is met with a shrug, and failure is met with a hounding chorus of gleeful haters too busy hating on my team to notice or care about the success of their own.
The best, and sometimes only reason to be a Yankee fan is because of the tradition. The pinstripes, the numbers on the outfield wall and the names on the plaques in Monument Park speak to a legacy that few other teams in sports can match. It's fun to follow a team that feels like a truly professional sporting organization, and has a history of success that you can enjoy and feel good about even when the team on the field isn't showing up. And showing up to a game in a jersey with a name on the back, with a Johnny motherfucking Damon T-shirt on underneath, and a 26 time World Champions hat completely misses the point.
You don't need to put his name on the back, because pinstripes + 42 = Mariano Rivera. You don't need a hat that says 26 time World Champions on it. A blue hat with a white interlocking N-Y says it all. And if you were looking for a player to represent the worst of the modern day mercenary athlete, you couldn't do much better than Johnny Damon.
Jim is not even a Yankee fan, but at least he gets it. What the fuck is your problem?
Maybe I'm making too big a deal out of this guy's sartorial crimes, but I think it speaks to the larger problem. Jim continues:
"Enter Sandman.
This guy takes
off his jersey and holds it up. He starts seriously headbanging. He
appears on the Jumbotron, achieving his 15 seconds of fame (Warhol got
the units wrong). [...] He [finally] sits, ready to cheer his favorite
player on.
Minutes later, Aubrey Huff blasts a solo shot out of the park.
Without hesitation, our subject stands, turns, and exits the stadium. As he passes by, I have but two words: 'Exit Sandman.' "
After 13 straight years of making the playoffs (the longest active stretch in baseball), this year's injury-wracked Yankees team will be watching October baseball from somewhere other than the dugouts. As a spoiled Yankee fan, I'm supposed to be enraged. I'm disappointed, but not enraged. I understand that, $209 million payroll or not, there are 29 other teams vying for a World Championship every year, and only 4 playoff spots in the American League. It was bound to happen eventually. What, did I think that the Yankees were going to make the playoffs every year for the rest of my life?
But this run of success has bloated the Yankee bandwagon to the point where a grown man covers himself head to toe in tacky, overpriced Yankee merchandise just to get noticed, and runs out of the stadium at the first sign of trouble. Because he isn't a real fan.
Listen, douche, wherever you are: if you get to go to Yankee stadium and see the greatest team in professional sports play, and then scurry out of the stadium like a bitch when things go sour, do me a favor next time: make sure you take the millions of other bandwagon fans with you.
It is no secret that, as a whole, the viewing public has terrible taste in movies. Out of the top 10 grossing movies of all time, there are two all-time classics (Star Wars and E.T.), one great movie (The Return of the King), one good movie (Spiderman), 5 floating turds (2 Star Wars prequels, a Pirates of the Carribean movie, Shrek 2), and one sinking turd (Titanic).
The trend is, as always, downwards. Last summer was the summer of sequel sequels. No less than 12 movies that came out last summer were at least the third movie in a franchise. Yes, 12. And this year, every comic book ever published was turned into a movie before July was over. Hollywood is completely out of original movie ideas. What they are not out of is ways to shove these terrible movies down the gullet of the movie watching public.
It's been a long time since most major releases made any significant money on their theatrical runs. For big summer flicks, the theatrical run serves as little more than a marketing campaign for the DVD release. Until recent years, the money was made on video rentals at chains like Blockbuster (these days its cheapo DVD purchases at Wal-Mart). The considerable evils of Blockbuster have been well documented, but at least the possibility of finding a movie that wasn't in 3000 theaters six months ago still existed among the racks. Netflix and Blockbuster Online have further expanded the ability of video watchers to search the back catalogs to find an off the beaten path selection.
This is anathema to the movie release-as-promotional tool business model. Enter the Redbox rental kiosks. You can find them in Wal-Mart, McDonald's, supermarkets, and anywhere else you'd find harried parents, screaming offspring in tow, looking to find a cheap night's entertainment with the least possible effort. And these kiosks only offer the latest Hollywood releases - for $1 per night.
And thus the death spiral of Hollywood creativity is completed.
What can we do? If I had unlimited disposable income, I would travel around town to every Redbox, rent as many copies of The Bucket List as I could and replace them with copies of Straw Dogs.
People go and rent the latest release because they have no better ideas. Sure, there are lists of the 100 Greatest Movies from AFI, or Roger Ebert's Great Movies project, but sometimes a "great movie" isn't what the people want. So, in that spirit, I propose the Movie Night Movie project.
Here are the criteria for a movie night movie:
- Under 105 minutes long - A "fresh" rating on Rotten Tomatoes - Domestic gross of under $50 million
And that's it. Send me your suggestions or post them in the comments below. Together we can defeat the ugly scourge of the Redboxes.
Edit: In response to Jim's suggestions below, I am adding a criteria which I original meant to put in, which is that a Movie Night Movie cannot have been nominated for any of what I consider the top 5 Academy Awards - those are Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, and Screenplay.
With the Pandora's Box of hilarity that is Sarah Palin, it's easy to forget the O.G. of terrible candidates, John McCain. However, he's been doing his best to keep from being overshadowed by apparently declaring war on musicians.
The most recent is Heart: Palin's nickname is Barracuda, causing the campaign to use it post-speech.
"The Republican campaign did not ask for permission to use the song,
nor would they have been granted that permission. We have asked the
Republican campaign publicly not to use our music. We hope our wishes
will be honored."
McCain, who runs an honorable, respectful campaign in no way influenced by Rove protege Steve Schmidt, did not honor them, using the song again after his own speech.
"I think it's completely unfair to be so misrepresented. I feel
completely fucked over."
They issued another statement following:
"Sarah Palin's views and values in NO WAY represent us as American
women. We ask that our song 'Barracuda' no longer be used to promote
her image. The song 'Barracuda' was written in the late '70s as a
scathing rant against the soulless, corporate nature of the music
business, particularly for women. (The 'barracuda' represented the
business.) While Heart did not and would not authorize the use of their
song at the RNC, there's irony in Republican strategists' choice to
make use of it there."
But this is no one off event.
Van Halen: Van Halen management tells us the band had no idea McCain was planning
on using "Right Now" during his big entrance in Ohio telling us,
"Permission was not sought or granted nor would it have been given."
John Hall: Yes, Rep. John Hall (D-NY). In delightful irony, George Bush did the same thing a few years earlier.
"This is yet another example of John McCain not learning anything from
George Bush's mistakes," Hall wrote First Read in an interview over
e-mail. "First, McCain adopted Bush's failed policy of an open-ended
war in Iraq, then he wrapped his arms around the failed Bush economic
policies that have put the squeeze on middle class families. Now, he's
making the same mistake George Bush made illegally using a copyrighted
song without asking either the writers or the performers for
permission."
Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, asked and got permission to use the song at her rallies.
Yes, the diehard Democrat who actually stumped with possible babydaddy John Edwards for months last year.
"Mellencamp hasn't yet made a public response, but his reps are quietly
reaching out to McCain and asking him to stop playing his tunes.
(McCain's press office did not immediately respond to a request for
comment.)"
Yes, anti-nuclear activist Jackson Browne is suing the campaign. Why? Far from simply playing the song at a rally, the McCain camp set one of their ads to "Running on Empty" without bothering to license it or even sending a postcard. Unfortunately thanks to McCain-Feingold's Campaign Finance Reform, the settlement he's likely to receive will not go to McCain's opponent, as Browne has already maxed out his donation to Obama's campaign. Perhaps, in a blatant violation of the spirit if not letter of McCain-Feingold, he'll set up a 527. Just like John McCain.
Back during his primary campaign, he "found out that he has few fans in Scandinavia when he tried to adopt
Abba's "Take a chance on me" as his campaign song. After running into
difficulties with the Swedish supergroup, McCain lamented to reporters
on board his plane that it wasn't as easy to play the song as he
thought.
"It gets expensive in a big hurry and if you're not careful you can
alienate some Swedes," he joked."If word gets out to Stockholm that
we're using Abba music, then there'll be a worsening in U.S.-Swedish relations.""
Apparently this poor experience with the costs of licensing is the reason he's stopped even asking, much less paying.
Did you know an incurable parasite infects more than 60 million people in the US alone?
And did you know that there's evidence that it changes the behavior of its host in subtle, hard to determine ways?
Wikipedia, aka the collected beliefs of the autism spectrum disorder community, overreaches based mostly on one human study by a research ecologist operating out of his field of study, but has a good summary regardless.
The short version: the parasite's hosts are primarily feline, but it spreads to most warm blooded creatures. When it infects a mouse, it causes them to lose all fear of cats. This a problem for the mouse, who rapidly becomes dinner, but the parasite gets laid out of the deal. It can be transmitted to humans in a variety of ways, but most commonly by eating undercooked pork and licking your fingers after changing a litterbox. I'm only a guestblogger, but I feel confident in saying that ObscureCraft does not recommend the second as regular practice.
So what happens once you're infected? A few weeks of feeling vaguely ill before your immune system puts it into a latent state. Also (possibly) a higher incidence of schizophrenia and slower reaction times. Particularly fun is that when latent, it's almost impossible to get rid of!
Unfortunately the arrival of Sarah Palin on the national scene has swept away the PUMA's and thus the political connection to this article. The link between toxoplasmosis and the catlady brigade is thus left as an exercise to the reader.
[WARNING: The following article contains an artist's rendering of a penis.]
From elementary through middle school, I used to play an instrument. I was a trombone player - or, to use the technical term, a tromboner. I didn't realize how uncool it was to be a tromboner at the time. If my parents loved me, they would have taken little Jesse aside and said, "Hey there, little Jesse. It's great that you want to play an instrument. It will help your physical dexterity and mental acuity, and studies show you'll do better in math and science. But if you pick the right instrument, not only will you get those benefits, you'll get another one: pussy. More pussy than you can shake a stick at, and all the colors of the rainbow. But you don't get pussy with a trombone. Play the guitar, or the drums. Or if you like fat girls, the bass. But don't play the trombone."
But my parents didn't love me enough to give me this sage advice. And if the popularity of the Guitar Hero/Rockband franchises is any indicator, I'm not the only one. This whole playing-plastic-instruments-in-your-living-room thing is really taking off. I never got into Guitar Hero, mostly because I stink. I can play it on easy, with three fret buttons. As soon as that fourth fret button was introduced I fell apart faster than Alex Rodriguez in a playoff game.
But Rockband is different. Why? Because I can play the drums, motherfuckers!
And now it is on. We're getting the band together. Suzi on lead vocals, me on drums, and Kevin "The Slasher" Cavnar-Johnson on guitar. We're holding auditions for a bass player in the greater Houston area.
So there is one last question to answer: what to name our band?
There was an early frontrunner with the name "Fat Chick Sperm Bank." Unfortunately, this name was unable to power its awesomeness through the XBox Live content filters. This is additionally tragic because Suzi made us a couple of logos which completely shattered my Awesometer.
So, what should we do? Stick with FCSB? Try to push it through with some variation, like Fat Chick Sp3rm Bank, or Fat Chick Spernn Bank? Some other options are posted in the new poll on the right.
In the meantime... that's right ladies, I'm with the band. Want to see my dressing room?
McCain's people MUST have known about Stephen Colbert's "Make McCain Exciting Challenge." In case you didn't: McCain gave a speech in front of a green screen earlier in the campaign. Colbert grabbed the footage, threw it online, and let Colbert Nation have their way with it. Well, have their way they did.
McCain's people must think that, by getting his face onto The Colbert Report, he will benefit from the Colbert bump. He wouldn't be the first one.
The Colbert bump is very, very real. Mike Huckabee rode that bump, after a series of appearances on the Report, all the way to brief front-runner status early in the campaign.
(Holy Jesus, he's in front of a blue screen now. Does he know that they can use those too?)
In just a few years, Colbert has gone from second (or third) banana on The Daily Show to one of the most influential people in the world. Don't believe me? Well, don't take my word for it.From Vanity Fair:
"There's no denying the growing stature of
his 30-minute faux evening talk show. This year he asked Hillary
Clinton for audio/video-technician tips, and queried Michelle Obama on how "hope" and "change" fit into the Obama household discussions (as in "I hope that you will change
the cat litter"). According to one study, the "Colbert Bump"--originally
a self-deprecating gag--actually exists. After Democrats appeared on The Colbert Report,
they saw a fund-raising jump of 44 percent the following month. Even
Republican Mike Huckabee tripled his approval numbers when he went on
the show."
Influential, intelligent, quick-witted, and oh so good looking. What's not to love? Oops - I think I've got a little Colbert bump of my own. If you know what I mean.
How else to describe what has happened in the last few days in the presidential race? Sarah Palin is a walking Oh my God. The news is breaking faster than her pregnant teenage daughter's water. For someone who is pro-life, her candidacy is quickly turning into an abortion.
And on and on.
Just to make sure nothing falls through the cracks, I've taken it upon myself to aggregate all the Palin news I can muster into one place. As of September 3, 2008, here is your Obscure Guide to Sarah Palin.
(Photoshopped? Yes. Awesome? Yes.)
Qualifications
One assumes that, before accepting the job, she at least had McCain explain to her what a VP does.
"As for that VP talk all the time, I'll tell you, I still can't answer
that question until somebody answers for me what is it exactly that the
VP does every day?"
Here's a positive part of the selection: it's fun to watch talking heads try to justify it!
Patriotism
"The founder of the Alaska Independence Party -- a group that has been
courted over the years by Sarah Palin, and one her husband was a member
of for roughly seven years -- once professed his 'hatred for the
American government' and cursed the American flag as a 'damn flag.' "
Didn't we spend the entire summer talking about Obama's former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, for this exact same shit? Except I don't think Wright ever mentioned secession:
" 'The fires of hell are frozen glaciers compared to my hatred for the
American government,' [AIP founder] Vogler said in the interview, in which he talked
extensively about his desire for Alaskan secession, the key goal of the
AIP."
Associates
Oh, and here's another guy vying to be Sarah Palin's Jeremiah Wright:
"Palin's church, the Wasilla Bible Church, gave its pulpit over to a
figure viewed with deep hostility by many Jewish organizations: David
Brickner, the founder of Jews for Jesus [on August 17th]."
Wouldn't a Jew for Jesus be called a Christian? That group as always confused me. Anyway, here are some of the insightful remarks Mr. Brickner had to say while Sarah Palin was in attendance:
" 'Judgment is very real and we see it played out on the pages of the
newspapers and on the television. It's very real. When [Brickner's son]
was in Jerusalem he was there to witness some of that judgment, some of
that conflict, when a Palestinian from East Jerusalem took a bulldozer
and went plowing through a score of cars, killing numbers of people.
Judgment -- you can't miss it.' "
That's right - terrorist attacks by Palestinians on Israeli citizens was judgment for the Jews unbelief in the divinity of Jesus Christ. Hmm, why does that sound so familiar...
She's got all the right political friends too.
"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin began building clout in her state's political
circles in part by serving as a director of an independent political
group organized by the now embattled Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens."
"Palin's name is listed on 2003 incorporation papers of the 'Ted Stevens
Excellence in Public Service, Inc.,' a 527 group that could raise
unlimited funds from corporate donors. The group was designed to serve
as a political boot camp for Republican women in the state. She served
as one of three directors until June 2005, when her name was replaced
on state filings."
Abuse of power
"Alaska's former commissioner of public safety says Gov. Sarah Palin,
[...] personally talked with him on
two occasions about a state trooper who was locked in a bitter custody
battle with the governor's sister.
In a phone conversation Friday night, Walt Monegan, who was Alaska's
top cop until Palin fired him July 11, told the Daily News that the
governor also had e-mailed him two or three times about her
ex-brother-in-law, Trooper Mike Wooten, though the e-mails didn't
mention Wooten by name.
Monegan claims his refusal to fire Wooten was a major reason that Palin dismissed him."
Nice! Get your sister's ex fired from his job so he can't win a custody battle. Also, ruin his career in the process. Those are some family values!
Reform
"In her introductory speech Friday as McCain's running mate, Gov.
Sarah Palin picked up on the Ketchikan bridge that was never built as a
symbol of bad federal policy.
"I championed reform to end the abuses of earmark spending by
Congress," Palin said at her first campaign appearance. 'In fact, I
told Congress -- I told Congress, 'Thanks, but no thanks,' on that
bridge to nowhere. If our state wanted a bridge, I said we'd build it
ourselves.' "
Well, that's pretty great, actually. Okay, okay - it would be great if it weren't a flat out, bald-faced, catch-me-if-you-can lie:
"On Oct. 22, 2006, the Anchorage Daily News asked Palin and the other
candidates, 'Would you continue state funding for the proposed Knik Arm
and Gravina Island bridges?'
Her response: 'Yes. I would like to see Alaska's infrastructure
projects built sooner rather than later. The window is now -- while our
congressional delegation is in a strong position to assist.' "
And the full of shit-ness about earmark spending doesn't stop there. Not even close.
"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin employed a lobbying firm to secure almost $27 million in federal earmarks for a town of 6,700 residents while she was its mayor." [OC: that's $4000 a person.]"
"There was $500,000 for a youth shelter, $1.9 million for a
transportation hub, $900,000 for sewer repairs, and $15 million for a
rail project -- all intended to benefit Palin's town, Wasilla, located
about 45 miles north of Anchorage."
Compassion
Hey, know what's hilarious? Cancer.
"The governor's appearance on KWHL's "The Bob
and Mark Show" last week is plain and simple one of the most
unprofessional, childish and inexcusable performances I've ever seen
from a politician."
"Early on in the conversation before Palin started to crack up, [DJ Bob] Lester
referred to [Alaskan Senate President Lyda] Green as a jealous woman and a cancer. Palin, who
knows full well Lyda Green is a cancer survivor, didn't do what any
decent person would do, say, 'Bob, that's going too far.' "
"Then Lester clearly sets the stage for what he is about to say by
warning his large audience and Palin. He says, 'Governor you can't say
this but I will, Lyda Green is a cancer and a b----.' Palin laughs for
the second time."
Censorship
"[A]s mayor, Palin continued to inject religious beliefs into her policy
at times. 'She asked the library how she could go about banning books,' he says, because some voters thought they had inappropriate language in
them. 'The librarian was aghast.' That woman, Mary Ellen Baker,
couldn't be reached for comment, but news reports from the time show
that Palin had threatened to fire Baker for not giving 'full support'
to the mayor."
Mm, an old-school conservative, with old-school conservative book burning values!
Family planning Her views on abortion:
"I am pro-life. With the
exception of a doctor's determination that the mother's life would end
if the pregnancy continued. I believe that no matter what mistakes we
make as a society, we cannot condone ending an innocent's life." [OC: this includes cases of rape and incest.]
Contraception:
"Today, pro-life groups in the U.S. are reclassifying the most common
contraception methods, including the birth control pill, the patch, the
IUD and the depo-shot, as 'abortifacients,' claiming, with no
scientific backing, that they cause abortions. On their website,
Feminists for Life classifies emergency contraception as an abortion
method." [OC: Sarah Palin is a member of Feminists for Life]
Sex ed:
"[T]he explicit sex-ed programs will not find my support."
Well, that abstinence-only education program worked great for your daughter Bristol, pregnant at the age of 17. Oh, and about the father of this lucky child, Levi Johnston? Here are some excerpts from his (now taken down) Myspace page:
"I'm a f - - -in' redneck ... I live to play hockey. I like to go camping and hang out with the boys,
do some fishing, shoot some s- - - and just f - - -in' chillin' I guess ... Ya f - - - with me I'll kick [your] ass ... [I am] in a relationship [but] I don't want kids."
Oops! Enjoy your shotgun wedding, Levi.
But surely Sarah Palin, mother of a teenage mother, would at least have some compassion for other teenage mothe... oops!
"Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential nominee
who revealed Monday that her 17-year-old daughter is pregnant, earlier
this year used her line-item veto to slash funding for a state program
benefiting teen mothers in need of a place to live.
After the legislature passed a spending bill in April, Palin went
through the measure reducing and eliminating funds for programs she
opposed. Inking her initials on the legislation -- "SP" -- Palin
reduced funding for Covenant House Alaska by more than 20 percent,
cutting funds from $5 million to $3.9 million.
So, pregnant teens: you better have those babies like God intended. But don't expect any help actually caring for them from us. Sluts.
Did I miss anything? Or, Jesus Christ, did some more news break? Send me your tips here.
The spot: Priceline spokesman William Shatner answers a blue phone out of a box held by a man in a lab coat. He is strapped to a jetpack. "Some ladies need a weekend getaway? I'm on it." He is introduced, via snappy jingle, as the Priceline Negotiator as he jetpacks away. Jetpack.
Cut to three women outside at some sort of cafe, huddled around a laptop. They are well dressed, wearing pearls, and daintily enjoying their... let's call it brunch.
William Shatner wheels around the corner pushing a very large bassinet. The ladies (they are repeatedly referred to as ladies) immediately begin oohing and aahing at the triplets: Robbie, Robbie, and Little Billy. While they are distracted, William Shatner releases a highly-trained mongoose, who skillfully calls up Priceline.com and finds the best price on the airfare the ladies were after.
Their mission accomplished, William Shatner tells the ladies to "enjoy your trip, ladies." While the ladies are astonished at how cheap the airfare is on Priceline, but are indifferent to the fact that somebody was using their computer while they were not looking, William Shatner and his highly-trained mongoose congratulate each other on a job well done.
So, to recap:
- Women are to be referred to as "ladies" at all times, so long as they are wearing blouses and pearls. - Babies cause women to immediately drop what they are doing and ooh and aah over them, until the babies are forcibly removed from their presence. - Women are less skilled at navigating through the series of tubes that compose the internet than an (albeit highly-trained) mongoose. - Women think that somebody using their laptop while they were not looking, and therefore having access some of their personal information, is not cause for alarm.
The radio version of this ad goes something like this:
"Hey, ladies! Once your husband finishes driving you around since you do not have the skills necessary to operate an automobile, ask him to show you Priceline.com, where you can find the best deals on travel. You ladies like travel, don't you?"
Here are some other versions of this ad that were rejected for being just slightly too offensive:
- A group of three nebbishy, Woody Allen-looking Jews sit around a laptop, complaining about the cost of airfare and the humidity. William Shatner shows up and scatters some loose change onto the ground. While the Jews hurriedly collect each precious cent, his trained mongoose navigates their computer to Priceline.com for great airfare back to Israel.
- A group of five black men, one of them holding a basketball, huddle around a laptop looking for flights to the Million Man March. William Shatner shows up with a bucket of fried chicken.
- 3 Mexican day laborers are looking for flights to visit their families. William Shatner arrives in a pickup truck and brings them back to his house to do yardwork. He does not assist them in finding cheap airfare.
In the most recent issue of Somebody Else's Business, we were treated to a wonderfully whacked letter from a recent mother who was aghast at her husband for looking at porn. The horror!
"I'm shocked, disgusted,
and feel betrayed. I'm up with the baby all night, and he's having a
party downstairs."
When I first read this, I assumed that she was upstairs with the baby, while her husband was downstairs at the computer. Astute OC reader Greg writes:
"So is [the] computer on the ground floor, or is "having a party downstairs" a euphemism?"
Well, if it wasn't a euphemism before, it is now. From now on, you aren't looking at porn on the computer. You're having a party downstairs!
But is looking at pornography the only thing we do on the computer's that we are ashamed of? A problem has cropped up recently. And that problem is blog shame.
Much of the subject matter for this website is recounting the occasionally amusing or interesting things that happen in my life. But now, whenever something potentially blog worthy happens, The Suze has taken to exclaiming in a loud voice: "You should blog about this!"
Ugh. Okay, yes, I have a blog. But does she have to tell everyone? I feel like she just announced to the room that I need to go apply hemorrhoid medicine. I prefer to blog in the privacy of my own home, when nobody is around. I take a few minutes on the computer, do what I need to do, and then get on with my life. Which are also the ideal computer porn watching conditions.
So from now on:
Watching porn on the computer? You're having a party downstairs. Blogging? That's a party upstairs.
