The Year In Bill Maher

I can't think of a better way to sum up the year in politics than this clip of Bill Maher from November 7th talking about Barack The Magic Negro Obama's win and the Republican reaction.

And just for shits and giggles, here's Bill Maher's list of Dickheads of the Year from Rolling Stone's December 07 issue. My favorites (and two things that are timeless in their suckdom) are:

College Republicans: The place where cutthroat, amoral putzes like Karl Rove cut their teeth. They're all staunchly for the Iraq War, although none have volunteered to go, even though they're the same age as the grunts doing the fighting they say is so important. Doughy losers who, at age twenty, care more about tax cuts than girls. And lately they've been holding these "Catch an Illegal Immigrant" parties around the country where they basically play hide-and-seek with one lucky player posing as the wetback. Usually you have to be older and married before you start hating life so much you try to blame the Mexicans for all your problems, don't you?

George W. Bush: Come on, no list of assholes and fuck-ups could be complete without the Dipshit in Chief. Who will tell this president what everyone but him already knows? The theory of evolution. And the times tables. And where the sun goes at night. And that Iraq is going to be three different countries. And that everyone hates us and we've run our military into the ground and the Taliban is back and we still haven't caught bin Laden and the economy is tanking and we wasted eight years blowing the oil companies while the Earth is melting. We had a pretty nice house when this Cat in the Hat of presidents came in and made the mess of all time. And who's going to clean it all up — Rudy Giuliani?

Luckily, no, it wasn't the guy who was fucking there on 9/11. That dumbass got his ass handed to him by a bunch of sundried Florida retirees after a spectacularly inept campaign. No, it's going to be a guy no one outside of Illinois, the Trinity United Church of Christ, and the Internet had even heard of last year at this time. And a black guy no less! Twenty more days!

However, I need to bitch a little about our president-elect. I keep receiving e-mails from his campaign (can we even call it that anymore?) still wanting money for shit, this time to throw the inaugural ball to end inaugural balls. Seriously, B, are you fuckin' kidding me? You raised $700 million in the general! Where the fuck did that go? And I did spot you $15 back in October, dude. That's the best I can do until I can get a job rebuilding infrastructure and a greener America and shizz.

Anyway, Happy New Year. Here's to 09 being slightly less shitty.

Is It The Apocalypse Yet?

I almost got excited over the news that Israel is bombing the shit out of Gaza, prompting massive protests in the Muslim world over the 300 or so Palestinians who have died in nonstop rocket attacks since a ceasefire pact expired last week. Now, I don't want you to think I'm a sadist. I'm not. I'm just an atheist who is totally obsessed with the notion of The End.

The nihilist in me is really hoping this is the beginning of Armageddon. Of course, it can't really be the beginning of the end because not all the Jews are back in Israel and Obama hasn't taken office yet (Obama being the anti-Christ; read your Bibles, bitches!). But this is a good start.

I was ready to write a post blasting Israel but since I'm currently doped up on Ativan, I'm feeling vulnerable, indifferent, and slightly gooey at my center. Uh, anyway, I happened to read this lovely article in The Independent defending Israel and now I'm all confused.

There are a few components of this current iteration of the ancient Muslim-Jew blood feud that I'm having problems with. Firstly, *chuckles* literally the first thing the United States said (via our not at all incompetent Secretary of State Condi Rice) after the rockets burst in air was, "We blame the Muslims currently being destroyed by mortar fire for startin' dis shit. Y'all should have known who you be fuckin' with. Jewz 4 Lyfe!"*. That struck even me as heartless and cruel. Apparently the initial round of rocket attacks began in broad daylight, when the Israelis knew damn well there would be civilians and children around. So to turn around and blame these same people for starting the shit in the first place feels a touch insane. That's like blaming Iraqi civilians for goading us into invading their country.

Anyway, the article in The Independent basically breaks down the dichotomy of Israel. Should it exist or not? And if it should, how far should it go to defend itself? Is it a victim? Is it a bully? Blah blah blah. Basically, it's the same debate people have about the United States. It just makes me think that Israel is our total Mini-me. They're our little buddy; the "us" of the Middle East. We both can shoot you the big puppy dog eyes while bombing the shit out of something behind your back. We're two peas in a fucked up pod.

*a Beelzebub original translation

And now for something completely different...Disgraced Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich appointed a 71-year-old black guy named Roland Burris to fill Obama's vacated Senate seat. The Democratic leadership in Illinois is laughing at Blago and saying there's no fuckin' way they'll confirm this guy. I legitimately cannot believe Blago hasn't stepped down yet. He's like the energizer bunny of bullshit crooks. Maybe it's that hair. Fuck, that's the only way he'll be taken down; we must rip that hell hair off his head, thus rendering his powers useless! I'm also interested to know how much this Burris guy paid for that seat or if he "won" it the old-fashioned way- through smokey backroom quid pro quo wheelin' and dealin'. Anyway, I'm interested to see if the Democrats in Illinois actually do something about Blago or if they pussy out as usual.

All this and it's still 2008! Here's hoping 09 is half as interesting. :)

Sarah Palin, Grandma at 44

The Governor of Alaska's 18-year-old unmarried daughter Bristol popped out her first (of many, I'm sure) kid today. Bristol "Abstinence-Only Sex Programs Just Make Me Wanna Fuck More!" Palin and her hot baby daddy Levi Johnston named their son Tripp. Ah, it's lovely to see this young couple continuing the Palin tradition of shit awful first names. Oh by the way, they're still not married. So Jesus is a very unhappy god-man right now.

And just because I really don't care for Sarah Palin, I'd just like to mock her children's names a little longer. Bristol is one of five children; her siblings are Piper, Track, Willow, and Trig. It's like Sarah and Todd just threw darts at random nouns to get these names. "'Track?' That's a high school sport! Meh, fuck it." "'Trig?' Oh come on now! We're Alaskan hicks, Todd! Gosh, my college degree is in journalism; I can barely read talking points off a teleprompter! I can't do math; I don't even know Africa is a continent!"

Ah, white trash. There's nothing more American.

Minnesota Is The New Florida

Holy shit. Al Franken just might pulls this thing off. According to my favorite socialist London paper, The Guardian, the former SNL writer is up by 48 whole votes over Republican incumbent Norm Coleman. The recount is still far from over, but in a country where elections are perpetual, that's not surprising. Frankly, we wouldn't have it any other way.

Coleman's peeps are still trying to have the state's supreme court declare the race over in his favor by throwing out some of Franken's votes, claiming they were counted twice (wtf?). I haven't been following the race closely enough, I suppose, but that just sounds like the last gasp of desperation from a lonely, mean Republican. Either that, or this whole shitfight just highlights how insanely fucked up our system still is. Almost exactly eight years after the U.S. Supreme Court coronated George Walker Bush by halting the recount in Florida, it still takes us a month and a half to recount votes that were originally counted over a 12-hour period on Election Day. What. Ever. At least the hanging chads aren't haunting us this time around. Fuck them!

It just amazes me that I can go to Sheetz, a chain of convenience stores here on the East Coast, and get a sandwich by typing my order into computer and get it no problem in five minutes, compete with my beloved mayo and jalapeno peppers. But when it comes to elections, we are not capable of just noting who people voted for and finishing this shit by midnight on November 4th. Recounts! Absentee ballots! Early ballots! Supreme courts! Oh my!

No wonder China's communist. They ain't stupid. :)

Child Labor Globalization Is Chic

I certainly cleaned up today. I got a closet's worth of new clothes, some books, and three seasons worth of Bullshit!. Jesus' birthday was very good for this atheist.

As per holiday tradition, I went through all of the tags on my new clothes to laugh at the countries they were made in: Hong Kong, India, China, Cambodia, and Mexico all made the list. I just want to make one thing clear: I do not support child labor in the First World. I find it barbaric and sickening. But dammit, I am a sucker for a finely stitched sweater! I just want to thank the six-year-old who crocheted this gorgeous pattern on my new turtleneck:

It's actually purple; I'm not sure why it's showing up as red. I blame the communist idiots in China who made my Sony Cyber-shot digital camera. Anyway, I wonder if she knows purple is a regal color. Doubt it. But she certainly has a future in...aw, she doesn't have a future! But thanks!

It's no wonder America died this year. India and China's economies are so booming they have to employ children. Way to rub it in, Third World Asian countries! I mean, how are we supposed to compete with that? Our six-year-olds are too busy not learning anything in our horribly underfunded public schools. And those damn American auto workers, with their demands for safe working conditions and decent wages! You know who else said shit like that? One Karl Marx! I guess it's a good thing the auto industry collapsed so we can finally break their backs and get back to paying workers in lint and verbal abuse. Hey, it's the only feasible way we can compete with the sweatshops powerhouses in Asia- by reverting back to societal standards circa The Jungle. And I promise that's my last use of the strikeout thing this post. ;)

Nah, I actually don't mind that everything I wear, drive, eat, and think originated in other countries. I'm just embarrassed that we can't even make our own patriotic shit in America anymore. We've outsourced flag-making! Way to be "country first," Republicans! You know we're fucked when our "America Is #1" foam fingers come made in China.

Anyway, hope your Xmas went well. I also hope you bewared the gun-totin' Santas. Geesh.

Happy Xmas Eve Eve

The sign homeless Santa is holding says, "The sleigh broke down." This picture would probably be funnier if it were 1999 but I wanted to give a shout out to the economic crisis in this otherwise cheery post.

Robot Santa from "Futurama." He's the reason I will only refer to Christmas as "Xmas."

And this one is just for lolz. I hate kids, so this one brings a tear to my eye.

I actually enjoy Xmas Day but I'm not really sure why. I was about 9 or 10 when I caught on to the great Santa conspiracy and I never really forgave my parents for that injustice. Ever since I was about 12, Christmas at the Beelzebub household has really been like Hanukkah. We just get each other the practical shit we asked for. No surprise, no excitement, other than the unwrapping. "Oh, it's that book I asked for. Thanks." "Oh wow. A whole pack of socks? It really must be Christmas!" OK, you get it. I guess that's one of the joys of growing up.

However, I do love the food and being around family. Yeah, my cyncism hasn't completely calcified and I don't actually hate being around my family at holidays. And there's one reason for that: they're all fucking nuts. My grandmother, for example, has been calling George Bush the anti-Christ since at least summer 2001 and finds the need to mention it at every familial get together. And my 50-year-old uncle is a spinster. I'm unaware of an equally offensive term for men but if that word exists, my uncle is it. He has never been married and lives alone with four cats, one of which he named after himself. Yes, he owns a cat that he has named after himself. A cat.

Anyway, enough with this nonsense, I just wanted to wish everyone a Merry Xmas. I was going to give you the secular "Happy Holidays" but even I as an atheist hate that shit.

The Following Dumb Things Make Me lOLz

-Watching that kickass Iraqi journalist throw his shoes at George Bush's face. It will never get old and gives poignant new meaning to the phrase "shoeicide bomber." But I do have to take issue with the media reporting that his flying shoes represent only Muslim outrage at Bush. Believe me, no one hates Bush more than Americans right now.

-Knowing people are booking rooms in my hometown for Obama's inauguration, even though it's long, lonely, red two and a half hours away from Washington, D.C.

-The final election results from my county. We went almost 2:1 for McSame-Palin.

-The giant leaning Christmas tree downtown. I would have taken a picture but I kept laughing too hard to hold the camera straight. There's also a Santa Claus holding an American flag, which struck me as slightly insane.

-The Republican "outrage" over the Rod Blagojevich thing. And listening to tv hosts continually stumble over "Blagojevich."

-Listening to all the hicks who live in my hometown freak out over Obama's victory. One of them actually said: "I'm scared." What's to be afraid of? He's only the anti-Christ. And why are you afraid of the impending apocalypse? Isn't that what you nutbag Christians are trying to precipitate in the Middle East with your bizarrely vociferous support of Israel? Hell, man, look on the bright side! Obama's gonna be great for the sales of the Left Behind: It All Started November 4, 2008 series!

-Facebook status. It's just so narcissistic and stupid (unlike, say, having a blog where you espouse your worthless opinions). But at least I get to know whenever one of my "friends" is "so sad it's ridiculous" or "laughing so hard because McCain got beat like a cat gets beat down the stairs." (<--- They're real!) I mean, these are mostly people I haven't seen in five years or more and this is all I get about their lives since high school. And if it says anything...aw, fuck it. It doesn't say anything! It's just pointless inanity!

-Dick Cheney nonchalantly admitting he OK'd torture. And that Iraq never had WMDs (remember them?). And our collective indifference to those admissions.

-My mom's reaction to the Caylee Anthony case. OK, even I think it's sad that a two-year-old probably got killed by her mother, but my mom is acting like it's the first time the media has blown a filicide case out of proportion. I think she also views it as a reason she's a good mom, like I should be thanking her for not chloroforming me as a toddler. Uh, thanks Mom.

-Conservative bloggers. Get on talk radio! The blogosphere is our thing!

-Procrastination. I went to the big city today (Hagerstown, Maryland, population: 39,640) and every discount store I went to was packed with lazy (yet pushy and vicious) last-minute shoppers. While I was sitting in traffic waiting to leave the mall parking lot, I couldn't believe we're going through the worst economic crisis in 80 years. It certainly isn't keeping people out of the mall or off the roads. The way the media portrays it, every single American is spending the holiday season cowering in terror and hoarding their pennies in their soon-to-be-repossessed homes.

-That Iraqi journalist throwing his shoes at George Bush's face! You're my hero, man!

A Rant In Historical Perspective

On this day ten years ago, the House of Representatives voted to impeach Bill Clinton based on his perjury, obstruction of justice, and abuse of power during the Lewinsky scandal. Lead by moral crusader Henry Hyde, who himself engaged in a five-year long affair with a married woman with children, the bills of impeachment barely passed and solely along party lines.

I remember this shit. I remember supporting Clinton's impeachment only because I wanted to tell my kids someday, "Yeah, I lived through a presidential impeachment." Of course, I was 13 years old and didn't understand that "impeachment" and "removal from office" are two totally different legal concepts. Clinton, of course, was never removed from office; that vote in the Senate barely failed and solely along party lines.

I don't think I need to get into how utterly ridiculous the whole Lewinsky thing is vis-a-vis everything that's happened under Bush. But it just highlights this theory of mine that we allow Republicans to get away with things we'd never allow Democrats to even think about. I vaguely remember how outraged Republicans were at the Monica thing and at Clinton's "complete disrespect of the law." I concretely remember how Bush's "complete disrespect of the law" post-9/11 didn't bother the GOP in the slightest. Wiping his ass with the Constitution? Silence. Making shit up about WMDs in Iraq? Silence. Fucking torturing guys? Silence.

Actually, they haven't been silent. They've been vociferously in favor of all that, or at the very least complicit in its perpetuation. What a difference ten years can make! Ten years ago, if you sat in front of the U.S. Congress and made shit up about an embarrassing private fuck-up, you were excoriated and held up as an example of the moral decay we godless liberals started in the 60s. Today, if you sit in front of the U.S. Congress the United fucking Nations and make shit up to get us into an illegal, unnecessary, unwinable war, you're hailed as a hero who's "kept us safe."

"Everything changed on 9/11," they whine. No it didn't. Or at least it didn't have to. How many of you think that if Bush were a Democrat who lied to everyone's faces about Iraq's capabilities to manufacture weapons and its "airtight" ties to 9/11 and Osama bin Laden, then invaded the country on those pretenses, then have it be revealed everything he ever said about the reasons for war was bullshit, then have said war devolve into a chaotic shitfight with Iraqi insurgents and a nascent al-Qaeda base, then change the reasons for war to fluffy sounding crap like "liberation" and "spreading democracy," that he would have survived politically for more than a second after declaring "mission accomplished" in his dumb, fake jumpsuit? If Bush the Democrat tried this shit, we would have impeached him, removed him from office, and deleted him from the White House homepage before "American Idol" that night.

OK, this is getting long but one last point. I think it was just last week, Dick Cheney did an interview where he basically admitted that he knew the pre-war intelligence was made-up nonsense and that an invasion of Iraq had been planned before 9/11. He said that even knowing then what we all know now, he still would have pushed to invade Iraq. He also casually admitted to authorizing torture at Gitmo. And the response from the Republican peanut gallery? "Bush kept us safe!" Yeah, safe from our rights, prosperity, science, our allies, and our once pretty damn good global standing.

Yeah, Clinton is a scumbag in a lot of ways but come the fuck on! How goddamn quaint does his impeachment seem now! It's almost cute how in 1998, the Republicans made it sound like the biggest threat to national security was Bill Clinton's penis. It was also in 1998 that al-Qaeda bombed those two American embassies in Africa and bin Laden issued his second fatwa against the U.S. It makes one wonder what better things the FBI could have been investigating instead of Monica Lewinsky, Linda Tripp, and seimen samples from a blue dress. Thanks, Republicans! I'll always remember how your party "kept us safe" in the 21st Century.

My Free Wishlist

Here's a quick post for a thing at Twentysomething bloggers:

"A wishlist of things you want that are free":

-To see Obama and his family walk into the White House, knowing he's a smart guy who's right for the job. And knowing the White House was constructed by slave labor. It'll be pretty righteous. :)

-To see George Walker Bush walk out of the White House. For. ever. And just generally putting a period at the end of the past eight years of shock and blah.

-I wouldn't mind witnessing a Nuremberg-style trial for the Bushites but I'd settle for closing Guantanomo Bay.

-To watch the swearing in of the Republican-lite 111th Congress.

-To see that Iraqi journalist who threw his shoes at Bush win the Nobel Prize for Awesome.

-For 2009 to not suck, personally and professionally.

-To see this depression lift, personally and globally.

-That Sarah Palin continues to hang around. She makes me lOlz.

-Wuv and understanding. And more hugs. Hugs are always good.

-To see a less insane world. Or at least a world that's more 'good' crazy than 'batshit' crazy.

-For more people to just freakin' relax and laugh at shit. Humor does not have a partisan bias (though we libs are way funnier).

-For Obama to really be the anti-Christ. Wouldn't that be hilarious?!

*Yawn*

Time magazine has named our next president as Person of the Year in its annual issue. And yeah, that's not the right cover. This cover is from 2006 and note the title of the article: "Why Barack Obama Could Be The Next President." Come on! Two years ago, we were all laughing at that shit! A brotha? Are you kidding? The next president all the way back then was maybe going to be Hillary or quite possibly Rudy Guiliani (because he was fucking there on 9/11). Barack Obama? Shit, with that name he should be glad he made it to the Senate. And that was before we even knew his middle name. I mean, the fact that we were even considering Hillary as a viable candidate was too much for most of America. A white woman as president? Whoa whoa whoa there, little lady! Why can't you bitches just be glad one of yous is Speaker of the House? Leave the commander in chiefin' to the men. ROAR!

Anyway, that was before Obama kicked the shit out of Hillary and John Edwards in the Iowa caucases, before the country got used to his booming smokers' voice speechifyin' about hope and shit in packed stadiums coast to coast, before the youtube videos and "grassroots" Internet campaigning. Before the $700 million raised and the Obamamania...OK, you get it.

As I've written before, I'm glad he won. I'm really really really glad he won. But this is such a boring, predictable, political choice by Time. Not as political as selecting Rudy Guiliani over Osama bin Laden in 2001 (bin Laden was the original choice but the Time peeps pussied out at the last minute) but it's just expected. Just to be an asshole, I would have picked Sarah Palin or Rush Limbaugh and written articles about how their brand of hate, "anti-intellectual pride" (David Cross quote, I loves it!), and lowest common denominator bullshit brilliantly backfired this year. I then would have parlayed that into how America is changing and shit, you know, the stuff we progressives love to hear.

But seriously, I hope this will be the last of the Obama apotheosis pieces and we can get down to the business of being more skeptical and critical of his decisions. The election's over, America has climaxed, and now we're waiting to see how our baby develops. Obama has a lot on his plate, which means he actually has to do shit. And a lot of it. Let's leave Obama the Celebrity in '08, please?

Local Randomness and Maudlin Self-Reflection

It's snowing! It's our first measurable snowfall of the year and the whole area is overreacting, as usual. Schools let out two hours early and most other public buildings closed early as well.

Yeah, I know. This isn't very exciting... until you realize that it was a humid, sunny 58 degrees Fahrenheit yesterday. It's a good thing this climate change thing is nothing more than liberal scare tactics rather than an empirical historical trend. Fuck you, Al! And now for a completely gratuitous Simpsons quote:

"Could this record-breaking heat wave be the result of the dreaded 'greenhouse effect'? Well, if 70-degree days in the middle of winter are the 'price' of car pollution, then you'll forgive me if I keep my old Pontiac"- Kent Brockman

I had a job interview today! The job is for a part-time census-taker position. Actually, it wasn't an interview, it was a test. I had to take a standardized test in a room full of other potential applicants. It was a test divided into sections designed to measure our strengths in particular areas of intellect (ie verbal, math, etc). Sort of like the SAT. I suddenly realized the absurdity of the situation when it dawned on me that I took the SAT exactly six years ago this month...in a room not unlike the room I sat in today. And when I was taking said SAT six years ago, I certainly thought I was preparing myself for a job beyond the one I was applying for today. I did manage to graduate from college (finally, after five years) but for what? To end up taking a test in a room full of people who were all easily at least twenty years older than me, some so old I was convinced they'd probably signed up for a job like this during the last depression?

It's almost enough to make me depressed...until I realize I don't really care. The job only lasts ten weeks and the pay is insane. I do realize that the time is coming for me to make a decision: to be (a grad student) or not to be. Or to continue down this path of working random jobs far below my skill set for a few weeks at a time because I'm too lazy to move away from this shithole hometown I loathe.

But this intrapersonal melodrama is gonna have to wait. Rachel Maddow's on!

God Is In Your Taxes

This is what boredom and insomnia will do to you: I just finished a marathon YouTube session (I'm officially over 8,000 videos watched!) that lasted about an hour and a half. OK, maybe an hour and a half isn't such a long time but when your normal posture ranks somewhere between Kurt Cobain and Quasimodo, sitting in a computer chair for an hour and a half can fuck up an already-fucked up back. Anyway, I digress. On to the topic at hand.

This is one of the coolest/weirdest videos I've seen about atheist campaigning. I'm always glad to see fellow atheists fighting for our constitutional rights against the "moral majority" and I'm always glad to see it done in creative/funny ways. I also enjoyed the tv hosts' faux shock at the idea that atheists actually exist and can afford billboards.

But what the fuck was up with that religious right-winger radio host? "Income tax doesn't not exist just because somebody doesn't believe in it. And the same is true with our creator, god." Um, yeah. That is easily the damn dumbest analogy I've ever heard. Well, dude, I know income tax exists because I can see where the government has taken it from me each paycheck. I can see it and I can feel it. God? Not so much. Maybe if god wants to make his presence known, he should send himself to Earth in the form of tax.

Actually, upon second thought, God and government have a lot in common. Both are primarily concerned with taking money from its people under false pretenses. Both are obsessed with image and concerned with the adherence to arbitrary laws. Both are war-mongering hypocrites. And both get national holidays for their shit.

But I do have to give the random dudes who wrote the Bible god his props for this gem, which is easily my favorite biblical verse:

Proverbs 22:14: "The mouth of strange women is a deep pit." Yes, it is.

Top Ten Best Things About 2008 (4-1)

4) The world doesn't hate us anymore! (at least they didn't November 4th and 5th)

3) The New and Improved (and Blue) Electoral Map.

2) The Saturday Night Live-centered election. Normally, elections are parodies of themselves. Not this year. I propose that for 2012, we should just abolish the debates and town hall meetings and condense the entire campaign to a series of SNL skits. As long as they bring back Tina Fey to do Sarah Palin.

1) Obama Wins

Holla.

Top Ten Best Things About 2008 (10-5)

OK, so I've noticed the tone of my previous posts is dark, bitter, bitchy, and depressing. I'm going to attempt to stay on the light side with this one and countdown the 10 best things of the year in my not-so-humble opinion. 10-5:

10) Bush's last year!

9) Obama surprises everyone by winning the Iowa caucuses, proves the Internet isn't just for porn addicts and fat virgin bloggers.

8) "Paper Planes" by M.I.A. goes Top Ten (I adore her because she makes real, weird music), upsetting the natural order of popular music being shit.

7) Barriers Are Broken- from Clinton and Obama to (yes, even) Sarah Palin, 2008 was a serious year for civil rights.

6) "The Dark Knight" proves all the good movies weren't just made in the 30s.

5) Sarah Palin keeps talking, proving with every word how incompetent she is.

Look How Far We've Come

My favorite president is Thomas Jefferson. He was a genius in about everything he did (outside of the slave raping). He supported the full funding of education from kindergarten through university level. He wrote his own bible. He provided his personal library to start the Library of Congress. He negotiated the Louisiana Purchase. He was also a fellow dreaded secular progressive.

It always cracks me up to hear the Bill O'Reillys of the nation rant and rave about the nefarious impact people like me have on society with our wacky, liberal beliefs. I hate to break it to these people but we were a nation founded by secular progressives. Actually, we were founded by a group of secular radicals. The great thing about men like Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, Benjamin Franklin, et al (and there are many great things about them) is that none of them would be considered great today. They'd be vilified by people like O'Reilly and reduced to some kind of wailing banshee demon like Howard Dean. It's like we started at the top and have just been sliding downhill ever since.

We've just gotten progressively dumber and (coincidentally) more religious over the years, which is completely bizarre and at odds with every other fucking First World country on earth. All those grand cathedrals in Europe may look impressive on postcards but come Sunday, they're as empty as the Federal Reserve. I was thinking about an exchange Bill Maher (my hero) had with Larry King a while back on this same topic. Larry said (I'm paraphrasing): "FDR always said 'I never went wrong relying on the American people.'" To which Bill Maher replied, "Well, people were smarter back then."

Maybe tv's to blame. Maybe the Internet. It just feels like we've devolved to the point where we're so narcissistic (and so very very dumb) that we could go, in just 199 years, from electing a man like Jefferson to electing a totally emotionally retarded, cipher, frat boy whose longest held job title pre-presidency was "alcoholic."

I am happy we elected Obama, because I feel like his victory sort of balanced out the past eight years of madness, but we'll be dealing with the repercussions of Bush's breathtaking ineptitude for years and years to come. And for that, I'd like to give a heartfelt "fuck you" to the red states for allowing this man to ransack America for nearly a decade. Because, really, without you, it wouldn't have been possible.

Drugs Vs. Drugs

I take Lorazepam, known colloquially as Ativan. I take it because I suffer from anxiety and insomnia and Lorazepam, working as a depressant, calms my happy ass down. I feel groggy and indifferent after a dose and I suppose those reactions make taking the drug a success. I have a prescription for it, therefore it's an "OK" drug.

Anyway, I was inspired to write something on the topic of prescription drugs after hearing the dearly departed Heath Ledger got nominated for a Golden Globe for his kickass performance in "The Dark Knight." Ledger, of course, died in January from a prescription drug overdose. Among the panoply of drugs found in the 28-year-old's system was our good friend Lorazepam. Just for the hell of it, I googled Anna Nicole Smith's death and what do ya know? Lorazepam was also found in her body.

Of course, Heath Ledger and Anna Nicole Smith died from a combination of drugs (and a lot of them), not just from one anti-anxiety pill. But the bigger point here is where do we draw the line between an "OK" drug, like Lorazepam, and a "bad" drug like, oh, heroin? Drug overdose is now the second leading cause of accidental deaths among U.S. adults and obviously, that doesn't just include crack and other "street" drugs.

I'm certainly not implying that we should ban prescription drugs- I, for one, need my Lorazepam and I know others who need their pills, too. I'm actually one of those crazy liberals who say the war on drugs is a joke. I guess the problem I have is with perception. It's like prescription drugs are the "white collar" drugs (re: not that bad) and crack and smack are "inner city" drugs (re: the real problem). It's almost analogous to the dual bailouts: Wall Street/white collar America gets theirs without question while the car companies/blue collar America just gets their asses spanked.

culture

Richard Dawkins and Bill Maher are God

Yeah, she got shut down. This definitely tickled me. It also reminded me of a somewhat heated appearance Bill Maher made on "Scarborough Country" a while back.



And this is why I don't believe in religion. I could make a serious argument for why religion's bullshit but I prefer the devastating humor of people like Dawkins and Maher. Thank you and good night.

"My Wit's Diseased"

"This is not about political direction, this is about opening the doors for evil to permeate this nation to its very fiber." Actual comment at http://pmailletblogs.blogspot.com/ about the idea of a Barack Obama presidency. I, like the moron I am, commented on the obvious irony of this post. It was a kneejerk reaction. I feel bad that I may have distracted that poor woman from memorizing biblical passages and crying over the impending destruction of Israel.

When one googles "Obama antichrist," one gets this: "Results 1 - 10 of about 1,170,000 for obama antichrist. (0.18 seconds)". When I typed in "barack obama anti" I got a field of autopopulated results that included: "anti-gun" (495,000 results), "anti-semitic" and "anti-israel" (1,179,000 combined results), "anti-white" (510,000 results), and "anti-america" (1,800,000 results). This isn't surprising, especially considering all the racist shit that went on all over the country right after Obama won. My favorite racist moment:

Second- and third-grade students on a school bus in Rexburg, Idaho, chanted
"assassinate Obama," a district official said.

Ahhhh, gotta love the future of America.

Rural America: Living Up To Stereotypes

This is the state of the state I live in. The state of Maryland theoretically ends at Frederick, which is located roughly at the black line. To the right of that line lies Baltimore and the D.C. suburbs. That's where all the people and wealth in the state are located. That part of the state is overwhelmingly Democratic, which is why Maryland is always a solidly blue state. The Eastern shore and the area to the left of the line are, well, not so Democratic. But because no one really lives there, the Southern sympathies of those areas are easily overriden (praise Jaysus).

Of course, being a denizen of that lovely place I affectionally call "Eastern West Virginia," I get to put up with racist and backwards shit that should have been settled decades ago. Just this year, at a vocational high school near my hometown, a controversy erupted over some white students displaying the Confederate Flag. Yes, the Confederate flag...in Maryland...a state that was a member of the Union, not the Confederacy. Now while most of us consider the Confederate flag to be a symbol of hate and division, others see it as a symbol of pride and unity. The furor from this shit even reached as far as The Washington Post, which painted my hometown as some shithole relic of the Old South (which it both is and isn't, since Maryland isn't the South!). As you can see, it was clearly just the honor students worried about their constitutional rights to free expression and not just idiot neo-Nazis. After all the dust was settled, it was ruled that the racist assholes were allowed to keep displaying their hate flag, for after all, it's their constitutional right.

Now, despite my personal opinions on the Confederate flag, I actually agree with the ruling. Because if I ever got caught burning a U.S. flag (which I've never actually done), I could just point to this event as precident that it's free speech. And then I'd inform all the haters to kiss my blue ass and move to West Virginia (which is a state that seceded from Virginia to be a part of the Union, though don't tell them that. There's plenty of Confederate flags in that state as well).

Fun times in Appalachia.

'The Dark Knight' = Best Political Commentary of the Year

The best movie of the year comes out on DVD Tuesday! I'm seriously stoked. I saw "The Dark Knight" twice at the theaters, which is the first time I've seen a movie more than once since "Titanic" in '97 (Hey, I was 12).

Heath Ledger totally rocked it out as the Joker. He was both hilarious and terrifying at the same time and if he doesn't get his posthumous Oscar, I'll...whine right here on my blog. My favorite scenes were the bit with the pencil ("Wanna see a magic trick?" being one of the best set-up lines in a movie ever) and the part when the tractor trailer flips over. It really is a great movie, both for the special effects and the terrorism/political subtext. I can't wait! God, I am such a fangirl. :)

There's Only One President at a Time

OK, B. We know. You don't have to say it everytime you're on tv or giving one of your youtube speeches. Of course, it'd be great if Bush would abdicate right now. I was thinking that pretty vehemently during that shit in India last week. I can't wait until it's popular, fresh-faced B. Hussein Obama talking down countries rather than flaming asshole hypocrite George Bush. 45 more days! And you know Dude could still invade Iran.

Sort of piggybacking off of yesterday's post, I was conversing recently with a Republican friend of mine who isn't a huge fan of our president-elect. And it suddenly hit me then that now I am able to use all those sore winner phrases on Republicans that they were so fond of four years ago. So I told this friend, "You lost, get over it" and "This is America, love it or leave it." And it was everything I thought it could be. Being a prick is bipartisan, bitch!

Moving on to horrific economic news, the current US unemployment is 6.7% and the big boys predict it could hit as high as 10% by early next year. While this is definitely shitty news, it's not going to get as high as the 25-30% it was at the height of the Great Depression. *whew* For a second, I thought George Bush had turned us into France.

Man, fuck this decade. I prefer to live in the 90s that still exists in my own warped mind. I lionize the 90s the way Republicans masturbate gently over black and white images of the 50s. I loved the 90s: The Secret World of Alex Mac, Clarissa Explains It All, Fresh Prince of Bel Air, Hanging with Mr. Cooper, My Brother and Me, All That, Ren and Stimpy, Hey Arnold, Beverly Hills 90210 (which totally owned The fucking O.C.). *sighs* Here's a little ode to the 90s:

A Few Phenomena I'll Never Understand

1) Christmas lights

I'll never understand how celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ has turned into this. I'm sure the nexus somehow involves Santa Claus, capitalism and OCD but it's still pretty insane how endemic it's become. The act of putting up Christmas lights usurps celebrating the actual holiday. My family has the same dialogue every Black Friday (after the dawn shopping, of course): "Junk the hay and pumpkins and put up the icicle lights! Get the fake deer that move their heads in the yard, now! Where the fuck is the "Santa Stops Here!" sign? Well, pull the cobbwebs off it and stick it in the yard!" I was driving along Route 40 tonight and saw a house with one of those huge, inflatable, lighted snowglobes and four of those huge, inflatable, lighted snowmen in their yard. It literally blinded me, both by its luminescence and its inanity. I mean, fuck it. If we're going to literally highlight our blatant disregard for energy conservation, I say leave the lights on 24/7, year round. "Yeah, bitches! Oh, Americans use 25% of the world's resources? Wah! Now we use them all!" And then, you know, we all die in a nuclear 9/11. But it'd be funny for a while.

2) George Bush apologists

OK, now I understand that the jury is still out on Bush's standing in the pantheon of U.S. presidents but...aw fuck it, you know he's going to be rated worst! Worst ever! Here's a small list of reasons why:

His handling of 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, the economy, the war in Iraq, the purging of U.S. attorneys, appointing an ex-dildo salesman as head of FEMA, shitting on the Constitution, and making "enhanced interrogation" and "rendition" part of common 21st Century parlance.

And yet...there are many who defend this man. There are many who think he will be rated among the best of our leaders. And whenever you attempt to spoil their reverie with a little facts, they get all pissy and claim you're un-American.

It's funny, because I question the patriotism of those who vote Republican. I think George Bush has been a better recruitment tool for al-Qaeda than Osama bin Laden. Yeah, I just fucking said it. A few days after Obama's victory, al-Qaeda released a video tape mocking and denigrating Obama, claiming he was an insult to "honorable" black Americans like Malcolm X. It's clear to me, and many others, that al-Qaeda is shitting in their throbes over Obama's win, partly because he has pledged to remove U.S. troops from Iraq. The number one reason al-Qaeda is able to recruit young men to suicide-kill is because of our sustained presence in the Holy Land. That's what incenses them. And the funny things is, Bush actually removed our troops from Saudi Arabia after 9/11 in what will go down as easily the best move he ever made on foreign policy. But then the moron turned right around and put hundreds of thousands of U.S. troops right back in their faces. A Bush apologist would say, "Yeah, but we haven't been attacked here since 9/11." To which I would respond, "How many people died on 9/11? Around 3,000? How many U.S. soldiers have died in Iraq? 4,209." Declare victory over that, motherfucker.

Get Your Fat Ass Outta My Face

The other day, I found myself in a similar argument with a friend over my smoking:

Friend: But why do you do it?

Me: Because I enjoy it and everyone hates it. You know I'm a contrarian prick.

Friend: But it's disgusting and it kills you.

Me: What doesn't kill you these days?

Then I proceeded to launch into my typical defense of smokers, which invariable involves comparing smoking to eating shit. To wit, there are roughly 400,000 Americans who die of cancer each year and not every single one of them was a smoker. In fact, most of them were probably fatasses who lived off sugar, uncaffeinated coffee, and high fructose corn syrup who passed anti-smoking laws because they worried about the effect of second-hand smoking on their treasured health. Let me repeat that fact: 400,000 Americans die every year of cancer and most of them were not smokers.

Secondly, what pisses me off as a smoker is that we as a society placate, coddle, and pity the fatties. "Oh, wah. I'm 600 pounds and I don't know why God did me like this!" God didn't shove mountains of shit down your throat. God did not invent the Oreo pizza or the deep fryer. And God probably doesn't consider being fat a "curse." Dude used to make shit rain frogs and killed tons of people just to prove a point about his severe jealously. You know, we shouldn't make excuses for these people. Just like me, they have a vice that should be frowned upon. But unlike me, they get Oprah specials and a bizarre outpouring of sympathy. Just because everyone is fat doesn't make it right, mmmkay? Besides, it's funny as hell to watch fat people fall down.

This brings me to the state of Maryland's decision to ban smoking in bars and restaurants a few years ago. OK, right. Because people go to bars and get shitfaced out of concern for their health. People waddle into restaurants to stuff themselves numb at the buffet (with room for desert!) out of concern for their health. If you're going to make it difficult for me to light up without being cited, then you better make it hard for fatties to access their drugs. Ban fatties from fast food joints! Make McDonald's, Burger King, and Little Debbie shell out big like the tobacco companies did in the 90s! Jesus! The hypocrisy here is really astounding.

Anyway, after I went through all that, my friend had to admit I had a point. Fuck yeah I do.

The USA Has Left The Building

Despite the shitty economy, I have a job opportunity lined up. I'm going to be a part-time census taker! Yeah! It's exactly what I went to college for!

Actually, it is. I have a B.S. in political science and now I'll be working for the Man (at least through 2009). All I need to do is pass the introductory test.

I've been doing a lot of thinking about the economy in general and like everyone, I'm worried and pissed off and pessimistic. Like a lot of people, I blame Bush and the Republicans for allowing Wall Street to run amok and piss our money and future into the wind. And I know Obama has a mountain of work to do to pull us out of the crater they've left us in. I have no idea how he's going to do it though. The media's acting like if he can just pull off some shit FDR did in 1933 then everything will be fine but they're overlooking a fundamental difference between now and then: almost nothing sold in the U.S. is actually made in the U.S. anymore. We need to get over this notion that the United States can overcome this "hiccup" and be the great superpower again. We've reached an impasse and the world is much different now. Let's just throw China the reigns and be like Europeans, whining and bitching about the evil Chinese empire while doing nothing ourselves. I hope Obama can achieve some stability in our economy but I also hope he's realistic about our deflated place on the world stage.

'Britz' Is Half Good, Half Stereotype

I just got done watching this movie on BBC America called "Britz." It's about a Muslim brother and sister living in the UK and how they deal with the ensuing identity crisis in completely different ways.

The brother, Sahail, becomes a member of Britain's MI5, which is the British CIA. Of course, this invariably involves him spying on his old Muslim friends who are all suspected of being involved in nefarious Muslim-related activities. I thought his episode was by far superior than the sister's because Sahail's character was fleshed out and dynamic. There's a scene where he talks about how much he owes to the UK, his freedom and whatnot, which I found particularly endearing.

The sister (I've forgotten her name) is just a walking cliche. She hates England and goes to Pakistan to train at some al-Qaeda camp and ends up blowing herself up at the base of some iconic London building to mark the sixth anniversary of 9/11. I didn't empathize with the sister at all (although that's to be expected I guess). I thought she was acting like a jaded cry baby (just put on "Nevermind" and smoke weed like everyone else in the West!) and the boilerplate at the end? Bitch, please. You don't want to get me started on the "rationale" for why al-Qaeda blows shit up and kills people (who are mostly Muslim, by the way). And I couldn't shake the absurdity of listening to this clearly British girl speak in a thick British accent while condeming Britain (OK, that italics probably wasn't necessary). I know Europe does immigration differently than we do and, if the facts flashed at the end of the movie are correct, perhaps they should change course.

If you get the chance to see "Britz," just watch the episode with Sahail. His character does more for the image of Muslims in the eyes of us infidels than the sister, who merely encapsulates every stereotype we have of the crazy assholes who blow themselves up out of a sense of exaggerated injustice. And the ending is just pathetic.