Fuck This Shit

Man, I am sick of Blogger fucking with me. It's almost enough to make me go back to using MT. Too lazy for that too, though, so I guess is me going away for a while.

Haloscan commenting and trackback have been added to this blog.

Uh, It's Like Art and Life... 'n Stuff. You Know What I'm Talkin' About

Feed me, Steyn, feed me:

The other day, [Kerry] attended a glitzy fundraiser at which Whoopi Goldberg did a little riff comparing the Bush in the White House to her own, ah, pudenda.

The senator, in his own anatomical response, said these celebrities represented the "heart and soul of America".

Afterwards, asked about his apparent enthusiasm for the potty-mouthed has-beens, he replied thus: "When I talked about the heart and soul, I'm talking about the artistic expression. I'm talking about sort of the, I mean, I believe in the arts. I think that there's a great expression in it, and there's always this struggle. You know, does life imitate art or art imitate life? Which comes first? It's a little of both."

He Wishes for the 24/7 Teresa Channel

A love poem for Teresa Heinz Kerry, by George W. Bush

Had I my very own media empire,
Bristling forth with its glassy eyes,
The mics, and the cables and swell
Anchors in sharp-looking suits,
I would pitch its gaze on you 24/7;
But I, being president, have only the local news;
I have spread your husband's campaign under your feet;
Tread heavily, for you are an obnoxious cow.

Via Steve H.

"I'm Gettin' Too Stupid For This Shit"

Danny Glover, A.N.S.W.E.R. mainstay, was caught saying something insipid enough to actually hold Ben Affleck's attention... at least in that "This is me being concerned and engaged" sorta way.

Act (Up) Now Against War

You know how you can tell that angry political organizing has really arrived? When its advertising starts to look like a rave promotion.

But that's where we are, apparently. For a few days now, I've been seeing another iteration of those glossy post-card sized flyers flitting about the halls of the house. If you've ever seen them, you know what I'm talking about. They're usually decorated with brightly colored fractals or other vaguely psychedelic imagery, and breathlessly list the plethora of DJs to be appearing at the revelry in question. Normally the names are of the "SphinX," "Hera-CLY-tis," or "TK-421" variety. You know, like what 14 year-olds call themselves in chat rooms.

Anyway, this most recent flyer is a little different. An ad for this site, it declares "COME STAND UP TO THE REPUBLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION."

EMPIRE is the framework for global control (accelerated, but not begun by the Bush Administration), combining US military dominance, corporate globalization, and domestic policies that promote fear, attacks on immigrants, and racial scapegoating, as well as undermine civil liberties, while transferring the world's wealth from the majority  of the people in the world to big corporations and a rich minority.

Oooh, lemme just pull out my homemade "Smash Capitalism!" t-shirt, and I'll be good to go. This'll sure cheez off all the squares real good.

Overheard Conversations

Hippie: (reading newspaper) Ugh, look at this nanotechnology stuff. That's so evil. They're like... perverting everything in Mother Nature. It's exactly like genetic engineering, you know.

My Girlfriend (molecular bio major): (finally losing patience) What? Exactly how in the hell is naotechnology "exactly like" genetic engineering? Huh? Care to enlighten me?

Hippie: ...
 
Girlfriend: ...

Hippie: They both use molecules.

The Perfect Recipe

What do you get when you add together just about every logical inconsistency, moral absurdity and ethical hypocrisy with regards to the state of Israel and the ever-important notion of "world opinion," and wrap them all up in healthy dose of Swiftian wit and verve?

Why, you get this post.

'Bout Damn Time, Sez-eye

The thing that pisses me off about this is that it is only now happening after all this time, while for so long intellectually empty and visually soporific cartoonists like this guy are allowed to embarrass themselves on the broadsheets as a quotidian annoyance to humanity.

A Picture's Worth a Thousand Blows to the Head

Vice Presidential candidate John Edwards gesures at a rally in New York city, displaying his pants in which he assured the audience there was party and to which he pledged they were all invited.

I Could Kick Glenn Reynolds' Ass

Wanna know how I know that?

He has a cat named "Precious."

I mean, Christ, that's like standing on a street corner with a sign reading "Will work for wedgies."

Paul Simon Explains the Inexorable Fragility of Modern Romantics

You're kind
You're so kind
You rescued me when I was blind
And you put me on your pillow
When I was on the wall
You're kind, so kind, so kind

Why you don't treat me like the other humans do
Is just a mystery to me
It gets me agitated when I think that
You're gonna love me now indefinitely

So goodbye, goodbye
I'm gonna leave you now
And here's the reason why
I like to sleep with the window open
And you keep the window closed
So goodbye, goodbye, goodbye

Suitable for IQs 70 and Below

So Dowdy's got herself a new book.

Also sprach Insty: "Dowd's book is, basically, a bunch of her columns sorted by topic. If you like her columns, you'll like the book. If you don't, there's not much value-added."

Translation: If you're of the idiot persuasion, this will be a welcome collection to your menagerie of small shiny objects.

Living In a Co-Op Is...

Part of a continuing series

...not attending the Naked Crisco Twister party.*

*I never thought I would have to say that again.

Cynthia McKinney Explains Her Father's Remarks

"Sure, but when he done said I lost the primary because of 'the J - E - W - S,' he was tryin' to say that it was O.J. Simpson's fault. You gotta understand, he's, you know, a little slow and don't spell too good."

Getting Ugly

I suppose the reasonable thing to do is be outraged by this, but God help me, I'm all outraged out.

I've already gone through the motions on this one. Talking about killing the president in serious, apparently earnest tones? I got you beat by four months, at least. That was when I heard someone (a resident of my house) yearn out loud for an opportunity to kill Bush. I admit, she was the only one I actually heard say it (though I don't seek out the conversation of people - I have more constructive and rewarding things to do, like counting toothpicks), but the people listening either agreed or were silent.

It's not like this kinda thing is unprecedented. I wouldn't be surprised if, 35 years ago, this same building I live in housed a good number of people for whom "Off the pigs" was one of their rhetorical standards. The difference today seems to be that back then, the mainstream media and political establishment didn't often tolerate that sort of thing, to say nothing of obsequiously indulging or fetishizing it as some kind of relevant, important voice of discourse.

Late into the night of the 2000 election, when most of media was officially calling it for Bush, several other house members were going around the house excitedly saying that people were assembling for a riot on Telegraph in response to Bush winning. If memory serves, the rage of the Berkeley street failed to materialize as anything more dangerous than a bunch of people standing around in the street occasionally trying to start up chants that quickly degenerated into simple dissonant shouting from a lack of cohesion.

True, they didn't do anything really threatening. And the motivation was likely as much about coming up with an excuse to go out late at night and have a party, if not to fuck shit up and stick it to the Man.

But they were still out there by the hundreds. And this was before they and their ideological bretheren had rallied around the mantra of a STOLEN ELECTION, when Bush was merely a silly chimp, not BUSHITLER, or the man who KNEW ABOUT 9/11, or the meat-grinder of American youth and Iraqi children in a WAR FOR OIL, or the rapist-murderer of ABU GHRAIB, or the filthy puppet of a ZIONIST CONSPIRACY, etc. etc.

Maybe Michele was right. Maybe there're Days of Rage ahead. Maybe if Bush is re-elected, there are going to be burning cars and smashed windows in quite a few places. I'm not convinced that's the case, but I wouldn't be surprised, either.

Living in a Co-Op Is...

Part of a continuing series

...the occasional taste of penicillin in your fruit. Them's good eats.