Saturday, December 21, 2013

Dynasty of the Duck


You got a purty mouth.
Well, of course i have an opinion on the Duck Dynasty boondoggle, why wouldn't i?  And this is it.  Look, i'm as liberal as the next lib, but i also have thick skin and nothing this guy says is going to "offend" me.   People are more interesting when they are allowed to speak their minds.  So let Phil be Phil.  Let Eminem be Eminem.  Let Stern be Stern.  Let Carlin be Carlin.  And let's live with it, okay?  I'm tired of living in a culture where we're supposed to be "shocked and appalled" at every salty thing that every bearded weirdo mutters. 

Let it be, man.  A&E should hire Phil back.  And let him do what he wants.  Heck, if he wants to march around in Klan robes and hurl empty whiskey bottles at the TV every time Adam Lambert appears onscreen, let him.

It would make the show more interesting.

You know what does offend me?

That the insecure white man brigade is using this to fluff themselves up and stroke their persecution complex yet again.  And that is always offensive.  Look, if it were the other way around -- if a gay reality star was being suspending for saying he couldn't understand why people go to church, people must be gross and dumb to do that -- then these same people would say "hey, this has nothing to do with persecution.  This is just a PRIVATE company exercising their right to promote whom they want on their network.  The fact that this guy is trying to make it about all gay people is just sad and wrong." 

But if it's one of THEIR guys?  Well, it's all about persecution from a shadowy force.  Just listen to this slop from Pat Archbold, who found the angle to maximize his audience's feelings of injustice and rage...

"This is what happened.  The whole idea of the show was to parade these nouveau riche Christian hillbillies around so that we could laugh at them. "Look at them," we were supposed to say.  "Look how backward they are!  Look what they believe!  Can you believe they really live this way and believe this stuff?  See how they don't fit in? HAHAHA."  They tried to get the Robertson's to tone down their Christianity, but to their eternal credit they refused.  They tried to add fake cussin' to the show by inserting bleeps where no cussword was uttered.  At best, they wanted to make the Robertson's look like crass buffoons. At worst they wanted them to look like hypocrites.  They desperately wanted us to laugh at the Robertsons.  Instead, we loved them.  A&E wanted us to point fingers at them and laugh at them.  But something else happened entirely.  Millions upon millions of people tuned in, not to laugh at them, but to laugh with them. And then we pointed at them.  We pointed at them and said things like, "I wish my family was more like them.  I wish we prayed together as a family.  I wish we were together like the Robertsons."  By the time this all happened, A&E had a conundrum.  They knew who the Robertsons were and what they believe and they still held it in disdain.  But they really liked the money.  Really liked the money. So they lived with it.  But the progressives whose bank accounts were not growing fatter because of these backward rubes were never inclined to look the other way.  They hate the show and they really hate the response to the show.  They want it destroyed."

 ....what a load.

Notice how he starts with "this is what happened?"  He does that because he's telling us what he wants to have happened.  Notice that there's no anonymous network source here, no quotes, no evidence of any sort.  Nah, he just assures you, sans evidence, that this is a case of honest, awesome folks who became unexpectedly successful ('coz God loves 'em) and are now being set upon and hounded by a few bizarre, shrunken demons in suits who cannot tolerate their essential goodness.  How does he know what the "whole idea" of the show was?  How does he know that it changed?  How does he know that "progressives" are in charge of A&E's department of development?  How does he know it's not a case of normal businesspeople trying to rein in their star before he damages their fluffy, family-friendly brand, because they default position of any capitalist enterprise these days is "offend nobody?"

He doesn't.  He's just guessing. 

The important thing is, the Duck lovers out there get to feel nice and persecuted.  This isn't about ONE guy saying dumb things, this isn't about ONE man who has to be accountable to his bosses' demands or else lose his job -- this is about a hatred for THEIR way of life and ALL of them.

Group politics.  When gay people, or black people, or women, or any other group of people think this way, it's wrong.  When they do it?  They don't mind it at all.  

Lame.


This is what happened. The whole idea of the show was to parade these nouveau riche Christian hillbillies around so that we could laugh at them. “Look at them,” we were supposed to say. “Look how backward they are! Look what they believe! Can you believe they really live this way and believe this stuff? See how they don’t fit in? HAHAHA” When the producers saw the way the show was shaping up, different than they envisioned it, they tried to change course. They tried to get the Robertson’s to tone down their Christianity, but to their eternal credit they refused. They tried to add fake cussin’ to the show by inserting bleeps where no cussword was uttered. At best, they wanted to make the Robertson’s look like crass buffoons. At worst they wanted them to look like hypocrites.
They desperately wanted us to laugh at the Robertsons. Instead, we loved them.
A&E wanted us to point fingers at them and laugh at them. But something else happened entirely. Millions upon millions of people tuned in, not to laugh at them, but to laugh with them.
And then we pointed at them. We pointed at them and said things like, “I wish my family was more like them. I wish we prayed together as a family. I wish we were together like the Robertsons.”
By the time this all happened, A&E had a conundrum. They knew who the Robertsons were and what they believe and they still held it in disdain. But they really liked the money. Really liked the money. So they lived with it.
But the progressives whose bank accounts were not growing fatter because of these backward rubes were never inclined to look the other way. They hate the show and they really hate the response to the show. They want it destroyed.
- See more at: http://proteinwisdom.com/#sthash.XxJJDCbb.dpuf

Wednesday, December 18, 2013

(Too sick with the flu to write anything coherent.)

What the hell happened to us?
What happened to the American Dream?
....what happened to the American Dream?

It came true.  You're lookin' at it.


Wednesday, December 11, 2013

Glory Days of Couch Potatage



You know, life sucks.  I work a normal job just like most people, and i generally get a day or two off per week.  The tragic irony is that my days off are so much busier than my days on.  I wake up, walk our dogs, and then begin a mad orgy of laundration, meal cookery, vacuumage, and other randomized chorework before settling down about halfway through the day and drawing for seven hours, because i'm a freelance artist and there's always something to be done.  All while giving the dogs regular walks.  The day is over and done before i know it.

If i'm lucky, i'll have enough time to slip in one episode of whatever current show i'm watching.  (Right now, it's Darker Than Black.)  And even then, i have to FORCE myself to sit still and watch it without checking my messages or getting up to clean something.  I think i've lost my ability to zone out completely.  I fantasize about spending a day off doing nothing but sitting around in unclean shorts, playing videogames, eating Hot Pockets, and watching television mindlessly.  Man, does that ever sound sweet... remember television?  Remember being a kid and vegging out on television for long periods of time?  I'm not sure how i ever had time for that, because i must have had a pretty brutal schedule of school, doing homework, playing with friends, drawing, reading, and beating every 8-bit NES game that came within reach of my fingers.  Even so, there were those languid afternoon stretches of brainless TV absorbtion, because i distinctly recall seeing many episodes of Bewitched, The Price is Right, Head of the Class, Family Matters, Dinosaurs, DuckTales, Step By Step, Saved by the Bell, Perfect Strangers, The Beverly Hillbillies, Wheel of Fortune, and yes, even some Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers.  

....how bored must we have been to watch that stuff?  Not to mention all the movies.  Oh, look, Ghostbusters II is on... i've already seen it three times, but i might as well watch it again, it's not bad i guess. 

Where did we ever get the time?  Seems so gloriously lazy and unstructured now.  I haven't even been able to start watching The Sopranos and Game of Thrones because, damnit, there is no time.  I have those slotted in for 2014.


Wednesday, November 27, 2013

That's why you're still kids, you're stupid.

Okay, i don't normally comment on stuff like this, but this picture caught my eye while i was randomly flitting about the internet on this chilly, cloudy Thanksgiving Eve Eve....



....this is a photo of One Direction, currently the biggest and most profitable boy band on the planet.  I've seen female coworkers swoon over their songs, but i had no idea they looked like that.  What... the... fuck.  They look.... so.... i mean, is it just me?  Or do they just look incredibly weird and lame?  Is this what preteen girls currently fap to?

I mean, jeez.  Backstreet Boys, N*Sync, i could see the appeal of those groups, even if i didn't like their music.  But look at those guys.  They look like... what do they look like, Jimmy?

Dorks.

Yeah, they look like dorks.

I really do not understand anything anymore.

Saturday, November 23, 2013

The Prism of Reality


It's true what they say, it really all is in the eye of the old beholder, ain't it?  Reality is elastic, entirely dependent upon the consciousness observing it.... at least, that's the conclusion i have to make after hearing about this "Knockout Game" bullshit on the news this morning.  You've heard that crap, right?  These random thuggy kids walk up and smack the shit out of random people on the street for kicks and film it?

My reaction is this:

"What a bunch of assholes.  I blame that WorldStarHipHop website.  Kids have always been dumb and violent, but never before have they had the chance to be dumb and violent in front of millions of people who applaud their dumb violence.  Idiots!"

Then i listen to Michael Savage, and his reaction is thus:

"This is happening because of Obama, and Oprah, but mostly Obama!  These black kids are striking out because Obama tells them to, he wants to make them into his Greenshirt Army, quick, play that clip from 2009 where Obama called for a "civilian service corps" which is like the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia who were organized by college-lib-educated Pol Pot socialist communist dictator with red scarves!  Soon no white person will be able to leave the house without being bludgeoned to death by angry strong black kids wearing Obama uniforms and carrying lengths of pipe to beat us all to death, waaaaarrrgh!"
[ Paraphrase]

Really.

And i just cock my head to the side like a confused squid.


"Well... I suppose you could go that route with it."

Different realities.  Which is valid?  Who can say.  Who really can say. 

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Puppies and puppies and even more dogs

Ain't he beautiful?

One thing i love is dogs.  Almost all of them.  We have three dogs.  That dog pictured there?  One of my dogs.  He's kinda old and stinky but we love him anyway.

I love dogs so much that it pisses me off when people are bad dog owners.  Nothing that the government can do even comes close.  The main thing that grinds my gears is when people get it in their heads that they want a dog, and make plans to get a dog, and it's just abundantly clear that they probably shouldn't.  The main red flag is when a guy says he wants a pit bull, you know a really big tough one, like those rappers have?  Or when a girl says they want a little teacup chihuahua, you know, a teensy-little-tiny-bitty one.

You already know that this person wants the dog as a fashion accessory, and will pay attention to it about one hour a day, when friends are over, if that.  The dog will spend the other 23 hours a day locked in a garage or shut up in a spare bathroom.  It will rarely interact with other dogs.  It will be lonely and desperate.

I've seen it.  It pisses me off.

People don't realize that dogs need attention.  We have three dogs, and between me, my brother, and his girlfriend, there is almost always someone here to take care of them.  Only rarely do they have to be caged, if the carpets are being cleaned or what have you.  And they get to run around everywhere.  Does this mean having to vacuum up some dog hair every week?   Do things occasionally get chewed on?  Sure.  But those are the breaks.  If you care more about your decorative throw pillows than your dog, then don't get a dog.  If you're not willing to conceal every cord in your house so they aren't within the dog's chewing radius, then don't get a dog.

If you plan on keeping the dog outside in a pen all year, even when its 19 degrees out, you suck.

One time, my Muslim coworker asked me if i had any questions about Islam.  "It's like Ask a Black Guy," he goofed, "except it's Ask a Muslim!"  I knew i was treading on delicate ground because you know i like to be PC within reasonable limits.  The only thing i could think to ask him was -- why are dogs thought of poorly in the Muslim world sometimes?  Why are they not man's best friend?  He said something about how the Koran labels dogs as unclean, and that if a dog licks your hand, you have to wash it seven times.  And then use sanitizer, i would imagine.

And i said, man, that's not how we do things here in America.

Dogs.  I like dogs.

It's my day off right now, and i'll be working my dogs around five times.  The youngest one will want to play tug-of-war when the sun comes up.  Mostly, they will laze around while i draw and work.

It's a good life.

Monday, November 11, 2013

"In a strictly medical definition"

 Because i have no original thoughts of my own today.

"I think it's important to remember that American life in particular is institutionally predisposed to make people unhealthy. We have few walkable/bikeable living choices, absolute crap for food regulation services, subsidized prices but only for crap food, and a culture that rewards manipulative marketing behavior. The food market doesn't care if it kills you, and the USG doesn't either. Good luck out there.

Now we get to the more important part: the lack of time. If you don't make much money, you have to stay at work for 60+ hours a week to make it. If you make a little bit of money, your boss will make you stay for 60+ hours a week. Then subtract the worlds longest and worst commutes from your day. I didn't get healthy until I moved to a country where 40 hours was a full work week, and working outside of that time is viewed with suspicion and disgust, but the same can probably be achieved with a change of jobs. And who has those kinds of options open to them? I was lucky.


I think many of us living fully western lives are miserable because we are barely valued in our places in the machine. All we have time to do is work, commute, eat, sleep, and die, with nothing but entertainment from a small backlit rectangle to see us through. These financial connections to other people are not nearly as satisfying as regular camaraderie and meatspace interaction, for me at least, but our financial connections are the only connections that are valued. Your job is your life, the source of your financial stability, and probably your health insurance. But in the end we're still just keeping up with what we see on television, and accepting bland 22 minute narratives as a drop-in replacement for living. You can work really hard, miss your kids growing up and dinners with your partner, and your only upgrade is the kind of car you drive, or the cut of your suit.

So of course almost everyone is miserable, no matter what they look like or how much money they have compared to others. Many of us are only alive in a strictly medical definition."


- Tripping Daisy, Metafilter.

Parasailin'.

"The plan is to allow those things that had been proposed over many years to reform a health-care system in America that certainly does need more help so that there's more competition, there's less tort reform threat, there's less trajectory of the cost increases, and those plans have been proposed over and over again," Palin said.  "And what thwarts those plans? It's the far left," she said "It's President Obama and his supporters who will not allow the Republicans to usher in free market, patient-centered, doctor-patient relationship links to reform health care."

...

......wow.

...nice.

Peanut gallery?   What say you?

"She has absolutely no idea what the words mean that come out of her mouth. They are opulent iridescent pearls, as beautiful as they are inscrutable. She is as baffled by her bullsh*t as you are. What she does know is whatever it is she is doing is a gold mine with diminishing returns." - Lockers.


"Romney is GooglePolBot 2.0. Palin was 1.0. All of her thought processes end up being run through each language in Google Translate before they're converted into speech. Google admits they still have a long road ahead of them before their robots are ready for public office but believe the speech pattern advancements alone are a good indicator of how much they've progressed in four years. They also have asked the public's help in capturing one of the beta models that escaped the labs and accidentally became governor of Texas." -EngineerAU

"Why do people keep giving this creature air time? She's obviously as dim as five feet up a pig's ass, and yet no one ever seems to call her out for her bullshiat. The only people who seem to make any attempt to hold her accountable for the idiotic things that spill out of her are the Daily Show and Colbert Report writing staff. Sure, she's good for plenty of laughs, but every time they play a clip of her talking, my brain starts to melt." - Wenchmaster

"Okay, let's cut to the chase:  is she retarded or on drugs?  It has to be either/or." -- Guntram Shatterhand

"When I hear Sarah Palin, I hear America.  I hear the sweet cries of an eagle above the purple waves of grain.  I hear the song of freedom that reminds me of a country where the people are free to be freedom, the flag is revered, and mobility scooters can hoveround." -- Uncomfortable Silence

Yes.
Yes.
This is why i love Fark.com.

Friday, November 08, 2013

I am Souperman

I still haven't seen Man of Steel yet -- except for a few minutes of it on a friend's cel phone -- but i'm already disappointed that the sequel will apparently feature both Superman AND Batman... and did someone say Wonder Woman as well?

Lame.

I really am anti-crossover.  Crossovers are useless.  I don't want Batman to meet Superman, i don't want the Predator to fight Aliens, i don't want Harry Potter to team up with Robocop.  Has a crossover ever been anything but forgettable and gimmicky?  It reminds me of the type of random scenarios that we'd come up while drawing at our desks in 4th grade -- hey, Scottie, what if the Mario Brothers met the Ninja Turtles, who'd win in a fight?  Shredder would totally beat Bowser!  That sort of thinking should vanish when you become an adult and learn how not to be stupid.

I just don't like the idea that Bats and Supes live on the same earth.  It doesn't fit.  If Superman existed, the people of Gotham would be talking about him all the time, because he'd be the biggest news story in the world.  Batman's crusades against local gangsters would be bumped to page six because the headline of the Gotham Times would be something like RUSSIANS DEMAND TALKS WITH SUPERMAN or NASA HOPES SUPERMAN WILL HELP DETECT NEAR-EARTH ASTEROIDS or maybe just NO ONE HAS SEEN SUPERMAN IN WEEKS, WHERE IS THE MAN OF STEEL?

Superman is too overwhelming and he blocks out everything else like the freakin' sun.  Bruce Wayne's whole life quest only makes sense in a world where there are no costumed heroes, where he's one man engaged in some impossible ongoing struggle against corruption and violence.  When he puts on his suit in Batman Begins, it's something that no one has ever done before.  If Superman was flying around out there, Alfred would just cock his head to the side and ask "who do you think you are, Master Bruce?  Superman with ears?"

It's all just... messy and pointless.  Look, it's entirely possible that at some point, J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis could have sat down, and said, "hey, what if we write a book where Frodo and Gandalf travel to Narnia, meet the Pevensie kids, and have some kind of adventure where they stop, i dunno, some random villain?  The wouldn't get along at first, of course, but then they'd overcome their differences and come together for the common good..."

That would be horrible.

Wouldn't it?

But don't get me wrong, it's not that i'm going to automatically hate the next Superman movie just because Batman is in it, and that he's going to be an Affleck Batman at that.  Might be fun?  The tragedy is that this goofy-ass movie is going to take the place of something much cooler -- a superior sequel where Lex Luthor is finally made into a real, convincing villain, and engages Superman in a battle of wits for the soul of humanity using his incredible intellect -- a Superman film that has the same power as, say, The Dark Knight.

Whatever Superman/Batman is, it won't be that.

Monday, November 04, 2013

You want the Thing you Claim to Fear



Really, you do.

One argument i see Teabaggers make all the time is this -- "look, all our apparent madness is totally justified because we see, quite clearly, the incredible and imminent doom that the DEBT will bring to America.  And that only OUR solutions to the debt problem will work."

It's that simple, they're the farsighted Cassandras wailing in the square.  They're just like a person who sees a leak in the levee, or a forest fire spreading and heading to the town -- they are FORCED into action and have to warn the rest of us.  And that's why they sound like doomsayers who "root for ruin" and cheer on any sign of government shutdown or debt default.

But the massive economic realities that face us are not simple.

Here's a more apt analogy -- they're like the people screaming about the end of the world before Y2K.  Way back in 1999, people were saying many things about the dreaded Millennium Bug.  If you were a rational person who liked technology and the modern world in general, then your response was probably something like "this sounds serious,  i don't want it to happen, we'd better fix it, let's get to work."  But if you were a nutter who didn't like the way things were and secretly yearned for some sort of apocalyptic collapse because you thought it would allow some new, pure, redneck society to spring forth from the ruin, then you sounded like the Teabaggers do today.  "It's too late!  Collapse is inevitable!  You liberals and city-dwellers will get what's coming to you, while us real blue-collar Christian men will become the new natural aristocracy.  Bill Gates will be a pauper, begging for a place in the new order from Big Jim the Drygoods King!"

They thought that was going to happen because they wanted it to happen.

It's the same thing with religious fanatics.  They demand that everyone live according to their holy book, because the alternative is fire and damnation.  "Look, i don't want anyone to go to Hell and burn forever in endless agony, but that's what's gonna happen if you don't listen to me."

See the common thread?  Fundamentalists, Y2K alarmists, doomsday preppers, teabaggers... they all see doom on the horizon because it justifies their own personal worldviews.   Do what we say or the Universe will punish you.  It's not a coincidence that these people all sort of overlap on the Right in a churning, eddying ocean of fear and hatred.

Wednesday, October 30, 2013

It's not easy being Green. Or Tea.


You know, to be entirely serious, i do feel bad for the Teabaggers whenever they issue one of their "clarion calls" or "calls to arms."  Things aren't going well for them, and they're stuck in the classic splinter-party conundrum.  They want to abandon the GOP and go third party, except they know that this will forever shunt them off to the third-party ghetto where they'll never win another election.  Third parties don't even get invited to debates -- that's messed up.  They'd rather stay inside the GOP and take it over -- but are stymied by the larger number of centrists and moderates who resist the glorious purification.  Hell, any Republican who can do simple math knows that they'd be in control of the Senate right now, if not for the likes of Christine O'Donnell and Todd Akin.  So what do they do now?  I mean, how long are they going to have to wait to see real change?  They've been at this for, what, at least three years now?

Sadly, they may have a bit longer to go.  Look, guys, have you ever heard of the Green Party, or Ralph Nader?  People on my side have been disillusioned and dissatisfied for ages.  Back when you teadrinkers were happily lining up at the trough and voting for Bush, we were screaming that neither of the two parties represented OUR interests.  We wished that the Democratic Party was a true liberal party that would take drastic action against corporate malfeasance, make bold moves to improve the environment, decrease the size and the scope of the military, allow full rights to gays, and hey -- decriminalize drugs!  Any moral person can see that the Drug War is senseless and evil!

See?  We've barely scratched the surface on those issues.  A Green Party activist who's been plugging away for 25 years can look back and say, well, at least we have gay marriage?  Legal weed in two states?

The struggle goes on.

So teabaggers, be patient and keep at it.  You've got a long road ahead.  Things might look better in a few decades if you don't lose hope.  For now, you're going to have to accept that Chris Christie or Jeb Bush is going to be your nominee in 2016, rather than Rand Paul or Ted Cruz. 

Also, we must accept the loss of Christine O'Donnell.  Gosh, she was cute.

Sunday, October 27, 2013

Methods in the Mouth of the Mountain of Madness



Most of my friends and acquaintances look at the teabaggers and the actions of individuals like Ted Cruz, and ask "are these people insane?"

And i tell them -- perhaps.  Perhaps they are.  But there is a method to their madness.  You have to delve into their thinking and see the big picture that exists inside their mental minds!  It goes something like this...

We hate America as it is.  We desire a new America.  We long for a massive structural collapse or other catastrophe to completely snap the spine of the nation.  If such an event happens, Washington DC will simply go away.  The President and Congress and the Joint Chiefs of Staff will all get on planes and fly away to France and the states will be left to fend for themselves.  The Red States, being full of fertile farmland and virtuous people, will thrive.  The Blue States, which have no natural resources and are populated by moochers and leeches whose only occupation is to "move money around" and fiddle with weird technology that no one really needs, will become impoverished hellholes.  And any smartypants losers from those states who escape the hordes of looting blacks and rioting Mexicans will have to beg our forgiveness before we allow them to enter our Red Utopias.  Ha, ha, not so smart now, are you, city man?  Who's your daddy!

Am i exaggerating?  Hardly.  They sit around their little blogs and daydream of exactly this, and they say things like...

"My secessionist energies are devoted to a free Cascadia. From San Fran to British Columbia on the Western side. More than enough food and resources. Ports for trade, travel and fish, and the natural protections afforded by mountain ranges. Politically, farther left than blue could ever hope to be – bioregionalism at its finest.  I’m getting to this late – but why would redtopia not sell food to bluistan? Pre-schism trade relationships would likely still exist, and trade is probably a better deal than economic/social isolationism."

"When the alternative is to sell to people who have nothing but demands, and those funny green pieces of paper, I think they would sell to anyone who actually has the money. The blue areas won’t have that money, because they will have no wealth to back it up.  Wealth is not those little green pieces of paper, that’s just money, useful for trade, but not backed by anything but the promises of a government that is about to collapse. Wealth is arable land. Wealth is energy. Wealth is potable water. Those blue areas are notoriously short on all three.  You keep thinking that US currency will be worth anything by that time. I imagine the Weimar Republic thought the same thing."

No matter how many times i read such slop, i never stop being amazed at it.

 Glossing over the ridiculous simplicity of reducing states to geographic stereotypes, let's imagine the other more plausible scenarions that would occur before this daydream could materialize.

-- If the US does indeed suffer an economic collapse on some unprecedented scale, we'd see some sort of default/bailout in the international arena.  While i'm no American Exceptionalist, i do recognize that there are nations -- China, for one -- who can't afford to see the US reduced to a bucolic farming community.  The US would limp on, worse than before, but it would remain intact.

-- If ever did get past some point of no return, Washington DC and the central power structure would not "go away," and more than Moscow did after the fall of the USSR.  If the presidency and the Constitution became null and void, they would almost undoubtedly be replaced by some sort of regime that would exercise even MORE dreaded Federal authority than the government we have now.  The impulse to hold the nerve center together at the cost of extraneous limbs is hard to overcome.  We would not have pure freedom, we'd have true tyranny for the first time.

-- There would be no hand-to-hand Civil War that the gun nuts and NRA boosters dream of.  Government agents would not go house-to-house to try to seize your ramen and your bullets.  No, we'd have more of a situation where the General in Charge of the Interior would demand that the North Dakotan oil would continue to flow as it should, else suffer some light bombing runs.  Just because the Constitution trumpets the virtues of a "well-armed militia," this doesn't mean that hunting rifles and shotguns will ever be the deciding factor in any intranational conflict.

Honestly, is this not the same sort of logic that made the Confederacy to believe they'd win in the first Civil War?  They're hitting all the same notes -- we're better people, we have farms and stuff, factories and railroads won't make a difference, and God is on our side anyway. 

Is that really at the heart of this all?  Do they want to fight the Civil War all over again so they can triumph this time?


Monday, October 21, 2013

It's Teatime



Well, that was a fun senseless debacle.  

Sometimes, in the midst of these political jujitsu grapples, it's easy to lose sight of the essential issues.  To the people on the right, the issue is Teh Debt.  Everything, they claim, is insignificant compared to the one defining priority -- reducing the national debt by any means necessary.  That's why Obama (or any Dem president) is by definition, unnacceptably evil -- because any president, inheriting the recessions and the wars of the previous president -- would be presiding over a country where the debt is increasing.

That brings me to my bullet points.  This is why Teabaggers are WRONG.

1.) To imagine that any president could have assumed the office in 2009 and immediately slashed the Federal Debt is insane.  It couldn't have happened without crippling the country.  Stop dreaming that this was somehow a plausible idea.

2.) The only way to decrease the Debt is steadily, over time, through a combintion of increased revenue, cuts to entitlement programs, the elimination of waste, and a reduction in the defense budget.  Democrats have compromised on entitlements, but Republicans have refused to do the same when it comes to taxes and defense.  They demand not ONE penny in higher taxes, and not ONE penny cut from the Pentagon -- because the Republicans take their orders from billionaires who don't like paying taxes, and defense companies like Halliburton, Lockheed-Martin, etc.  Let me just state this again -- the Republican Party works for billionaires, and ONLY billionaires.  Ever since the Reagan era, they've been pursuing a long-term strategy of using deficits as an excuse to eliminate programs they don't like.  The government is in debt?  How awful!  Sure, we could raise the capital gains tax or eliminate some defense programs, but why even think of doing that when you could eliminate the EPA, gut the IRS, and kill the departments of education and energy?

The Republican Party uses crisis as an excuse to pursue things only found on the Billionaire's Wish List.  And thanks to talk radio, they've very successfully fooled millions of blue-collar people into supporting their aims.  Seriously, as we speak, there are rednecks in poor rural areas who feel very strongly that the EPA needs to die, not because they've EVER dealt with the EPA, but because they've absorbed their masters' propaganda.  It... is... sickening.


3.) Of course, the Republican party is now two parties, and the supposedly-insurgent Teabaggers are just as bad in these respects as the old guard conservative elites.  They think they're different, but when it comes to compromise, they both take the same hard line -- all the money we need to save must come from social spending, and not one penny from the Pentagon or the Koch Brothers' capital gains.  The old elites used to demand tax cuts and deregualation under the guise of "it's better for the economy, and you'd better give us what we want unless you want everyone to suffer."  The new teabagger elites now demand tax cuts because they've listened to too much Mark Levin, fetishize the Revolutionary era, and pursue some fever dream of "doing what the Founders intended."  Because the Founders were infallible beings of pure light and goodness, i suppose.

This supposed civil war in the GOP amuses me, because both sides are equally as vile.  It's a bit like watching radical Sunnis and radical Shiites kill one another because they both want to be the only genuine crazy cult in town.

4.)  Nobody believes that you know anything about prudent tax policy when you act like the teabaggers do.  When you dress up in tricorne hats, adorn yourselves with Lipton bags, carry racist signs, and are obsessed with sideshow issues -- Obama's a muslim, abortion, FEMA deathcamps, UN oppression, fluoride in the water... you don't look or sound serious.  You look like a bunch of loons.  
That's pretty much it.


Accept some higher taxes on the rich.  Accept some cuts to defense.  Stop making youselves look stupid.  We can totally deal.

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Tiger Balm

I'm feeling a bit flu-ish today, so here are some wise words from someone else.

"It happened slowly, didn’t it? The change in the Republican Party? I don’t know. Maybe it’s nostalgia. There have always been the wild, vicious voices of the right. The devil on the shoulder of the conservative movement that whispers in its ear, “burn it down, burn it down.” But those voices were to be ignored, humored, tolerated, placated, or just deceived. That was the way of things, and we were protected by the obvious: people who believe foolish things tend to be easy to fool.


Then it all changed. The Republican elite caught a ride on the tiger. But the tiger got sick of waiting for the gazelles it was promised, the gazelles that were always one election away. The tiger was hungry and angry and tired of being used and the longer it waited the more appetizing the elite on its back became. So the tiger got a radio station and a news channel. The tiger got organized and mobilized. And finally the tiger realized it didn’t need someone kicking its sides telling it which way to run and who to eat and when to eat and why it wasn’t time to eat and the time to eat would come, don’t worry, you’ll eat soon enough.

So the tiger ate its master and now here we are.


America needs a strong, rational, positive, practical conservative movement. It needs that bulwark against liberal delusion and hubris. It needs a voice that says we are imperfect, that life is complex, that government can create need even as it meets need, that you can’t fix everything and freedom is worth some danger and sorrow. And there are smart, honest conservatives at the ready to be that voice, to help govern practically and sincerely with that voice, but they are drowned out by the guttural scream of craven utopians raging against reality.


This moment in American political life is insane. That a group of narrow-minded zealots could push us to the brink of economic ruin, that they maintain a base of support in their frenzied, quixotic, incompetent gambit, that there is an apparatus that exists to defend this kind of nonsense—it came on us slowly but it is no less an emergency. This is broken. This cannot go on."   -- Jon Lovett.

I.... agree.  Is all i can say.

Monday, October 14, 2013

Brang down dem Burricades!


So damn, the shit continues to get more and more real.  Yesterday, this group of Real Americans took to the streets and tore down some dividers... er, foot traffic partitions... no, i mean some BARRICADES in order to protest the government shutdown that they originally clamored for.

...wait, really?  When they heard that the big bad Federal Gubmint was going to close down, they imagined that the parts they liked would be personally exempt?  Christ, what a bunch of babies.  Pull your diapers up, guys.

Look, i ain't mad at these guys.  I like civil disobedience and mischief so long as no one gets hurt.  So more power to you, redneck swarm, you stir that shit up.  The people i have a problem with are all the conservative bloggers who are cumming themselves stupid over these photos, and screeching about people power and takin' it to da streets, and fucking BARRICADES.... 

(Les Miserables, this ain't.  The Friends of the ABC, they are not.)

...because, come on, if the people in that photo were any group apart from old white rednecks, if they were young, or black, or gay, or female, or had long hair -- the same bloggers would be calling for them to be pepper-sprayed, beaten, and arrested.

You know this.

But seriously, just revel in the insanity here.  They want the government to go away, and they they throw tantrums when it does.

Babies.

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Saturday, October 12, 2013

Bubble realities



If you've ever seen Donnie Darko or certain episodes of Star Trek, then you know that bubble realities exist.  Every once in a while, the Universe Prime spits out a temporary, false reality that exists for a short amount of time, allowing characters to experience some delicious bit of unreality, before collapsing back into the spacetime manifold.

This, i think, happens to Teabaggers on a pretty frequent basis.  Take last week, when the following imaginary scenario bubbled up from the ether before collapsing under the weight of reality.

-- Someone suggests that truckers might, should, will stage a massive protest by blockading the DC beltway in their rigs.  The entire city of Washington will grind to a halt.

-- A leaked "secret" journal at Redstate.com proves that Obama will deploy the National Guard to disperse the rolling patriots, in the name of national security.

-- Things will turn ugly, shots will be fired, it will rage out of control.

-- Teabaggers everywhere are aghast at this shocking abuse of authority, and take to the interwebs to blather "in terms of “level of agitation and unrest”, I see no way this motherfucking Marxist and his politoboro can survive another three years. No way!"

-- Impeachment proceeding begin!  And hundreds of thousands of yokels descend on the White House to demand the ouster of the wicked king.

....then, none of that actually happens.  But the poor baggers are left almost believing that it did.  It... might have happened?  It could have happened, if it had happened it would have happened just as the internet buffoons imagined.

I mean, can you believe that Obama sat in the White House, snickering and masturbating while patriotic Real Americans were pulled from their cabs and shot in the back of the head?  I know, i was shocked.  Too bad it didn't happen.  That would have been just, well, shocking.

Bubble realities.

Wait!

We have word of a new bubble reality forming in the Northeast.... it looks like a technical glitch has caused EBT cards to stop functioning for a time.  Our yokel sources claim that this is a "test run" for the "big one," an upcoming Obama-caused disaster in which all food stamp cards are revoked, causing millions of young hungry black males and other minority urban youths to flee the cities, and overrun suburbia in order to rape and pillage the well-stocked pantries and virtuous white wives of the Real Americans.

Buy some more guns, people, shit is about to get real.

in terms of “level of agitation and unrest”, I see no way this motherfucking Marxist and his politoboro can survive another three years. No way. - See more at: http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=51485#comments
in terms of “level of agitation and unrest”, I see no way this motherfucking Marxist and his politoboro can survive another three years. No way. - See more at: http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=51485#comments
in terms of “level of agitation and unrest”, I see no way this motherfucking Marxist and his politoboro can survive another three years. No way. - See more at: http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=51485#comments

Tuesday, October 08, 2013

The State of Things and Crap

Gosh, darn.

Well, i just got back from my momentous vacation -- i saw my best friend again, and we spent a day strolling around downtown DC, which was pretty darned cool even if i couldn't go inside any of the buildings...

...now, it's back to business as normal.  Let's see, Obama is still rightfully holding the line against the Republicans, who apparently believe that naked extortion should be a legitimate political tool from now on.  I would ask any conservatives reading this to simply stop, breathe, and imagine that the players were reversed -- imagine, if the Republicans controlled the Senate and Mitt Romney was president after thrashing Barack Obama by a margin of 5 million votes -- but the Democrat-controlled House said "we want a national gun registry and for most guns to be totally illegal, and until you give us what we want, the government stays closed, and we might even force a catastrophic debt default because 'surrendering' at this point is not an option."

How would you feel?

Sure, Republicans, you trounced them in the last election, but you have to negotiate with them and outlaw virtually all guns.  Police must begin seizing every rifle and shotgun in the hands of the citizens, or there's no deal.

Look, be reasonable, the Democrats control the House, so obviously they get everything they want, and you just have to accept that.

Look me in the fucking eye and tell me that you'd be just fine with that.  And you wouldn't call them traitors, or unreasonable, you'd just shrug and say, gosh, i suppose Romney should cave before it's too late.

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Monday, September 23, 2013

RFM




It sucks to have a racist family member, especially if it's someone you care about.  But sometimes the back-and-forth is hilarious... but depressing.

Me: "There's a new hot white girl at my job.  There are a lot of hot girls there, but not many hot white girls.  She's kinda country, but really hot."

Racist Family Member: "If there's no hot white girls there, there are no hot girls there."

Me:  "What, a girl has to be white in order to be hot?"

Racist Family Member: "Yes."

Me: "So nonwhite girls can never be hot, according to you."

Racist Family Member: "Correct."

Me: "No way.  That Muslim girl i used to work with was mad hot."

Racist Family Member: "It doesn't matter how they look.  Even if they're hot, you know that underneath it all, all they're thinking is "kill Whitey."

Me: "You realize that the only reason why you think everyone else is racist, is because you're racist and you're projecting it on everyone else?"

Racist Family Member: "Everyone is racist."

Me:  "That hot Muslim girl wasn't racist.  She loved white guys.  All she ever talked about was how much she loved Channing Tatum."

Racist Family Member: "That doesn't matter."


There's just no reaching some people.  It's sad.  It's sad.

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Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Rush is right?



Sometimes, conservatives do speak the truth.  The issue is how they say it.  It's not the steak, it's the sizzle, you know?  Remember when Rush Limbaugh said that feminism was invented to give ugly women access to the workplace?  Let me find the exact quote...

"Feminism was established so as to allow unattractive women easier access to the mainstream of society."  -- Rush Limbaugh

Sure, it's any decent person's natural instinct to be repulsed by this boorish drivel and declare it untrue, but then, you think... hey, i've never watched Mad Men, but yeah, wasn't there supposedly a time in America when women were valued most for attractiveness, because their best chance for success in life was to woo and marry a successful man?  And if they couldn't, they had to work, and in the fields open to women, such as secretarial work, the men hiring them would base their decisions on whom they'd like to ogle and maybe pressure into illicit sex?  And that skilled women, older women, women who were good workers, were at a disadvantage against young babes with perky boobs?

Hmm.

Well, that sounds like a kinda fucked-up world.  Maybe that is why feminism was invented, and it sounds like a good thing, if you have any decency or sense of justice and aren't a complete and total sack of shit.  Why does that bloated drug addict say it like its a bad thing?

^__^

I mean, they do that with a lot of things.  When listening to conservative radio, they paint the following horrific scenario...

....in a few short decades, unless things change, America will be filled by people who are mostly tan.  All the races will interbreed and the white gene pool will be diluted by all those sexy latino and asian and african genes.  You won't even be able to tell if that dreadlocked young person handing your your morning ultraccino is a blackanese Hawaiin, or a Chinese-Mexican-Samoan,  or a Soledad O'Brien, or a Vin Diesel, or maybe even a Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.  Instead of five races we'll have a million.  Race might even become meaningless.  Even worse,  traditional religion will no longer control people's lives.  It will no longer be the norm to marry the first person who comes along and stick it out forever.  Homosexuals will no longer be discriminated against, and there will be bisexuals and all manner of lesbians, and sex will be rampant and free.  A lesbian might be president, even, in this new world that isn't like the one we know.

Ummmm.

Hmmm.

Hey, that's probably true.  Why do they keep saying it like it's bad?


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Mass Shootings are Bad


I don't suppose i'm alone in wishing the best to the families of the victims of yesterday's senseless attack.  And wondering why the hell people snap like that.  And a tiny amount of satisfaction that the diseased scumbag who perpetrated the act is stone cold dead.

That all goes without saying.

But please, can we get over this ludicrous argument over whether acts like these are "terrorism" or not?  It's more of a sematic quibble than anything.  Because if you want to get technical, it's only terrorism if the person carrying out the act part of an organization or movement with a specific political goal in mind that the violence is supposed to advance. 

If it's just another case of someone who is mentally disturbed (Jared Loughner) or a loser (Adam Lanza) going nuts because they can't stand life and want to take out as many people as they can, then it's not terrorism.  It's just insane, pointless violence.  Teenaged violence, workplace violence. 

And then, sure there are gray areas like the case of Nidal Hassan.  If an incompetent, sadsack loner like Hassan is influenced by islamist websites or the speeches of religious fanatics, if he self-identifies with a cultural movement like jihadism, but isn't receiving orders from anyone, and his actions are purely to satisfy his own sick desires -- and have no clear political goal that can be achieved -- is it terrorism?  Is it any different than a twisted child like Lanza being influenced by movies or video games?

Me, i don't give a crap.  In any case, i doubt that our media classifications will have any effect on the actions of law enforcement.  They will always seek out any possible conspirators, whether they are motivated by ideology, mental illness, terminal butthurt, or some combination of all three.

Get over it, people.

Also, no one gives a crap whether this murderous loon self-identified as a Buddhist or not.  What, do you want to start bombing Buddhist countries or something?

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Friday, September 06, 2013

This is Syri-ous.

As i write this, i am listening to Michael Savage bellow and sneer at the hypocrisy of THE LIBRULS.  Every liberal, every person who ever voted for Obama, is and has always been a lifelong opponent of war in any form; a hippie, a peacenik, a flower child... and now they are utter hypocrites for thinking it's okay for the US to intervene in Syria.  How unlike those hardy conservatives, whose beliefs are set in stone and never change!

In certain cases, i'm sure he's correct.  There are plenty of people out there who support Obama now, but would have opposed Bush doing the same.  Hypocrites exist.  It sucks but it's true.

(Wait, what about the old slight that Democrats like Kerry and Hillary voted to go into Iraq, and thus are equally culpable for that failure?  Does that mean they're just as patriotic as Republicans, or just as stupid?  I've lost track...)

Of course, Savage would never hold the mirror up to his own audience and berate them for now saying the EXACT same things that anti-war liberals did in 2003.  I mean, it's amazing, it's like they're digging up old Code Pink speeches, hitting CTRL-F, and replacing "Iraq" with "Syria." 

  • America doesn't have the moral authority to intervene in other countries' struggles.
  •  We should save that money and spend it here at home.
  • The Middle East is a complex web of allies and enemies, and any action we take will have massive unintended consequences. 
  • The idea of a single quick strike is naive; we will end up in a quagmire with boots on the ground.
  • Tyrants are bad, but the chaos left after their ouster is usually worse.

....it's the same.  They say the exact same things that we were saying ten years ago.  I wish they'd at least acknowledge that.  I wish they'd say, look, it was after 9-11.  It was after 9-11 and there was a Christian President, and god help me, i ain't that smart.  George Bush said that blowing up the middle East would magically spread democracy, and i believed him because i thought Jesus would wave his magic wand and make it so.  Heck, if Bush had told me that we should start raping cats and eating dogshit to keep the turrists from winning, i'd have done that, too.  It was after 9-11.  We were confused.

All snark aside, i think this is a positive development.  It proves that, yes, conservatives can change.  The Conservative ideology is not set in stone.  For fifty years, the puppetmasters of the Republican Party have effectively brainwashed their working-class grunts into accepting a bundled package of beliefs and stances that don't necessarily have to go together. 

Christian?  Then you want taxes cut for the rich.

Like guns?  Then you hate unions.

Don't like abortion?  Then you think the EPA should be dissolved.

Bundles.  If you've ever dealt with a cable company, then you know that in order to get the one thing you actually want, you have to buy a lot of crap that you don't.  That's how we end up with dirt-poor rednecks driving their sputtering pick-ups to a shift at the sausage factory and nodding in agreement when Rush Limbaugh tells them that the capital gains tax must be lowered, and the payroll tax raised. 

You know what i'd like to see?  You know what might be a positive sea change in the following decades?  If the conservative base changed its tune on labor issues.  It can happen, it probably will happen.  Look, if Obama stood up and gave a sonorous speech about how every worker in America deserves certain things, they'd jeer and scream about socialism...

...but if a good old boy gave the same speech?  If they heard those ideas repeated by others?  Then they'd be on board.  Hell yeah, hoss, this is fucking AMERICA.  I'm a fucking MAN and i have a fucking RIGHT to be able to support my family if i work hard.  I fucking DESERVE at least $12.50/hour minimum wage, ten sick days and one week of vacation per year, and a minimum level of preventative medical care.  This is fucking America!  You gonna listen to all these librul elitists who think you should work two jobs and live in a shack like a fucking Mexican and go bankrupt over a single health crisis because them billionaires want to pay less taxes?  Fuck that!  That ain't America!!!
Tell me that's impossible.

If they can go from being fiercely pro-war and interventionist to being anti-war and isolationist in one decade, then anything can happen. 

If Michael Savage is still filling the airwaves with his hilarious filth in ten years, he'll probably be screaming that he was always in favor of Obama... er, i mean Boehnercare, and god damn you if you say otherwise.

Wait, didn't this start off being about Syria?

Syria.

I don't think we should intervene in Syria.  Supposedly, the last time intervention worked was in Kosovo, and i'm too young to really remember that.  When that shit was going down in the '90s, i was busy watching cartoons, listening to Metallica, and discovering masturbation.  Kosovo, ain't nobody got time for that.

If it does happen, i hope the people doing it know what they're doing.  

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Tuesday, September 03, 2013

Ahead of the Curve

You can go to a lot of teablogs these days, the dens of the true blue conservatives, and read the equivalent of the following...

George W. Bush was a disaster, an honest but clueless dimwit who foolishly overspent and got us involved in two overseas wars that we had no business being in.

Bob Dole was a doddering old establishment hack.

John McCain is a mentally unbalanced, trigger-happy loon who should have retired years ago because he has no idea what is going on and is just embarrassing himself.  A soulless sellout and a shellshocked tragedy of a man.

Mitt Romney was a pompous, overstuffed fraud, a spoiled goofball, and a perfumed, manicured weakling who had no business ever running for President.  The worst candidate in modern memory.

.....and i agree.

Republicans, we are more alike than you think.  We both hate the people you put up for President, it's just that we realize how full of shit they are BEFORE they can win.  You figure it out two years later.

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Thursday, August 29, 2013

Permanent Daylight

Sigh.  War?  No war?  What the fuck?

An atmosphere of permanent war.  It's just another sign of the pervasisve, low-level insanity that is basically infecting every level of our society.  When i really think of how things are now, it's hard not to be angry and disgusted all of the time.  Almost everything is tragically flawed in some crucial way.

College costs.  If you want to become a doctor, an engineer, or anything else that is useful to society, you have to pay an insane amount of money.  I have no problem with poetry and philosophy degrees remaining luxury items, but useful professions?  Why do we make it so hard to get through the gate?  What if  you wanted to join the military, but had to pay $60,000 to do so?  We would call that madness, would we not?

Shitty food.  If you want to remain healthy, you have to avoid 90% of the food that is shoved at you.  I've been eating way healthier lately, which means that most of what i shove down my face hole comes from the produce section or the other outside areas of a grocery store, where you can still find the unprocessed foods that are actually meant to be eaten.  And you have to shun all the convenient shit that is pushed from fast-food joints and vending machines, turn down all the sugary crap that appears at parties and other people's houses.  If you just take what society gives you, you're basically poisoning yourself.

Cigarettes.  Alchohol.  Prescription drugs.  It's all poison.

Half of our citizens are working jobs where they break their backs and are on their feet all day.  The other half sit down all day until their bodies atrophy.  Either way, you're a cog doing a job.  Humans serve the machine.  The machine doesn't serve the humans.

I work nights, so i avoid the traffic.  But every morning, i see the highway going into the city clogged with thousands upon thousands of cars going 5 miles an hour.  We built cars to get places faster, right?

Television.  A brilliant device invented by brilliant people, a technology designed to transmit information... is now mostly used to beam images of the stupidest, most grotesque, most backwards, vile, and selfish idiots at us.  It's like using nanotechnology to produce fake vomit and dog shit.

Bah.

I'm just sleepy, addled, and discontent right now.   Everything looks iffy.  Ignore me.

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Thursday, August 22, 2013

Scum of the Earf

So everyone already knows that three soulless, scum-sucking sacks of shit shot an Australian student named Christopher Lane to death for no reason. 

These kids should rot forever.  The fucking dolts.

But yeah, i also kind of want to bitch about the conservative reaction.  All week, they've been asking stupid questions like "why isn't this huge story i heard about in the news being talked about in the news?" and "how come this isn't as big as the Trayvon Martin case?"

Well, i'll tell you. 

Because once the police caught up to these murdering fucks, they didn't detain them for a few hours, and then release them scot-free because they were, you know, standing their ground against an aggressive foreigner who was running right at them, or something.

If that had happened, then it would probably be pretty big.

RAAH LIBRULS WANT TO MAKE THESE KIDS HEROS COZ TEHYRE BALCK AND THEY THINK IT ALWAYS IS GOOD TO KILL WHITEMEN BECUAZE THEY FEEL OPPRESSED FOR BEING POOR AN DUMB WITH NO JOBS AND GOT TROPHIEZ EVERY DAY FOR NOTHING JESSE JACKSON AL SHARPTON SELFESTEEM BENGHAZI IRS COVERUP

Yes.  Yes, it is.

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