Where's My Unicorn?

The Political Gospel According to Sarah doth say:

"[Democrats] act like they're permanent residents of a unicorn ranch in fantasyland if they really think they're gonna be able to turn it around with the liberal policies they have to continue, and you know, it's pixie dust."

Unicorn ranch? Where the fuck is this? I want my goddamn pink fuzzy unicorn and I want it now!!!

What else are they holding out on us? Jetpacks? Woolly mammoth dishwashers? And they also got pixie dust?

Dammit! Dammit! Dammit! I'm quitting the secret Democratic Fantasy Party immediately if I don't get my unicorn by secret Intertube mail within one hour. One hour, you heard me. Unicorn-holding out bastards.

Who? Me? Tea Party?

Ultra-billionaire David Koch claims that he has never been involved in the "tea party" movement, never met anyone involved in, doesn't even know what tea is, apparently.

But...



Gosh, that must be an animatronic robot ghost clone monkey of David Koch presiding over a meeting of national reps from the "grassroots" Tea Party that he's never heard of.

Somebody catch that clone!

Mr. Law & Order

Check it out!



And, tomorrow, David Vitter is going to turn himself in for having illegal sex with prostitutes. He's going to bring his own rope and ask that he just be lynched right away because he can't stand for anyone who breaks the law to go unpunished!

What a guy.

Oh Noes! They Haz Brown Faces!

No, no, no - the Tea Baggers are not a bunch of sick racist bastards! Why won't anyone listen to me? Why?

Oh, that's why. Sorry. My bad.

Burn, Baby, Burn!

PROBLEM

The New Republican Vision for America: Pay-to-Play!

House burning down? Did you pay your fire bribe?

Armed robbery at your gas station? Did you pay off your local cops?

Kids want an education? Mbwahahahahahaha! What? Really? Mbwahahahaha! (Oh, you're not kidding?)

There are two visions for America - one in which the general welfare is provided for all by all of us and another in which only those who can afford it have access to...well...everything.

If Republicans and Tea Bag crazyfucktards take control of Congress next month, look for the end of America as we know it. Unless you got the cash.

SOLUTION? GET OFF YOUR ASS AND VOTE!

Feel My Pain? No Thanks

I really hate Bill Clinton. Hated him while he was President, hate him just as much now, even when he's out purportedly stumping for Obama's policies. More like stumping for his own publicity - he's an attention whore of a high degree. Hate him, yes sir, totally hate him.

Plus,  I've never understood the kind of thrall in which he holds so many, especially in the media. The other evening, Chris "Man-Crush" Matthews was drooling about Clinton and bemoaning Obama's inability to be just like Clinton, to get out and emote and slobber and lie about "feeling our pain"! I wanted to feel my fist against Matthews throat before he was done.

Obama, praise be, ain't Clinton. Let's get that straight. Obama ain't perfect, either. I'm not 100% thrilled with every policy direction Obama has taken since January of last year, but for only the second time in my life I feel like this country has a President that thinks before he acts. (Carter was the only other in and I'll always be pro-Carter, no matter how much the Right trashes him, imperfect as he too was as a President). I'll take Obama's measured, thoughtful way over Cowboy George's shoot-the-country-in-the-foot-from-his-hip approach or Clinton's smarmy Demo-Publican touchy-feely bullshit any day. And don't get me started on that bastard Reagan!!!!

Obama is also the hardest working President we've had in generations. He has accomplished an incredible number of legislative feats in the last year, even working against the Party of No. Bush didn't get as much done in eight years as Obama has in less than two, unless you take into account his plunging of the nation into a recession, squandering a trillion-dollar surplus on tax cuts for the wealthy and starting multiple endless wars as accomplishments. And Obama keeps going, despite the opposition, despite the idiocy, despite having to spend way too much of his time fixing his predecessors fuck-ups.

Dang. I didn't mean to go full-bore about Obama. Just wanted to smack Bill Clinton down when I started. Hate that bastard, really hate him.

He Just Doesn't Get It (And He's Not Getting Any Either)

Sometimes, I found the absolute and total hypocrisy of the right funny as hell. I don't yell, I laugh. Here's the perfect example - James O'Keefe, the lying piece of human garbage that destroyed ACORN with his doctored video tapes (and the complete cooperation of the traditional media and Congress), thought he'd do the same thing with CNN. This time around, his plan was to seduce and sexually blackmail a female CNN reporter who was doing a story on him and other members of the fringe right-media. But it all blew up in his face.

I don't know what to laugh at more. Is it the whole high school sophomore idea of the great seduction which involved a floating pleasure palace, sex toys, hidden cameras and more or is it O'Keefe's delusion that he was attractive enough to seduce a woman. Any woman. Anywhere. Without paying her upfront. And she'd still turn him down and leave with his money.

James O'Keefe is a sexual predator, deeply misogynistic and with an over-inflated ego that will someday yet be his downfall. Maybe this is the time. Let's hope the judge revokes his probation from his last attempt at illegal wire-tapping and B&E. Let's hope he goes behind bars. Maybe some of his sex dreams will finally come true then.

SPOILER ALERT!!!

If, like me, you enjoy a good alternate history yarn, I'm sure you were on pins and needles for the November 9 release of what has been touted as a total blockbuster in the genre:

Sadly, after receiving an advanced copy, I have to explode the hype. Read on but be aware of spoilers, kids.

Evidently, the plot is about a fictional President of the United States during a time of great crisis and many threats to the nation's identity and very survival. In it's one really good twist, the author claims to be this same President and is presenting the novel as a memoir. Shades of Norman Spinrad and The Iron Dream, eh?

Anyhoo, this President Bush* enters the Oval Office without winning either the popular vote and with a spurious electoral  count but is somehow magically installed by the Supreme Court (like that'd ever happen!) Immediately, he begins planning war upon Iraq, ordering his advisors to create a plausible reason for an invasion. Luckily for this President's insane desire to destroy peace in the Middle East for generations and the novel's plot, terrorists attack the United States during the President's first year in office. This gives Bush all the excuse he needs to wage unlimited war on multiple fronts in both Iraq and Afghanistan while also creating secret prisons and torture camps and ramrodding legislation through Congress designed to strip American citizens of their basic liberties in the name of freedom. Unbelievably, the Congress and the American people just go along with all of this, cowed evidently by the massive fear campaign the President creates with the help of his truly evil Vice President, Cheney. (The invention of Cheney is the one good point in this otherwise crap novel; he is  evil through and through and how the author created such a villain will forever be a mystery as his main character, himself, is as forgettable as yesterday's news).

I'm not going to give away too much more of the story, though I will tell you that amazingly (and evidently through nefarious means) this President Bush wins a second term in office. Even more amazingly, without possibility of sequel, this President Bush does absolutely nothing to capture the terrorists responsible for the original attacks on the United States! Overall, the plot is ramshackle, hard to digest, harder to believe and make it barely worth giving the book a look-see when it hits your local library, let alone buying a copy. Total fantasy - and not even a good one!

As for the style, let's just say it reads like it was ghost-written. By a real ghost.

And from our Just For Laughs Department, we present a pic of the author snapped at this year's Comic-Con where he COS-played as his alter-ego, Gorgeo the Elf-Mage. The photo is author-submitted and I'm pretty sure he had a lot of fun with Photoshop. Yikes! Who does he think he is?

* I'm wondering if the author is trying to play off the real President Bush - remember him, the guy who beat Clinton in '92 but left office in disgrace after, well, you know all about it and it's just too sordid to repeat here.

No More War! No More War!

[Above: John Boehner at Woodstock]

The progressive party of peace and love, the Gaia-loving hippies of Congress, won a major battle today. A battle in the war against war.

Yes, Republicans came out loud and strong today and spoke with a strong voice against war and the military industrial complex, hallelujah, hallelujah! Voting to deny money to the nation's military, Republicans (and a few crazy Democrats!) turned their backs on our soldiers and the nation's defense. Never before has the peace-wing of American politics had such a significant victory! Maya Angelou is crying in her beer right now, crying with joy.

Kudos! Bravo! Go, soul sisters!

And make sure you slam that damn door shut on your way out. Don't want teh gays gettin' in here. They might want to redecorate the place. Or join the Army, God forbid.

What They Do When We're Not Looking

I read the headlines on Daily Kos about voter fraud in Wisconsin and I feared greatly for our democracy. Ohmigod, I thought/screamed, ACORN is back! Images of happy non-white voters legally expressing themselves at the ballot box filled my head - oh, the horror, the horror!!!!

But now I feel better. This time - unlike the imaginary last time - it's just Republicans, Tea Baggers and similar filth planning in detail to subvert the electoral process in Wisconsin, disenfranchise minority voters and rig an election.

No biggie. Because, as we all know, It's Okay If You're A Republican!!!!

Or a white rich male. Same diff.

What's the name of that Metallica album that always comes to mind at times like these? Hmmm....

The Stupid Leading the Blind

To the anti-Obama, Teabagger-types who've left comments denying racism in their movement, please see the above.

If you don't care to watch the video, it shows a man in an Obama mask on a float full of Teabag crazies (note the well-lettered signs, a dead giveaway). And "The President" is whipping a young white male wearing a t-shirt (again, hand lettered) identifying him as a "Future Tax Payer."

Nope, no racism here. None at all. Just move along. Got a lynching to go to after the parade, doncha know.

Do Teabaggers not support their local t-shirt and sign shops? Don't they like helping out local businesses? They prefer buying posterboard and Sharpies at Walmart? Is it part of their therapy sessions to do craft projects?

And I think the collective age of the folks on that float is actually older than the Universe.

One Good Thing About Republicans

They say (they, of course, being America's beloved Van Patten family), that if you can't say something good about a person, you shouldn't say anything at all. Or some kind of crap like that.

And today I finally figured out something good to say about Republicans: You can always tell when they are up to no good.

That's a nice thing to say, right? It's a compliment, I think.

How can you tell? Just let them tell you themselves. For instance, if a Republican starts screaming about vote fraud and voter intimidation, then of course he or she is involved in vote fraud and voter intimidation. It's like a cherry on top of a poisoned Sundae when it also involves racism!



Watch this and then read this. These fuckers will stop at nothing to win. They will commit arson, threaten minorities, lie lie lie lie lie and lie again. Fucking Nazis, that's all they are.

How to Beat Republicans in One Easy Lesson

Lesson One - 
Call Them On Their Lies

Thus ends today's lesson. Amen.

Dance Like This and You'll Be All Right!

Had some great fun this past weekend with a mysterious visitor from the North. Beers, laughter, BBQ, music, fun. Also hit the junk shops for old vinyl and scored a couple of mint Stanley Brothers LPs. Boy howdy! That's good shit, good shit indeed.



Pardon me for indulging my inner hillbilly.

Faking History

Lying about everything, but especially about history, is a specialty of Glenn Beck.

For example, one of his favorite "expert" guests is the bogus American historian David Barton, perhaps the one individual most responsible for all of the current lies about the Christian origins of our nation. Barton is as sleazy as they come, constantly editing historical documents to suit his own needs and taking them out of context to support his phony supposition that our nation was founded as a Christian nation by Christian leaders, amen, the end.

[For the best expose of Barton, check out Chris Rodda's awesome column over at Talk to Action where she regularly takes the hammer to liars and fools. Her Liars for Jesus is a great antidote to the kind of Christian nation myth the conservatives have been upchucking for the last decade plus.]

And now these lies have even filtered down to the level of t-shirt handy aphorism, as seen above. The religious right loves this George Washington quotation - they use it all of the time to support their fantasies about our history. But...but...it's a lie.Washington never said this. It's not in any of his speeches or letters or any other documents from his life before, during or after his Presidency. And they'll never admit it. 

Above is a pic from Beck's Saturday Godapalooza in DC. I hear Jesus returned, flew above the crowd and personally endorsed Beck as his mouthpiece on Earth. Oh, no, sorry, that was a dove shitting on his head. Same difference. Except doves and shit are real and Jesus ain't.

Let Money Ring!

I got a great troll comment last night about my snarky crap-down of Glenn Beck's upcoming ego-rama event in DC tomorrow. But I'm wondering if the troll who says he/she/it (what gender are trolls?) will be in attendance knows that they are giving their monies first and foremost to Mr. Glenn Beck's pockets and NOT to the charity being horribly abused and used promoted by Beck.

Yup, according to the Restoring Honor website:

"All contributions made to the Special Operations Warrior Foundation (SOWF) will first be applied to the costs of the Restoring Honor Rally taking place on August 28, 2010."

Yeah. What do you wanna bet that the above means SOWF ain't gettin' shit from Beck. They're just getting shit on. Poor fuckers.

We're Not Hitchhiking Anymore!!!

Advance Copy of Glenn Beck's Bullet Point Speech (with stage directions)
 
[Put vinegar in eyes to stimulate tear ducts]

[Enter - by golden jet pack]

• Cry.
• Talk crazy about shit.
• Cry.
• More crazy-ass shit talk.
• Cry.
• Speak in tongues.
• Cry.
• And now a word from our sponsor Goldline.
• Cry.

[Exit - on ebony palanquin carried by Nubian slaves]

[Count fuckin' huge mounds of cash taken from duped rubes and fools]

[Laugh at rubes and fools all night long while returning to my mansion in my private jet]

The Shitbird Has Landed

I've been renewing my spiritual self in a cave in Mongolia for a few months and have returned to America with cleansed body, mind and vision, ready to enjoy the post-racial eco-utopia that I was sure I'd find, full of solar cars, wind farms, organic rooftop gardens, mosques built within Jewish temples and both built inside Catholic churches and run by Buddhist monks and gay Baptist preachers, while choirs of white, black, yellow, red, pink, brown, mauve and gray sang socialist worker songs in praise of universal health care and the end of war.

And I find this.

Fuck me. I'm back to the cave. Screw you all later.

My Line in the Sand

I've had it with him. No more Mr. Nice Monkey! Obama - I'm calling you out!

Not only did you spend Memorial Day drunkenly urinating on the graves of our heroic soldiers while rapping "The Internationale", or so I imagine, but now this...this outrage!

Check out the picture, kids, this is what our high and mighty President likes to do on his day off - hit little girls! Little white girls! And because he's "The President," this poor little girl's parents have to smile and pretend to like it! (Or take a bullet in the head from the Secret Service agents who had their laser-sights on them the whole time...I imagine).

Look at how he's about to slap her face! See how she raises her lily-white hand to ward off his aggression! Pretend what I'm saying is true! Aauugghhh!!!! Double-aauugghhh!

Go back to Kenya, Mr. President, or whatever phony country you really came from (there's no such place as Kenya, is there?). Leave America alone! Stopping hitting us! Stop hitting us! Why won't you stop hitting us!!!

The New Crazy

I've been bin-diving the crazy online for a long time now, always trying to keep my itchy finger on what's driving the fringe, and one thing that hasn't changed in years is the über-far-right conspiracy mania over government surveillance of us all ("They watch us poop! And they know what you ate last night, too!") and the ever-present, ever-popular BLACK HELICOPTERS!

Gotta love them black helicopters, man, that's a classic.

But now,tThe teabagger/wingnut/libercrazians have finally done it - inverted their own sense of reality, turning themselves inside out to pull the last bit of crazy into the light of day.

Current TC (Top Crazy), Rand Paul, son of famous former TC, Ron, is now begging the big scary government to watch us from the skies - and to send in the helicopters!!!

Wow. It's a philosophic reality flip-flop of incredible dimensions, kids. I bet tachyons are leaking from RP's toenails over this one. Space and time are ripping! C'thulhu is rising! Children are being born today speaking fluent Esperanto, the old are aging backwards, John McCain is acting honorably and Rahm Emanuel has stopped swearing...for Lent!

All I can say is "Congratulations!" And Philip K. Dick would be proud.

The Dirty Diaper Theory of Free Market Baby

Overall, my opinion of Libertarians (thanks for asking, by the way), has been one of non-committal, reluctant acceptance of their existence. While I like some of the basic libertarian ideas regarding individual rights they have, they tend to take everything to an extreme. Especially if it involves property and property rights.

Why do they fetishize property rights so much? Things and what one is allowed to do with things are of over-arching concern to Libertarians. I find this especially confusing because in the United States, at least, the classical definition of libertarianism has for much of the 20th century been hip-joined to socialism. Very anti-thing, if ya know what I mean.

But somewhere along the way, libertarianism met capitalism and had a baby called the free market. This greedy little baby requires unlimited resources and zero restrictions on its growth to survive.

"FEED ME!!!" screams this bastard child!

"DON'T FENCE ME IN!!!" it hollers.

"I'LL FUCKING KILL YOU IF YOU GET IN MY WAY" it cries.

It cries so hard and so long that we come to believe what it is saying. We fear that if we stop feeding it everything it wants, stop giving in to its demands, try to reign in its unimpeded growth, the world as we know it will come to an end.

Bullshit.

It's time to put the baby on a diet, kids. Time to pull the feeding tubes and make a great big double-duty belt - for tightening around its waist as much for beating it when it whines.

And the next time baby decides to shit all over us, maybe we'll have a diaper ready. We can't let the fat little bastard run around pantless anymore. It's time for baby to grow up. Or die.

Arizona is Mr. Burns!

Arizona has lowered the national IQ by half. We're now at 25, folks. And getting lower every minute. Soon, Amerka won't be able to walk and chew gum at the same time. Amerka won't be able to sit and chew gum. Even Velcro won't help us keep our shoes on.

Arizona has gone Mr Burns on Los Angeles! They're gonna take away their "electrons" for being all uppity in AZ's face about their racist/fascist (you say "idiot" and I say "idjit") new Braun Volk  Brown Folk Suppression Law of 1939 2010.

Somedays it really is worth waking up, when you can spend your day laughing at dipshits and nimrods like this. Thank you, Arizona! And good luck with them electrons!

Jesus M. Christ (The "M" is for Marxist)!

I ever tell ya'all about two of my favorite TV shows and why they are favorites?

What, you ask, are they? What does the 'monkey love so much: The Beverly Hillbillies and Columbo.

They could hardly be more different at first glance, I know. One a sitcom about hillbillies in Beverly Hills - what? How crazy can that be? (Will someone please tell the Palin family that it's not a documentary). And the other a detective drama about starring a glass-eyed slob?

But when one looks closer, one sees the commonalities. Of course, both are set in Los Angeles, more or less. And both are about class warfare.

Yes, yes they are. As they say on all the wingnut and freeper blogs, just give me a chance and follow me on this... (I love it when I find a blog post that starts like that - it's straight to crazy town from thereon in!)

First, Columbo is the salt-of-the-earth working glass schmuck who is also the worst nightmare of every murdering high-class rich sumbitch. They all think they are smarter and better than him, they all look down on him, they all treat him like crap and threaten him - and in the end, always smiling, he sends them all to jail. (Occasionally, the murderer is not wealthy, merely class-conscious or extraordinarily self-centered and egotistic, but they all treat Columbo the same).

Everyone's favorite hillbillies are always playing the class card, too. In fact, without it, the show would suck. The juxtaposition of earnest, decent, caring, formerly poorer than dirt Jed and family with the vacuous and the greedy of Beverly Hills and Hollywood is the greatest little class-conscious morality play ever. There's never been an American TV show that better exposes the enormous divide between the wealthy and the poor than the Beverly Hillbillies.

This all came to mind today while I was reading this excellent little essay about Jesus and his love for the poor. My Smart Wife and I were just talking about this, too; about the lack of caring for the poor and the out and downcast that so many Christians we know can apparently justify with their "faith" in Jesus. And we don't get it. But this smart fella nails it pretty good, as far as I'm concerned. He even makes me want to re-read the New Testament. Been a while...

Americans Go Home!

Rep. Duncan Hunter's on the right track, let me tell you, brother! Send 'em all home! Send 'em back to where they belong! Send 'em back to where they were born, hallelujah!

Meaning, of course, round-up and deport the naturalized by birth children of illegal immigrants. Who are, by law, citizens of the United States of America.

Rep. Hunter is a deep thinker, evidently. Because he tells us that being American is something in "our souls." Though I think he misspoke and meant to say "our skins." As in our "lily, pasty, mayo-white skins."

I guess Rep. Hunter has never read the Constitution. There's a thing in there called the Fourteenth Amendment that specifically guarantees citizenship to children born on American soil. (Even John McCain is technically a US citizen, though he wasn't born on American soil, but just to two American parents. Go figure!)

How retroactive does Rep. Hunter want to go on this issue? Why, I bet there's a passel of gray-hairs out there who are the children of early-20th century illegals who were born here, worked here, payed taxes here, voted here and assumed for their entire lives that they were Americans. Until now. Because it's not in their souls. Time to round 'em up and ship 'em out! Back to where they came from...America?

* * *

CONTEXTUALIZATION - Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment

“ Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.”

So, reading the above, we can only assume that the first time some pointy-headed Nazi Sheriff in Arizona (lookin' at you, Arpaio, you brown-shirted thug!) arrests and deports a Constitutionally-naturalized child of an illegal immigrant, he's in big trouble. Let's hope.

Bondage Family Values

Republicans are the gift that keeps on giving. You think they can't possibly get more messed up, more stupid, more hypocritical...but they can! And they do!

Of course, it helps when you have a PR-wiz like Michael Steele in charge of your national party machine. What, you say, what has Steele done now?

Nothin' much, just $2000 worth of wining and dining good old-fashioned Christian Republican donors at lesbian bondage strip clubs. Just good clean lesbian bondage strip-club family value fun, that's all! Did I mention the lesbian bondage strip club?

I know my newest troll won't believe any of this because he or she apparently doesn't believe anything in the media, but for those who want more laughs, check out this and this. It's so sweet it's schadenfreude-a-licious!

Does this matter? No. But it's freakin' funny as hell! It'll mean nothing to the brainwashed rightwing true believers. I mean, the wingnut brigade out there is still incensed about Obama's feet being on his own desk in his own office, for pete's sake! For some reason, it bothers them when the black man does it. Though when the white men did it, they were fine. Explain........waiting......nothing? Still nothing? Trying to find someway to say it's wrong without admitting you're a racist?

It's okay. I can wait. I'll just put my feet up on my desk...

UPDATE! BREAKING! Steele innocent! Or so he says. And I guess because he says so we gotta believe him, because when a Republican says something it's always true. Just ask Nixon.

SUPER-DUPER UPDATE! TOTALLY BROKEN! Steele FIRES staff member who digs lesbian bondage strip-club family fun time! Way to man up and take responsibility, Mike! You're the man! Are you going to fire yourself for that Hawaiian resort snafu next?

Oh...I cannot stop laughing about this. I really can't. I just hope they don't fire Mike because he's the surest path to victory for Dems in 2010. And we know he won't resign, so it's pink slip or nothing for him. If there's ever been a Republican values poster boy, it's Steele: unwilling to take responsibility for any action of his own or his subordinates (to whom we can only assume he sets the role model for behavior), lavishly out of touch with reality, dumb as a brick and mule-stubborn. It's like they cloned Bush's brain!

Trolls!

Holy Zombie Jesus!

Trolls! I've got trolls! Scary, name-calling anonymous trolls! Eeeeeeeeeeeeek!

Yes, We Did

This would only be a better video if they spliced in a clip from Scanners at the end...you know...exploding head-time.

Poor Boehner. I bet he thought he looked so courageous and filled with moral outrage.

All he really did was look like a jack-o-lantern throwing a tantrum.

In all seriousness, though, I do think Pumpkinhead represents something tangible here. He's the face of people afraid of losing their privilege and power, afraid of history and change, afraid of everything that doesn't look just like himself in the mirror. No wonder the neo-Nazis are feeling so liberated these days. Guys like Pumpkinhead are now publicly channeling all their sick masturbatory racial fear fetishes, right on the floor of the United States Congress. Good job, Johnny. Better hope they don't blame you for not stopping Obama. They turn easily.

All the Way to the Bank

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

I was screaming at Man-Crush Matthews when this was originally aired. I frightened the cats, I was so loud, so angry. I couldn't believe his arrogance during this interview.

Watching it again, I realized that it's not arrogance but fear. He doesn't understand the world anymore. Bloggers and the scary "netroots" are out there miles ahead of him, figuring out what's going in Washington and elsewhere and leaving his pasty old ass behind.

Beautiful. Matthews is about as useful as John McCain these days. I hope everyone at MSNBC sent him an email link to this today, to piss on his parade. But he probably doesn't do email. The Intertubes scare him.

Time to Switch?

QUESTION YOURSELF: If you are a Republican, can you support the party that thinks it is a reasonable thing for protestors to call members of the opposition party by foul racist and sexual slurs?

Think about it. That's exactly what Republican spokes-troll Rep. Devin Nunes of California thinks, speaking as a member of the party this morning in response to the sick verbal abuse inflicted by Tea-Baggers yesterday on Rep. Barney Frank and Rep. John Lewis.

Nunes actual words:

“When you use a totalitarian tactics, people, you know, begin to act crazy,” Nunes told C-SPAN’s Steve Scully Sunday morning when asked about the slurs. “I think that people have every right to say what they want. If they want to smear someone they can do it. It’s not appropriate--I think I would stop short of characterizing the 20,000 people protesting, that all of them were doing that.”

"Not appropriate" are the strongest words of condemnation Nunes can come up with.

Well. Okay. Then. By that standard, I guess it's perfectly okay to slander David Nunes as an illiterate, self-abusing, corpse-eating, Satan-worshiping, porn-addicted, wife-beating, dope-smoking flat-Earther. And charter member of NAMBLA.

Sorry. Yeah. That's going too far. Scratch "illiterate."

(John Lewis, BTW, is a heckuva nice guy and real American hero who was savagely beaten in 1961 in Montgomery while marching to end racial discrimination in this country. Fuck you if think otherwise. Barney Frank if you don't know is the second openly gay member of Congress and while I think he should occasionally think before speaking - as smart and amusing as he can be - I bet Frank would probably speak up in defense of a toad like Nunes if he were similarly abused by Democratic protestors. Again, fuck you...Seriously, I just don't care if you have an opposing opinion on this subject. I really don't.)

Rock Hard - RIP (Repost)

Alex Chilton - Live at Berkeley Square, Berkeley, CA (6-22-85) 1 & 2
Alex Chilton - Live at the VFW Hall, Baton Rouge, LA (9-27-85) 1
Alex Chilton - Live at The Heartbreak Hotel, Languedoc, France (5-7-86) 1 & 2

March 18, 2010 - I heard the news today. First story on NPR when the alarm went off, I think it was. First I noticed. My eyes shot open when the announcer said "Alex Chilton..." because I knew it couldn't be anything good that was going to follow. I was still shocked when she actually said it, though. My Smart Wife and I both gasped and said "Oh, no!" at the same time. I think I swore too.

Thanks for everything Alex. I'm actually tearing up typing this. You've brought a lot of joy into our home and our hearts. Thanks for everything.

The following was originally posted here on February 16, 2009.

Like so much of the music that hit me right between my eyes and somehow also pierced my heart in my Golden Youth, Alex Chilton's came to me via a tape made by Oldest Brother. He put Bach's Bottom and Like Flies on Sherbert on it with some Cramps to fill 'er out. I didn't know what in the hell I was hearing, but it struck me as being somewhere between madness and brilliance in the giddy, throw myself at the walls way it made me feel. It was a new language to me, alien in its raw blueness and its lowdown drunken heartbeats. I didn't know how to hear this stuff. (A few years later Oldest Brother and the 'monkey had too many beers and spent a night singing - nay, screaming - along to "Take Me Home and Make Me Like It" in the kitchen of the apartment we shared).

And then Chilton had his 80s renaissance and not only was he recording but touring - huzzah! High Priest became a party album and a point of commonality between me and my friends who came to music via a different path (non-punk, classic rock and blues). And Chilton live was an awesome thing. I've never stopped hearing his totally wacked and extended solo on "Volare" from one of his O'Cayz gigs. My Smart Wife and I still go all glassy-eyed when we talk about it. (And if you are out there, guy who was next to me at that show, guy who had microphones on his baseball cap and wires going down into his shirt- release your tape! If the tape self-destructed, unable to contain such beauty, you are forgiven. If you are dead, you are forgiven. Otherwise, I will find you and you will pay for keeping this from the world for so long!)

Saw Chilton in Middleton, Wisconsin in 2000 at The Hotel which I think is gone now, probably an apartment building or something. Sweet show. Got all fanboy and asked for his autograph. He was a gentleman for sure. This was just before or after the show at Schuba's that's passed around a lot in trading circles. I don't recommend that show; the sound sucks. These kind of tinny, raw tapes from the 80s are much better. They really capture Chilton live.

Enjoy! Buy shit!

Postscript: I just found this on the YouTube...and it reminds me of the Chilton I loved. A total wise-ass! This has to be the very worst lip-synching job in history. And check out what the keyboard player is doing! Alex does manage to look cool even when his mouth isn't open and he's still magically singing.

Cry, Baby, Cry

Ahem. Cough, cough. Testing - 1, 2, 3 - Is this thing on?

To all the sorry-ass Republicans and Tea Bagging cretins - I have an economy-sized box of tissues for each and every one of you for when health care reform is passed into law. I know you'll need it. Only $50 bucks each, though I may have to deny snot-coverage to some based solely on my own tyrannical whims.

You're a bunch of whining, crying losers and your tears will flow like acid rain. I hope they burn as much too.

It's painfully obvious that you know you're going to lose this battle. And that by losing it, you are ensuring a Democratic majority in the Congress again after 2010 and probably a second term for Obama.

That's gotta hurt.

Scream treason, cry foul, have a tantrum, throw a fit, get drunk, drive off a cliff - do whatever you want to do, because it won't matter after health care reform becomes the law of the land. You're dead. You're meat.

Looking forward to the funeral, folks.

American Blues

I called Senator Dick Durbin today to press his office staff on his position regarding HCR and the "Public Option."  I wasn't expecting them to tell me anything new and they didn't, but I asked them to put my remarks down and pass them on to wherever they get passed. (Can you say "paper shredder"? I knew you could).

I know I'm a liberal commie American-hating progressive socialist double-liberal freak. Always have been. It's just the way television made me, I guess. (Thanks, Archie! Thanks, Hawkeye! Thank you, Cookie Monster!)

BUT...I cannot understand why having a public health insurance option available to the American people would upset anyone at all. Excepting the gold and diamond dust encrusted CEO's of our beloved corporate health insurance providers. May Raptor Jesus bite them all with his blessings!

One example: I spent two hours recently consoling the damaged parent of one of my students who has done nothing but try to do good by his family, including moving from one state to another to take care of aging parents (leaving two good jobs, his and his wife's, in the process), because he felt that was what one does when family needs you.

Misfortune befell him and his family though. Unexpected illness and accidents struck both elderly parents and they are in a care facility now and probably for the rest of their lives.

They didn't have the right kind of insurance to cover this situation because they couldn't afford the right kind of insurance to cover this situation.

Now, every penny of the household income, including the savings of the grandparents, is going to pay for the care facility. And the wife of the man who just wanted to help his parents like a good son should - she has been disabled by an accident and will not be able to work for many, many months.

They are broke. They are desperate. They are slowly crumbling beneath the weight of the world. And all of that would be different if we had a public health and care insurance option available. Those with need would no longer suffer.

My America doesn't want people to suffer. My America wants people to prosper. My America doesn't let you live if you are rich and die if you are poor. My American gives a damn.

How about your America?

PS - I forgot to mention another vile horde that would be upset by a public option in health care - our for-profit hospital system! They probably stand to lose more instant revenue than the insurance companies do, if they are force to control their costs.

None Dare Call It Treason

ABOVE: Governor Tim Pawlenty seconds before being delivered a vicious series of noogies by a bunch of really smart kids. It's for your own good, Governor; take it like man.

There's really not much more to say about how completely out of touch, heartless and totally fucked the Republican party is today that can't be summed up by this quote from Governor Tim Pawlenty.

"Take a nine iron and smash a window out of big government."

Pawlenty said that this morning. This morning. Yeah.

Only one day after a crazed "domestic terrorist" did his damndest to try and kill hundreds of federal employs by crashing his plane into an IRS building.

Gov. Pawlenty: You are a worthless piece of shit. A "retard" of the highest order, to quote the great Rush Limbaloney. To even use such a metaphor as an elected official, is reprehensible. Yes, I understand it's supposed to be a catchy, hip reference to Tiger Woods, about a month too late for it too really be catchy or hip. Doesn't matter. It's one thing for a crapmaster like Grover Norquist, who's never held office in his life, to use a drowning-baby metaphor to describe his fetishes about the size of government, but it's another thing entirely for the governor of a state to do so. In fact, I call it treason.

Oh, I know, that one man's treason is another man's witty remark, but it's always only okay if you are a Republican, isn't it? If a Democrat had said the same thing during the Reign of Bush the Second, a call would have went out for his or her head, for a hanging, a lynching, a firing squad at dawn!

Damn, but this crap makes me so tired.

Old Mother Hubbard Went to the Undertakers...And Didn't Come Back

IDIOTS.

His Razor Sharp Blessings Be Upon You All

I just passed my 450th post on this blog - and it was about Hogan's Heroes. Sweet. Didn't even plan that. Just happened.

Life is good.

And it's even better now because nutjob anti-abortion crazy killer Scott "He's just like Martin Luther King, Jr!" Roeder has been found guilty of murder by a jury of his peers.

In only thirty-seven minutes.

Roeder's lunatic-fringe fellow-haters are already threatening violence over the decision.

What was that, Negativland? What about Christianity?

There's Always Room For Jello!

Even when you've been imprisoned by Nazis.

(And space is very dirty, we all know, at any temperature!)

The State of the Union Address - A Considered Review

He said our name! Obama said our name! He said "Galesburg, Illinois"!

Yeah, us! Yeah!!!

That's when I lost consciousness. Anything else happen?

Red Scare Reduxulous

Thanks, Texas. You've given me one more reason to be ashamed of my chosen profession. As if being ashamed that you were ever let into the Union isn't enough...too bad they really don't have the right to secede that they think they do.

You're probably aware that the Texas Board of Education is the most powerful group of educational nitwits in the nation. Since they buy so many textbooks, they practically dictate the content of them for the whole country.

But besides being uptight, overzealous, small-minded, warped and fracked conservative creeps of the highest order, they are also Grade A Morons.

Their latest kooky escapade? Banning the classic and beloved children's book Brown Bear, Brown Bear by Bill Martin. Why? Because Bill Martin also wrote a book about - gasp! - Marxism - double gasp!!

Except he didn't. Different Bill Martin. Gasp?

And they don't have the brass ones to change their minds and correct their mistakes. All they can do is point fingers and run in circles and eventually fall in a heap on the ground with those fingers stuck up some very naughty places, I'm sure, because that's where they were pulled from to begin with.

I really pity those poor kids in Texas if  this is what passes for educational leadership there. And it is.

Caution - Lairs @ Work

 

Make sure you wrap an Ace bandage tightly around your head or after you watch the Liars @ Work above you'll end up like this:

Wasn't Scanners cool?

See Kendra! See Kendra Play!

 Check it out - live Dream Syndicate footage with Kendra on bass!

Won't let me embed. So many things wrong with that sentence. Sigh.

Spawning Time

The New Disease has split itself in two, kids.

No more music here. Only jibber and probably jabber.

For music, you'll have to go over to Nothin' But Neil (Young). If you want live Neil Young. That's all I'm posting there. That and midnight love letters to Neil.

I've been pondering a change of direction for a long time and decided this is the time. I'll be posting one or two complete Neil shows, in FLAC format, every week. NO MP3s!!! If you want MP3s, you can do the magic downgrading after you get the FLAC files.

I got me a funky new template that I like because it's clean and simple and kinda looks like a magazine. I'm also pushing Neil-ware via Amazon. Download the bootleg - buy an album! (I can't force you, but I do encourage you to).

Please stop by, let me know how you feel about it, don't freakin' whine because I'm using Rapishare because I don't give a shit about it, and enjoy the tunes.